Year: 1862

MASON AND SIIDEIL.-The information brought
to this port by the brig Mountain Eagle ON
Thursday last, that the Gladiator had arrived
at st. Georges, Bermuda on the 9th, with the
rebel emissaries on board, is subject, we think.
to very grave doubts. The Gladiator, it will
be recollected, is vessel that was purchased
in England for the purpose of supplying the
South with arms, ammunition and clothing for
the rebel army. On her first voyage out,
being unable to run the blockade, she tram
shipped her cargo at Nassau on board the rebel
steamer Ella Warley, which succeeded in
getting into Charleston. AS to what her move
ments have been since we have no very clear
information; but it is not at all probable that
she should have picked up the rebel commits
sioners in her wanderings. That it was the
Rinaldo, and not the Gladiator, whose arrival
was announced at Bermuda is another sugges-
ton. There are good grounds for doubling
this. When the Rinaldo left Provincetown, ON
the evening of the lst January, with Messrs'
Mason and Slidell on board, it was blowing .
perfect hurricane from the northwest. Under
its influence it would not have taken that vessel
more than thirty-six hours to reach st. Thomas;
SO that it could not have been she whose arrival
at St. Georges nine days after is reported. We
regret, for the sake of the families and friends
of the officers and crew, to suggest these
doubts; but they appear to us to be borne out
by the facts of the case.


1t is therefore far from certain that Messrs.
Mason and Slidell have reached st. Thomas, OF
will ever reach England. The forebodings "a
to the loss of the Rinaldo have yet to be dis
PEELED by the announcement of her safe arrival
at either destination. Some of our contempo-
raries are, we see, anticipating that the English
will rush into jubilant excesses over these
miserable traitors. We do not share this opin-
ion. They are practical people, and, when
they find that they have been paying dearly for
a whistle which no one wanted to contest with
them, they will be inclined, we think, to pipe
small. The expenditure which their war prepa-
rations have cost them in connection with this
Trent affair has probably not been less than
five millions of dollars, and they will feel tho
roughly ashamed that they should have been
betrayed into such folly by the incitations of
journals notoriously in the conspiracy to pro-
woke, at any cost, q rupture with this country.
Lord Palmerston will have killed this anti
American excitement by appearing to 60 with
it. If he had resisted it he would have been
driven from power by the tories, who had
made of it the lever of their schemes for the
displacement of his administration When it
comes to be ascertained that all this expendi-
ture of anger and hostile preparation has been
based on false notions Of the feelings and pur-
poses of our government, it is likely that the
reaction in our favor will be so great that
Messrs. Mason and Slidell, instead of being the
object of public ovations, will be allowed to
sink into the oblivion in which such contempti-
BILE traitors are always sure in the end to find
themselves. They have already had q foretaste
of this in the ignoble manner in which they
have been hurried out Of the country. Instead
of being placed on board of a British man-of-
war by the captain Of the San Jacinto, and
saluted with diplomatic honors, as their asso-
ciates fondy hoped would be the case, they
have been taken away more like couple Of
convicts than political ENJOYS about whom two
great nations were so near going to war. The
English government deserves credit for it's
manner of dealing with these worthless. Its
conduct shows that, whatever may be the tone
of its press, it has not entirely forgotten the
obligations Of international courtesy.