Year: 1864

The diversion to the Federal army of
such a vast amount of labor from its
legitimate channels, would be productive
of serious results were it not for the as
surance of large increase of European
immigration, which come to us not only
from American sources abroad, deemed
perfectly reliable, but from the press of
Great Britain and the Continent of Eu-
rope. Our statistics of immigration for
1868, indicate an increase of one hundred
per cent. over the preceding year, and de-
spite the efforts of the press and statesmen
of England to turn the tide in favor of the
British Colonies, there is reason to be-
lieve that there will be such heavy influx
of the bone and sinew of the old world to
our shores the current year, as to compen-
safe in great measure, for the exhaustion
of our population by the circumstances of
war.


In country so largely devoted to ag-
riculture as the United States-with an
immense area of uncultivated territory
immigration is always desirable, and the
prospects of large accessions of the labor
ing classes of Europe, this season, is espe-
cially so, since so many OF our own patri-
otic people have exchanged the farm and
the workshop for the tented field. With
out immigration it is difficult to say how
the growing demand for labor i'll this
country could be adequately supplied, and
no means should be therefore left untried
to foster and encourage 1t.


A letter from Hon. Robert J. Walker,
in London, states that a great revolution
is going on in European opinion with re-
gard to the stability and financial strength
of the American Republic. In England,
we are told, the masses are beginning to
realize the immensity of the resources OF
the United States, and that the prophesies
by secession sympathizers of final dismem-
berment and standardization are wholly
unfounded. Those English journals, so
confident i'll their predictions of our ma
tional downfall, too, are constrained to
admit that our Northern States are gradu-
ally absorbing their laborcrs and artizans;
and that all their efforts to avert the flow
of emigration to the Great Republic are
impotent.


From other countries involved in do
mestic strife, the people usually depart in
haste, and few are adventurous enough
to enter; but with regard to our own
country at the present time, the opposite
is the case, and it is confidently predicted
by sanguine calculators, that the number
of immigrants to arrive in 1864, will reach
nearly half million. Large as this num-
Der may appear, it cannot be regarded as
altogether extravagant, since, previous to
the breaking out of the rebellion, the arri-
walls in a single year amounted to over
three hundred thousand. Engaged in a
contest which has marshalled armies
scarcely exceeded by the mightiest host Of
the Eastern continent, and fighting despe-
rate battles, rivalling the greatest known
to history, yet have vast area of country
unscathed by war and smiling in prosper
ity.


Should war break out in the North ot
Europe, We may expect to see vast in
crease from that section, second now to
Great Britain-but likely to surpass it
uuder the disturbing influences of war.
4 number of manufacturers, traders, and
farmers of this State have sent parties to
England with the view of employing me-
chanics and laborers to come to this coun-
try in the spring, where every industrious
man will find immediate and abundant
employment at highly remunerative
wages.


1t is estimated that nearly one-seventh
of the industrial population of the North
and West have been drawn from their
usual vocations by the war; and It is re-
ported to be almost impossible to procure
artizans for the factories and workshops
of the manufacturing districts, while many
farms in the West are lying fallow for the
want of hands to carry them on. From
nearly all sections of the loyal States, re-
ports come to us of high wages and search
ty of men, and in many instances the
mechanical arts are languishing on this
account. In this condition of our indus
trial affairs, therefore we ought to encour-
age and welcome the accessions to our
laboring population from the old world.
" Y. Ship. List.