66 66 tunes, in their faculty of what they call coming "right side up'ard," that as a community they are no more depressed by a total rout than they would be in their individual capacities by a pecuniary loss. A singular trait in human character is exhibited in their open acknowledgment to all the world of defeat, coupled with the "enthusiastic reception" which they are giving to whole regiments of volunteers, who, on pretence of their time being up, are marching homeward on the morrow of a great defeat and on the eve of an expected advance of the Southern army. The more aristocratic New York volunteers had returned home long before the battle at Bull Run, and now regiments from almost every State are hastening back to their respective districts, to be received with the loudest plaudits of their friends. The 14th Ohio, on returning to Toledo, experienced a cordial reception." It was mentioned that, after a few weeks' furlough, they would be ready to reënlist-those few weeks, for all that they know, being destined to decide the fate of the Union forever. But the most extraordinary case is that of General Patterson's army. The general, according to his own account, was in front of General Johnston, who had 40,000 men. 'My force is less than 20,000 men. Nineteen regiments, whose term of service was up, or would be within a week, all refused to stay an hour over their time, with the exception of four. Five regiments have gone home, two more go to-day, and three more to-morrow. To avoid being cut off with the remainder, I fell back and occupied this place." This is, we think, one of the most astounding incidents in the history of war. It entirely agrees with the statement given by our Special Correspondent, that while the cannon of Beauregard were thundering in their ears, a regiment of volunteers passed him on their way home, their three months' terms of service being complete. If such a thing had happened to one corps, it might have been set down to the bad counsels of one or more discontented spirits, or to the injudicious conduct of some commanding officers. But here it is evident that the whole volunteer army of the Northern States is worthless as a military organization. It is useless to comment on the behavior of men who, pretending to rush to arms for the salvation of their country, make off in thousands when the enemy comes in sight, and leave their general to take care of himself. This is certainly carrying to its furthest limit that right of secession which they flew to arms to punish. In any other country such conduct would be looked upon as the extreme of baseness. But the Americans do not visit it as such, and they, perhaps, have an instinctive sense of the justice of the case. They feel how hollow has been so much of the indignation expressed by their party-how much the campaign against the South is a sham, entered into in obedience to a "sensation" policy, and differing widely from the earnest and steady resolve which animates men who are fighting for objects really dear to them. If England or France were invading the Northern States, no one can believe that a whole American army would evaporate because three calendar monthlis were up; nor, to bring matters nearer home, can we imagine that the Southerners will take the rail homeward while New York rowdies and Boston abolitionists are desolating the villages of Virginia. In all ages success in war has inclined to the party which is fighting for its existence, and is consequently steeled to a sterner resolve. There is a want of this earnestness to be noticed in the conduct of the Northerners. They take things easy to a degree which astonishes an Englishman who recollects the frenzy which followed the first misfortunes of our army at the end of 1854. The whole story of the battle of Bull Run is given by the Northern papers, of course with many variations, but, we are bound to say, with entire candor. The completeness of the defeat, the courage of the enemy and the panic of their own army, are not extenuated or denied in any way. There is, of course, the usual tendency to lay the blame on the commanders, and to save the self-love of the army at the expense of its chiefs. But, making allowances for this, it is probable not only that the leaders were incompetent, but the mass of the troops felt that they were. From the first there seems to have been little purpose in any thing that was done. The advance began before dawn, and one writer says that even at that hour there seemed a lack of unity and direct purpose among the officers, which sometimes was made too evident to the troops not to affect their spirit and demeanor. At the very opening of the day it was plain to all, that real and sound discipline was abandoned. On the other hand, the Confederates were evidently commanded by men who knew something of war. The ground on the Federal side was wooded almost down to the ravine, through which the stream flows, but on the other side "the enemy had cleared away all obstructive foliage, and bared the earth in every direction over which they could bring their artillery upon us." The battle began about sunrise, and was at its height a little after noon. The accounts given by the Northern correspondents describe the enemy as almost destroyed by the repeated charges of the Federalists. Allowing for exaggeration, it may be taken as pretty certain that they were hardpressed, and that some, at least, of the Federal troops behaved with gallantry. The 71st New York Regiment is described as having inflicted severe loss on the enemy. Indeed, the bulletins published by the Confederate authorities appear to admit that the Southern army suffered severely at one point of the action. But this was but the beginning of the day's work. Whether the Confederates had any plan of fighting settled beforehand by their commanders, we do not as yet know; but the ac count of the Northerners is that "the enemy | fighting had evidently inspired the Southern troops with a respect for Northern valor. troops half fasting and worn out by a twelve hours' march. An official despatch to Richinond from the Confederate camp, says that the Northern troops on the left fought so valiantly and pressed the Southern forces under Gen. "Johnston so severely, that the issue seemed doubtful. "It was here," the same despatch states, "that Col. Bartow's Georgian regiment was posted, which was so terribly cut up that a large body of our troops from the centre was sent at a critical moment to the left's assistance, and turned the tide of the battle." When at length obliged to retire, it is evident that the Northern troops soon fell into disorder. But this, so far from being inexplicable, is only what might naturally be expected under the special circumstances of the case. The army was composed of volunteers, and however well such troops may fight, it is the most difficult achievement in the world to bring them from the field in good order. And most probably, which ever army had been compelled to retire, would soon have fallen into confusion, and converted the retreat into a rout. The confusion of the retreat is, no doubt, a lesson to volunWe have as yet no detailed official account teers which ought not to be forgotten either in of the battle at Bull Run; but the additional this country or America. But the fact that information received during the last few days the Southern army failed to follow up its adall tends to show that the earliest accounts of vantage, proves that the retreat of the Federal the engagement published were not only inac- army was not, as it has been unjustly reprecurate, but, so far as the defeat of the North|sented, the flight of cowards. The nine hours' was concerned, absurdly exaggerated. This was perfectly natural, as the narratives were those of sutlers and civilians, who saw and knew nothing of the action except the retreat, and who appear to have formed their estimate of the Northern ariny and its behavior in the field from the hurried flight and terrified exclamations of a mere panic-stricken mob of camp-followers. Even these accounts, however, were sufficient to convict the wholesale sentence that 75,000 American patriots fled for twenty miles in agony of fear"-of being a wanton and malignant fiction. That any English journal of position and influence should be capable of making such a statement in a tone of mockery and exultation, is a humiliation and disgrace to the press of this country. Such writing proves that, notwithstanding our boasted superiority over the journals on the other side of the Atlantic, an English organ of opinion may occasionally equal in rancorous scorn, selfish passion, and vulgar prejudice, the worst rowdy hacks of the lowest New York prints. Instead of 75,000 Northern troops having been engaged in the action at Bull Run, it appears that not half that number were present, and their gallant behavior in the field is attested, not only by the facts, but by the explicit testimony of their enemies. Success in such an enterprise would probably have been, even to trained troops, almost impossible; and Gen. Scott is reported to have reproached himself for allowing the attack to have been made so soon-prematurely, in fact. But, once begun, the struggle was obstinately maintained by But however imperfect our knowledge of this first great collision may be, we may predict some of its results with tolerable certainty. It will put an end to hollow and deceptive schemes of compromise. The grand controversy between the North and the South has at length reached the point it has been for years past gradually approaching-the ultima ratio of force; and the sword having now been drawn in earnest, it must be fought out. The defeat of the Federal forces in this first great encounter, will, however, in evitably tend to protract the war, and the delay will work to the advantage of the North. Tho Federal States are in character, position, and means, far better able to sustain a protracted contest, than the secessionists. The reverse they have experienced will but rouse their latent energy, and develop their ample resources, moral and material. It will help to give to the national struggle of the North the depth and seriousness it ought to possess. It will do this by bringing clearly out, and keeping prominently in view, the profounder motives and nobler issues-in a word, the whole moral significance--of the conflict. We cannot for a moment regret this. Whatever may have been the immediate occasion of the actual appeal to arms, the real causes and objects of this war are of supreme gravity and importance. The Federal States are, in fact, fighting for the very elements and essence of social order, civic prosperity, and national life. The revolted States pretend, indeed, according to Mr. Stephens' owed no obligations to the Union, but were perfect strangers, the Northern leaders, intrusted by Providence with the necessary material force, would be morally bound to prevent the formation of such a State-such a portentous anomaly in the history of human progress. -London Daily News, Aug. 9. ingenious speech, that all they want is to be allowed to manage their own affairs in their own way. But this is, as every one knows, the merest delusion in the world. So long as their peculiar institution remains, the slave States must adopt a violent aggressive policy, or perish. That is the policy they have adopted and successfully carried out for years past 'Tis in the New World as in the Old-treain the Federal Government; they gained power, son never prospers; for if it prospers, none kept it, and used it for their own ends. But dare call it treason." All the waiters on events, the constitutional despotism they have enjoyed all the idolaters of success, all the secret symso long having been at length constitutionally pathizers with despotism, are on the alert to broken up, they appeal to the sword. For catch the first gleam of good fortune that lights what purpose? To gain by force the criminal on the dark banners of a wicked cause. The and degrading ends thay have hitherto secured rebellion that aims to enlarge and perpetuate by policy. The one object for which they have slavery, is the only rebellion to which the Times broken up the Union and taken the field against and its tributary streamlets of un-English opintheir fellow-countrymen, is to extend and per- ion ever wafted encouragement. As oft as an petuate slavery. It is neither more nor less oppressed people snatched at the sword in the than a wild and despotic crusade on behalf of desperate hope of cutting its way to freedom, the greatest curse that ever afflicted or ever can they poured derision and censure on the gallant afflict any people. That this is the true character effort. If Frenchmen essayed to establish a of the war in the South, is demonstrated by the French Government-if Germans passed in a formal acts and declarations of the secession moment of energetic inspiration from dreaming leaders and representatives. Mr. Stephens, the to working-if Hungarians renounced an alleVice-President of the Confederate States, pub- giance that had become a national death-if licly declares to all the world, "The foundations Poles or Italians writhed from prostrate subof our new Government are laid, its corner-stone jection into erect and sublime resistance--the rests upon the great truth, that slavery-subor- Times and its emulative followers hissed forth dination to the superior race-is the natural their scorn of such romantic courage, their and moral condition of the negro." Hitherto, hatred of such irreverent boldness. They mawhile its evils were admitted, Slavery was ligned the motives, defamed the characters, defended in the South on the ground of its perverted the principles and objects of the necessity. Now it is declared to be absolutely leaders in such adventures for freedom. Men right, a new moral truth, the centre or corner- of mild and noble natures were portrayed as stone of a new State, the symbol and watch- blood-thirsty ruffians. Men of the most pracword of a new and sanguinary crusade. The tical sagacity were painted as reckless enthudeepest wrong and most cruel injury that man siasts. Men whose first acts were the abolition can possibly inflict on his fellow, is formally of capital punishment and the institution of consecrated as right, while Heaven is profanely legal relief for destitution, were branded as invoked in its defence. The one social curse enemies of life and property. Nations whose which destroyed free and noble nations of old, humble hopes were bounded by the expectation and which modern civilization has repudiated of just and equal laws, were confounded with as essentially destructive of national life and a few half-crazed philosophers, in whom improgress, is now, for the first time in history, prisonment or exile had bred an excess of phiproclaimed as the one grand principle of the lanthropy. Yet even Red Republicans were new Confederation. Such a State, were it extolled if they chanced to gain a victory at the possible to set it up, must be the permanent barricades; and the conspirator who, by supeenemy, the natural foe, of all free peoples. To rior craft, obtained a crown, was lauded as an talk of coming to an understanding with such example of laudable ambition. When the tide a State, of living on terms of amity and peace turned again-when deposed kings and prowith it, would be out of the question. Such scribed revolutionists were thrown on the a State brands the notion of freedom as a false-strand, fragments of successive wrecks, victims hood, and stigmatizes industry as a disgrace. of a storm that uplifted only to abase-when The moral influence of a free and industrious people would be more fatal to it than the sword than any display of mere material force. Its policy must be violent and aggressive in mere self-defence. It would be essentially, by nature, constitution, and necessity, filibustering and piratical. This is the real meaning of the struggle in the South, and this would be its result were it successful. In view of such results, mere constitutional arguments, true as as they may be, sink to the level of idle pedantry. If the Southern leaders and their adherents the reign of force was reestablished, and order was vindicated by the crowd of captives and fugitives that looked and longed in vain through the bars of adverse fate, or across the waters that mocked their change of fortunes-the Times was ready again with its parable for the day; ready, as before, to flatter the successful, to fawn on the powerful, to insult the fallen, to libel human nature, and to outrage the generous sympathies of Englishmen, with freedom in arms or with freedom trodden under foot. As with the European peoples, so with the American press, when it finds a leading English journal deliberately and recklessly pouring vinegar and vitriol into the wounds of the national pride and sensibility? How can we expect our kinsmen of the North to believe in our friendship and good wishes, when our newspapers go out laden with columns of scornful comment upon a disaster that might prove fatal to a people less high-spirited and resolute? What can they think of our anti-slavery sentiment, or even of our international neutrality, when they see the slaveholding rebellion treated with far greater respect than the Government elected by millions of freedom-loving freemen, and the atrocious rhapsodies of the New York Herald quoted as the utterance of a settled transat American. What peans to the honor of the Jupiter in the Capitol at Washington should we have heard resounding from the Olympus in the Blackfriars, if the battle of Bull Run had filled Manassas Gap with the corpses of the Confederates! Then would the swelling strain have rolled across the Atlantic in notes ontpealing the loudest New York thunder. Then would history and imagination have been stretched for parallels to the greatness of the conflict and the glory of the victors. Then would the Confederate cause have been denounced as abhorrent to gods and men-treason of the utmost turpitude, rebellion of parricidal wickedness. Then should we have been told that Beauregard had chosen his own ground, the strongest between the Potomac and Rich-lantic policy? If there were no sin or shame mond, had strengthened it with all military strength, concealed within a cincture of wood and hill, ninety thousand men, and had been driven from his intrenchment by twenty or thirty thousand undisciplined volunteers, fired with the ardor of conscious rectitude, and made invincible by the heroism of disinterested valor. The battle has gone the other way,-and, behold, the laurels that have been woven for President Lincoln are proffered to President Davis. Yet, not quite so. "We" who were in the "route" had the momentary candor to admit that it was a drawn battle, not a disgraceful defeat. The fugitives may rally. The numbers may be balanced. The event may be reversed. It is not safe to crown Beauregard till McClellan has been vanquished. Meanwhile, till the eagle settles on this banner or on that, let us revile the combatants. Let us say the National army was "a screaming erowd," and the Confederates only less frightened than the "mob" that fled when no man pursued. Let us say, in the face of plainest facts, that the forces were equal, and the encounter an open and stand-up fight. Let us require of soldiers from the counting-house and farm, the steady courage of veterans. Let us suppress all reference to frequency of panic in battle; make the "riffraff" of the regiments represent "the grand army;” transfer, from a few lawless ruffians who escaped the ProvostMarshal, to the entire expedition, the shame of burning houses on the outward march, and fleeing back pale-faced over the smoking embers. Let us do all this with an affectation of surprise and regret, and hold off till we see whether the Confederates capture Harper's Ferry. It is thus the Times seems to have taken counsel with itself, after the perusal of its Special Correspondent's graphic narrative of the panic that followed on a well-sustained fight. The fight he did not see. The panic naturally shocked and enraged an historian who has seen as much of wars as Xenophon. The Special Correspondent will, doubtless, be able to make good his story against the reclamations of men who saw less and felt differently. But what can we expect from the VOL. II.-Doc. 13 in exaggerating and ridiculing an event fraught The disaster which has befallen the army of the United States is undoubtedly a great one, though we cannot say that it was wholly unexpected, and still less that it is irretrievable, Vast bodies of men new to arms, unversed in the ordinary evolutions of warfare, and almost as much so in regimental discipline, are brought face to face with one of the most difficult tasks that soldiers can be called upon to perform, and they prove unequal to it. In this there is nothing wonderful. If they had succeeded, it would have been immensely to their creditnot merely for raw heroism, but for disciplined valor-precisely that quality which they have had the least opportunity of acquiring. The intrinsic magnitude of the misfortune is a repulse before a position which was deliberately selected for its strategical advantages, and which has since been diligently fortified with his duty, that unpropitious junction would have been avoided. It is the old tale of Grouchy and Blucher at Waterloo. Every Frenchman knows that if Grouchy had not been culpably negligent, Blucher would never have been able to come to the assistance of Wellington, who in that case would have been beaten hollow. The theory is very natural, since it interposes an "if" as a shield against the dishonor of defeat, but there is something to be said against it. In the first place, Gen. Johnston was known to have joined the main army of the rebels long before the fight on the 21st, so that the advantage thus acquired by the enemy was foreseen. It is the same as if Blucher, instead of arriving at Waterloo at 4 o'clock on the afternoon of the 18th June, 1815, had joined Wellington the day before, and Napoleon had known that he had two enemies to contend against instead of one-a circumstance which would have made all the difference. In the next place, before blaming Gen. Patterson, we ought to ask whether he was in a position to do all that was required of him. The same journal which censures him so loudly, tells us of his success on the 15th, and adds that his men were so mutinous for want of shoes and other necessaries, that he had to appeal to them in the most pathetic terms to stand by him, and not forsake the flag of the Union, but without success. If this is true, it is arrant injustice to blame him. We trust our Northern friends will not copy the Carthaginians, by crucifying a general just because he is unsuccessful. That will be a sorry way of mending their misfortune. The advance on Manassas Gap was doubtless imprudent, and has turned out most unfortunate; but the people were in favor of it--they demanded it, they howled for it. They had their way, and they have been taught a lesson. Their sole business is to improve it. If they are wise, magnanimous, and brave men, they will not make this misfortune more ignoble by wrangling over it, but try to find in defeat the discipline and patience which lead to victory. all the aids that practised ingenuity could suggest. Such a defeat could be borne without dishonor, and without material effect on the issue of a campaign. If it had been received by disciplined troops, they would probably have retired to a safe distance for the night, and renewed the attempt the next day, with a victory as the gross result. The apparent magnitude of the calamity, that which makes it look overwhelming, is due to the unnecessary and disorderly flight. The best troops in the world are liable to panics, but the liability is infinitely greater with raw levies, abounding in patriotic zeal and native courage, but necessarily wanting in cohesion and self-reliance. It is remarkably easy now to point out several blunders which are fairly responsible for the defeat; but, instead of assuming for ourselves the credit of the discovery, we will assign it to a quarter where it had at least the honor of being prior to the event. The New York Times, in an article published the day before the battle, distinctly pointed out the circumstances which might justify the prediction of an untoward result. In truth, it was a foolhardy step to hurl untried troops against a position of unknown strength, and which turned out to be an amphitheatre of masked batteries, supported by an overwhelming force of the enemy. In such a game, all the advantages are on the side of the defence. To the assailants, nothing was likelier than a defeat, and with an army so heterogeneous in its composition, imperfectly disciplined, and officered by yesterday's civilians, a defeat was certain to end in something worse-a universal break-up and pell-mell rout. In the delirious excitement which followed, the disaster was no doubt greatly exaggerated. It was gradually found out that all the men were not slaughtered, that all the artillery was not taken, and that regiments which presented a miserably broken appearance on the morning after the battle, soon filled up their ranks as the runaways came in. The affair was a fight and a scamper, the scamper being unquestionably the worst part of it. The consequence of the disaster will be lamentable, no doubt, chiefly by protracting the war, and exciting intenser passions on both sides; but to describe it as an Austerlitz," is A new and singular charge is brought against a blunder only possible to those who sacrifice" unlimited Democracy." We are told that it accuracy to a taste for grandiloquence. After such a disaster, recrimination naturally rules the hour. The great question is, Whom | shall we hang? Of course a victim will be found, even if justice itself expires in the effort to make its own award. The gentleman who is likeliest to figure as culprit-in-chief is Gen. Patterson, who commanded the troops at Harper's Ferry, and whose special business it was to give an account of Gen. Johnston, the rebel commander, who was at the head of 25,000 men. The favorite theory is, that the junction of Gen. Johnston's troops with those of Gen. Beauregard, on the 21st, decided the fortune of the day, and that if Gen. Patterson had done REPLY TO THE LONDON -Manchester Examiner. TIMES ON AMERICAN DEMOCRACY. does not furnish the "slightest security against the worst of wars," the proof being the civil war in the United States. We must observe at the outset, that the writer's superlatives are sadly at fault. War, it is true, has broken out between the North and the South, but, for any thing that is urged to the contrary, this catastrophe may have happened in spite of the sagest precautions and the strongest securities that human wisdom could suggest. It may be that under any other form of government known to the world, the Americans would have been fighting twenty years ago, end that civil strife has been delayed so long simply because of the pallia tive and remedial tendencies of Democratic in |
