We find in a recent number of the New York
Tribune a letter from
Paris, dated May 16, on the subject of
European intervention in American affairs.
We copy a portions, giving it to the reader for what it is worth:
‘
"There is no immediate danger of Anglo French intervention in our affairs; has not been any of a serious nature since last winter, and the settlement of the
Trent affair.
I say 'danger;' I had better said opportunity.
Intervention is constantly imminent, but in no wise threatening.
In any preparatory steps taken the
French foot will undoubtedly appear foremost, though much maligned
John Bull's sturdy pegs will doubtless keep step with its every motion.
It is in all the interests of the
French and
English nations that they act together in this matter, and so act as not to afford the
American people the future recovered customers, either North or South.
Both feel the sore need of our cotton market to buy from, and our general market to sell to.
"
England's industrial and commercial need is greater than that of
France;
France's political need is greater than that of
England.
Their real policy will be, as it hitherto constantly has been, concerted.
For the present,
France will seem to be foremost in offering — gently urging — a policy of 'conciliation and mediation' on and (and or
or according to circumstances) between the two American Cabinets.
The sentence is a little confused; so is the state of the case; the state of things
France and
England watch and wait, and will watch and wait for some time to come.
Only note how long they have already waited — in
England's case unexampled long — to acknowledge the
de facto C. S. A. Compare with this waiting the record of Belgian, Grecian, South and North American,
Italian, revolted and newly- constituted Governments, to say nothing of ready recognition by
England, at three day's notice, of quick-shifting
French de facto Governments — in 1830, two; in 1848, one; in 1851, one; in 1852, one."
’
The fall of New Orleans.
[From the London Times, May 13.]
The spirit in which the fall of New Orleans has been met by the
Southern Press is one of fierce defiance.
The great fact seems to be that thirteen gunboats have succeeded in getting up the river to the city.
When this had happened the rest was a matter of course.--
Gen. Lovell and his garrison could not get at these gunboats; but the gunboats could get at
Gen. Lovell, and, moreover, could set the city on fire.
The foreign vessels of war upon the spot very naturally protested against the exercise of this latter power, and
Gen. Lovell, and his garrison went forth from a position in which they could be of no further use. New Orleans would, no doubt, have capitulated or surrendered, or have done anything which was necessary to be done, in order to a void being shelled, but there was no one to take possession.
The angry citizens profess to hope that some of their own gunboats may come down and relieve them from the thirteen small furies that hold them in such deadly terror.
But the simple truth is that New Orleans has allowed itself to be placed at the mercy of the Federal fleet.
It has always been a city of "rowdies," and with such persons bluster is too apt to take the place of valorous deeds.
It is now in the position of waiting for the arrival of a hostile garrison, in order that it may surrender.
If words in
America always represented facts, the fall of this city would be of no more importance than the fall of any common fort upon the coast.
The Southern press is completely of this opinion.
It most clearly perceives how the fact is capable of being made an advantage rather than a blow to the
Southern cause.
It is, they say, a great Confederate army released from an awkward and indefensible position; it is a Federal army shut up in prison, where it must melt away from yellow-fever; it is a city, useless because blockaded, removed from the catalogue of Confederate embarrassments.
It we might judge from the slackness with which the city has been defended, we might give some credence to the affected complacency with which they contemplate its loss.
But it cannot be a pleasant thing to lose the commercial capital of the
South, and still less to lose it in this inglorious manner.
It is in vain to deny that the possession of New Orleans is such a loss to the
South that, if that city could be maintained by the
Federal power or an indefinite time, the
South itself, great as it is, must pine, and dwindle, and go back to its natural state of forest and swamp.
It is vain to say that a force holding that city, and supreme wherever a boat can swim, cannot spread devastation far abroad, and ruin all the classes which depend upon profits derived from without.
To do the Southerners justice, they appear inclined, at least tacitly to admit a great part of this.
But they say they accept the sacrifice for the moment, and deny the
Federal power to continue the pressure beyond a brief stace.
They say that successive garrisons will occupy the city, and in certain succession be deposited in its cemeteries, and that reinforcements of sailors will come only to follow their comrades to a sailor's burial in the waters of the
Mississippi.
They say that, penetrate where they may, the invaders will be regarded as buccaneers and brigands, who may hill and plunder where they go, but behind whom a hostile population will always close up, shooting down their stragglers, harassing their communications, cutting their telegraph wires, and watching every opportunity for their destruction.
They point already to "immense quantities" of cotton and tobacco burnt, and to the partial execution of a general plan to this effect long since formed.
Their weakness, they say — and they truly say — extends only to a cannon shot distance from the sea, or a lake, or a navigable river, and they point to a million of square miles which are not thus dominated, and ask how it is possible that these can be subdued?
Much of this is very true.
But the question remains whether the Southerners have the constancy to endure these terrible sufferings rather than give in. If they have, and of course, they never can be conquered.--There are histories without end of natures deserting their sea- coasts, leaving their plains, retiring from their rivers, holding their own in their mountains, and retaining their independence at last; and, if the Southerners have but the endurance of which it would be easy to cite a hundred instances, they may well laugh the idea of subjugation to scorn.
But they have sometimes talked so loudly and acted so feebly — as in this case of Now
Orleans — that we are not certain that words really do mean fact.
It is impossible to deny what the
Southern press says — that they have a great front of battle still unsure on. There is
Beauregard at
Corinth with a great army which has shown it can fight, and which he has shown himself able to lead.--There is
Johnston face to face with
McClellan at
Yorktown.
There is
Jackson in the
Valley of the Shenandoah.
There are other
