Surrender of New Orleans.
From the New Orleans
Crescent, of the 28th ult., we copy the following:
The Situation — our duty.
The circumstances surrounding us, their nature and extent, must be patent to all, and needs no reiteration at this time.
With a large and powerful Federal fleet before our city, demanding its surrender, the reply of our city authorities, dignifiedly and determinedly refusing to accede to the demand — these and all other things connected with our unpleasant and humiliating condition, are familiar to our readers, and prudence requires that little be said thereof in these columns.
But, little as we shall say, we will utter in calm, determined, sober and unmistakable language.
While we counsel order and discretion with our citizens — that no act be committed tending to insult or to exasperate the enemy in our front — yet our people should quietly await, with unflinching spirits, the time when the free, unfettered soul, may send forth its natural and patriotic impulses.
Let that day be near or far off, it is not of our knowledge at this time to say; but the hope and belief is strong within us that their triumph, yet incomplete, will be of short duration, and this city soon again breathe the pure air of the free.
It is with feelings of the deepest pride that we point the
Federal officers to the fact that no Union sentiment exists in our midst — that with almost one voice and one tongue, this community entirely repudiates all allegiance to the old Government, and warmly and devotedly adheres to the new. And we respectfully but firmly assert that this sentiment, this feeling, is so firmly implanted in the breasts of our people, that no time, no circumstance, no change can serve to eradicate it or still their free souls in the struggle for their independence.
They have suffered, they may suffered unspeakably in the future, but we hazard nothing in saying that no sacrifice, even to the last life will be toe much to accomplish the one groom mighty and glorious undertaking.
This we honestly believe, and while we do not utter our convictions in a vain-glorious spirit, we will not shrink from their free and independent expression.
The action of our city authorities — the
Mayor and Common Council--has been such as to fill every patriotic breast with honest pride.
The answer of the
Mayor to the demand of the
Federal commander, is at once able, courteous and dignified, and will reflect imperishable honor in the annals of historic time.
The Council has fully justified the expectations of the people, and for weal or for woe, their conduct in this trying crisis will be upheld and maintained by every being who can assert the soul of man. We may be ‘"conquered, not subdued"’ We may be defenseless, but the craven heart must not be found amongst us who would ingloriously yield obedience to an unjust demand Our powerful enemy may ‘"cry havoc, and let slip the dogs of war,"’ and a generous, brave, devoted people suffer the horrors thereof, and the innocent welter in their gore.
God forbid ! We do not believe it. The world would stand aghast.
All Christendom would wake as from a horrid dream, and retribution, dire and terrible, be visited upon the perpetrators of the dastardly outrage.
No ! We will do our enemy the justice to believe them incapable of such an atrocity.
They are men — must have the souls of men — and however much their devotion to their cause and flag, they must remember and grant us the same rectitude of purpose, and still more, the God given right to protect our homes.
Opinions of the abolition press.
The New York
Times, of May 3d, has a bombastic editorial, a portion of which we copy:
A Farrago to
Farragut.
The official epistle after day or
Monroe, of
New-Orleans, in reply to
Commodore Farragut's demand for a surrender of the city, has no doubt set the whole country in a broad grin; and if rebellion has not dried up all the springs of mirth in the
Southern nature, the rebels themselves must be moved to saturnine laughter by its farrago of bombast, impotence and conceit.
It must have been a fine study of a facial effect to see the plain, practical-minded sailor
Farragut, perusing, on board his flagship off the levee, the queer rigmarole he received in reply to his pointed demand for the surrender of the city; and if he waltz till he unravels this metaphysical puzzle before taking possession, the accumulations of
Mississippi mud will have carried the delta ten miles further into the
Gulf.
After a good deal more of the same sort, the article concludes:
But there is a sting in the tail of his letter that makes one doubt whether he is not quite as much of a knave as a fool.
Swelling with impotent rage, he begs
Commander Farragut to understand that they ‘"will-not allow themselves to be insulted by the interference of such as have rendered themselves odious and contemptible by their dastardly desertion of our cause in the nighty struggle,"’ etc., etc. Now, if this means anything, it means the process of shooting down all such as show their love for the ‘"old flag"’ will continue, as well as all the other atrocities of rebellion which the ‘"noble nature"’ of
Mr. Mayor and his mates may dictate !. Let us hope that are this time protection has been brought to the
Union men of New Orleans, and that they are no longer exposed to the tender mercies of those ‘"sensitive and susceptible"’ monsters.
