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[111] may be the proportions the war may assume, “renew their sacrifices and their services from year to year, until they have made good to the uttermost their right to self-government.”

The day of battle shows how they redeemed this pledge for them, and in adversity as in victory, it is the undying pledge of all.--New Orleans Picayune, July 23.


The great victory.

The battle annals of the American continent furnish no parallel to the brilliant and splendid victory won by the Southern army on Sunday last over the hired mercenaries and minions of the abolition despotism. With an inferior force, in point of numbers, we have driven back to their dens the boasting invaders of our soil, scattering them before our victorious arms as leaves are scattered before the autumn wind. The details we publish in our telegraphic column leave no doubt that we have put the enemy to utter rout, and struck him a blow from which it is impossible for him wholly to recover.

The victory is the more significant, from the fact that it is the first general engagement between the opposing forces. That the President of the Confederate States was himself in the thickest of the fight, exposed to all the perils of the battle-field, is another circumstance that adds to the joy of our triumph, and swells our triumphant note of exultation. All honor to our brave and gallant leader and President, to the brave Beauregard, the gallant Johnston, and our chivalric soldiery.

We have driven the enemy back from our soil, we have mowed down his men by the hundreds and by the thousands, we have captured his batteries, and sent him howling and panic-stricken from the field of the fight. The blow, in its moral and its physical effects, will prove of incalculable advantage to the Southern cause.

The first regiment of the enemy that crossed over from Washington — the Zouaves of Ellsworth — have fled from the field with only two hundred left of the entire regiment. Retributive justice has overtaken the first of the enemy who put their feet upon the sacred soil of Virginia, and from six to eight hundred of them have been cut down dead upon the land which they insolently dared to invade.

Many a brave Southerner has had to fall, too — but our loss, we are confident, is small in comparison to that of the enemy. Our brave boys fought with heroic courage, but they fell in the holy cause of defence against aggression, and “it is sweet and honorable to die for one's country.” To the God of Battles let the heart of the whole South yield its tribute of praise and thanksgiving for this most signal and brilliant victory.--New Orleans Crescent, July 28.

The dead bodies of the hirelings lay in heaps on road and in field. We conquered gloriously. The enemy fought bravely and well, but their valor could not resist the courage of men under the inspiration of a grand and holy cause, and they have been utterly routed by half their number.

Our joy at this signal work of the Divine favor is tempered by the heavy loss we have sustained in the death of those who have taken the first step in a career of glorious usefulness. We bewail the death of noble spirits. And other names may be added to the gloomy list. We forbear to write them down until the mention of them can be accomplished with a fitting tribute to their virtues and valor. We would rather, at this time, rejoice and give thanks that more of our gallant sons have not fallen upon that bloody field.

It is these strokes that forbid the exultation in which the importance and splendor of the victory prompts us to indulge. And the death of those noble men causes us to realize our increased obligation to Him who ruleth in the armies of heaven and earth, and to fall down in adoring gratitude, and give the honor of the success to the God whom we serve. His right arm won the victory for our arms, and to Him would we ascribe the glory.--Charleston Courier, July 23.

While we rejoice for our success, many homes have the shadow of death round about, and the voice of weeping, the wail of widowhood, the sharp cry of orphanage, are in our land. We have bought our victory dearly, paid for it the purchase-blood of the brave.

While we drop a tear for the noble, the manly, the gallant heroic, for our Bartow, and Bee, and Johnson, and Stovall, and the whole long list of glory's children, and while we mourn with their families and friends, let us thus be nerved all the more to strike, strike again.--Atlanta (Ga.) Sentinel, July 23.

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