American prospects.
[From the
Liverpool Albion]
Amongst those that are born of woman there beats not a bolder heart than that of
Jefferson Davis.
We are not ashamed to confess to a large amount of hero-worship for the man for when his Northern foes can find no better name than rebel and slave-owner.
Never unduly elated by success, never dismayed by adversity, his voice rings out clear as a trumpet-call on the darkest day that befalls his country.
Not
Cato himself spoke to his little Senate at
Utica with more dignity and steadfastness than does the
Southern President when addressing his suffering fellow-countrymen.
Four years have passed since the tremendous struggle began with which his name will be forever identified; and, if American figures can be trusted, (a point on which we always feel serious misgivings,) those four years have witnessed a greater amount of bloodshed and a larger loss of human life than any other four consecutive years since the Deluge.
The loss of ten thousand men on a single day has become quite a common event; and a conscription of one, two or three hundred thousand at a time no longer excites astonishment.
The of war has surged from North to from East to West.
It has been waged by land and sea, on mid-ocean and in harbor, and up thousands of miles of river — in the midst of forests, on spacious plains, and off the sides of lofty mountains.
Professional soldiers and amateur generals have tried their hands upon it; attorneys and politicians have brought their talents to its aid; every invention of modern times has been pressed into its service.
Newfangled ships, cannon of hitherto unknown calibre, rifles of novel construction, new tactics and new tools, all have been used in turn, and yet the end has not come.
Such energy, such obstinacy, such determination to win, have been shown on both sides as were hardly ever seen before, and such an amount of money expended as no other country ever spent in a period ten times as long.
If, in the early days of this struggle, we were ever disposed to sneer at the efforts of either side, we must now, all of us, confess that we had underrated both their intentions and their probable performances. --It is a struggle of heroic proportions on both sides.
But, come what may, it is to the weaker party that the highest amount of admiration is justly due; and what is true of one is doubly true of the other.
And now, after vicissitudes innumerable, the tide has turned of late against the
South; and, doubtless, sore discouragement has fallen upon many a heart which not long ago was exulting in the sense of victory.
It is not, indeed, a great many weeks ago since we were told, on what was assumed to be good authority, that discouragement was universal throughout the
Northern States, and that the cry for peace — peace at almost any price — was upon every tongue.
The result shows the folly of generalizing freely from particular instances, and yet only forty-eight hours ago there were many faint-hearted friends of the
Southern cause in a state bordering on despair about its future prospects.
So many men are ready to rush from one extreme to its opposite!
But clear across the waters comes the brave voice of
Jefferson Davis; there is no quaver in his tones — he speaks with no uncertain sound.
Few as are his words reported to us, we cannot for a moment doubt his resolution; his voice is still for war!--Dark as is the present hour, he has passed through hours as dark before, and through the gloom he believes he sees the coming dawn.
When New Orleans was taken, when
Vicksburg was surrendered, when
Stonewall Jackson fell in the noonday of his glory, a sadness and discouragement spread over all the Southern Confederacy; and as their undaunted
President raised anew their spirit then, so we are persuaded he will do now. We shall not, of course, think of denying that the exhaustion of men and means has been immense since those events took place; but it must be borne in mind that, whereas the
Southern armies are still entirely composed of white men, the
Northern army, according to a recent speech of
Mr. Lincoln, numbers two hundred thousand blacks amongst its soldiers.
And
Mr. Lincoln adduced this fact as a reason for maintaining the policy of emancipation.
There remains, therefore, to the
Southern Government the expedient of resorting to the negro element for the repletion of their ranks; and though this will, no doubt, for obvious reasons, be a last resort, we feel no doubt that the operation will, by a long period, precede submission to the
Federal.
We see no reason to doubt that the negroes will fight for their masters as willingly as they work for them, and we imagine a Southern negro is quite as capable of fighting as his Northern brother.
So far, therefore, as the supply of men for their armies is concerned, we do not think that the
South is as yet any worse off than the
North.
