The London Times on American affairs.
From the London Times, of July 26, we copy the following:‘ We must do the New York press the justice to say that, so far as we have been, it treats the disasters of the Federals with sufficient fairness.--Though, to a certain extent, echoing the mendacious bulletins of the Government, and the pompous addresses of Gen. McClellan, it is still independent enough, and honest enough, to let the country understand the whole truth. While Falstaff and Boabdil describe their exploits, the newspaper correspondents quietly explain matters in a manner that has filled the Northern cities with consternation. Since these battles hardly a single prediction has been hazarded of the ultimate conquest of the South. Exhortations to persevere, to send reinforcements, to deliver the Federal army from its difficulties, to avenge the dishonor of its flag by a triumphant entry into Richmond, have, of course, been plentiful, but, as to anything further, there is a dead and most portentous silence. In fact, it is feet that the defeat of McClellan's army has changed everything. But a fortnight before, a vast and well provided force was investing the capital city of the South, defended, as it was thought, only by a few starving regiments. All was joy and ignorant confidence. Now the truth is revealed. A whole population is seen to have risen in arms; enthusiasm and devotion have made good all deficiencies; Generals of consummate skill are at the head of a soldiery of fanatical courage, and an army equal to the greatest of those with which European rulers make war, guards the frontier of the Confederacy, after having crushed the main force of the invaders. The Northerners, though they have shown themselves more liable to delusion than any one could have believed of such a people, are not fools; and, in spite of the boasting and lying of their Government, they are receiving the conviction that such a people as the Confederates can never be subjugated. If it were a war for a fortress or a frontier, they would not be discouraged; but when they reflect on the object of the present invasion, and remember that they have undertaken not only to defeat the armies of Lee and Beauregard, but to utterly destroy them, to occupy the whole Southern territory and garrison it, year after year with a standing army of at least a quarter of a million of men, it may well be imagined that they are cooled and sobered by the prospect. We cannot but think that a great change of feeling is likely to take place at the North.--The undercurrents of the popular mind are at first not visible; it is only when they have gained volume and strength that they can change the course of the stream. But there is enough to show that multitudes of the Northern people are becoming weary of this purposeless slaughter.--About the temper of the business men there can be but little doubt; they have been for many weeks giving to the cause of peace all the influence which their own timidity and the constitution of American society will allow them. But now we have fair grounds for believing that matters have gone further, and that the great body of the people are slowly coming round to the opinions of their less shortsighted countrymen. That these will be candid and confess their own madness is not to be expected. A people never recants. But they may show their rulers, by signs not to be mistaken, that they will tolerate no more of Mr. Lincoln's crusade. The question will be soon determined. If this war is to go on, the immense levy ordered by the President must be actually made. The 300,000 men must be forthcoming if Virginia is to be conquered, or if even Tennessee is to be held. But they will not be forthcoming.
We are told in the last dispatches that the volunteering makes slow progress, and that the question of a conscription continues to be discussed. Our correspondent declares that in eleven days only 15,000 men had come forward, in spite of the enormous bounty, amounting in all to $150, that was offered to each man by the Federal and State Governments. Drafting for service, or, in other words, a conscription, was talked about; but we should think it would be only talked about. The scheme of a forcible levy of troops in a republic to subjugate and hold down another republic is one that will hardly be seriously proposed, even by the more fanatical of Mr. Lincoln's advisers. All now, therefore, depends on the enlistment that is going on under the President's proclamation. If this falls, then all is over, and after a few months the independence of the South must be acknowledged, as it might have been with profit a twelve month ago.
’
