NEWS OF TIIE WEEK.
riemcees of Sherman is amazingly rapid. The Confederacy, tTaid home one, is a nut with a very hard shell but no kernel. And it seems likely. In one week we have heard of the evacuation of Branchville, the evacuation of Columbia, the evacuation of Charleston, and the capture of Fort Anderson, which means in all probability the capture -of Wilmington. Branchville, the junction station which links the Danville line with both Augusta and Charleston, was evacuated and taken by Sherman on the 8th February, whether "after three days' hard fighting," as one account brought by a courier direct from Branchville to Admiral Porter's fleet at Smithville says, or without any fighting, does not yet appear. Ever since the ride of that Tatar who falsely announced the capture of Sebastopol about a year before it happened, we have dis- trusted couriers riding unlimited distances with such news. Still it was true, whether the Confederate army had been defeated or not in the attempt to hold it. Nine days later, on 17th February, General Sherman entered Columbia, sixty-eight miles north- west of Branchville, and the capital of the State. On this the Con- federates evacuated Charleston, which was occupied by the Federals on the same day. It has once before been said in rela- tion to this war what is now more than ever true—that "the French take forts, the Turks defend them, and•the Confederates evacuate them."
