TOPICS OF THE DAY.
THE PROSPECTS OF THE NORTH. THESE Americans retain one quality at least of their English blood. They know how to repair disaster. From the day of their defeat at Bull's Run they have dis- played an energy, a calm collected persistence in reorganiza- tion which has taken those who judged them by the Irish mob of New York wholly by surprise, and is already exercising its effect on European opinion. With that wonderful quickness which the American shares with the French intellect, they have apprehended the causes as well as the occasion of their defeat, and set themselves at once to their removal. Even qualities which seemed to impede a successful prosecution of the war have been, for the moment, laid aside. The race which defied even the control essential to social order, has strengthened the hands of Government with almost imprudent zeal. Men who for a century have resisted the regular police, now sanction domiciliary visits, approve arrests, and applaud the wholesale removal of sus- pected officers. Politicians whose avowed theory has been that "government at best was a necessary evil," urge on the Executive to acts a European Government would only defend on the plea of necessity, advocate passports, defend the suspension of the habeas corpus, and discuss with an ap- proving smile projects of conscription to which the balloting for the militia is mild. Classes usually inimical to the com- monest order as an interference" with the liberty of citizens," vote for men who have supported martial law in disaffected districts, and purchase papers which clamour for martial law directed against themselves. Free intercommunication seemed to Americans like free breath, a privilege without which life was impossible or worthless ; but the instant free communi- cation conflicted with public safety, it was given up. The Government, yesterday so weak, now controls the railways, the posts, the ports, the telegraphs, questions whom it will, arrests at discretion, violates inconvenient " State rights" with entire impunity. The better class Americans detested politics, but it is they and not the politicians who are now so rapidly strengthening the Executive. They avoided mili- tary service except in command ; but, says Mr. Rus- sell, the Irish and Germans in the new army are only auxiliaries. If there was one feeling which seemed uni- versal in the North, it was dislike of the Federal army. Time after time West Point was only saved from wild reductions by Southern votes. The "people" exulted in their right to make military officers, and talked non- sense incessantly about volunteers in Mexico. Since 21st July the same men have called incessantly for "trained" offi- cers, and the volunteer commandants of local influence, able tongues, and no idea of discipline, have been removed in scores. The " insubordinate " soldiery have submitted to orders which menace death Zr writing private letters, death for drunken- ness, and death for insult to an officer. The sternest comman- der the troops had had in command is the idol of the army. Drinking, quarrelling, uproar, are things of the past, and though the men are still troublesome about food, so are all soldiers on earth, British Guardsmen excepted. The American nation, in short, moved by a great cause, and with its volatile hauteur softened by a great defeat, has submitted itself to the discipline it contemned. If the Government need still larger powers they will obtain them, for the people are in the mood when self-denial seems almost an expiation. It is trash to talk of all this as a reign of terror. There is not a soldier in New York or Massachusetts who is not of the people, actuated by every popular impulse, sensitive to every breeze of popular opinion. That there are many set-offs to be reckoned against this strange phase of public feeling we willingly admit. Part of it, no doubt, is mere ephemeral impulse—a war feeling, such as has led Englishmen to subscribe unasked loans for a revolutionary war, or drill the whole population into a national guard. No doubt, too, the upper classes are only too rejoiced at any opportunity of securing the strong executive for which they have long pined, delight in a police 'which, if arbitrary, can at least hang rowdies, and a passport -system which keeps out the scouring of Irishmen and Ger- mans. Above all, it is undeniable that many strong acts of the Government are partly or wholly indefensible. There is too much disposition to pay off old scores, to suppress instead of regulating the press, to despise the guarantees of personal rights, to open letters and intercept despatches. But the very excesses of the popular spirit prove its reality, and show with startling plainness that the American people can per- form the one act of self-denial which seemed inconsistent with their character, can make personal privilege subordinate to the private weal. Even the right of growling has been temporarily laid aside. It is a noteworthy fact that General Scott, loaded with insult while supposed invincible, has since his failure never been attacked, and that McDowell, general of a beaten army, though removed by Government, has never been seriously assailed by the people for losing their first engagement.
As a natural consequence of this new spirit, the nation is recovering its strength, and the slow drift of events, so much more important than any single action, begins to set in steadily on the Northern side. Mr. Russell, who is from experience almost as prejudiced in favour of discipline as the regulars themselves, allows that General McClellan is strong enough to govern. There is silence and order in the camp, and the admirable physique of the rank and file, no longer concealed by wretched clothing, careless drill, and half-drunken slovenliness, strikes observers accustomed to the British line. The works for the defence of Washington are admitted to be excellent, and McClellan is in a better position to move forward than his enemy. There is still a cry for men, but be has 150,000 troops under his orders, who, in discipline and drill, are rapidly becoming an army ; the commissariat is plentifully supplied, and the means of carriage strike even Mr. Russell, accustomed as he is to the imperial lavishness of Indian quartermasters, with a feeling of sur- prise. If the cold weather is allowed to come on without a serious engagement, and no epidemic breaki out in camp, a danger of which Mr. Olmsted, the Sanitary Commissioner, entertains serious dread, the army, in November, ought to be equal to an invasion of the South in force. An army once formed, may be recruited largely without impairing its discipline, and the rest must depend on generalship. The force necessary to the work the Government already pos- sesses.
On the east, the Northern States have reorganized their strength, and in the West their position is altogether new. General Fremont has arrived in his command, and already the influence of his somewhat unscrupulous energy is felt in every direction. Upon his arrival he found the State of Missouri in a condition of anarchy, ravaged by armed bands from both sides who levy re,quisitions, burn villages, and treat quasi allies re-tiler worse than enemies. He adopted the only alternative left, and by proclaiming martial law, established a system which, however terrible, is at least legitimate and understood. His order, enfranchising all slaves in the hands of Southern partisans—i.e. all slaves, for it is the freesoilers who support the Union—though not perhaps so long a step towards abolition as some of its admirers imagine, frightfully embarrasses his foes. The slaves will not rise, but they will fly, and the order in itself inspires all slaveowners with an ineradicable distrust, and sends them and their white de- pendents away from the Southern army to watch over their plantations. A flotilla of armed boats, broad boats as we understand them, each with one gun, and to be towed by steamers, has been collected, and General Fremont was by the last accounts ready to descend the river. An army, it is added, will at the same time march down each bank, but this report, we are convinced, is a New York delusion. The Mississippi is a tropical river, with banks covered with forest, and cleft at every succeeding mile or two by deep bayous, along which an army could not move itself a mile a day, and , could not carry artillery at all. The flotilla must convey the army to be landed where needful, and although we are a little distrustful of a descent as far as Orleans—a feat which might be performed in steamers, but certainly in no other mode—General Fremont will at the worst be able to effect a most important diversion. Any approach to an earnest effort to conquer the debatable land on the part of the South is impossible while he is in motion, and he will at once threaten five States, and clear the river for the ascent of a force adequate to retain its command. He is not by any means as yet master of the situation in the West, but he has completely checked Southern advance, and is gradually collecting a command which it will require all the strength of the river States effectually to impede. To paralyze them is to beat them, for they can render no as- sistance to the East, and it must never be forgotten that in this war, time, the best of political aids, is the ally of the richer and more numerous population. At sea the tide has turned even more decisively. The Southern plans for disarming the fleet of the republic were laid with considerable care and skill. The Southern planters have served well at sea, and for years the fleet has been filled with Southern officers. During the official conspiracy which preceded the revolt the most efficient ships were despatched to China, the Pacific, and the Mediterranean, and the few vessels in dock left scarcely ready for service. The seizure of the Norfolk Yard cost the Government its best reserve, and for a month or two it seemed as if the Federal marine were crippled. Popular energy, however, supplied all defects. The fleets were summoned home. Everything that would float was put in commission. Every ship that could be ex- pected to carry an armament, or keep afloat in an hour's engagement—a very limited class, the Americans not pos- sessing our vast list of sea-going packets built under the packet system with an eye to possible warfare—was pur- chased, and at the present moment the Government have a fleet which includes 87 armed vessels, besides several dis- tinct flotillas. The recruiting for this fleet proceeds rapidly, as the suspension of trade drives sailors from the merchant- men, and already it has achieved one considerable success. The attack on Hatteras is not quite the brilliant victory which the Americans in their not unnatural exultation at the turn of the tide declare it to be, but it was a decided, and, for the means employed, an important success. Two forts and six hundred men surrendered to the Federal force. The most important outlet of the system of naviga- tion, which, in the south-east States, extends within the outer coast line, and affords inexhaustible shelter for pri- vateers, is stopped up, and will be permanently closed during the war by a deposit of stone. Above all, one Southern dis- trict has been set free from coercion, and already the inhabit- ants are hurrying in to take the oath of allegiance, and declare themselves overborne by sudden legislation and an irresistible popular force. The last result is one which, if it be correctly reported, immensely improves the position of the Federal Government, and, indeed, makes the retention of the South by force an evident possibility. The incident will give new spirit to the movements of the marine, and the States in which secession feeling is strongest are precisely those which lie most exposed to attack from the seaboard. With its Eastern army reorganized under a new and stronger discipline, its Western position so improved that it has become the attacking instead of the resisting force, with a fleet collected, and put successfully in motion, with the people surrendering their dearest prejudices in order to strengthen the executive, and with the crusading spirit alowly but distinctly gaining ground among its supporters, the Federal Government has no reason to despair of its cause, or to doubt its own ability to learn the lesson which precedes military success. If it can but find money, it is strong enough for the work it has to do, and with all due deference to the financiers who so roundly declare that money cannot be obtained, we must maintain that on this point nothing is yet decided. We know, indeed, that Europe will lend nothing for the war. We know that the American banks cannot long keep pace with the enormous demands now made on them. But we do not know, cannot with any reasonable accuracy even guess, what the effect of open loans may be. The savings of a thrifty nation form often a colossal reserve. France has over and over again responded to demands of this kind as if subscription were a privilege instead of a tax, and the stocking-feet of American farmers hold more than the earthen pots of the French pea- santry. An average subscription from each family to the extent of three months' wages is certainly not beyond the bounds of possibility, and that alone would amount to fifty millions. Even should specie fail, there remains the resource of subscriptions in army stores, of revenue devoted solely to military purposes, of a requisition upon the States as they are occupied, and of assignats secured upon the Federal lands. Quarrels have never been stopped yet by lack of money, and the Americans are in the mood when men discover that money as only the second necessity, that war can be made now as Attila made it, "whose exchequer bills were never at par," and that with bread and iron one can get to China. The party which looks to financial difficulties to solve the problem of the States reckons without taking into account the first figure in all politieal calculations,—the roused passions of mankind.
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