The New York Herald Newspaper, February 24, 1862, Page 5

NEW YORK HERALD. JAMES GORDON BENNETT, EDITOR AND PROPRIETOR OFFICE N. W. CORNER OF PULTON AND NASSAU STS. hm pe 1 advance. sake he None but ‘THE DAILY BERALD. £100 ceat sper coo. $7 par annum. FRE WEEKLY HERALD, coery Saturany, at sty cence ots en porn i pe ann aed Great trae Galiernie Flare ‘on the ist, 1128 ead Slat a7 ech theme alate per anna. rilh raise tt ‘HEKALD, on Wednesday, at four cents Der “2 VF CORRESPONDENCE, containing important Wotentan ad frou any quarter of the world; if took wiltte poe, “3 ar Ovr Forxien CoresronpeNnts ake Farncolane¥ RxQuesTkD To SKAL alt Lerress axp Pack “Gu nor MBO NOTICE taken of enonymonscorrnpoulenc. Wedono aDy. sorted im mM it hy mai? will beatthe ‘Bank ‘ville current in New York isements ine comme ADVERTISEMENTS © serene and inthe ihe Want Hewat. Foy rein Ladd PRINTING executed with neatness, cheapness and de AMUSEMENTS THIS EVENING. ACADEMY OF MUSIC, Irving place.—Puores:on ADRIEN “NIBLO'G GARDEN, Broadway.—Counrx Baws, etataacrs THEATRE, No. S44 Broadway—Wus “LAURA KEENE’S THEATRE, Broadway.—Tux Ma- Gserur; og, tax Pasr or Dar. NEW BOWERY THEATRE, CAPTURE OF FoR? Doweisos—Curgry anv Fare payee! Sess tg BOWERY THEATRE. Bowery.—Sticenxr's Nationat Creovs. Afternoon aud jenna BARNUM'S: AMERICAN ., MUSEUM, Broadway.—Com Norr—Lunxe Hirrorotamus, Waatk, &c., at all Bours Onouna, afvernoon and evening. BRYANTS’ L rresg nd Mechanics’ Ball, 472 Broad- way.—Caaw Roast Bex: MOOLRY'S MINSTRELS, Stuyvesant Iustitnte, N Broadway.—Fox is a Fin Eraioriax Soxon, Dances, te eee Pan ent HALL, No, 539 Broxdway.— Songs, Danoxs, Buacesques, &c.—Houray ix [necanp. CANTERBURY MUSIC HALL, 585 Broadway.—s aNcus, BURLESQUES, ise Wie Be GAIETIES We neg ROO: Room Kuragtammunts, Bacets, Paxtomiuns, ances, £0, Fy 2 i MUSIC HALL, 444 Broadway.—Soas, Bax- Pantomiaus, &0.—Porrnatt Parner. CRYSTAL PALACE CONCERT | HALL, No. 45 Bowery. ~ Bunursaurs, Sones, Daxcxs, dc.—itusuvors— two PaRratan CABINET OF ae Ro ERs, - Open daily from 19 A. M. tig P. M. Pate ee Lg a HALL, 616 Broadway.—Burursques New ¥ pacaray eabay, ‘Fepraary a4, 1862. DAILY CIRCULATION OF THE NEW YORK HERALD. Sunday,.Febraary 16... Monday, February 17.. Tuesday, February 18. . Wednesday, February 19. Thuraday, February 20... Friday, February 21... Saturday, February 22. Average daily circulation. 114,829 The above figures, which can be verified from our books, give the circulation of the New Your Harato for the week just past. We believe that it more than equals the aggregate circulation of all the other daily papers in this city, and of course it far surpasses that of any oneof them. The ad- vantages which the Herat affords to advertisers are self-evident. THE SITUATION. There isno news of any importance from the Army of the Potomac to-day. A Our special correspondence from Roanoke Island and Hilton Head will be found highly interesting. We publish maps of the defences st Roanoke, show- ing Forts Hager, Bartow and Blanchard in ground plans. Our maps of Clarksville, and the description of the whole vicinity, including Nashville, Russellville and the other prominent points of interest in the progressing campaign in the West, is highly im- portant as a guide to the operations of our armies in that portion of the country. Our latest news from the West announces the arrival at Indianapolis of 5,000 of the rebel prison- ers from Fort Donelson. They present 8 miserable appearance, being dressed in multi-colored rags, and using pieces of carpet for blankets. They state that they have been wretchedly fed and cared for during the last six months, and say that the rebellion ia pretty well used up, as far as they can judge. The captive officers do not wear any uniform, and in appearance, it is said, do not seem much superior in social position to the mass of the privates. We have received a highly interesting collection of iate Southern newspapers, from which we are enabled to collate the latest news from the rebel country. The ‘permanent’ rebel Congress was inaugurated at Richmond on the 18th inst. Vice President Stephens formally opened the session of the Senate. R. M. T. Huntcr was elected President pro tem. of that body. In the House, Thomas§. Bo- cock was elected Speaker. In his speech on en- tering on the duties of his office he said:—The gaze of the world is fixed upon us. Nations look on, curious to see how this new system of go- vernment will move off, and what manner of men have been chosen to guide its earliest movements.” In excusing the acts of himself and co-rebels Mr‘ Bocock alludes to the federal government in the following terms:—‘‘When ambition and interest seized upon it and destroyed its integrity they were not allowed to appropriate the rule alto- gether to themselves. Fanaticism came forward and demanded to be received as @ participant of power with them, and it claimed not in vain. Be- neath the sway of this unholy triumvirate justice was forgotten, intolerance was established, private morals were ruined, and public virtue perish- ed. All feeling of constitutional restraint passed away, and all sense of the obliga- tion of an oath was forever lost. The whole ma- chinery of government degenerated into the abso- lute rule of a corrupt numerical majority. Already the weaker section was marked out for destruction by the stronger, and then came disruption and overthrow. Since then tyranny the most abso- lute, dnd perjury the most vile, have destroyed the last vestige of soundness in the whole system.” ‘The rebel press evidently feel very sore over the capture of Fort Donelson. The editorials of the Richmond papers are endeavoring to stimulate the waning effects of this defeat, by carefully avoiding reference to the facts of the cap- ture, and endeavoring to make their read- era believe that the rebels wore a Spartan band borne down by an overwhelming force. The rebel editors admit that the event has tanght them @ lesson, admonishing them to he more wary and 104,016 NEW YORK HERALD, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 1862. circumspect, to husband with greater care their “limited” resources, and not to underrate their enemy. The New Orleana Delia admita that past oxpe- rience has demonstrated the impracticability of destroying the iron-cased gunboats of the fedcrals by the cannon of forts. It says:—‘The only eff- cient mode of resistance, of defeating such craft, in the absence of like vessels on their part, is to board aad capture them. The Memphis Avalanche of the 12th inst. says that Beauregard is examining and preparing for operations somewhere “between that city and sunset.” The same paper says that the Union men in Weekly county, Tennessee, are “ openly cheering for Lincoln upon the atreets.”’ Tt calls it a “shameful and treasonable practice.’” Bishop Thomas F. Davia, of the Diocesan Con- vention of the Episcopal Church of South Carolina, now in session at Charleston, has pronounced an address in which he states that prior Conventions of-the Church in the Confederate States-had de- claned that “we were no ‘longer, asa Church, in administrative union with the Church in the United States.’ The rebel Secretary of the Treasury estimates the appropriation required for the purchase of specie for tho use of the government, including premium, commissions and charges, at two million dollars. The Knoxville (Tenn.) Register of the 15th inst. publishes an account of a rencontre in Scott county, Tenn., between a body of rebel troops and Unionists, in which it is alleged the latter were routed. It shows that the Union fire is spreading in rebeldom. Our columns contain to-day telegraphic details of the European news brought to Halifax by the Niagara, a summary of which was given yester- day morning. Our advices are dated to the oth instant. The Palmerston Cabinet had submittea to Par- liament voluminous State papers on the subject of England’s diplomatic course, down to December last, during the American war crisis. Judging from the portions of these documents now printed, we must arrive at the conclusion that the govern- meat had all the time a salutary dread of being in- volved in war with the United States, in conse- quence of the commission of some act— underhand or ovett—of active sympathy with the Southern rebels, and that the English ministers had determined to wheedle, to prevari- cate, and even endeavor to intimidate, Mr. Lincoln from time to time, hoping that eventually the “fortune of arms’? would be with the rebels, and then the Queen could and would recognise them. Indeed, Earl Russell used the above very remark- able words ina conversation which he had with Messrs. Yancey, Mann and Rost on the subject. Lord Lyons was instructed to inform Mr. Lincoln that, in case of war with the United States, Eng- land would consent to abolish privateering, as beteoeen the two countries during the war, if the President would agree to do the same—a modest proposition truly, coming froma Power boasting even then of having twenty thousand guns on her war ships, toa Power engaged in quelling the most formidable rebellion ever before known. The observations of Messrs. Gregory and Ben- tinck, in the Commons, relative to the blockade, are merely the fag ends of speeches prepared for effect in the rebel cause, had that measure been really inefficient, but rendcred useless by the energy and determination of our government and ite officers on the Southern coast. MISCELLANEOUS NEWS. The Niagara, from Liverpool on the 8th and Queenstown on the 9th inst., reached Halifax on Saturday evening. Her news is two days later. It was reported in London that ten millions of dollars in gold would be remitted to Paris—the first instalment of the new loan—during February. This produced a large demand for money in the Bank of England. The Paris Moniteur denies that the loan has been effected. Consols closed in London on the 8th inst. at 92% 2 9314 for money. The Liverpool cotton market was firmer at the close on the 8th inst., but prices remained as reported by the Bohemian. Breadstuffs were dull and provi- sions inactive. Communication was interrupted all over Ger- many by serious inundations. The Russian govera- ment had pronounced other severe sentences on Catholic priests in Poland. Martinez de la Kosa, a Spanish statesman, died in Madrid on the 7th inst. Since the commencement of the war the rebels have lost in battle the followiag named generala:— Simon B. Buckner, captured, Loyd Tiighma Pp 5 Bushrod Johnson, captured. Robert 8. Garnett, killed. Barnard E. Bee, killed. Felix K. Zollicoffer, killed. The Unionists have lost but one—Nathaniel Lyon, killed. The Toronto Leader is not at all pleased with the result of the battle of Fort Donelson, but it has discovered a small piece of consolation, and exultingly proclaims that the number of rebel “prisoners taken has dwindled down from fifteen’ thousand to thirteen thousand three hundred.”’ Almost every day we find recorded in the raral journals the superior marksmanship of some indi- vidual in bringing down with his gun an American eagle. The last case of this description occurred in Westmoreland county, Pa., where it is stated that Mr. A. Montgomery ‘‘shot a large bald eagle, with ahead as big as a sheep's,” or probably about the size of the gentleman’s who aimed the gan. In our opinion if Mr. Montgomery would en- list in one of the companies belonging to Berdan’s Sharpshooters, he might be in a position where his superior marksmanship would redound more to the credit of himself and to the honor and glory of his country than it can possibly do by ‘‘bringing down’ a harmless, inoffensive bird, from which the liberty of the nation isallegorized. The shoot- ing of these birds should by law be made a mis demeanor, and severely punished. The practice is more than vandalism, and if it is not put a stop to by legal enactment it should be frowned down by every lover of the Union. A public meeting of the Board of Publication of the Reformed Dutch church, in Harrison street: Brooklyn, was held last evening, for the purpose of devising the best means of disseminating reli- gious consolation in the shape of tracts, &c., among the army now fighting the battles of the Union. After the usual religious exercises had been performed the pastor of the church, Rev. Mr. Smith, explained the object of the meeting to the congregation. Colonel Hayward, of New York, was then introduced, and spoke at some length on the necessity of providing the soldiers with Bibles and hymn books. Rev. Dr. Porter, of Williams- burg, also addressed the congregation in advocacy of the object, and stated that the Board of Publi- cation had a number of tracts, &e., on their shelves, which would be willingly devoted to the soldiers. A collection was then taken up for the purpose of indomnifying the Board for their books, and, after the singing of @ hymn, the pro- ooedings ended. It being Sunday, skating was allowed on the Gentral Park yesterday, although the ico was in anything but a good condition for the sport. About twenty-two thousand persons visited the ice dur- ing the day, up to five o'clock, at which hour the ice was cleared, because it was not considered safe to allow skating at that hour. There has been altogether forty days of skating on the Contra! Park, twenty of which have been during the pre- sent month. It is expected that the pond will not be opened to-day at all. ‘The United States frigate St. Lawrence was yes- terday towed from the Brooklyn Navy Yard, and is pow at anchor off the Battery. Nine steamboats left St. Louis on the 19th inst. for Cape Girardeau, Cairo and Paducah, all toaded with government troops, stores and munitions of war, Thirty-one of the crew of the ship Great Repub- lic, now lying in Portland harbor under @ goveru- meat charter, descrted on the 19th inst. Ninoteea of the number were afterwards arrested. Manassas and Nashville-The oss of Both or Either the Emd of the Rebol- Hon. Manassas and Nashvillo have now become the twogreat vital points of tho rebellion. They are both indispensable to the cause of Jeff: Davis, for the 1038 of either will involve the loss ofthe other. Are tho rebels sufficiently strong to hold these two positions againat the shock of our beleaguering forces? No. Manassas and Nashville, with or without a sanguinary strug- gle, are both destined, and soon, to fall into our possession. Considering, too, the crippling and demoralizing effect of a groat defeat either at Manassas or Nashville, we shall not be surprised to hear, before the lapse of many days, that both these places have beoh abandoned, and that the rebel government is moving down iis military forces to the defensive line of the seven original seceding States. This programme, of course, involves the abandonment of Virginia, North Carolina, Ten- nessee, Arkansas, Kentucky and Missouri to the “old Unioa;” but still, consulting the military dangers and difficulties of their prosent posi- tion, it is the best system of defence which the rebels can pursue, if they desire to try the chances of a prolonged resistance. Hence we think it highly probable that, if they can do it without being caught in the act, they will aban- don Virginia and Tennesgee, and fall back upon the defensive line of their original cotton States confederacy, to save their army gnd their cause from that overwhelming demoralizatiog and Southern popular reaction whigh will jpevitably follow a great defeat at Nashville or . And why should Davis and his colleagues in the rebel government any longer adhere to their grand imposture of a Southern confede- racy, embracing all the Southern States—Mary- land and the city of Washington included— when it has become as clear to them as the noonday sun that they have lost Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri, beyond redemption ; that Arkansas is defenceless a, ainst our ad- vancing forces ; that Virginia "Ceased to be tenable ; that ‘Tennessee will have to be re- lingulshed, and that, with the Burnside expedi- tion fastened upon the eastern shores and in- land seas of North Carolina, no stand by any rebel army can be made in that State wi; the hazard of being crusl between Burn- side from the East, ellan from the North, and the advanced columgs of Gene- rals Buell and legk’s divisions from the West, to say jothing of a “fire in the rear” from the Union citizens of the Com- monwealth? We believe that the border slave States were dragged j to this rebellion more for the purposes of fee: nig it and supporting it, and making those States the battle field, than from any hope or wish to secure them within the Ii of a recognized Southern confederacy. pat lieve that the rebel government was ved up tg Richmond, and that the main body ms the rebel army was advanced to the line of the Potomac, not so much for the purpose of seizing Washington to hold {t, or with the hope of holding Virginia, as for the purpose of im- pressing upon European nations a favor- able idea of the stfength of this rebellion, and for extorting from the government of the United State the recognitidn of the original seceding cotton States as on independent nation. In this view, the border slave, States having been used and abused as fur as pessible to feel the rebellion, and to bear the brunt of the war, without securing European intervention, and the chances of holding any one of them having become exceedingly desperate, we conclude that they will be recovered to the Union with- out much further trouble. Bull ran, the rebel army andihe rebel blockade of the Potomac, from July last down to the setilement of the Trent affair, were operating most prejudicially against us and in favor of Davis in England and throughout the European continent. All our facts and statistics of the overwhelming military forces and resources of the Union were more than neutralized over the water by those other facts, that a rebel army, after a great victory, was besieging Washington, and that the great outlet of our national capital to the sea was for many miles at the mercy of a succession of blockading rebel batteries. If the rebel leaders have resolved upon a single hazard of the dic ina great battle at Manassas, then, in the inevitable result, the rebellion will at once be broken to pieces, and we shall have nothing to do but gather them up; but if Davis and his colleagues have determined upon fighting to the last extremity, they will adopt the policy of short- ening their lines and concentrating their forces for a final struggle in the cotton States. In either event, as our policy is manifestly the policy of an onward movement, and as our fleets and armies are all properly arranged, equipped, prepared, and eager for the work, there is every reason to hope that by the 4th of July the loyal citizen and the stranger with- in our gates will be reinvested with the glori- ous privilege of travelling from Washington to New Orleans, via Manassas, Richmond, Charles- ton and Montgomery, without # passport. Tux Day or Cetepration—Never in the history of our country was the birthday of Washington celebrated with more uni- versal and earnest interest than on Saturday last. The occasion derived increased impres- sivenoss from the faci that we combined with our reverence for the memory of the man a sincere and hearty feeling of joy and thankful- ness that the glorious heritage which he loft to us as the reward of his labors was to be spared to us in all its integrity, nothwithstanding the machinations of Southern traitors. The know- ledge that the national arms had just been crowned with victory after victory, and that the Union flag had been restored to all but one of the disaffected States, served to buoy up our spirita and point*to s speedy termina- tion of the great war into which we had been forced in defence of our rights and consti- tution. With the achievements of the heroes of forta Donelson and Henry and the exploits of the Burnside and other expeditions fresh before us, and the prospect of new victories, which would speedily crush every vestige of this un- holy rebellion, we were well justified in con- gratulating each other on the success which has attended a grand and righteous cause. The general observance of the anniversary of the birth of the Father of his Country was tho strongest testimony of loyalty that the people of the United States could have given, and in it they shed equal lustre upon themselves, both as @ nation and as individuals. Such a sublime exam- ple of national devotion cannot be without its good effect abroad as well as at home, and the inhabitants of other countries will exclaim, “How, with such a people, could a nation fail?” Patriotism relinquished gain, and offer- ed up a mighty ¢ribute which will not soon be forgotten. That we are still a great nation, strong and indivisible, with the power to ac- complish ail that we have faken in hand, the display of the. twenty-aecond of February. will show to the civilized world, and it is an inci- dent in our history upon which we may look back with pride when the flag of the Union is again floating over Fort Sumter, and secession is remembered only in history. The News from Hurope-New Era in ‘War—The Lessons to the World. There is nothing new or important, in regard to this country, in the advices received by the Niagara at Halifax. Atl of the correspondence which has passed between the several diplo- matic agents, since the rebellion broke out, has been laid before Parliament; but there are no points not previously known to our readers. Our relations with Europe, however, will here- after wear a different aspect, and our position be more @ decided one in the estimation of statesmen on the other side of the Atlantic. New leaves, by recent events here, are being turned over in the history of the world, and the United States will occupy in future the place she appears almost unwittingly to have all along occupied among nations, so necessary for the maintenance of the general political equilibrium. The recent operations of our army and navy against the insurrection have opened a new era in the history of war and of this country. The mechanical foroes—the result of modern inven- tion~-brought to bear in the inland waters of the South are eminently suggestive. Iron-clad gun- boats are due to the inventive genius of the French; but the Americans are the firat to turn them to practical account. Until the brilliant victories at Fort Henry and Fort Donelson the importance of this kind of war vessel was not determined. In Europe it was still considered an experiment, and here members of Congress doubtedits value. But the brilliant achievements in the Tennessee and the Cumberland rivers removed all doubt and rendered the immense superiority of the mailed vessels a fixed fact Heretofore the Confederates depended on their railroads for effecting rapid movements and combinations, and no doubt this mode of march gave them a tremendous advantage. But the iron-clad gunboats have more than neutralized it. The entire Southera country is not only in- tersected by one immense river—the Father of Waters—but divided st right aggles to this by numerous other rivers; quch as the Missouri, the Arkapags, the Red river, the Tennessee, the Cumberland, the York, the James, the Roanoke, the Ashley, the Cooper, the Chowan, the Neuse, the Tar, the Fear, Santee, the Savannah, the Alabama and thé Rio Grande. If irén-clad gunboats were unknown these rivers could be rendered impregnable. But against gach vea- sels they cannot be syoceasfally defended. By means of these boats the corhmunication by the railroads which cross them can be cut, by the destruction of the bridges, at the same time that the boats themselves can move as fast as a heavily laden railcoad train, and troops, mu- nitions of war and provisions cap be concen- trated with great rapidity. Ifa Southern army moves it must leave its Heavy batteries behiad. In their iron-clad gunboats the Northern troops carry their batteries with them; nor can the highway of water be desiroved like the rail- roads. Here, then, is a lesson for France and all Europe. Had the elder Napoleon been pos- sessed of this instrumentality he would have invaded England and subjagated her to his yoke, and be would then have conquered all Taropetng held it in subjection till the day of his death. The Mediterranean, the Buck Sea‘aid the Baltic would haye become French lakes. Not only the Rhine, but the Danube, the Don, and all the navigable rivers of Europe, would have owned his sway. The*great obsta- cle to his final success was England, whose insular position and naval superiority protect- edher. But iron-clad steamboats would have neutralized the latter and rendered the former of no avail. What Napoleon failed to do because he did not possess the appliances of modern times, ‘the nephew of his uncle” will probably accomplish. By the rapid construc- tion of iron-clad gunboats he can invade and cripple England; and that done, he can have little difficulty in overrunning all Europe. French troops are superior to any others on the Continent, not only from their intelligence, but their inventive and mechanical genius. The extensive use made of the telegraph in this war is another lesson to Napoleon. General McClellan owes to the telegraph those rapid and brilliant combinations in Western Virginia which first directed public attention to him as the general to lead our armies. Ho is now using the same agency upon a larger scale, and before long every regiment, from the Susque- hannah to the Rio Grande, and from the Mis- souri to the Atlantic, will be put in communica- tion with the Commander-in-Chief by this mys- terious wire. Here is lesson the second. Another lesson which the recent victories in this war teach is the splendid fighting qualities of the troops, both of North and South. At Fort Donelson they fought with all the tena- city of veterans, even incasés where all their officers were shot down. This losson is in the nature of a warning to the royal and imperial conspirators who are preparing to consummate the destruction of the independence of Mexico in order to establish a monarchy upon the ruins of the republic-~a bargain and sale by which a scion of the Mouse of Hapsburg is to receive a throne in the New World for the surrender of Vonetia to Victor Emanuel; the consideration for which to Napoleon is to be the island of Sardinia, as Savoy was the guid pro quo for ngland, perhaps, does not as yet ng of the arrangement about {abq will find is out in due tima Lombardy. know an sardinia The cool audacity and impudence of these crowned heads, who dispose of the destiny of a free and independent nation as if it were so much morchandise, are without a parallel in history. Even the partition of Poland and the distribution of republics, kingdoms and prinei- palities by the great Powers by the treaty of Vienna fall short of the coldblooded crimi- nality of the attack upon the liberties of Mexico, The Vienna arrangements were made, a3 was alleged, to preserve the balance of power in Europe. There is no such excuse for the conquest of Mexico. The object is to de- stroy the power of the United States, by estab- lishing the counterpoise of a great monarchy, embracing not only Mexico, but Central America and South America; while on the north tho republic is to be hemmed in by Canada, which itis expected soon to erect into an independent monarchy, with a British prince on the throne, And had our government or the people faltered in their determination to crush the rebellion in the Southern States, the great Powers of Europe would have givena King to the Confederacy. But it is now too late, Before their measures | @ax be takew the insurrection will have. been ; put down, as they will soon be apprised by the news of the recent victories won by our arms. John Bull, who laughed so indecently and im- moderately at Bull run, will now laugh at the wrong side of his face. When the Union and peace are restored—as they will be before the Fourth of July—there will be three-quarters of a million of Northern, and more than a quarter of a million of Southern soldiers—up- wards of a million in all—of the finest troops in,the world. Most of these men will prefer to continue fighting rather than be disbanded. How long will Louis Napoleon’s fifty thousand troops, which are to be sent to Mexico, stand before them; or how long wi!l all the men that the combined Powers of Europe can furnish be able to resist their arms: It will be necessary, for our own safety, to sweep away from every part of this con- tiuent, and every island that belongs to it, every vestige of kingcraft and foreign domi- pion. The great Powers of Europe, perhaps, may draw in their horns when they read of the triumphs of our arms at Roanoke and in Ten- nessee. But if they do not recede there is nothing surer in the hook of fate than that they will be all driven from America; and, that Canada, Cuba, and every island of the West In- dies will be annexed to the American republic, which is stronger than it ever was before, and will come out of this war in a condition better able to battle against all the crowned heads of Europe than it was before the rebellion began. The Caving In of Tennessee Symptomatic of the Dissolution of the Rebellion. The recent demonstrations of loyalty to the Stars and Stripes on the Tennessee river, as high up as Florence, Alabama, and the later exhibi- tions at Clarkesville, on the Cumberland, toge- ther with other developements daily made pub- lic, are the strongest indications of the general caving in of the rebellion. Kentucky is lost to the rebels, with the exception of the southwest corner of the State, where there is a stronghold which is destined soon to share the fate of Bowling Green or Fort Donelson. All Missouri is evacuated by Price and his horde. The soil of even Arkansas feels the tread of our armed men. Judging from the .manifestations along the Tennessee, between Fort Heary and Flo- rence, even Northern Alabaina is for the Union; and the triumphant uprising of the loyal senti- ment of the people is confirmed by the destruc- tion of the bridges, not by our troops, but by the inhabitants themselves. But, according to present appearances, Tennessee, which was among the last to go out, will be the first of the revolted States to return to her allegiance. She hesitated long before she identified herself with the rebellion, and at last was really forced to espouse the cause. When the rebel flag had been unfurled in South Carolina the agitation read over the Southern States, and Governor larris seems to have caught the contagion at ap early day. He called an exira session of the Legislature, to meet in Nashville on the 7th of January, 1861, and recommended the pas- sage of an ordinance calling a convention of the people to consider the propriety of voting the State out of the Union. The Legislature only partially followed his advice, and ordered that while voting fur delegates to the conven- tion the people should also decide the question whether a convention should be held or not. The vote was taken on the 9th of February, three days after the first meeting of the South. ern Provisional Congress. The result was as follows:— Por Convention. Conv: Against fiom. 54 Rast Tennessee... iddlo Tennessee. ‘est Tennessee The delegates chosen by this election were unconditional Union men, and, if the ordinance calfing a convention had been adopted by the people, these delegates would have met on the 25th of February. Governor Harris, thus baf- fled, determined to carry the State out of the Union, whether the people desired it or not, and accordingly summoned the Legislature to meet on the 25th of April. The work of dragooning its members waa pro- ceeded with just as it was in the Richmond Convention, till, on the 6th of May, a majority was obtained sufficient to pass what was called “a declaration of independence,” which, in effect, was an act of secession; and it was or- dered that it should go to the people for their decision. In three days the Legislature again adjourned, and on the 8th of June the vote was taken on the “declaration of independence,” and it was adopted through the influence of the politicians and stump orators who overrun the State from all parts of the South. On the 17th of June the Legislature assembled for the third time, and consummated the secession of the State. Tennessee is one of the most important of the Southern States. In 1860 it had a population of 1,146,690, of which 287,112, or one-fourth of the whole, were slaves. Its territory measures 40,000 square miles. Its people have always been regarded as among tho very best soldiers in the Union. In the war with England in 1812-15 it was chiefly by the riflemen of Tennessee, who had marched fifteen hundred miles to New Orleans, that the hosts of English invaders were driven back to their ships from the plains of Chal- mette. The loss of Tennessee to the rebel Con- federacy would be fatal to its hopes. With the loss of this State neither Virginia nor North Jarolina could any longer be held; and if these three important border States, together with —_—_——— Kentucky and Missouri, aro wrestel from the grasp of the insurgent chiofs, nothing 5 for them but to fall back for @ last struggle upon the original Confederate States which they held when their capital wax fixed at Montgomery, a city to which the gov ernment is soon likely to be transferred again. But even these are weakly held, and the Uniow troops have footholdsin South Carolina, Geor- gis, Texas, Mississippi, Louisiana, Florida and Arkansas, as they will soon bave in Ala bama—the only State where tho Stars and Stripes do not yet actually wave. There is no safety, therefore, for the Southers people but to overthrow their leaders by @ counter revolution, and return to the Union under the mgis of the constitution, by whose operation, without any law of Congress or proclamation of the President, they will be entitled to all the rights and immunities they ever enjoyed, and will recover their old poai- tion in the Union, in despite of any-abolition traitors in or out of Congress. The Mexican Question and sheBentey 68 Napoleon. After reading the recent intelligence frome Europe, published in our columns, no refiecting person can, doubt that the Emperor ef the French meditates the destruction of the: inde- pendence of Mexico and the erection upon the ruins of the republic of a throne, which he pro- poses to trade off with Austria for the cession of Venice and its surrounding territory, Quad- rilateral and all, to the King of Italy. Such a curious mode of settling the Italian question could only occur to the astute genius of Napo- leon, and the proposition must have startled the slow, plodding minds of the Hapsburgs. But it may be asked what benefit is France to derive from the arrangement. Victor Emanuel will gladly cede to her the island of Sardinia, which would be of great consequence to Napo-, leon, to strengthen his position in the Mediter- rean, with a view to ulterior designs upon the Fast, and also to the maintenance of French preponderance in Africa; while on the other hand the island is not absolutely necessary to the Italian King, and is of small importance to him compared with the value of Venetia, the acquisition of which will almost complete the unity and consolidation of Italy from the Alps to the Adriatic, and thus fulfil the better part of the promise Napoleon made in one of his oracular announcements during the Italian war. It is true. there will still be the exception of Rome and the Pope’s contracted temporal dominions; but Napoleon’s mode of fixing that is equally sagacious with his plan of wheedling Austria out of Venetia. He will not disturb the present poor old Pope, but will protect him in possession of what he holds as long as he lives. At his death tho Em- peror will have the making of the new Pope, who will receive his appointment on condition of his relinquishing all temporal dominion, and limiting his sway exclusively to things spirit- ual—a change for which Napoleon has recently prepared all Italy and the Catholic world, by reminding the Pope that hereafter the sovereign pontiff must render to Cesar the things which are Cesar’s, while Napoleon is willing to ren- der to “God’s vicegerent” the things which are God's. No doubt, when Rome is at last oeded to Victor Emanuel, Napoleon will claim some other territorial compensation. In 1860, fn re- quital for his services to Victor Emanuel in the Italian war, he claimed and obtained the duchy of Savoy, on the French side of the Alps, and the county of Nice, bordering on the Mediter- ranean and the French department of Var, in- cluding the port of Marseilles, on the ground that, geographically, it belonged ‘more to France than to Italy, being separated from the latter by the Maritime Alps. Probably he will now claim the old republic of Genoa, including its fine port, a territory adjacent, ‘atill further east, and conquered by France in the Revolution, when there was assigned to it the name of the Ligurian Republic, and afterwards it was incorporated with the French empire, till, by the treaty of Vienna, in 1815, it was transferred by the aid of England to the King of Sardinia, against the indignant protest of the inhabitants. Napoleon III. re- members this. It was at the city of Genoa he landed when he drove Francis Joseph out of Lombardy, and he saw that the possession of this port, well fortified, would, from its close proximity to Marseilles, afford him the key to the conquest of Italy at any time that its King should become refractory or form alliances against the interests of France. Geographically Genoa is divided from the rest of Italy by the Apennines, just as Savoy and Nice are separated from it by the Alps, and belonged to the French empire till stripped of them by the royal robbers of Europe at the fall of the First Napoleon. To Napoleon III. this, and the pre- scriptive possession by France for the eighteen years from 1797 to 1815, would afford as good arguments for the transfer of Genoa as any he was able to urge for the cession of Nice, or of Savoy, the original nucleus of the kingdom of Sardinia. Such is the programme of Napoleon; and, though he knows very well when our civil war is terminated we will have something to say to the Mexican part of the arrangement, he cares nothing, as by that time he will have gained his point in Europe, and will let Maximil- ian then whistle for the throne of Montezuma. That will then become Austria’s affair, and France will have nothing further to do with it. But is this the only advantage Nupoleon pro- poses to himself by his Mexican scheme? By no means. He saw from the commencement of our war that it would greatly affect France financially, and he determined he would not only make something good out of it politically and torritorially, but at the same time effect some reparation of the loss of trade and reve- nue arising from the blockade. French com- merce has received a heavy blow, and French manufactures are reduced to the lowest ebb- The idle and hungry mechanics and artisans are in a revolutionary condition. The revenues have fallen off two hundred millions of dollars» and the tobacco, on which the revenue so largely depends in France, is effectually locked up in Virginia, The French silk trade, the principal portion of which was done with this country, is temporarily destroyed. It is cut off entirely from the South, and the North, for eco- nomical reasons, does not now think fit to do much business in that line. Under these circum- stances, Mexico, if the war in the United States should not be soon ended, would open a new field for trade and revenue. The fertile soil and fine climate of Mexico are as well suited to the growth of cotton and tobacco as our Southern, States. The Emperor concluded that it would, much cheaper and oasier to restore peace there by intervention than in the United Statés; ands peace being restored, and a king in, possossion,