surrendered the commissioners, and did so in accordance with long-established American doctrine.

In surrendering the commissioners, the Washington govern ment took the opportunity to declare its reassured hopes of the Union, and to express its contempt for the Southern revolution. In his letter to Earl Russell, Mr. Seward took particular pains to declare, that "the safety of the Union did not require the detention of the captured persons;" that an "effectual check" had been put to the "existing insurrection," and that its "waning proportions" made it no longer a subject of se rious consideration.

The declaration was false and affected, but it contained an element of truth. There is no doubt that, at the time it was made, the power of the revolution in the South was declining; and a rapid survey of the political posture, and of events transpiring in the latter half of the year 1861, affords painful evidence of relaxation on the part of the Confederate government, and of instances of weakness and abuse that the people, who had pledged every thing and endured every thing in a contest for freedom, had no right to expect.

REVIEW OF AFFAIRS AT THE CLOSE OF THE YEAR 1861.

The justice of history compels us to state that two causesthe overweening confidence of the South in the superior valor of its people, induced by the unfortunate victory of Manassas, and the vain delusion, continued from month to month, that European interference was certain, and that peace was near at hand, conspired, about this time, to reduce the Southern cause to a critical condition of apathy.

Western Virginia had been abandoned to the enemy almost with indifference, and with an apathetic confidence in an army that was in danger of becoming demoralized, and in the prospects of European interference, which were no brighter than formerly, except in imagination, the South carelessly observed the immense preparations of the North, by sea and land, to extend the area of the contest from the coasts of Carolina to the States on the Mississippi, and to embrace her whole territory with the lengthening arms of the war.

While the enemy was busy making his immense naval prep

DR

arations against our sea-coast, and building scores of gunboats on the upper Mississippi to drive our armies out of Kentucky and Tennessee, the Southern government had shown the most extraordinary apathy; the spirit of our armies was evidently decaying, and abuses of extraordinary magnitude had crept into the civil administration of our affairs. No corresponding activity was manifested by us in the line of naval enterprise adopted by the enemy. Means were not wanting for at least some emulation in this respect. Large appropriations had been made by Congress for the construction of gunboats and objects of river defence; the State of Virginia had turned over to the Confederate government the best navy-yard on the continent, and two armories with their machinery; and with the means and appliances at Gosport and Richmond, it is not doubted that, with proper activity, the government might have created a considerable fleet.

The North had improved the advantage of its possession of a navy by increasing its numbers. Nearly a hundred vessels of different descriptions were purchased by it, and fleets of gunboats fitted out for operations on the coast and rivers. Two naval expeditions had already, before the close of the year, been sent down the Carolina coast, and without accomplishing much, had given serious indications of what was to be expected from this arm of the service on the slight fortifications of our ocean frontier.

On the 29th of August, a naval expedition from Fortress Monroe, under command of Commodore Stringham and Majorgeneral Butler, had reduced the two forts at Hatteras Inlet, and had signalized their victory by the capture of fifteen guns and 615 prisoners, among whom was Commodore Barron, the Confederate officer in command.

The capture of Port Royal, on the South Carolina coast, on the 7th of November, by the bombardment of Forts Walker and Beauregard, gave to the enemy a point for his squadrons to find shelter, and a convenient naval depot. The attack was made on the 7th of November, by a Federal fleet, numbering fifteen war-steamers and gunboats, under command of Capt. Dupont, flag-officer of the south Atlantic blockading squadron. The attack was easily successful by the bombardment of the forts at the entrance of the sound. It may be imagined how

inefficient our defences must have been, when the fact is, that they yielded after a bombardment which continued precisely four hours and thirty minutes; the condition of Fort Walker at this time being, according to the official report of General Drayton, who was in command, "all but three of the guns in the water front disabled, and only five hundred pounds of powder in the magazine." But these were only the first lessons of the enemy's power and our improvidence in defences, that were to be taught us on the coast.

The privateering service had yielded us but poor fruits. The Savannah, the first of the privateers, was captured, and her crew treated as pirates, at least so far as to load them with irons, and confine them in felons' cells. With the exception of the Sumter (an awkwardly rigged bark) and one or two others, the privateers of the South were pretty closely confined within their own harbors and rivers by the blockading fleets. The "militia of the seas," that, it was predicted in the early part of the war, would penetrate into every sea, and find splendid prizes in the silk ships of China, and the gold-freighted steamers of California, had proved but an inconsiderable annoyance to the extensive commercial marine of the North; it had captured during the year but fifty prizes in smacks, schooners, and small merchantmen, and by this time the South had learned that its privateering resources were about as delusive as that other early and crude expectation of adventitious aid in the war-the power of "King Cotton."

It is curious, indeed, how the early expectations of the manner and conduct of a war are disappointed by the progress of its events, and its invariable law of success in the stern competitions of force, without reference to other circumstances. It was said, at the beginning of the war, that, while cotton would "bring Europe to its knees," the Southern privateers would cut up the commerce of the North, and soon bring the mercenary and money-making spirits of that section to repentance. Neither result was realized. At the close of the year 1861, the South appeared to be fully convinced that it was waging a war in which it could no longer look for aid to external and adventitious circumstances; that it could no longer hope to obtain its independence from European interference, or from cotton, or from the annoyances of its privateers, or from the

rupture of a financial system in the North; and that it had no other resource of hope but in the stern and bloody trials of the battle-field.

Beyond the events briefly sketched in this and the foregoing chapters, there were some incidents which were interesting as episodes in the progress of the war, up to the close of the year 1861, to which a full reference has been impossible in a work which professes to treat only the material parts of the important campaigns of the year.

The most interesting of these was probably the attack on Santa Rosa Island, in the harbor of Pensacola, on the night of the 8th October, and the storming, by picked companies from the Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Florida regiments, of the camp which had been made on the island by the notorious Billy Wilson Zouaves. Landing from steamers and flats on the enemy's shore, within sight of his fleet, the small band of Confederates marched some three or four miles in the darkness of the night over an unknown and almost impassable ground, killing the enemy's pickets, storming his intrenched camp, driving off the notorious regiment of New York bullies, with their colonel flying at their head, and burning every vestige of their clothing, equipage, and provisions. This action was rendered remarkable by an instance of disgusting brutality on the part of the enemy-the murder of our wounded who had been left on the field on account of the necessity of rapidly retiring with our small force, before the enemy could rally from his surprise. Of thirteen dead bodies recovered, eleven were shot through the head, having, at the same time, disabling wounds on the body. This fact admits of but one inference.

The affair of Dranesville, on the line of the Potomac, had given a sharp and unexpected lesson to our immoderate confidence. This action occurred on the 22d day of December. Our whole force engaged was nearly 2,500 men, composed of Virginia, South Carolina, Kentucky, and Alabama troops, under command of Gen. Stuart. The expedition, which was attended by a train of wagons intended for foraging purposes, fell in with the enemy near Dranesville. On the appearance of the enemy, the 11th Virginia regiment charged them with a yell, and drove them back to their lines within sight of Dranes

ville. Here the enemy rallied. In the confusion which ensued, the 1st Kentucky regiment fired upon the South Carolina troops, mistaking them for the enemy. Discovering his mistake, Colonel Taylor, of the 1st Kentucky, moved cautiously through the woods. Coming in sight of another regiment, and prompted to unusual caution by his previous mistake, he shouted to their commander to know who he was. "The colonel of the 9th," was the reply. "Of what 9th ?" "Don't shoot," said the Yankees; "we are friends-South Carolinians." "On which side are you?" asked Col. Taylor. "For the Union," now shouted the Federals; at the same instant pouring a murderous volley into the ranks of the Kentuckians. The engagement now became general. The Federals had the advantage of position and largely superior numbers. Their field batteries swept our lines, and several regiments of their infantry, protected by the ground, had advanced within one hundred yards of us, keeping the air full of minié-balls. After sustaining the fire for some time, our troops were compelled to fall back. The retreat was executed in good order, as the enemy did not attempt any pursuit. Our loss on the field from which we were repulsed was about two hundred in killed and wounded. The next day, reinforcements having reached Gen. Stuart, the enemy had drawn off from the locality of the battle-field, and declined any further engage

ment.

The affair at Dranesville, was no serious disaster, but it was a significant warning, and, in this respect, it had an importance beyond the size of the engagement and its immediate results. The Yankees were learning to stand fire, and, out of the material which was raw at Bull Run, McClellan was making troops who were no longer contemptible, and who were perceptibly improving in discipline, stanchness, and soldierly qualities.

Of the political measures adopted by the South in further ance of the objects of the war, but a few words need be said. They are justly described as weak and halting responses to the really vigorous acts of the Northern government in its heartless, but strong and effective prosecution of the war. While the Washington government protected itself against disaffected persons and spies by a system of military police, extending