THE AMERICAN PRESS ON THE WAR.

Lyttelton Times, Volume XXI, Issue 1228, 28 April 1864, Page 3

THE AMERICAN PRESS ON THE WAR.

The Southern View,

The Spring Campaign.—'There is a great and general revival in the spirits and confidence of our people relative to the war. And there is reason for this Our army is acting nobly, and is in the best of spirits. The men whose three years' terms are approaching their close have ceased to wait upon Congress. From all quarters—from Johnston before Chattanooga, and Lee on the llapidan-glonous tidings come from these gallant veterans. Without any inducement, save the promptings of patriotism and the inspirations of a manly courage, they are coming forward with the utmost enthusiasm, iy regiments and brigades, to volunteer for the war. Our armies are also in excellent health, and will give a good account of themselves in the coming campaign. The spirit of our people is also „ood. There is a general determination to unite in harmonious effort, each in his sphere, to wane the war with our grandest energies. I he news from the enemy is likewise encouraging. They are finding much greater difficulty in recruiting £r armies than we have heretofore supposed. lhe old soldiers are not re-enlisting in the numbers that have been claimed. Meade's army will be composed f nPir levies and how can such as tlieystand befoie ° f IfirlS And what a difference in the spint Tthe amies ! On one side bribes of a thousand re-enlisting with toto. W^ wenfeji try and home-the to ad(l its pei ._ The money crash is C Jl- dustering difficulties plexities to our enemy. Our difficulties, "though in many afford to do it. incline us, beeause we respects greater, earn maintain our c J„„ t ntford 1 f g E nCT(!r to0I)S , sS z Jan. 29. gwitty of Richmond. —Newsare not precisely the best media for

conveying information of a general's plans or purposes. Flaming capitals and notes of exclamation are better fitted for announcing the contemplated movements of prima donnas than of generalissimos, of travelling circuses than of disciplined column?. Yet, in this war of anomalies, it is not impossible that deep laid strategy may be discussed in this unusual manner ; and, among a people so much given to tht: emotions of a busy and sensational press as the Yankees, important military secrets may be foreshadowed through this active reflector of popular sentiment. Already have there been instances in which the speculations of the New York press have been the real shadows of coming events ; and in considering the few obvious modes of prosecuting the war, an inkling of the one adopted may really have been allowed to come to light for the purpose of inspiriting the hopes of the people, and under the belief that combinations of great magnitude cannot, at least in their general outline, be preserved in complete secrecy. There is, then, a possibility that the scheme of a grand combined advance upon Richmond by three distinct lines, with overwhelming forces, announced in the Yankee press, may be the real programme of the spring campaign, it is in harmony with the strategy which Grant, the alleged deviser and contemplated leader of the operation, has heretofore exhibited. The successes which have elevated him so prominently above all the generals of the enemy and probably opened the path for him to seize the glittering prize of the Presidency, have been all won by the vigorous and unsparing application of superior numbers—an advantage and a strategy common to him with his colleagues, but which he has used to a greater extent, and in which he has been favored by propitious chances. Alexander, of Epirus, invaded Italy and encountered the Romans at very nearly the same time that his relative, " Macedon's madman," turned his attention to the softer regions of Asia, routed the tumultuous hosts of Darius and captured his seraglio and his treasures. The fate of the former was very different, and he moralized upon the result by saying that he had fallen on the men's side of the house, while Alexander the Great had invaded that of the women. Grant may have cause to note the difference between the strategy he encountered at Baker's Creek and that which awaits him on the Rappahannock, or at some other point of his proposed triple advance on Richmond, and to moralize upon the fate of his predecessors. That the coming campaign will witness a renewal of the stereotyped advance upon Richmond there is every indication. The Yankee heart pants with an inexpressible longing to plant its cherished gridiron upon the lofty site of that Capitol which looks majestically down upon scenes that the last three years have rendered famous in story. They will come as they have come before, and there is no reason to think that they will not return as they have invariably done before. Every line of advance upon this coveted city has been tried, and it now only remains, in sheer desperation of accomplishing the purpose by a persevering and concerted plan, that they should resort to the doctrine of chances, and trust that, in several simultaneous assaults, luck may befriend them at one point.—Richmond Examiner, Jan. 16.

[ The Northern View. Warnings of Danger from East Tennessee. — Our dispatches of the last day or two from East Tennessee show that the rebels are unusually active in that quarter, and evidently intend to recapture Knoxville, if they can, without much loss of time. This is certainly the game of Longstreet; for he knows that the fortifications of Knoxville may be much more easily carried now than next spring, or next month, or even next week; and he knows, too, from the bountiful manner in which our armies are supplied, that he would be apt to obtain, with the capture of Knoxville, subsistence, medicines, clothing, &c., sufficient to make his army comfortable for two or three months to come. Joe Johnston's forces lately south of Chattanooga, on the roads leading to Dalton, Georgia, are reported by a reconnoitering squad or two of Union cavalry as having disappeared. The immediate inference is that they have been moved round to a junction with Longstreet. The numerous detachments of rebels, infantry and cavalry, which a short time ago were operating in the Shenandoah valley, and in other valleys among the Virginia mountains to the northward, are not now to be found there. Having diverted our attention to the protection of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad and Harper's Ferry, they have probably pushed on to a junction with Longstreet. By these and other reinforcements it may be that Longstreet's column of twenty thousand men when sent out by Bragg has beer) enlarged into a powerful army of fifty thousand meij. Why not? We may safely assume that Jeff.- Dayis is pretty well posted touching the present situation of things, and the advantages which invite him to i immediate action in East Tennessee. He knows, at all events, that without East Tennessee his confederacy is gone, and that all hopes of recovering this important ground may be dismissed if the task shall he dylyyed till the return of spring. The wintry obstacles of rains and snows, and miry loads and swollen streams, may be overcome by Longstreet's halfclad and half-starved soldiers, with the prospect before them of plentiful supplies of provisions and clothing with the surprise and capture of Knoxville. Nor have we any reason to doubt that this daring enterprise is the main object of all these predatory operations of the enemy in Virginia, East Tennessee, and Northern Alabama. Desperate cases call for desperate measures, and thus it is possible that a greater concentration of the enemy may be impending over General Foster than that which stopped the advance of Rosecranz into Georgia. From Washington and from Tennessee we have no lack of reports of the demoralisation of the rebel armies and the desertion of their soldiers. We would admonish the administration, however. Hint we have paid somewhat too dearly for its ciedulity heretofore in regard to such reports, to justify any want of vigilance or preparation at this crisis, in view of a sudden assault by the enemy, Last or West. Let us have no more sleeping or slumbering j over our great success, under the pleasing delusion that the rebellion is ended ; for we apprehend that the hardest fighting of the war is before us and that the enemy will open the ball.—New York Herald^ Jan. 31. . . The Draft for Half a Million of Men. An executive order, published to-day, fixes the longdelayed draft for the 10th of March. It also carries the number for which the drawing will be made from three hundred thousand men, which was the number called for lusfc October, up to Half a Million. Against this number, however, will be credited all who may have enlisted or been drafted prior to the Ist of March, and have not been credited to other calls. We have no data regarding the number that is thus to be substracted from the 500,000, and can, of course, form no precise estimate how many may enlist during the month of grace yet remaining. We are thus left in doubt as to the exact number that will need to be drafted; but as volunteering has been quite brisk, and gives promise of being so, a very handsome subtrahend should appear There is reason to believe that the number needed will not go over three hundred thousand men. We are to conclude from the ordering ot this draft that the Administration, taking into account the needs of the country, and the comparative availability of the two methods of raising troops, Jias adopted it as a measure of necessity. The Government can have no predilections for the draft so strong that it should prefer it as a system to volunteering. Were there any well-grounded certainty that the armies of the Republic would be withini a reasonable time filled up by yoluntee.yecrui s e have uo doubt the Administration would gladly put aside the severe regimen of the cQiiscripti • there is no such certainty, while theie is t.ie present S tapemlive certain,} U». it the ,-ebetaws to be put down, our armies must be » iuea ' c ' (l odo Ft It is therefore, as the country shall elect if the men needed are not forthcoming fnU be accepted a, » the draft. In attempting to estimate tilt uu ciSicy of the coming draft to accomplish the object proposed, it is impossible to go general conjecture, for the provisions under wluch t will lie made have not yet been elaborated by ton cress. The bill, passed by the Senate, is to come up for discussion in the House to-day, a<_ > doubtless, be completed and become a law m the course of the week. Those who have followed the history of this bill through the Senate debates are aware that it will be much more rigid in its piovi S than the act of last year. The (llh - nn i, vnised from 300 dollars to 400 clonals. Besides, persons furnishing substitutes from any source but the class not liable to draft (as aliens, perSL under twenty years of age, &c.) become themselves subject to draft on the exhaustion of the enrolment. This measure was adopted as an indispensable means of avoiding such an abuse CO V*; mutation as would presently have exhausted the SX basis itself. To all those who, on theoretical or practical grounds, dislike the consumption, theie now remains but one course—to volunteer themselves, or to encourage volunteering. 1 here is a month during which the stimulus of he large bounties offered by the Government aswelasSate nnd local bounties, can operate, and after that tliey cease The more we do now, the less °"® rous v St' will be on the Ides of March .-New Yo,k Times, Feb. 1.