SAD CONDITION OF THE CONFEDERATE STATES.

Colonist, Volume VII, Issue 663, 4 March 1864, Page 3

SAD CONDITION OF THE CONFEDERATE STATES.

The World, a New York journal in the Copperhead interest, and therefore favourable to the South, in its editorial column of December Bth publishes the folio win " extract trom a letter written by a lady who has spent some time in the South, and for whose respectability the World vouches — " The desolation of the Southern States be^ars description. Destitution and poverty °have taken the place of opulence and prosperity. Men that were worth hundreds of thousands are reduced to utter poverty. As for the luxuries of life, formerly so abundant in the South, there are none. Who were formerly the wealthiest have nothing to sustain lilb but what the country affords, and not enough of that, for by impressment it is taken from them for the army. Their garments, even their shoes, the families have to make themselves. They spin, weave and dye their cotton homespun clothes rich and poor. Tea coffee, and sugar are not to be had; milk and water are the only beverages; Indian corn is their principal food. The families ara broken up and ruined. You seldom meet with a single male inhabitant, and, if you do, he is either infirm or a cripple. A large portion of the ma^e population are killed in battle, many more crippled for lifetime; many patriotic Union men died of a broken heart. What remain are in the army or in the employment of the Government. Nevertheless., press-gangs cross the country in all directions in search of men for the army. All ties of social life are completely dissolved. No courts ofjusticeor equity are held—justice is meted out by the military. Universities, colleges, and schools are all suspended. The country, in many places resembles a wilderness. Wherever the armies march, there everything is ruined: " the crops destroyed, fences burned, trees cut down, domestic animals killed, robbed, or taken for the army. But whatever the Southern people suffer, they bear it with heroism and resignation • they have little hope of success. There are very few, if any, who prefer ignominy to death. Under the impending Congressional and Presidential measures, they deem it impossible to surrender at discretion, and are now resolved to bear utter destruction."

There is perhaps no doubt that this description only applies in full to those parts which have been ravaged by the war; but the fact-that since the Confederate defeat at Chattanooga, all the males in Georgia above 15 years old have been called out, shows howhard driven the South is for men.