Mr. Seward to Mr. Adams.
Sir: Your despatch of April 11, 1862, has been received. It is certainly to be regretted that the British government does not see fit to arrest, in some way, the proceedings of the parties engaged in supplying the insurrectionists in our country with materiel of war. How singularly this course contrasts with the generous enthusiasm of those states which send us soldiers by hundreds of thousands to uphold the American Union.
I have little to add to my recent communications concerning the military movements of the hour. Our generals are crowding the insurgents before them in northern and western Virginia. We hear, at last, of course through insurgent organs, of the beginning of the bombardment of the forts on the Mississippi, below New Orleans, by Captain Porter. We constantly expect the surrender of Fort Macon. But the exciting care of the hour is divided between Yorktown and Corinth. Battles there are imminent. The gain of either of these fields would have a decisive effect. The loss of both seems hardly possible, although calculations upon particular results in war are always uncertain.
The President approves of your visit at Paris, and of the policy you have concluded to adopt as a result of your conference with Mr. Dayton.
I am, sir, your obedient servant,
Charles Francis Adams, Esq., &c., &c., &c.