o pursue. Gen. H. was the
Governor of South Carolina during the nullification crisis, and is fully
imbued with the spirit of resistance to the Union. But he is also a man
of great practical sagacity, and after carefully surveying the whole
field, he is convinced that action now on the part of South Carolina
would be ruinous to her cause. He has been all through the Southern
States, and says he is satisfied that, in the event of such action,
there is not another Southern State that would join her in it. He
sketches the state of feeling in each of the States he has visited, and
represents the Union party as decidedly in the ascendant in every one of
them. He proceeds to say that although some of the recent measures of
Congress, and particularly the admission of California, were exceedingly
unjust to the South, yet they afford no justification for a disruption
of the confederacy. Many, he says, believe that in the event of
secession a collision will arise with the Federal Government, and South
Carolina would have the sympathy and the aid of the other Southern
States. But he does not believe the Federal Government would bring on
any such collision; he thinks they would only prevent goods from
entering their ports, carry the mail directly past them, and transfer
all the commerce which they now enjoy to Savannah. He thinks South
Carolina should await the result of the great battle in the North,
between those who stand up for the rights of the South and their
opponents. If the latter prevail and elect their President two years
hence, the fugitive slave law will be repealed, slavery will be
abolished in the District of Columbia, and a crisis will then occur
which will inevitably unite the South. He urges them to await this
event. The letter is written with great energy and eloquence, and will
have a wide and marked influence upon public sentiment.

A complimentary public dinner was given to Hon. JOHN M. CLAYTON at
Wilmington, on the 16th of November, by his political friends. Mr.
CLAYTON, in reply to a complimentary toast, made an extended and
eloquent speech, mainly in vindication of the administration of Gen.
TAYLOR from the reproach which political opponents had thrown upon it.
He showed that in proposing to admit California as a State, and to
organize the territories of New Mexico and Utah as States, with such
constitutions as their inhabitants might see fit to frame, Gen. TAYLOR
only followed the recommendations which had