recently from Charleston (I do believe it),
_Charleston_ will not be taken. If the ground be taken, it will not be
Charleston. If the forts fall, and our two rams be taken or destroyed,
the defenders will still resist. Rifle-pits have been dug in the
streets; and if driven from these, there are batteries beyond to sweep
the streets, thus involving the enemy and the city in one common ruin.

APRIL 8TH.--We learn to-day that the enemy bombarded our forts at
Charleston, yesterday, two hours and a half. But few of our men were
injured, and the forts sustained no damage of consequence. On the other
hand, several of the iron-clads and monitors of the enemy were badly
crippled; one of the latter, supposed to be the Keokuk, was sunk. Since
then the bombardment has not been renewed. But no doubt the enemy will
make other efforts to reduce a city which is the particular object of
their vengeance. Every one is on the _qui vive_ for further news from
Charleston. Success there will make Beauregard the most popular man in
the Confederacy, Lee excepted.

Speculation is running wild in this city; and the highest civil and
military officers are said to be engaged, directly or indirectly, in the
disgraceful business of smuggling. Mr. Memminger cannot be ignorant of
this; and yet these men are allowed to retain their places.

APRIL 9TH.--Nothing additional has occurred at Charleston, the enemy not
having renewed the attack. At Vicksburg all was quiet, and the enemy
abandoning their canal. Such news must have a depressing effect upon the
North. They will see that their monitors and iron-clads have lost their
terrors. They have lost some twenty war steamers within the last few
months; and how many of their merchantmen have been destroyed on the
ocean, we have no means of knowing.

British and French capitalists have taken a cotton loan of $15,000,000,
which is now selling at a premium of four per cent. in those countries.
Our government can, if it will, soon have a navy of Alabamas and
Floridas.

But we are in danger of being sold to the enemy by the blockade-runners
in this city. High officers, civil and military, are said, perhaps
maliciously, to be engaged in the unlawful trade hitherto carried on by
the Jews. It is said that the flag of truce boats serve as a medium of
negotiations between official dignitaries here and those at Washington;
and I have no doubt many of the Federal officers at Washington, for the
sake of lucre, make n