their armies on almost
every field,--with the expressed determination of the North to prosecute
the war, be the consequences what they may,--with the constant increase
of Union numbers,--and with the steady refusal of foreign powers to
recognize the Confederacy, or to afford it any countenance or open
assistance,--the Rebels must be infatuated, and determined to provoke
destruction, if they do not soon make overtures for peace.

It is all very well for the "chivalrous classes" at the South, whoever
they may happen to be, to talk about "dying in the last ditch," and of
imitating the action of Pelayo and his friends; but common folk like to
die in their beds, and to receive the inevitable visitant with decorum,
to an exhibition of which ditches are decidedly unfavorable. As to
Pelayo, he lived in an age in which there were neither railways nor
rifled cannon, neither steamships nor Parrott guns, neither Monitors
nor greenbacks,--else he and his would either have been routed out of
the Asturian Mountains, or have been compelled to remain there forever.
The conditions of modern life and society are highly unfavorable to
those heroic modes of resistance and existence in which alone gentlemen
of Pelayo's pursuits can hope to flourish. We Saracens of the North
would ask nothing better than to have Pelayo Davis lead all his valiant
ragamuffins into the strongest range of mountains that could be found in
all Secessia, there to establish the new Kingdom of Gijon. We should
deserve the worst that could befall us, if we failed to vindicate the
common American idea, that this country is no place for lovers of crowns
and kingdoms.

As to the guerrillas, we know that they are an exasperating set of
fellows, but they must soon disappear before the advance of the Union
armies. A guerrillade on an extensive scale and of long continuance is
possible only while it is supported by the presence of large and
successful regular armies. Had Wellington been driven out of the
Peninsula, the Spanish guerrillas would have given little trouble to the
intrusive French king at Madrid. Defeat Lee, and Mosby will vanish.
After all, the Southern guerrillas are not much worse than other
Southrons were at no very remote period. It is within the memory of even
middle-aged persons, that the southwestern portion of our country was in
as lawless a state as ever were the borders of England and Scotland, and
with no Belted Will to hang up ruffians to swing in t