Hardly any event, even in these days of great events, is more melancholy or memorable than the disruption of the United States. The history of England is entitled (with a doubtful exception in favour of that of Rome) to be considered as the most important chapter in the annals of the human race; for it describes the growth of institutions and the development of principles by which the largest and far the most flourishing part of mankind regulate their affairs. In another century, our language and literature, and, to a great extent, our laws and institutions, will express the thoughts and control the conduct of the population of more than half the world; and we have, therefore, an interest closely resembling that which connects blood relations in the prosperity of the great nations sprung from the same stock as ourselves. To every one who takes this view of the feelings which ought to exist between England and the United States, it must be matter of sincere regret that anything should diminish the friendliness of our relations. There is, however, reason to fear that the Americans have been deeply mortified by the feeling with which the secession of the Southern States has been regarded in this country; and if newspaper articles are taken as sufficient evidence of public feeling on the subject, it must be admitted that the feeling, if not wise, is at least intelligible. Our principal journals have, no doubt, uniformly treated the disruption of the Union and the prospect of civil war as great evils; but they have frequently taken a ground which is not in itself reasonable, and which to all Americans, and especially to all Northerners, must be excessively offensive, respecting the whole dispute. They almost invariably discuss the subject as if the case were the simple one of a dependency wishing to free itself from the yoke of a superior, and they constantly dwell upon that most inconclusive and irritating of all topics, the charge of inconsistency. With what pretence of fairness, it is said, can you Americans object to the secession of the Southern States, when your own nation was founded in secession from the British empire? It would be as reasonable to ask how a man, who has successfully defended one action, can ever have the face to be plaintiff in another. The fact, that resistance to a constituted government may sometimes be right, no more proves that it can never be wrong, than the fact that it is right to shoot an invader proves that there is no such crime as murder. The analogy between George III. and Washington, and President Lincoln and President Davis, is just near enough to be at once delusive and annoying. If the object is to vex the Americans, and chuckle with more or less ingenuity over their troubles, the course which our most influential papers have taken is a wise one. If we wish to understand the merits of the question, and the way in which it presents itself to those whom it