In the city, the excitement kept increasing; but after the first battle, the patriotism of the population received a new impulse. In the night attack many of the troops had lost all their clothing except that which they wore on their backs, and hence soon began to suffer. No sooner was this known to the ladies than their fair hands were in motion; and in a short time the wants of the soldiers were supplied. In the mean time the long-expected Kentucky troops, upwards of two thousand strong, arrived. Courier after courier had been sent to hurry their march; and the last day had been one of incredible toil and speed. Only five hundred of them, however, had muskets; the rest were armed with fowling-pieces, and such weapons as they could lay hands on. Nor were there any means of supplying them, so that the accession of strength was comparatively trifling. Gen. Lambert, too, had reinforced the British with several thousand veteran troops. A canal in the mean time had been widened through the levee, by which boats were transported to the Mississippi for that portion of the army which was destined to act against the fortifications on the west bank, commanded by General Morgan. A long siege was out of the question, and now nothing remained to be done but to advance at once to the assault of the American intrenchments, or abandon the expedition. The latter alternative was not to be contemplated; and, on the night of the 7th, Jackson, surveying the encampment through his glass, discovered unmistakeable evidence that the enemy was meditating an important movement. The camp was in commotion; the boats which had been dragged through the canal, and now lay moored to the levee, were being loaded with artillery and munitions of war, and every thing betokened a hot to-morrow. Coffee still held the swamp on the left; Carroll, with his Tennesseans, the centre; while Jackson, with the regulars under him, commanded in person the right, resting on the river. Behind Carroll were placed the Kentuckians, under General Adair--in all, less than four thousand effective men. [Sidenote: Jan. 8.] This was the position of affairs as the Sabbath morning of the 8th of January began to dawn. The light had scarcely streaked the east, when the inhabitants of New Orleans were startled from their slumbers by an explosion of cannon that shook the city. The battle had opened. Under cover of the night, heavy batteries had been erected within eight hundred yards of the American intrenchments, and, the moment the fog lifted above them, they opened their fire. Directly after, a rocket, rising through the mist near the swamp, and another answering it from the shore, announced that all was ready. The next moment, two columns, each four or five thousand strong--one moving straight on Carrol's position, the other against the right of the intrenchments--swept steadily and swiftly across the plain. Three thrilling cheers rose over the dark