The English newspapers seem very reluctant to concede to us any advantage in the news of yesterday. They overlook all the favorable parts and see only those which are doubtful. I am nonetheless inclined to belive that a battle between armies which lasts all day and leaves one of them the master of the field in which he finds eight thousand Its estimate of its own loss is very likely to be decisive, especially as it was on the last of several days195 of equally sharp fighting in divisions. Such is my judgment, and yet I have so little confidence in it, on a subject so little familiar to me that I await the next arrival with increased anxiety. We received today newspapers to the morning of the 30.th, before the reception of General Pope’s telegram of that day. The most interesting item to me which I found in them was a notice of my son charles as arrived at Washington on the 28th to join General Pope’s staff. This leaves it uncertain whether he could have joined him by the morning of the 29th The distance would be no obstacle, as his position is not more than twenty or thirty miles off from the field. Unless he should have been embarrassed by his horses and his personal effects not being at hand I am inclined to believe he must have got there. So we must await the news with private as well as public reasons for anxiety. And from this date every telegram will be a trial, and every letter from home, so long as the war lasts. My spirits were depressed all day by this consideration. I wrote a single Despatch in advance of my usual day, as we propose to pay a visit in the country on Friday. It happens just as I fear when I accepted the invitation. Very poor company shall I make. We had to dinner, Mr and Mrs Bigelow, of Paris, and Mr and Mrs Bigelow Lawrence. The former told me of a rumour that Mr Dayton had asked and obtained a recall. I am sorry for this, if it be time, of which I doubt I suspect the source from which it comes, Belgium.