Cost Of The War To The United States.

One of the professed objects of the war, after the pre- t-ence of repelhng invasion had been abandoned, was the indemnification of " our much-injured citizens," that is, the collection of a few millions of alleged debt. Our fleet and army were employed to collect this debt, and accord- ino; to Mr. Polk, the costs of collection were to be added to the sura due. We not only gave judgment in our own cause, but taxed our owiycosts. Those costs, as nearly as can be ascertained, will, when finally settled, exceed one HUNDRED MILLIONS OF DOLLARS. In civil life, the Very attempt to compel a debtor to pay a bill of costs twenty times the amount of the debt claimed,, would be deemed scandalous extortion. How far the determination of a powerful government, to extort such a bill from a feeble, exhausted State by slaughter and devastation, is divested of criminality on account of its national character, is a question embarrassing only to those who have persuaded themselves that statesmen and politicians are under the jurisdiction of a peculiar and relaxed morality. The idea th^ reparation is due to Mexico for a ruthless invasion, tke devastation of her cities, the plunder of her provinces, the slaughter of thousands and tens of thousands of her people, has been advanced, only to be denounced as un- patriotic, if not treasonable. •^ We have levied upon Mexican territory, for the hundred millions we have spent in attempting to collect a paltry debt, which, after all, we have remitted by the treaty of peace. Mr. Polk declared his determination to prosecute the war till " full indemnity" had been obtained ; but he failed to tell us by what moral arithmetic he ascertained what number of square miles of slave territory will afford a " full indemnity " for the misery, falsehood, and crime engendered by his war.