January 6, Tuesday. Got off dispatches this morning ordering the ironclads south to strengthen Du Pont in his attack on Charleston, which he intends to take, —then Savannah, if not too long delayed, when the ironclads must go around to Pensacola.
Wilkes is not doing as much as we expected. I fear he has more zeal for and finds it more profitable to capture blockade-runners than to hunt for the Alabama. Lord Lyons is preferring complaints against him for want of courtesy, when he is really flinging on him British insults. There is not much love lost between him and John Bull. If Seward would square up firmly we could make Bull behave better.
