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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/28926-8.txt b/28926-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9da3455 --- /dev/null +++ b/28926-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8813 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Diary from March 4, 1861, to November 12, +1862, by Adam Gurowski + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Diary from March 4, 1861, to November 12, 1862 + + +Author: Adam Gurowski + + + +Release Date: May 22, 2009 [eBook #28926] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DIARY FROM MARCH 4, 1861, TO +NOVEMBER 12, 1862*** + + +E-text prepared by David Edwards, Christine P. Travers, and the Project +Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from +digital material generously made available by Internet Archive +(http://www.archive.org) + + + +Note: Images of the original pages are available through + Internet Archive. See + http://www.archive.org/details/diarycivilwar01gurouoft + + +Transcriber's note: + + Obvious printer's errors have been corrected. Hyphenation and + accentuation have been standardised. All other inconsistencies + are as in the original. The author's spelling has been retained. + + + + + +DIARY, FROM MARCH 4, 1861, TO NOVEMBER 12, 1862. + +by + +ADAM GUROWSKI. + + + + + + + +Boston: +Lee and Shepard, +Successors to Phillips, Sampson & Co. +1862. + +Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1862, by +Lee and Shepard, +In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of +Massachusetts. + + + + +Dedicated + +TO + +THE WIDOWED WIVES, THE BEREAVED MOTHERS, SISTERS, + +SWEETHEARTS, AND ORPHANS + +IN + +THE LOYAL STATES. + + + + +_On doit ŕ son pays sa fortune, sa vie, mais avant tout la Vérité._ + + +In this Diary I recorded what I heard and saw myself, and what I heard +from others, on whose veracity I can implicitly rely. + +I recorded impressions as immediately as I felt them. A life almost +wholly spent in the tempests and among the breakers of our times has +taught me that the first impressions are the purest and the best. + +If they ever peruse these pages, my friends and acquaintances will +find therein what, during these horrible national trials, was a +subject of our confidential conversations and discussions, what in +letters and by mouth was a subject of repeated forebodings and +warnings. Perhaps these pages may in some way explain a phenomenon +almost unexampled in history,--that twenty millions of people, brave, +highly intelligent, and mastering all the wealth of modern +civilization, were, if not virtually overpowered, at least so long +kept at bay by about five millions of rebels. + + GUROWSKI. + +WASHINGTON, NOVEMBER, 1862. + + + + +CONTENTS. + + + MARCH, 1861. 13 + +Inauguration day -- The message -- Scott watching at the door of the +Union -- The Cabinet born -- The Seward and Chase struggle -- The New +York radicals triumph -- The treason spreads -- The Cabinet pays old +party debts -- The diplomats confounded -- Poor Senators! -- Sumner is +like a hare tracked by hounds -- Chase in favor of recognizing the +revolted States -- Blunted axes -- Blair demands action, brave fellow! +-- The slave-drivers -- The month of March closes -- No foresight! no +foresight! + + + APRIL, 1861. 22 + +Seward parleying with the rebel commissioners -- Corcoran's dinner -- +The crime in full blast! -- 75,000 men called for -- Massachusetts +takes the lead -- Baltimore -- Defence of Washington -- Blockade +discussed -- France our friend, not England -- Warning to the +President -- Virginia secedes -- Lincoln warned again -- Seward says +it will all blow over in sixty to ninety days -- Charles F. Adams -- +The administration undecided; the people alone inspired -- Slavery +must perish! -- The Fabian policy -- The Blairs -- Strange conduct of +Scott -- Lord Lyons -- Secret agent to Canada. + + + MAY, 1861. 37 + +The administration tossed by expedients -- Seward to Dayton -- +Spread-eagleism -- One phasis of the American Union finished -- The +fuss about Russell -- Pressure on the administration increases -- +Seward, Wickoff, and the Herald -- Lord Lyons menaced with passports +-- The splendid Northern army -- The administration not up to the +occasion -- The new men -- Andrew, Wadsworth, Boutwell, Noyes, Wade, +Trumbull, Walcott, King, Chandler, Wilson -- Lyon jumps over formulas +-- Governor Banks needed -- Butler takes Baltimore with two regiments +-- News from England -- The "belligerent" question -- Butler and Scott +-- Seward and the diplomats -- "What a Merlin!" -- "France not bigger +than New York!" -- Virginia invaded -- Murder of Ellsworth -- Harpies +at the White House. + + + JUNE, 1861. 50 + +Butler emancipates slaves -- The army not organized -- Promenades -- +The blockade -- Louis Napoleon -- Scott all in all -- Strategy! -- Gun +contracts -- The diplomats -- Masked batteries -- Seward writes for +"bunkum" -- Big Bethel -- The Dayton letter -- Instructions to Mr. +Adams. + + + JULY, 1861. 60 + +The Evening Post -- The message -- The administration caught napping +-- McDowell -- Congress slowly feels its way -- Seward's great +facility of labor -- Not a Know-Nothing -- Prophesies a speedy end -- +Carried away by his imagination -- Says "secession is over" -- Hopeful +views -- Politeness of the State department -- Scott carries on the +campaign from his sleeping room -- Bull Run -- Rout -- Panic -- +"Malediction! Malediction!" -- Not a manly word in Congress! -- Abuse +of the soldiers -- McClellan sent for -- Young-blood -- Gen. Wadsworth +-- Poor McDowell! -- Scott responsible -- Plan of reorganization -- +Let McClellan beware of routine. + + + AUGUST, 1861. 78 + +The truth about Bull Run -- The press staggers -- The Blairs alone +firm -- Scott's military character -- Seward -- Mr. Lincoln reads the +Herald -- The ubiquitous lobbyist -- Intervention -- Congress adjourns +-- The administration waits for something to turn up -- Wade -- Lyon +is killed -- Russell and his shadow -- The Yankees take the loan -- +Bravo, Yankees! -- McClellan works hard -- Prince Napoleon -- Manassas +fortifications a humbug -- Mr. Seward improves -- Old Whigism -- +McClellan's powers enlarged -- Jeff. Davis makes history -- Fremont +emancipates in Missouri -- The Cabinet. + + + SEPTEMBER, 1861. 92 + +What will McClellan do? -- Fremont disavowed -- The Blairs not in +fault -- Fremont ignorant and a bungler -- Conspiracy to destroy him +-- Seward rather on his side -- McClellan's staff -- A Marcy will not +do! -- McClellan publishes a slave-catching order -- The people move +onward -- Mr. Seward again -- West Point -- The Washington defences -- +What a Russian officer thought of them -- Oh, for battles! -- Fremont +wishes to attack Memphis; a bold move! -- Seward's influence over +Lincoln -- The people for Fremont -- Col. Romanoff's opinion of the +generals -- McClellan refuses to move -- Manoeuvrings -- The people +uneasy -- The staff -- The Orleans -- Brave boys! -- The Potomac +closed -- Oh, poor nation! -- Mexico -- McClellan and Scott. + + + OCTOBER, 1861. 104 + +Experiments on the people's life-blood -- McClellan's uniform -- The +army fit to move -- The rebels treat us like children -- We lose time +-- Everything is defensive -- The starvation theory -- The anaconda -- +First interview with McClellan -- Impressions of him -- His distrust +of the volunteers -- Not a Napoleon nor a Garibaldi -- Mason and +Slidell -- Seward admonishes Adams -- Fremont goes overboard -- The +pro-slavery party triumph -- The collateral missions to Europe -- +Peace impossible -- Every Southern gentleman is a pirate -- When will +we deal blows? -- Inertia! inertia! + + + NOVEMBER, 1861. 115 + +Ball's Bluff -- Whitewashing -- "Victoria! Old Scott gone overboard!" +-- His fatal influence -- His conceit -- Cameron -- Intervention -- +More reviews -- Weed, Everett, Hughes -- Gov. Andrew -- Boutwell -- +Mason and Slidell caught -- Lincoln frightened by the South Carolina +success -- Waits unnoticed in McClellan's library -- Gen. Thomas -- +Traitors and pedants -- The Virginia campaign -- West Point -- +McClellan's speciality -- When will they begin to see through him? + + + DECEMBER, 1861. 129 + +The message -- Emancipation -- State papers published -- Curtis Noyes +-- Greeley not fit for Senator -- Generalship all on the rebel side -- +The South and the North -- The sensationists -- The new idol will cost +the people their life-blood! -- The Blairs -- Poor Lincoln! -- The +Trent affair -- Scott home again -- The war investigation committee -- +Mr. Mercier. + + + JANUARY, 1862. 137 + +The year 1861 ends badly -- European defenders of slavery -- Secession +lies -- Jeremy Diddlers -- Sensation-seekers -- Despotic tendencies -- +Atomistic Torquemadas -- Congress chained by formulas -- Burnside's +expedition a sign of life -- Will this McClellan ever advance? -- Mr. +Adams unhorsed -- He packs his trunks -- Bad blankets -- Austria, +Prussia, and Russia -- The West Point nursery -- McClellan a greater +mistake than Scott -- Tracks to the White House -- European stories +about Mr. Lincoln -- The English ignorami -- The slaveholder a +scarcely varnished savage -- Jeff. Davis -- "Beauregard frightens us +-- McClellan rocks his baby" -- Fancy army equipment -- McClellan and +his chief of staff sick in bed -- "No satirist could invent such +things" -- Stanton in the Cabinet -- "This Stanton is the people" -- +Fremont -- Weed -- The English will not be humbugged -- Dayton in a +fret -- Beaufort -- The investigating committee condemn McClellan -- +Lincoln in the clutches of Seward and Blair -- Banks begs for guns and +cavalry in vain -- The people will awake! -- The question of race -- +Agassiz. + + + FEBRUARY, 1862. 151 + +Drifting -- The English blue book -- Lord John could not act +differently -- Palmerston the great European fuss-maker -- Mr. +Seward's "two pickled rods" for England -- Lord Lyons -- His pathway +strewn with broken glass -- Gen. Stone arrested -- Sumner's +resolutions infuse a new spirit in the Constitution -- Mr. Seward +beyond salvation -- He works to save slavery -- Weed has ruined him -- +The New York press -- "Poor Tribune" -- The Evening Post -- The Blairs +-- Illusions dispelled -- "All quiet on the Potomac" -- The London +papers -- Quill-heroes can be bought for a dinner -- French opinion -- +Superhuman efforts to save slavery -- It is doomed! -- "All you +worshippers of darkness cannot save it!" -- The Hutchinsons -- +Corporal Adams -- Victories in the West -- Stanton the man! -- +Strategy (hear!) + + + MARCH, 1862. 165 + +The Africo-Americans -- Fremont -- The Orleans -- Confiscation -- +American nepotism -- The Merrimac -- Wooden guns -- Oh shame! -- Gen. +Wadsworth -- The rats have the best of Stanton -- McClellan goes to +Fortress Monroe -- Utter imbecility -- The embarkation -- McClellan a +turtle -- He will stick in the marshes -- Louis Napoleon behaves nobly +-- So does Mr. Mercier -- Queen Victoria for freedom -- The great +strategian -- Senator Sumner and the French minister -- Archbishop +Hughes -- His diplomatic activity not worth the postage on his +correspondence -- Alberoni-Seward -- Love's labor lost. + + + APRIL, 1862. 180 + +Immense power of the President -- Mr. Seward's Egeria -- Programme of +peace -- The belligerent question -- Roebucks and Gregories scums -- +Running the blockade -- Weed and Seward take clouds for camels -- +Uncle Sam's pockets -- Manhood, not money, the sinews of war -- +Colonization schemes -- Senator Doolittle -- Coal mine speculation -- +Washington too near the seat of war -- Blair demands the return of a +fugitive slave woman -- Slavery is Mr. Lincoln's "_mammy_" -- He will +not destroy her -- Victories in the West -- The brave navy -- +McClellan subsides in mud before Yorktown -- Telegraphs for more men +-- God will be tired out! -- Great strength of the people -- +Emancipation in the District -- Wade's speech -- He is a monolith -- +Chase and Seward -- N. Y. Times -- The Rothschilds -- Army movements +and plans. + + + MAY, 1862. 198 + +Capture of New Orleans -- The second siege of Troy -- Mr. Seward +lights his lantern to search for the Union-saving party -- +Subserviency to power -- Vitality of the people -- Yorktown evacuated +-- Battle of Williamsburg -- Great bayonet charge! -- Heintzelman and +Hooker -- McClellan telegraphs that the enemy outnumber him -- The +terrible enemy evacuate Williamsburg -- The track of truth begins to +be lost -- Oh Napoleon! -- Oh spirit of Berthier! -- Dayton not in +favor -- Events are too rapid for Lincoln -- His integrity -- Too +tender of men's feelings -- Halleck -- Ten thousand men disabled by +disease -- The Bishop of Orleans -- The rebels retreat without the +knowledge of McNapoleon -- Hunter's proclamation -- Too noble for Mr. +Lincoln -- McClellan again subsides in mud -- Jackson defeats Banks, +who makes a masterly retreat -- Bravo, Banks! -- The aulic council +frightened -- Gov. Andrew's letter -- Sigel -- English opinion -- Mr. +Mill -- Young Europa -- Young Germany -- Corinth evacuated -- Oh, +generalship! -- McDowell grimly persecuted by bad luck. + + + JUNE, 1862. 218 + +Diplomatic circulars seasoned by stories -- Battle before Richmond -- +Casey's division disgraced -- McClellan afterwards confesses he was +misinformed -- Fair Oaks -- "Nobody is hurt, only the bleeding people" +-- Fremont disobeys orders -- N. Y. Times, World, and Herald, +opinion-poisoning sheets -- Napoleon never visible before nine o'clock +in the morning -- Hooker and the other fighters soldered to the mud -- +Senator Sumner shows the practical side of his intellect -- "Slavery a +big job!" -- McClellan sends for mortars -- Defenders of slavery in +Congress worse than the rebels -- Wooden guns and cotton sentries at +Corinth -- The navy is glorious -- Brave old Gideon Welles! -- July +4th to be celebrated in Richmond! -- Colonization again -- Justice to +France -- New regiments -- The people sublime! -- Congress -- Lincoln +visits Scott -- McDowell -- Pope -- Disloyalty in the departments. + + + JULY, 1862. 233 + +Intervention -- The cursed fields of the Chickahominy -- Titanic +fightings, but no generalship -- McClellan the first to reach James +river -- The Orleans leave -- July 4th, the gloomiest since the birth +of the republic -- Not reinforcements, but brains, wanted; and brains +not transferable! -- The people run to the rescue -- Rebel tactics -- +Lincoln does not sacrifice Stanton -- McClellan not the greatest +culprit -- Stanton a true statesman -- The President goes to James +river -- The Union as it was, a throttling nightmare! -- A man needed! +-- Confiscation bill signed -- Congress adjourned -- Mr. Dicey -- +Halleck, the American Carnot -- Lincoln tries to neutralize the +confiscation bill -- Guerillas spread like locusts. + + + AUGUST, 1862. 245 + +Emancipation -- The President's hand falls back -- Weed sent for -- +Gen. Wadsworth -- The new levies -- The Africo-Americans not called +for -- Let every Northern man be shot rather! -- End of the Peninsula +campaign -- Fifty or sixty thousand dead -- Who is responsible? -- The +army saved -- Lincoln and McClellan -- The President and the +Africo-Americans -- An Eden in Chiriqui -- Greeley -- The old lion +begins to awake -- Mr. Lincoln tells stories -- The rebels take the +offensive -- European opinion -- McClellan's army landed -- Roebuck -- +Halleck -- Butler's mistakes -- Hunter recalled -- Terrible fighting +at Manassas -- Pope cuts his way through -- Reinforcements slow +incoming -- McClellan reduced in command. + + + SEPTEMBER, 1862. 258 + +_Consummatum est!_ -- Will the outraged people avenge itself? -- +McClellan satisfies the President -- After a year! -- The truth will +be throttled -- Public opinion in Europe begins to abandon us -- The +country marching to its tomb -- Hooker, Kearney, Heintzelman, Sigel, +brave and true men -- Supremacy of mind over matter -- Stanton the +last Roman -- Inauguration of the pretorian regime -- Pope accuses +three generals -- Investigation prevented by McClellan -- McDowell +sacrificed -- The country inundated with lies -- The demoralized army +declares for McClellan -- The pretorians will soon finish with liberty +-- Wilkes sent to the West Indian waters -- Russia -- Mediation -- +Invasion of Maryland -- Strange story about Stanton -- Richmond never +invested -- McClellan in search of the enemy -- Thirty miles in six +days -- The telegrams -- Wadsworth -- Capitulation of Harper's Ferry +-- Five days' fighting -- Brave Hooker wounded -- No results -- No +reports from McClellan -- Tactics of the Maryland campaign -- Nobody +hurt in the staff -- Charmed lives -- Wadsworth, Judge Conway, Wade, +Boutwell, Andrew -- This most intelligent people become the +laughing-stock of the world! -- The proclamation of emancipation -- +Seward to the Paisley Association -- Future complications -- If Hooker +had not been wounded! -- The military situation -- Sigel persecuted by +West Point -- Three cheers for the carriage and six! -- How the great +captain was to catch the rebel army -- Interview with the Chicago +deputation -- Winter quarters -- The conspiracy against Sigel -- +Numbers of the rebel army -- Letters of marque. + + + OCTOBER, 1862. 288 + +Costly infatuation -- The do-nothing strategy -- Cavalry on lame +horses -- Bayonet charges -- Antietam -- Effect of the Proclamation -- +Disasters in the West -- The Abolitionists not originally hostile to +McClellan -- Helplessness in the War Department -- Devotedness of the +people -- McClellan and the proclamation -- Wilkes -- Colonel Key -- +Routine engineers -- Rebel raid into Pennsylvania -- Stanton's +sincerity -- Oh, unfighting strategians -- The administration a +success -- _De gustibus_ -- Stuart's raid -- West Point -- St. Domingo +-- The President's letter to McClellan -- Broad church -- The +elections -- The Republican party gone -- The remedy at the polls -- +McClellan wants to be relieved -- Mediation -- Compromise -- The +rhetors -- The optimists -- The foreigners -- Scott and Buchanan -- +Gladstone -- Foreign opinion and action -- Both the extremes to be put +down -- Spain -- Fremont's campaign against Jackson -- Seward's +circular -- General Scott's gift -- "Oh, could I go to a camp!" -- +McClellan crosses the Potomac -- Prays for rain -- Fevers decimate the +regiments -- Martindale and Fitz John Porter -- The political balance +to be preserved -- New regiments -- O poor country! + + + NOVEMBER, 1862. 311 + +Empty rhetoric -- The future dark and terrible -- Wadsworth defeated +-- The official bunglers blast everything they touch -- Great and holy +day! McClellan gone overboard! -- The planters -- Burnside -- +McClellan nominated for President -- Awful events approaching -- +Dictatorship dawns on the horizon -- The catastrophe. + + + + +DIARY. + + + + +MARCH, 1861. + + Inauguration day -- The message -- Scott watching at the door of + the Union -- The Cabinet born -- The Seward and Chase struggle -- + The New York radicals triumph -- The treason spreads -- The + Cabinet pays old party debts -- The diplomats confounded -- Poor + Senators! -- Sumner is like a hare tracked by hounds -- Chase in + favor of recognizing the revolted States -- Blunted axes -- Blair + demands action, brave fellow! -- The slave-drivers -- The month + of March closes -- No foresight! no foresight! + + +For the first time in my life I assisted at the simplest and grandest +spectacle--the inauguration of a President. Lincoln's message good, +according to circumstances, but not conclusive; it is not positive; it +discusses questions, but avoids to assert. May his mind not be +altogether of the same kind. Events will want and demand more +positiveness and action than the message contains assertions. The +immense majority around me seems to be satisfied. Well, well; I wait, +and prefer to judge and to admire when actions will speak. + +I am sure that a great drama will be played, equal to any one known in +history, and that the insurrection of the slave-drivers will not end +in smoke. So I now decide to keep a diary in my own way. I scarcely +know any of those men who are considered as leaders; the more +interesting to observe them, to analyze their mettle, their actions. +This insurrection may turn very complicated; if so, it must generate +more than one revolutionary manifestation. What will be its +march--what stages? Curious; perhaps it may turn out more interesting +than anything since that great renovation of humanity by the great +French Revolution. + +The old, brave warrior, Scott, watched at the door of the Union; his +shadow made the infamous rats tremble and crawl off, and so Scott +transmitted to Lincoln what was and could be saved during the +treachery of Buchanan. + +By the most propitious accident, I assisted at the throes among which +Mr. Lincoln's Cabinet was born. They were very painful, but of the +highest interest for me, and I suppose for others. I participated some +little therein. + +A pledge bound Mr. Lincoln to make Mr. Seward his Secretary of State. +The radical and the puritanic elements in the Republican party were +terribly scared. His speeches, or rather demeanor and repeated +utterances since the opening of the Congress, his influence on Mr. +Adams, who, under Seward's inspiration, made his speech _de lana +caprina_, and voted for compromises and concessions,--all this spread +and fortified the general and firm belief that Mr. Seward was ready to +give up many from among the cardinal articles of the Republican creed +of which he was one of the most ardent apostles. They, the +Republicans, speak of him in a way to remind me of the dictum, "_omnia +serviliter pro dominatione_," as they accuse him now of subserviency +to the slave power. The radical and puritan Republicans likewise dread +him on account of his close intimacy with a Thurlow Weed, a Matteson, +and with similar not over-cautious--as they call them--lobbyists. + +Some days previous to the inauguration, Mr. Seward brought Mr. Lincoln +on the Senate floor, of course on the Republican side; but soon Mr. +Seward was busily running among Democrats, begging them to be +introduced to Lincoln. It was a saddening, humiliating, and revolting +sight for the galleries, where I was. Criminal as is Mason, for a +minute I got reconciled to him for the scowl of horror and contempt +with which he shook his head at Seward. The whole humiliating +proceeding foreshadowed the future policy. Only two or three +Democratic Senators were moved by Seward's humble entreaties. The +criminal Mason has shown true manhood. + +The first attempt of sincere Republicans was to persuade Lincoln to +break his connection with Seward. This failed. To neutralize what was +considered quickly to become a baneful influence in Mr. Lincoln's +councils, the Republicans united on Gov. Chase. This Seward opposed +with all his might. Mr. Lincoln wavered, hesitated, and was bending +rather towards Mr. Seward. The struggle was terrific, lasted several +days, when Chase was finally and triumphantly forced into the +Cabinet. It was necessary not to leave him there alone against Seward, +and perhaps Bates, the old cunning Whig. Again terrible opposition by +Seward, but it was overcome by the radicals in the House, in the +Senate, and outside of Congress by such men as Curtis, Noyes, J. S. +Wadsworth, Opdyke, Barney, &c., &c., and Blair was brought in. Cameron +was variously opposed, but wished to be in by Seward; Welles was from +the start considered sound and safe in every respect; Smith was +considered a Seward man. + +From what I witnessed of Cabinet-making in Europe, above all in France +under Louis Philippe, I do not forebode anything good in the coming-on +shocks and eruptions, and I am sure these must come. This Cabinet as +it stands is not a fusion of various shadowings of a party, but it is +a violent mixing or putting together of inimical and repulsive forces, +which, if they do not devour, at the best will neutralize each other. + +Senator Wilson answered Douglass in the Senate, that "when the +Republican party took the power, treason was in the army, in the navy, +in the administration," etc. Dreadful, but true assertion. It is to be +seen how the administration will act to counteract this ramified +treason. + +What a run, a race for offices. This spectacle likewise new to me. + +The Cabinet Ministers, or, as they call them here, the Secretaries, have +old party debts to pay, old sores to avenge or to heal, and all this by +distributing offices, or by what they call it here--patronage. Through +patronage and offices everybody is to serve his friends and his party, +and to secure his political position. Some of the party leaders seem to +me similar to children enjoying a long-expected and ardently wished-for +toy. Some of the leaders are as generals who abandon the troops in a +campaign, and take to travel in foreign parts. Most of them act as if +they were sure that the battle is over. It begins only, but nobody, or +at least very few of the interested, seem to admit that the country is +on fire, that a terrible struggle begins. (Wrote in this sense an +article for the National Intelligencer; insertion refused.) They, the +leaders, look to create engines for their own political security, but no +one seems to look over Mason and Dixon's line to the terrible and with +lightning-like velocity spreading fire of hellish treason. + +The diplomats utterly upset, confused, and do not know what god to +worship. All their associations were with Southerners, now traitors. +In Southern talk, or in that of treacherous Northern Democrats, the +diplomats learned what they know about this country. Not one of them +is familiar, is acquainted with the genuine people of the North; with +its true, noble, grand, and pure character. It is for them a terra +incognita, as is the moon. The little they know of the North is the +few money or cotton bags of New York, Boston, Philadelphia,--these +would-be betters, these dinner-givers, and whist-players. The +diplomats consider Seward as the essence of Northern feeling. + +How little the thus-called statesmen know Europe. Sumner, Seward, etc. +already have under consideration if Europe will recognize the secesh. +Europe recognizes _faits accomplis_, and a great deal of blood will +run before secesh becomes _un fait accompli_. These Sewards, Sumners, +etc. pay too much attention to the silly talk of the European +diplomats in Washington; and by doing this these would-be statesmen +prove how ignorant they are of history in general, and specially +ignorant of the policy of European cabinets. Before a struggle decides +a question a recognition is bosh, and I laugh at it. + +The race, the race increases with a fearful rapidity. No flood does it +so quick. Poor Senators! Some of them must spend nights and days to +decide on whom to bestow this or that office. Secretaries or Ministers +wrangle, _fight_ (that is the word used), as if life and death +depended upon it. + +Poor (Carlylian-meaning) good-natured Senator Sumner, in his earnest, +honest wish to be just and of service to everybody, looks as a hare +tracked by hounds; so are at him office-seekers from the whole +country. This hunting degrades the hounds, and enervates the patrons. + +I am told that the President is wholly absorbed in adjusting, +harmonizing the amount of various salaries bestowed on various States +through its office-holders and office-seekers. + +It were better if the President would devote his time to calculate +the forces and resources needed to quench the fire. Over in Montgomery +the slave-drivers proceed with the terrible, unrelenting, fearless +earnestness of the most unflinching criminals. + +After all, these crowds of office-hunters are far from representing +the best element of the genuine, laborious, intelligent people,--of +its true healthy stamina. This is consoling for me, who know the +American people in the background of office-hunters. + +Of course an alleviating circumstance is, that the method, the system, +the routine, oblige, nay force, everybody to ask, to hunt. As in the +Scriptures, "Ask, and you will get; or knock, and it will be opened." +Of course, many worthy, honorable, deserving men, who would be +ornaments to the office, must run the gauntlet together with the +hounds. + +It is reported, and I am sure of the truth of the report, that +Governor Chase is for recognizing, or giving up the revolted Cotton +States, so as to save by it the Border States, and eventually to fight +for their remaining in the Union. What logic! If the treasonable +revolt is conceded to the Cotton States, on what ground can it be +denied to the thus called Border States? I am sorry that Chase has +such notions. + +It is positively asserted by those who ought to know, that Seward, +having secured to himself the Secretaryship of State, offered to the +Southern leaders in Congress compromise and concessions, to assure, by +such step, his confirmation by the Democratic vote. The chiefs +refused the bargain, distrusting him. All this was going on for weeks, +nay months, previous to the inauguration, so it is asserted. But +Seward might have been anxious to preserve the Union at any price. His +enemies assert that if Seward's plan had succeeded, virtually the +Democrats would have had the power. Thus the meaning of Lincoln's +election would have been destroyed, and Buchanan's administration +would have been continued in its most dirty features, the name only +being changed. + +Old Scott seems to be worried out by his laurels; he swallows incense, +and I do not see that anything whatever is done to meet the military +emergency. I see the cloud. + +Were it true that Seward and Scott go hand in hand, and that both, and +even Chase, are blunted axes! + +I hear that Mr. Blair is the only one who swears, demands, asks for +action, for getting at them without losing time. Brave fellow! I am +glad to have at Willard's many times piloted deputations to the doors +of Lincoln on behalf of Blair's admission into the Cabinet. I do not +know him, but will try to become nearer acquainted. + +But for the New York radical Republicans, already named, neither Chase +nor Blair would have entered the Cabinet. But for them Seward would +have had it totally his own way. Members of Congress acted less than +did the New Yorkers. + +The South, or the rebels, slave-drivers, slave-breeders, constitute +the most corrosive social decompositions and impurities; what the +human race throughout countless ages successively toiled to purify +itself from and throw off. Europe continually makes terrible and +painful efforts, which at times are marked by bloody destruction. This +I asserted in my various writings. This social, putrefied evil, and +the accumulated matter in the South, pestilentially and in various +ways influenced the North, poisoning its normal healthy condition. +This abscess, undermining the national life, has burst now. Somebody, +something must die, but this apparent death will generate a fresh and +better life. + +The month of March closes, but the administration seems to enjoy the +most beatific security. I do not see one single sign of +foresight,--this cardinal criterion of statesmanship. Chase measures +the empty abyss of the treasury. Senator Wilson spoke of treason +everywhere, but the administration seems not to go to work and to +reconstruct, to fill up what treason has disorganized and emptied. +Nothing about reorganizing the army, the navy, refitting the arsenals. +No foresight, no foresight! either statesmanlike or administrative. +Curious to see these men at work. The whole efforts visible to me and +to others, and the only signs given by the administration in concert, +are the paltry preparations to send provisions to Fort Sumpter. What +is the matter? what are they about? + + + + +APRIL, 1861. + + Seward parleying with the rebel commissioners -- Corcoran's + dinner -- The crime in full blast! -- 75,000 men called for -- + Massachusetts takes the lead -- Baltimore -- Defence of + Washington -- Blockade discussed -- France our friend, not + England -- Warning to the President -- Virginia secedes -- + Lincoln warned again -- Seward says it will all blow over in + sixty to ninety days -- Charles F. Adams -- The administration + undecided; the people alone inspired -- Slavery must perish! -- + The Fabian policy -- The Blairs -- Strange conduct of Scott -- + Lord Lyons -- Secret agent to Canada. + + +Commissioners from the rebels; Seward parleying with them through some +Judge Campbell. Curious way of treating and dealing with rebellion, +with rebels and traitors; why not arrest them? + +Corcoran, a rich partisan of secession, invited to a dinner the rebel +commissioners and the foreign diplomats. If such a thing were done +anywhere else, such a pimp would be arrested. The serious diplomats, +Lord Lyons, Mercier, and Stoeckl refused the invitation; some smaller +accepted, at least so I hear. + +The infamous traitors fire on the Union flag. They treat the garrison +of Sumpter as enemies on sufferance, and here their commissioners go +about free, and glory in treason. What is this administration about? +Have they no blood; are they fishes? + +The crime in full blast; _consummatum est._ Sumpter bombarded; +Virginia, under the nose of the administration, secedes, and the +leaders did not see or foresee anything: flirted with Virginia. + +Now, they, the leaders or the administration, are terribly startled; +so is the brave noble North; the people are taken unawares; but no +wonder; the people saw the Cabinet, the President, and the military in +complacent security. These watchmen did nothing to give an early sign +of alarm, so the people, confiding in them, went about its daily +occupation. But it will rise as one man and in terrible wrath. _Vous +le verrez mess. les Diplomates._ + +The President calls on the country for 75,000 men; telegram has +spoken, and they rise, they arm, they come. I am not deceived in my +faith in the North; the excitement, the wrath, is terrible. Party +lines burn, dissolved by the excitement. Now the people is in fusion +as bronze; if Lincoln and the leaders have mettle in themselves, then +they can cast such arms, moral, material, and legislative, as will +destroy at once this rebellion. But will they have the energy? They do +not look like Demiourgi. + +Massachusetts takes the lead; always so, this first people in the +world; first for peace by its civilization and intellectual +development, and first to run to the rescue. + +The most infamous treachery and murder, by Baltimoreans, of the +Massachusetts men. Will the cowardly murderers be exemplarily +punished? + +The President, under the advice of Scott, seems to take coolly the +treasonable murders of Baltimore; instead of action, again parleying +with these Baltimorean traitors. The rumor says that Seward is for +leniency, and goes hand in hand with Scott. Now, if they will handle +such murderers in silk gloves as they do, the fire must spread. + +The secessionists in Washington--and they are a legion, of all hues +and positions--are defiant, arrogant, sure that Washington will be +taken. One risks to be murdered here. + +I entered the thus called Cassius Clay Company, organized for the +defence of Washington until troops came. For several days patrolled, +drilled, and lay several nights on the hard floor. Had compensation, +that the drill often reproduced that of Falstaff's heroes. But my +campaigners would have fought well in case of emergency. Most of them +office-seekers. When the alarm was over, the company dissolved, but +each got a kind of certificate beautifully written and signed by +Lincoln and Cameron. I refused to take such a certificate, we having +had no occasion to fight. + +The President issued a proclamation for the blockade of the Southern +revolted ports. Do they not know better? + +How can the Minister of Foreign Affairs advise the President to resort +to such a measure? Is the Minister of Foreign Affairs so willing to +call in foreign nations by this blockade, thus transforming a purely +domestic and municipal question into an international, public one? + +The President is to quench the rebellion, a domestic fire, and to do +it he takes a weapon, an engine the most difficult to handle, and in +using of which he depends on foreign nations. Do they not know better +here in the ministry and in the councils? Russia dealt differently +with the revolted Circassians and with England in the so celebrated +case of the Vixen. + +The administration ought to know its rights of sovereignty and to +close the ports of entry. Then no chance would be left to England to +meddle. + +Yesterday N---- dined with Lord Lyons, and during the dinner an +anonymous note announced to the Lord that the proclamation of the +blockade is to be issued on to-morrow. N----, who has a romantic turn, +or rather who seeks for _midi ŕ 14-3/4 heures_, speculated what lady +would have thus violated a _secret d'État_. + +I rather think it comes from the Ministry, or, as they call it here, +from the Department. About two years ago, when the Central Americans +were so teased and maltreated by the filibusters and Democratic +administration, a Minister of one of these Central American States +told me in New York that in a Chief of the Departments, or something +the like, the Central Americans have a valuable friend, who, every +time that trouble is brewing against them in the Department, gives +them a secret and anonymous notice of it. This friend may have +transferred his kindness to England. + +How will foreign nations behave? I wish I may be misguided by my +political anglophobia, but England, envious, rapacious, and the +Palmerstons and others, filled with hatred towards the genuine +democracy and the American people, will play some bad tricks. They +will seize the occasion to avenge many humiliations. Charles Sumner, +Howe, and a great many others, rely on England,--on her anti-slavery +feeling. I do not. I know English policy. We shall see. + +France, Frenchmen, and Louis Napoleon are by far more reliable. The +principles and the interest of France, broadly conceived, make the +existence of a powerful Union a statesmanlike European and world +necessity. The cold, taciturn Louis Napoleon is full of broad and +clear conceptions. I am for relying, almost explicitly, on France and +on him. + +The administration calls in all the men-of-war scattered in all +waters. As the commercial interests of the Union will remain +unprotected, the administration ought to put them under the protection +of France. It is often done so between friendly powers. Louis Napoleon +could not refuse; and accepting, would become pledged to our side. + +Germany, great and small, governments and people, will be for the +Union. Germans are honest; they love the Union, hate slavery, and +understand, to be sure, the question. Russia, safe, very safe, few +blackguards excepted; so Italy. Spain may play double. I do not expect +that the Spaniards, goaded to the quick by the former fillibustering +administrations, will have judgment enough to find out that the +Republicans have been and will be anti-fillibusters, and do not crave +Cuba. + +Wrote a respectful warning to the President concerning the unavoidable +results of his proclamation in regard to the blockade; explained to +him that this, his international demonstration, will, and forcibly +must evoke a counter proclamation from foreign powers in the interest +of their own respective subjects and of their commercial relations. +Warned, foretelling that the foreign powers will recognize the rebels +as belligerents, he, the President, having done it already in some +way, thus applying an international mode of coercion. Warned, that the +condition of belligerents, once recognized, the rebel piratical crafts +will be recognized as privateers by foreign powers, and as such will +be admitted to all ports under the secesh flag, which will thus enjoy +a partial recognition. + +Foreign powers may grumble, or oppose the closing of the ports of +entry as a domestic, administrative decision, because they may not +wish to commit themselves to submit to a paper blockade. But if the +President will declare that he will enforce the closing of the ports +with the whole navy, so as to strictly guard and close the maritime +league, then the foreign powers will see that the administration does +not intend to humbug them, but that he, the President, will only +preserve intact the fullest exercise of sovereignty, and, as said the +Roman legist, he, the President, "_nil sibi postulat quod non aliis +tribuit_." And so he, the President, will only execute the laws of +his country, and not any arbitrary measure, to say with the Roman +Emperor, "_Leges etiam in ipsa arma imperium habere volumus._" Warned +the President that in all matters relating to this country Louis +Napoleon has abandoned the initiative to England; and to throw a small +wedge in this alliance, I finally respectfully suggested to the +President what is said above about putting the American interests in +the Mediterranean under the protection of Louis Napoleon. + +Few days thereafter learned that Mr. Seward does not believe that +France will follow England. Before long Seward will find it out. + +All the coquetting with Virginia, all the presumed influence of +General Scott, ended in Virginia's secession, and in the seizure of +Norfolk. + +Has ever any administration, cabinet, ministry--call it what name you +will--given positive, indubitable signs of want and absence of +foresight, as did ours in these Virginia, Norfolk, and Harper's Ferry +affairs? Not this or that minister or secretary, but all of them ought +to go to the constitutional guillotine. Blindness--no mere +short-sightedness--permeates the whole administration, Blair excepted. +And Scott, the politico-military adviser of the President! What is the +matter with Scott, or were the halo and incense surrounding him based +on bosh? Will it be one more illusion to be dispelled? + +The administration understood not how to save or defend Norfolk, nor +how to destroy it. No name to be found for such concrete incapacity. +The rebels are masters, taking our leaders by the nose. Norfolk gives +to them thousands of guns, &c., and nobody cries for shame. They ought +to go in sackcloth, those narrow-sighted, blind rulers. How will the +people stand this masterly administrative demonstration? In England +the people and the Parliament would impeach the whole Cabinet. + +Charles Sumner told me that the President and his Minister of Foreign +Affairs are to propose to the foreign powers the accession of the +Union to the celebrated convention of Paris of 1856. All three +considered it a master stroke of policy. They will not catch a fly by +it. + +Again wrote respectfully to Mr. Lincoln, warning him against a too +hasty accession to the Paris convention. Based my warning,-- + +1st. Not to give up the great principles contained in Marcy's +amendment. + +2d. Not to believe or suppose for a minute that the accession to the +Paris convention at this time can act in a retroactive sense; +explained that it will not and cannot prevent the rebel pirates from +being recognized by foreign powers as legal privateers, or being +treated as such. + +3d. For all these reasons the Union will not win anything by such a +step, but it will give up principles and chain its own hands in case +of any war with England. Supplicated the President not to risk a step +which logically must turn wrong. + +Baltimore still unpunished, and the President parleying with various +deputations, all this under the guidance of Scott. I begin to be +confused; cannot find out what is the character of Lincoln, and above +all of Scott. + +Governors from whole or half-rebel States refuse the President's call +for troops. The original call of 75,000, too small in itself, will be +reduced by that refusal. Why does not the administration call for more +on the North, and on the free States? In the temper of this noble +people it will be as easy to have 250,000 as 75,000, and then rush on +them; submerge Virginia, North Carolina, etc.; it can be now so easily +done. The Virginians are neither armed nor organized. Courage and +youth seemingly would do good in the councils. + +The free States undoubtedly will vindicate self-government. Whatever +may be said by foreign and domestic croakers, I do not doubt it for a +single minute. The free people will show to the world that the +apparently loose governmental ribbons are the strongest when everybody +carries them in him, and holds them. The people will show that the +intellectual magnetism of convictions permeating the million is by far +stronger than the commonly called governmental action from above, and +it is at the same time elastic and expansive, even if the official +leaders may turn out to be altogether mediocrities. The self-governing +free North will show more vitality and activity than any among the +governed European countries would be able to show in similar +emergencies. This is my creed, and I have faith in the people. + +The infamous slavers of the South would even be honored if named +Barbary States of North America. + +Before the inauguration, Seward was telling the diplomats that no +disruption will take place; now he tells them that it will blow over +in from sixty to ninety days. Does Seward believe it? Or does his +imagination or his patriotism carry him away or astray? Or, perhaps, +he prefers not to look the danger in the face, and tries to avert the +bitter cup. At any rate, he is incomprehensible, and the more so when +seen at a distance. + +Something, nay, even considerable efforts ought to be made to +enlighten the public opinion in Europe, as on the outside, +insurrections, nationalities, etc., are favored in Europe. How far the +diplomats sent by the administration are prepared for this task? + +Adams has shown in the last Congress his scholarly, classical +narrow-mindedness. Sanford cannot favorably impress anybody in Europe, +neither in cabinets, nor in saloons, nor the public at large. He looks +and acts as a _commis voyageur_, will be considered as such at first +sight by everybody, and his features and manners may not impress +others as being distinguished and high-toned. + +Every historical, that is, human event, has its moral and material +character and sides. To ignore, and still worse to blot out, to reject +the moral incentives and the moral verdict, is a crime to the public +at large, is a crime towards human reason. + +Such action blunts sound feelings and comprehension, increases the +arrogance of the evil-doers. The moral criterion is absolute and +unconditional, and ought as such unconditionally to be applied to the +events here. Things and actions must be called by their true names. +What is true, noble, pure, and lofty, is on the side of the North, and +permeates the unnamed millions of the free people; it ought to be +separated from what is sham, egotism, lie or assumption. Truth must be +told, never mind the outcry. History has not to produce pieces for the +stage, or to amuse a tea-party. + +Regiments pour in; the Massachusetts men, of course, leading the van, +as in the times of the tea-party. My admiration for the Yankees is +justified on every step, as is my scorn, my contempt, etc., etc., of +the Southern _chivalrous_ slaver. + +Wrote to Charles Sumner expressing my wonder at the undecided conduct +of the administration; at its want of foresight; its eternal parleying +with Baltimoreans, Virginians, Missourians, etc., and no step to tread +down the head of the young snake. No one among them seems to have the +seer's eye. The people alone, who arm, who pour in every day and in +large numbers, who transform Washington into a camp, and who crave for +fighting,--the people alone have the prophetic inspiration, and are +the genuine statesmen for the emergency. + +How will the Congress act? The Congress will come here emerging from +the innermost of the popular volcano; but the Congress will be +manacled by formulas; it will move not in the spirit of the +Constitution, but in the dry constitutionalism, and the Congress will +move with difficulty. Still I have faith, although the Congress never +will seize upon parliamentary omnipotence. Up to to-day, the +administration, instead of boldly crushing, or, at least, attempting +to do it; instead of striking at the traitors, the administration is +continually on the lookout where the blows come from, scarcely having +courage to ward them off. The deputations pouring from the North urge +prompt, decided, crushing action. This thunder-voice of the twenty +millions of freemen ought to nerve this senile administration. The +Southern leaders do not lose one minute's time; they spread the fire, +arm, and attack with all the fury of traitors and criminals. + +The Northern merchants roar for the offensive; the administration is +undecided. + +Some individuals, politicians, already speak out that the slaveocratic +privileges are only to be curtailed, and slavery preserved as a +domestic institution. Not a bit of it. The current and the development +of events will run over the heads of the pusillanimous and +contemptible conservatives. Slavery must perish, even if the whole +North, Lincoln and Seward at its head, should attempt to save it. + +Already they speak of the great results of Fabian policy; Seward, I am +told, prides in it. Do those Fabiuses know what they talk about? +Fabius's tactics--not policy--had in view not to expose young, +disheartened levies against Hannibal's unconquered veterans, but +further to give time to Rome to restore her exhausted means, to +recover political influences with other Italian independent +communities, to re-conclude broken alliances with the cities, etc. But +is this the condition of the Union? Your Fabian policy will cost +lives, time, and money; the people feels it, and roars for action. +Events are great, the people is great, but the official leaders may +turn out inadequate to both. + +What a magnificent chance--scarcely equal in history--to become a +great historical personality, to tower over future generations. But I +do not see any one pointing out the way. Better so; the principle of +self-government as the self-acting, self-preserving force will be +asserted by the total eclipse of great or even eminent men. + +The administration, under the influence of drill men, tries to form +twenty regiments of regulars, and calls for 45,000 three years' +volunteers. What a curious appreciation of necessity and of numbers +must prevail in the brains of the administration. Twenty regiments of +regulars will be a drop in water; will not help anything, but will be +sufficient to poison the public spirit. Citizens and people, but not +regulars, not hirelings, are to fight the battle of principle. +Regulars and their spirit, with few exceptions, is worse here than +were the Yanitschars. + +When the principle will be saved and victorious, it will be by the +devotion, the spontaneity of the people, and not by Lincoln, Scott, +Seward, or any of the like. It is said that Seward rules both Lincoln +and Scott. The people, the masses, do not doubt their ability to +crush by one blow the traitors, but the administration does. + +What I hear concerning the Blairs confirms my high opinion of both. +Blair alone in the Cabinet represents the spirit of the people. + +Something seems not right with Scott. Is he too old, or too much of a +Virginian, or a hero on a small scale? + +If, as they say, the President is guided by Scott's advice, such +advice, to judge from facts, is not politic, not heroic, not thorough, +not comprehensive, and not at all military, that is, not broad and +deep, in the military sense. It will be a pity to be disappointed in +this national idol. + +Scott is against entering Virginia, against taking Baltimore, against +punishing traitors. Strange, strange! + +Diplomats altogether out of their senses; they are bewildered by the +uprising, by the unanimity, by the warlike, earnest, unflinching +attitude of the masses of the freemen, of my dear Yankees. The diplomats +have lost the compass. They, duty bound, were diplomatically obsequious +to the power held so long by the pro-slavery party. They got accustomed +to the arrogant assumption and impertinence of the slavers, and, +forgetting their European origin, the diplomats tacitly--but for their +common sense and honor I hope reluctantly--admitted the assumptions of +the Southern banditti to be in America the nearest assimilation to the +chivalry and nobility of old Europe. Without taking the cudgel in +defence of European nobility, chivalry, and aristocracy, it is +sacrilegious to compare those infamous slavers with the old or even with +the modern European higher classes. In the midst of this slave-driving, +slave-worshipping, and slave-breeding society of Washington, the +diplomats swallowed, gulped all the Southern lies about the +Constitution, state-rights, the necessity of slavery, and other like +infamies. The question is, how far the diplomats in their respective +official reports transferred these pro-slavery common-places to their +governments. But, after all, the governments of Europe will not be +thoroughly influenced by the chat of their diplomats. + +Among all diplomats the English (Lord Lyons) is the most sphinx; he is +taciturn, reserved, listens more than he speaks; the others are more +communicative. + +What an idea have those Americans of sending a secret agent to Canada, +and what for? England will find it out, and must be offended. I would +not have committed such an absurdity, even in my palmy days, when I +conspired with Louis Napoleon, sat in the councils with Godefroi +Cavaignac, or wrote instructions for Mazzini, then only a beginner +with his _Giovina Italia_, and his miscarried Romarino attempt in +Savoy. + +Of what earthly use can be such _politique provocatrice_ towards +England? Or is it only to give some money to a hungry, noisy, and not +over-principled office-seeker? + + + + +MAY, 1861. + + The administration tossed by expedients -- Seward to Dayton -- + Spread-eagleism -- One phasis of the American Union finished -- + The fuss about Russell -- Pressure on the administration + increases -- Seward, Wickoff, and the Herald -- Lord Lyons + menaced with passports -- The splendid Northern army -- The + administration not up to the occasion -- The new men -- Andrew, + Wadsworth, Boutwell, Noyes, Wade, Trumbull, Walcott, King, + Chandler, Wilson -- Lyon jumps over formulas -- Governor Banks + needed -- Butler takes Baltimore with two regiments -- News from + England -- The "belligerent" question -- Butler and Scott -- + Seward and the diplomats -- "What a Merlin!" -- "France not + bigger than New York!" -- Virginia invaded -- Murder of Ellsworth + -- Harpies at the White House. + + +Rumors that the President, the administration, or whoever has it in +his hands, is to take the offensive, make a demonstration on Virginia +and on Baltimore. But these ups and downs, these vacillations, are +daily occurrences, and nothing points to a firm purpose, to a decided +policy, or any policy whatever of the administration. + +A great principle and a great cause cannot be served and cannot be +saved by half measures, and still less by tricks and by paltry +expedients. But the administration is tossed by expedients. Nothing is +hitherto done, and this denotes a want of any firm decision. + +Mr. Seward's letter to Dayton, a first manifesto to foreign nations, +and the first document of the new Minister of Foreign Affairs. It is +bold, high-toned, and American, but it has dark shadows; shows an +inexperienced hand in diplomacy and in dealing with events. The +passages about the frequent changes in Europe are unnecessary, and +unprovoked by anything whatever. It is especially offensive to France, +to the French people, and to Louis Napoleon. It is bosh, but in Europe +they will consider it as _une politique provocatrice_. + +For the present complications, diplomatic relations ought to be +conducted with firmness, with dignity, but not with an arrogant, +offensive assumption, not in the spirit of spread-eagleism; no brass, +but reason and decision. + +Americans will find out how absolute are the laws of history, as stern +and as positive as all the other laws of nature. To me it is clear +that one phasis of American political growth, development, &c., is +gone, is finished. It is the phasis of the Union as created by the +Constitution. This war--war it will be, and a terrible one, +notwithstanding all the prophecies of Mr. Seward to the contrary--this +war will generate new social and constitutional necessities and new +formulas. New conceptions and new passions will spring up; in one +word, it will bring forth new social, physical, and moral creations: +so we are in the period of gestation. + +Democracy, the true, the noble, that which constitutes the +signification of America in the progress of our race--democracy will +not be destroyed. All the inveterate enemies here and in Europe, all +who already joyously sing the funeral songs of democracy, all of them +will become disgraced. Democracy will emerge more pure, more powerful, +more rational; destroyed will be the most infamous oligarchy ever +known in history; oligarchy issued neither from the sword, nor the +gown, nor the shop, but wombed, generated, cemented, and sustained by +traffic in man. + +The famous Russell, of the London Times, is what I always thought him +to be--a graphic, imaginative writer, with power of description of all +he sees, but not the slightest insight in events, in men, in +institutions. Russell is not able to find out the epidermis under a +shirt. And they make so much fuss about him; Seward brings him to the +first cabinet dinner given by the President; Mrs. Lincoln sends him +bouquets; and this man, Russell, will heap blunders upon blunders. + +The pressure on the administration for decided, energetic action +increases from all sides. Seldom, anywhere, an administration receives +so many moral kicks as does this one; but it seems to stand them with +serenity. Oh, for a clear, firm, well-defined purpose! + +The country, the people demands an attack on Virginia, on Richmond, +and Baltimore; the country, better than the military authorities, +understands the political and military necessities; the people has the +consciousness that if fighting is done instantly, it will be done +cheaply and thoroughly by a move of its finger. The administration can +double the number of men under arms, but hesitates. What slow +coaches, and what ignorance of human nature and of human events. The +knowing ones, the wiseacres, will be the ruin of this country. They +poison the sound reason of the people. + +What the d---- is Seward with his politicians' policy? What can +signify his close alliance with such outlaws as Wikoff and the Herald, +and pushing that sheet to abuse England and Lord Lyons? Wikoff is, so +to speak, an inmate of Seward's house and office, and Wikoff declared +publicly that the telegram contained in the Herald, and so violent +against England and Lord Lyons, was written under Seward's dictation. +Wikoff, I am told, showed the MS. corrected in Seward's handwriting. +Lord Lyons is menaced with passports. Is this man mad? Can Seward for +a moment believe that Wikoff knows Europe, or has any influence? He +may know the low resorts there. Can Seward be fool enough to irritate +England, and entangle this country? Even my anglophobia cannot stand +it. Wrote about it warning letters to New York, to Barney, to Opdyke, +to Wadsworth, &c. + +The whole District a great camp; the best population from the North in +rank and file. More intelligence, industry, and all good national and +intellectual qualities represented in those militia and volunteer +regiments, than in any--not only army, but society--in Europe. +Artisans, mechanics of all industries, of trade, merchants, bankers, +lawyers; all pursuits and professions. Glorious, heart-elevating +sight! These regiments want only a small touch of military +organization. + +Weeks run, troops increase, and not the first step made to organize +them into an army, to form brigades, not to say divisions; not yet two +regiments manoeuvring together. What a strange idea the military chief +or chiefs, or department, or somebody, must have of what it is to +organize an army. Not the first letter made. Can it be ignorance of +this elementary knowledge with which is familiar every corporal in +Europe? When will they start, when begin to mould an army? + +The administration was not composed for this emergency, and is not up +to it. The government hesitates, is inexperienced, and will +unavoidably make heaps of mistakes, which may endanger the cause, and +for which, at any rate, the people is terribly to pay. The loss in men +and material will be very considerable before the administration will +get on the right track. It is painful to think, nay, to be sure of it. +Then the European anti-Union politicians and diplomats will credit the +disasters to the inefficiency of self-government. The diplomats, +accustomed to the rapid, energetic action of a supreme or of a +centralized power, laugh at the trepidation of ours. But the fault is +not in the principle of self-government, but in the accident which +brought to the helm such an amount of inexperience. Monarchy with a +feeble head is even in a worse predicament. Louis XV., the Spanish and +Neapolitan Bourbons, Gustavus IV., &c., are thereof the historical +evidences. + +May the shock of events bring out new lights from the people! One day +the administration is to take the initiative, that is, the offensive, +then it recedes from it. No one understands the organization and +handling of such large bodies. They are to make their apprenticeship, +if only it may not to be too dearly paid. But they cannot escape the +action of that so positive law in nature, in history, and, above all, +absolute in war. + +Wrote to Charles Sumner, suggesting that the ice magnates send here +from Boston ice for hospitals. + +The war now waged against the free States is one made by the most +hideous _sauvagerie_ against a most perfectioned and progressive +civilization. History records not a similar event. It is a hideous +phenomenon, disgracing our race, and it is so, look on it from +whatever side you will. + +A new man from the people, like Governor Andrew, of Massachusetts, +acts promptly, decisively; feels and speaks ardently, and not as the +rhetors. Andrew is the incarnation of the Massachusetts, nay, of the +genuine American people. I must become acquainted with Andrew. +Thousands of others like Andrew exist in all the States. Can anybody +be a more noble incarnation of the American people than J. S. +Wadsworth? I become acquainted with numerous men whom I honor as the +true American men. So Boutwell, of Massachusetts, Curtis Noyes, +Senator Wade, Trumbull, Walcott, from Ohio, Senator King, Chandler, +and many, many true patriots. Senator Wilson, my old friend, is up to +the mark; a man of the people, but too mercurial. + +Captain or Major Lyon in St. Louis, the first initiator or revelator +of what is the absolute law of necessity in questions of national +death or life. Lyon jumped over formulas, over routine, over clumsy +discipline and martinetism, and saved St. Louis and Missouri. + +It is positively asserted that General Scott's first impression was to +court-martial Lyon for this breach of discipline, for having acted on +his own patriotic responsibility. + +Can Scott be such a dried-up, narrow-minded disciplinarian, and he the +Egeria of Lincoln! Oh! oh! + +Diplomats tell me that Seward uses the dictatorial I, speaking of the +government. Three cheers for the new Louis XIV.! + +Governor Banks would be excellent for the _Intendant Général de +l'Armée_: they call it here _General Quartermaster_. Awful disorder +and slowness prevail in this cardinal branch of the army. Wrote to +Sumner concerning Banks. + +Gen. Butler took Baltimore; did what ought to have been done a long +time ago. Butler did it on his own responsibility, without orders. +Butler acted upon the same principle as Lyon, and, _horrabile dictu_, +astonished, terrified the parleying administration. Scott wishes to +put Butler under arrest; happily Lincoln resisted his boss (so Mr. +Lincoln called Scott before a deputation from Baltimore). Scott, +Patterson, and Mansfield made a beautiful _strategical_ horror! They +began to speak of strategy; plan to approach Baltimore on three +different roads, and with about 35,000 men. Butler did it one morning +with two regiments, and kicked over the senile strategians in council. + +The administration speaks with pride of its forbearing, that is, +parleying, policy. The people, the country, requires action. +_Congressus impar Achilli_: Achilles, the people, and _Congressus_ the +forbearing administration. + +Music, parades, serenades, receptions, &c., &c., only no genuine +military organization. They do it differently on the other side of the +Potomac. There the leaders are in earnest. + +Met Gov. Sprague and asked him when he would have a brigade; his +answer was, soon; but this soon comes very slow. + +News from England. Lord John Russell declared in Parliament that the +Queen, or the English government, will recognize the rebels in the +condition of "belligerents." O England, England! The declaration is +too hasty. Lord John cannot have had news of the proclamation of the +blockade when he made that declaration. The blockade could have served +him as an excuse for the haste. English aristocracy and government +show thus their enmity to the North, and their partiality to slavers. +What will the anglophiles of Boston say to this? + +Neither England or France, or anybody in Europe, recognized the +condition of "belligerents" to Poles, when we fought in Russia in +1831. Were the Magyars recognized as such in 1848-'49? Lord +Palmerston called the German flag hard names in the war with Denmark +for Schleswig-Holstein; and now he bows to the flag of slavers and +pirates. If the English statesmen have not some very particular reason +for this hasty, uncalled-for condescension to the enemies of humanity, +then curse upon the English government. I recollect that European +powers recognized the Greeks "belligerents" (Austria opposed) in their +glorious struggle against the slavers, the Turks. But then this +stretching of positive, international comity,--this stretching was +done in the interest of freedom, of right, and of humanity, against +savages and slaughterers. On the present occasion England did the +reverse. O England, England, thou Judas Iscariot of nations! Seward +said to John Jacob Astor, and to a New York deputation, that this +English declaration concerning "belligerents" is a mere formality, +having no bearing at all. I told the contrary to Astor and to others, +assuring them that Mr. Seward will soon find, to the cost of the +people and to his own, how much complication and trouble this _mere +formality_ will occasion, and occasion it before long. Is Seward so +ignorant of international laws, of general or special history, or was +it only said to throw dust? + +Wrote about the "belligerents" a warning letter to the President. + +Butler, in command of Fortress Monroe, proposes to land in Virginia +and to take Norfolk; Scott, the highest military authority in the +land, opposes. Has Scott used up his energy, his sense, and even his +military judgment in defending Washington before the inauguration? He +is too old; his brains, _cerebellum_, must be dried up. + +Imbecility in a leader is often, nay always, more dangerous than +treason; the people can find out--easily, too--treason, but is +disarmed against imbecility. + +What a thoughtlessness to press on Russia the convention of Paris? +Russia has already a treaty with America, but in case of a war with +England, the Russian ports on the Pacific, and the only one accessible +to Americans, will be closed to them by the convention of Paris. + +The governors of the States of Ohio, Illinois, Pennsylvania assure the +protection of their respective States to the Union men of the Border +States. What a bitter criticism on the slow, forbearing policy of the +administration. Mr. Lincoln seems to be a rather slow intellect, with +slow powers of perception. However, patience; perhaps the shock of +events will arouse and bring in action now latent, but good and +energetic qualities. As it stands now, the administration, being the +focus of activity, is tepid, if not cold and slow; the circumference, +that is, the people, the States, are full of fire and of activity. +This condition is altogether the reverse of the physiological and all +other natural laws, and this may turn out badly, as nature's laws +never can be with impunity reversed or violated. + +The diplomats complain that Seward treats them with a certain +rudeness; that he never gives them time to explain and speak, but +interrupts by saying, "I know it all," etc. If he had knowledge of +things, and of the diplomatic world, he would be aware that the more +firmness he has to use, the more politeness, even fastidiousness, he +is to display. + +Scott does not wish for any bold demonstration, for any offensive +movement. The reason may be, that he is too old, too crippled, to be +able to take the field in person, and too inflated by conceit to give +the glory of the active command to any other man. Wrote to Charles +Sumner in Boston to stir up some inventive Yankee to construct a +wheelbarrow in which Scott could take the field in person. + +In a conversation with Seward, I called his attention to the fact that +the government is surrounded by the finest, most complicated, intense, +and well-spread web of treason that ever was spun; that almost all +that constitutes society and is in a daily, nay hourly, contact with +the various branches of the Executive, all this, with soul, mind, and +heart is devoted to the rebels. I observed to him that _si licet +exemplis in parvo grandibus uti_. Napoleon suffered more from the +bitter hostility of the _faubourg St. Germain_, than from the armies +of the enemy; and here it is still worse, as this hostility runs out +into actual, unrelenting treason. To this Mr. Seward answered with the +utmost serenity, "that before long all this will change; that when he +became governor of New York, a similar hostility prevailed between the +two sections of that State, but soon he pacified everything." What a +Merlin! what a sorcerer! + +Some simple-minded persons from the interior of the State of New York +questioned Mr. Seward, in my presence, about Europe, and "what they +will do there?" To this, with a voice of the Delphic oracle, he +responded, "that after all France is not bigger than the State of New +York." Is it possible to say such trash even as a joke? + +Finally, the hesitations of General Scott are overcome. "Virginia's +sacred soil is invaded;" Potomac crossed; looks like a beginning of +activity; Scott consented to move on Arlington Heights, but during two +or three days opposed the seizure of Alexandria. Is that all that he +knows of that hateful watchword--strategy--nausea repeated by every +ignoramus and imbecile? + +Alexandria being a port of entry, and having a railroad, is more a +strategic point for the invasion of Virginia than are Arlington +Heights. + +The brave Ellsworth murdered in Alexandria, and Scott insisted that +Alexandria be invaded and occupied by night. In all probability, +Ellsworth would not have been murdered if this villanous nest had been +entered by broad daylight. As if the troops were committing a crime, +or a shameful act! O General Scott! but for you Ellsworth would not +have been murdered. + +General McDowell made a plan to seize upon Manassas as the centre of +railroads, the true defence of Washington, and the firm foothold in +Virginia. Nobody, or only few enemies, were in Manassas. McDowell +shows his genuine military insight. Scott, and, as I am told, the +whole senile military council, opposed McDowell's plan as being too +bold. Do these mummies intend to conduct a war without boldness? + +Thick clouds of patriotic, well-intentioned harpies surround all the +issues of the executive doors, windows, crevasses, all of them ready +to turn an honest, or rather dishonest, penny out of the fatherland. +Behind the harpies advance the busy-bodies, the would-be +well-informed, and a promiscuous crowd of well-intentioned +do-nothings. + + + + +JUNE, 1861. + + Butler emancipates slaves -- The army not organized -- Promenades + -- The blockade -- Louis Napoleon -- Scott all in all -- + Strategy! -- Gun contracts -- The diplomats -- Masked batteries + -- Seward writes for "bunkum" -- Big Bethel -- The Dayton letter + -- Instructions to Mr. Adams. + + +The emancipation of slaves is virtually inaugurated. Gen. Butler, once +a hard pro-slavery Democrat, takes the lead. _Tempora mutantur et +nos_, &c. Butler originated the name of _contrabands of war_ for +slaves faithful to the Union, who abandon their rebel masters. A +logical Yankee mind operates as an _accoucheur_ to bring that to +daylight with which the events are pregnant. + +The enemies of self-government at home and abroad are untiring in +vaticinations that a dictatorship now, and after the war a strong +centralized government, will be inaugurated. I do not believe it. +Perhaps the riddle to be solved will be, to make a strong +administration without modifying the principle of self-government. + +The most glorious difference between Americans and Europeans is, that +in cases of national emergencies, every European nation, the Swiss +excepted, is called, stimulated to action, to sacrifices, either by a +chief, or by certain families, or by some high-standing individual, +or by the government; here the people forces upon the administration +more of all kinds of sacrifices than the thus called rulers can grasp, +and the people is in every way ahead of the administration. + +Notwithstanding that a part of the army crossed the Potomac, very +little genuine organization is done. They begin only to organize +brigades, but slowly, very slowly. Gen. Scott unyielding in his +opposition to organizing any artillery, of which the army has very, +very little. This man is incomprehensible. He cannot be a clear-headed +general or organizer, or he cannot be a patriot. + +As for the past, single regiments are parading in honor of the +President, of members of the Cabinet, of married and unmarried +_ladies_, but no military preparatory exercise of men, regiments, or +brigades. It sickens to witness such _incurie_. + +Mr. Seward promenading the President from regiment to regiment, from +camp to camp, or rather showing up the President and himself. Do they +believe they can awake enthusiasm for their persons? The troops could +be better occupied than to serve for the aim of a promenade for these +two distinguished personalities. + +Gen. Scott refuses the formation of volunteer artillery and of new +cavalry regiments, and the active army, more than 20,000 men, has a +very insufficient number of batteries, and between 600 and 800 +cavalry. Lincoln blindly follows his boss. Seward, of course, sustains +Scott, and confuses Lincoln. Lincoln, Scott, Seward and Cameron +oppose offers pouring from the country. To a Mr. M----, from the State +of New York, who demanded permission to form a regiment of cavalry, +Mr. Lincoln angrily answered, that (patriotic) offers give more +"trouble to him and the administration than do the rebels." + +The debates of the English Parliament raise the ire of the people, +nay, exasperate even old fogyish Anglo-manes. + +Persons very familiar with the domestic relations of Gen. Scott assure +me that the vacillations of the old man, and his dread of a serious +warfare, result from the all-powerful influence on him of one of his +daughters, a rabid secessionist. The old man ought to be among relics +in the Patent office, or sent into a nursery. + +The published correspondence between Lord Lyons and Lord Russell +concerning the blockade furnishes curious revelations. + +When the blockade was to be declared, Mr. Seward seems to have been a +thorough novice in the whole matter, and in an official interview with +Lord Lyons, Mr. Seward was assisted by his chief clerk, who was +therefore the quintessence of the wisdom of the foreign affairs, a man +not even mastering the red-tape traditions of the department, without +any genuine instruction, without ideas. For this chief clerk, all that +he knew of a blockade was that it was in use during the Mexican war, +that it almost yearly occurred in South American waters, and every +tyro knows there exists such a thing as a blockade. But that was all +that this chief clerk knew. Lord Lyons asked for some special +precedents or former acts of the American government. The chief, and +his support, the chief clerk, ignored the existence of any. Lord Lyons +went home and sent to the department American precedents and +authorities. No Minister of Foreign Affairs in Europe, together with +his chief clerk, could ever be caught in such a _flagrante delicto_ of +ignorance. This chief clerk made Mr. Seward make _un pas de clerc_, +and this at the start. As Lord Lyons took a great interest in the +solution of the question of blockade, and as the chief clerk was the +_oraculum_ in this question, these combined facts may give some clue +to the anonymous advice sent to Lord Lyons, and mentioned in the month +of April. + +Suggested to Mr. Seward to at once elevate the American question to a +higher region, to represent it to Europe in its true, holy character, +as a question of right, freedom, and humanity. Then it will be +impossible for England to quibble about technicalities of the +international laws; then we can beat England with her own arms and +words, as England in 1824, &c., recognized the Greeks as belligerents, +on the plea of aiding freedom and humanity. The Southern insurrection +is a movement similar to that of the Neapolitan brigands, similar to +what partisans of the Grand Dukes of Tuscany or Modena may attempt, +similar to any--for argument's sake--supposed insurrection of any +Russian bojŕrs against the emancipating Czar. Not in one from among +the above enumerated cases would England concede to the insurgents the +condition of belligerents. If the Deys of Tunis and Tripoli should +attempt to throw off their allegiance to the Sultan on the plea that +the Porte prohibits the slave traffic, would England hurry to +recognize the Deys as belligerents? + +Suggested to Mr. Seward, what two months ago I suggested to the +President, to put the commercial interests in the Mediterranean, for a +time, under the protection of Louis Napoleon. + +I maintain the right of closing the ports, against the partisans of +blockade. _Qui jure suo utitur neminem lćdit_, says the Roman +jurisconsult. + +The condition of Lincoln has some similarity with that of Pio IX. in +1847-48. Plenty of good-will, but the eagle is not yet breaking out of +the egg. And as Pio IX. was surrounded by this or that cardinal, so is +Mr. Lincoln by Seward and Scott. + +Perhaps it may turn out that Lincoln is honest, but of not +transcendent powers. The war may last long, and the military spirit +generated by the war may in its turn generate despotic aspirations. +Under Lincoln in the White House, the final victory will be due to the +people alone, and he, Lincoln, will preserve intact the principle +which lifted him to such a height. + +The people is in a state of the healthiest and most generous +fermentation, but it may become soured and musty by the admixture of +Scott-Seward vacillatory powders. + +Scott is all in all--Minister or Secretary of War and +Commander-in-chief. How absurd to unite those functions, as they are +virtually united here, Scott deciding all the various military +questions; he the incarnation of the dusty, obsolete, everywhere +thrown overboard and rotten routine. They ought to have for Secretary +of War, if not a Carnot, at least a man of great energy, honesty, of +strong will, and of a thorough devotion to the cause. Senator Wade +would be suitable for this duty. Cameron is devoted, but I doubt his +other capacities for the emergency, and he has on his shoulders +General Scott as a dead weight. + +Charles Sumner, Mr. Motley, Dr. Howe, and many others, consider it as +a triumph that the English Cabinet asked Mr. Gregory to postpone his +motion for the recognition of the Southern Confederacy. Those +gentlemen here are not deep, and are satisfied with a few small crumbs +thrown them by the English aristocracy. Generally, the thus-called +better Americans eagerly snap at such crumbs. + +It is clear that the English Cabinet wished this postponement for its +own sake. A postponement spares the necessity to Russells, +Palmerstons, Gladstones, and _hoc genus omne_, to show their hands. +Mr. Adams likewise is taken in. + +_Military organization_ and _strategic points_ are the watchwords. +_Strategic points_, strategy, are natural excrescences of brains which +thus shamefully conceive and carry out what the abused people believe +to be _the_ military organization. + +Strategy--strategy repeats now every imbecile, and military fuss +covers its ignorance by that sacramental word. Scott cannot have in +view the destruction of the rebels. Not even the Austrian Aulic +Council imagined a strategy combined and stretching through several +thousands of miles. + +The people's strategy is best: to rush in masses on Richmond; to take +it now, when the enemy is there in comparatively small numbers. +Richmond taken, Norfolk and the lost guns at once will be recovered. +So speaks the people, and they are right; here among the wiseacres not +one understands the superiority of the people over his own little +brains. + +Warned Mr. Seward against making contracts for arms with all kinds of +German agents from New York and from abroad. They will furnish and +bring, at the best, what the German governments throw out as being of +no use at the present moment. All the German governments are at work +to renovate their fire-arms. + +The diplomats more and more confused,--some of them ludicrously so. +Here, as always and everywhere, diplomacy, by its essence, is +virtually _statu quo_; if not altogether retrograde, is conservative, +and often ultra conservative. It is rare to witness diplomacy _in +toto_, or even single diplomats, side with progressive efforts and +ideas. English diplomacy and diplomats do it at times; but then +mostly for the sake of political intrigue. + +Even the great events of Italy are not the child of diplomacy. It went +to work _clopin, clopan_, after Solferino. + +Not one of the diplomats here is intrinsically hostile to the Union. +Not one really wishes its disruption. Some brag so, but that is for +small effect. All of them are for peace, for _statu quo_, for the +grandeur of the country (as the greatest consumer of European +imports); but most of them would wish slavery to be preserved, and for +this reason they would have been glad to greet Breckinridge or Jeff. +Davis in the White House. + +Some among the diplomats are not virtually enemies of freedom and of +the North; but they know the North from the lies spread by the +Southerners, and by this putrescent heap of refuse, the Washington +society. I am the only Northerner on a footing of intimacy with the +diplomats. They consider me an _exalté_. + +It must be likewise taken into account,--and they say so +themselves,--that Mr. Seward's oracular vaticinations about the end of +the rebellion from sixty to ninety days confuse the judgment of +diplomats. Mr. Seward's conversation and words have an official +meaning for the diplomats, are the subject of their dispatches, and +they continually find that when Mr. Seward says yes the events say no. + +Some of the diplomats are Union men out of obedience to a lawful +government, whatever it be; others by principle. The few from Central +and South American republics are thoroughly sound. The diplomats of +the great powers, representing various complicated interests, are the +more confused, they have so many things to consider. The diplomatic +tail, the smallest, insignificant, fawn to all, and turn as whirlwinds +around the great ones. + +Scott continually refused the formation of new batteries, and now he +roars for them, and hurries the governors to send them. Governor +Andrew, of Massachusetts, weeks ago offered one or two rifled +batteries, was refused, and now Scott in all hurry asks for them. + +The unhappy affair of Big Bethel gave a shock to the nation, and +stirred up old Scott, or rather the President. + +Aside of strategy, there is a new bugbear to frighten the soldiers; +this bugbear is the masked batteries. The inexperience of commanders +at Big Bethel makes already _masked batteries_ a terror of the +country. The stupid press resounds the absurdity. Now everybody begins +to believe that the whole of Virginia is covered with masked +batteries, constituting, so to speak, a subterranean artillery, which +is to explode on every step, under the feet of our army. It seems that +this error and humbug is rather welcome to Scott, otherwise he would +explain to the nation and to the army that the existence of numerous +masked batteries is an absolute material and military impossibility. +The terror prevailing now may do great mischief. + +Mr. Seward was obliged to explain, exonerate, expostulate, and +neutralize before the French Cabinet his famous Dayton letter. I was +sure it was to come to this; Mr. Thouvenel politely protested, and Mr. +Seward confessed that it was written for the American market (alias, +for _bunkum_). All this will make a very unfavorable impression upon +European diplomats concerning Mr. Seward's diplomacy and +statesmanship, as undoubtedly Mr. Thouvenel will semi-officially +confidentially communicate Mr. Seward's _faux pas_ to his colleagues. + +Mr. Seward emphatically instructs Mr. Adams to exclude the question of +slavery from all his sayings and doings as Minister to England. Just +to England! That Mr. Adams, once the leader of the constitutional +anti-slavery party, submits to this obeisance of a corporal, I am not +astonished, as everything can be expected from the man who, in support +of the compromise, made a speech _de lana caprina_; but Senator +Sumner, Chairman of the Committee of Foreign Affairs, meekly swallowed +it. + + + + +JULY, 1861. + + The Evening Post -- The message -- The administration caught + napping -- McDowell -- Congress slowly feels its way -- Seward's + great facility of labor -- Not a Know-Nothing -- Prophesies a + speedy end -- Carried away by his imagination -- Says "secession + is over" -- Hopeful views -- Politeness of the State department + -- Scott carries on the campaign from his sleeping room -- Bull + Run -- Rout -- Panic -- "Malediction! Malediction!" -- Not a + manly word in Congress! -- Abuse of the soldiers -- McClellan + sent for -- Young blood -- Gen. Wadsworth -- Poor McDowell! -- + Scott responsible -- Plan of reorganization -- Let McClellan + beware of routine. + + +It seems to me that the destinies of this admirable people are in +strange hands. Mr. Lincoln, honest man of nature, perhaps an empiric, +doctoring with innocent juices from herbs; but some others around him +seem to be quacks of the first order. I wish I may be mistaken. + +The press, the thus called good one, is vacillating. Best of all, and +almost not vacillating, is the New York Evening Post. I do not speak +of principles; but the papers vacillate, speaking of the measures and +the slowness of the administration. + +The President's message; plenty of good, honest intentions; simple, +unaffected wording, but a confession that by the attack on Sumpter, +and the uprising of Virginia, the administration was, so to speak, +caught napping. Further, up to that day the administration did not +take any, the slightest, measure of any kind for any emergency; in a +word, that it expected no attacks, no war, saw no fire, and did not +prepare to meet and quench one. + +It were, perhaps, better for Lincoln if he could muster courage and +act by himself according to his nature, rather than follow so many, or +even any single adviser. Less and less I understand Mr. Lincoln, but +as his private secretary assures me that Lincoln has great judgment +and great energy, I suggested to the secretary to say to Lincoln he +should be more himself. + +Being _tęte-ŕ-tęte_ with McDowell, I saw him do things of details +which in any, even half-way organized army, belong to the speciality +of a chief of the staff. I, of course, wondered at it. McDowell, who +commands what in Europe would be called a large corps, told me that +General Scott allowed him not to form a complete staff, such a one as +he, McDowell, wished. + +And all this, so to speak, on the eve of a battle, when the army faces +the enemy. It seems that genuine staff duties are something altogether +unknown to the military senility of the army. McDowell received this +corps in the most chaotic state. Almost with his own hands he +organized, or rather put together, the artillery. Brigades are +scarcely formed; the commanders of brigades do not know their +commands, and the soldiers do not know their generals--and still they +consider Scott to be a great general! + +The Congress, well-intentioned, but entangled in formulas, slowly +feels its way. The Congress is composed of better elements than is the +administration, and it is ludicrous to see how the administration +takes airs of hauteur with the Congress. This Congress is in an +abnormal condition _for the task of directing a revolution_; _a +formula can be thrown in its face_ almost at every bold step. The +administration is virtually irresponsible, more so than the government +of any constitutional nation whatever. What great things this +administration could carry out! Congress will consecrate, legalize, +sanction everything. Perhaps no harm would have resulted if the Senate +and the House had contained some new, fresher elements directly from +the boiling, popular cauldron. Such men would take a _position_ at +once. Many of the leaders in both Houses were accustomed for many +years to make only opposition. But a long opposition influences and +disorganizes the judgment, forms not those genuine statesmen able to +grasp great events. For such emergencies as are now here, terrible +energy is needed, and only a very perfect mind resists the enervating +influence of a protracted opposition. + +Suggested to Mr. Seward that the best diplomacy was to take possession +of Virginia. Doing this, we will find all the cabinets smooth and +friendly. + +I seldom saw a man with greater facility of labor than Seward. When +once he is at work, it runs torrent-like from his pen. His mind is +elastic. His principal forte is argument on _any_ given case. But the +question is how far he masters the variegated information so necessary +in a statesman, and the more now, when the country earnestly has such +dangerous questions with European cabinets. He is still cheerful, +hopeful, and prophesies a speedy end. + +Seward has no Know-Nothingism about him. He is easy, and may have many +genuine generous traits in his character, were they not compressed by +the habits of the, not lofty, politician. At present, Seward is a moral +dictator; he has Lincoln in his hand, and is all in all. Very likely he +flatters him and imposes upon his simple mind by his over-bold, +dogmatic, but not over-correct and logical, generalizations. Seward's +finger is in all the other departments, but above all in the army. + +The opposition made to Seward is not courageous, not open, not +dignified. Such an opposition betrays the weakness of the opposers, +and does not inspire respect. It is darkly surreptitious. These +opponents call Seward hard names, but do this in a corner, although +most of them have their parliamentary chair wherefrom they can speak. +If he is bad and mischievous, then unite your forces and overthrow +him; if he is not bad, or if you are not strong enough against him, do +not cover yourself with ridicule, making a show of impotent malice. +When the Senate confirmed him, every one throughout the land knew his +vacillating policy; knew him to be for compromise, for concessions; +knew that he disbelieved in the terrible earnestness of the struggle, +and always prophesied its very speedy end. The Senate confirmed Seward +with open eyes. Perhaps at the start his imagination and his +patriotism made him doubt and disbelieve in the enormity of +treason--he could not realize that the traitors would go to the bitter +end. Seemingly, Seward still hopes that one day or another they may +return as forlorn sheep. Under the like impressions, he always +believed, and perhaps still believes, he shall be able to patch up the +quarrel, and be the savior of the Union. Very probably his +imagination, his ardent wishes, carry him away, and confuse that clear +insight into events which alone constitutes the statesman. + +Suggested to Sumner to demand the reduction of the tariff on certain +merchandises, on the plea of fraternity of the working American people +with their brethren the operatives all over Europe; by it principally +I wished to alleviate the condition of French industry, as I have full +confidence in Louis Napoleon, and in the unsophisticated judgment of +the genuine French people. The suggestion did not take with the +Senate. + +When the July telegraph brought the news of the victory at Romney +(Western Virginia), it was about midnight. Mr. Seward warmly +congratulated the President that "_the secession was over_." What a +far-reaching policy! + +When the struggle will be over, England, at least her Tories, +aristocrats, and politicians, will find themselves baffled in their +ardent wishes for the breaking of the Union. The free States will +look tidy and nice, as in the past. But more than one generation will +pass before ceases to bleed the wound inflicted by the lies, the +taunts, the vituperations, poured in England upon this noble, +generous, and high-minded people; upon the sacred cause defended by +the freemen. + +These freemen of America, up to the present time, incarnate the +loftiest principle in the successive, progressive, and historical +development of man. Nations, communities, societies, institutions, +stand and fall with that principle, whatever it be, whereof they are +the incarnation; so teaches us history. Woe to these freemen if they +will recede from the principle; if they abandon human rights; if they +do not crush human bondage, this sum of all infamies. Certainly the +question paramount to all is, to save and preserve pure +self-government in principle and in its direct application. But +although the question of slavery seems to be incidental and +subordinate to the former, virtually the question of slavery is twin +to the former. Slavery serves as a basis, as a nurse, for the most +infamous and abject aristocracy or oligarchy that was ever built up in +history, and any, even the best, the mildest, and the most honest +oligarchy or aristocracy kills and destroys man and self-government. + +From the purely administrative point of view, the principle whose +incarnation is the American people, the principle begins to be +perverted. The embodiment of self-government fills dungeons, +suppresses personal liberty, opens letters, and in the reckless +saturnalias of despotism it rivals many from among the European +despots. Europe, which does not see well the causes, shudders at this +_delirium tremens_ of despotism in America. + +Certainly, treason being in ebullition, the holders of power could not +stand by and look. But instead of an energetic action, instead of +exercising in full the existing laws, they hesitated, and treason, +emboldened, grew over their heads. + +The law inflicted the severest capital punishment on the chiefs of the +revolt in Baltimore, but all went off unharmed. The administration one +day willingly allows the law to slide from its lap, and the next +moment grasps at an unnecessary arbitrary power. Had the traitors of +Baltimore been tried by court-martial, as the law allowed, and +punished, few, if any, traitors would then have raised their heads in +the North. + +Englishmen forget that even after a secession, the North, to-day +twenty millions, as large as the whole Union eight years ago, will in +ten years be thirty millions; a population rich, industrious, and +hating England with fury. + +Seward, having complete hold of the President, weakens Lincoln's mind +by using it up in hunting after comparatively paltry expedients. +Seward-Scott's influence neutralizes the energetic cry of the country, +of the congressmen, and in the Cabinet that of Blair, who is still a +trump. + +The emancipation of slaves is spoken of as an expedient, but not as a +sacred duty, even for the maintenance of the Union. To emancipate +through the war power is an offence to reason, logic, and humanity; +but better even so than not at all. War power is in its nature +violent, transient, established for a day; emancipation is the highest +social and economical solution to be given by law and reason, and +ought to result from a thorough and mature deliberation. When the +Constitution was framed, slavery was ashamed of itself, stood in the +corner, had no paws. Now-a-days, slavery has become a traitor, is +arrogant, blood-thirsty, worse than a jackal and a hyena; deliberately +slavery is a matricide. And they still talk of slavery as sheltered by +the Constitution; and many once anti-slavery men like Seward, etc., +are ready to preserve it, to compromise with the crime. + +The existence of nations oscillates between epochs when the substance +and when the form prevails. The formation of America was the epoch +when substance prevailed. Afterward, for more than half a century, the +form was paramount; the term of substance again begins. The +Constitution is substance and form. The substance in it is perennial; +but every form is transient, and must be expanded, changed, re-cast. + +Few, if any, Americans are aware of the identity of laws ruling the +universe with laws ruling and prevailing in the historical development +of man. Rarely has an American patience enough to ascend the long +chain from effect to cause, until he reaches the first cause, the +womb wherein was first generated the subsequent distant effect. So, +likewise, they cannot realize that at the start the imperceptible +deviation from the aim by and by widens to a bottomless gap until the +aim is missed. Then the greatest and the most devoted sacrifices are +useless. The legal conductors of the nation, since March 6th, ignore +this law. + +The foreign ministers here in Washington were astonished at the +_politeness_, when some time ago the Department sent to the foreign +ministers a circular announcing to them that armed vessels of the +neutrals will be allowed to enter at pleasure the rebel blockaded +ports. This favor was not asked, not hoped for, and was not necessary. +It was too late when I called the attention of the Department to the +fact that such favors were very seldom granted; that they are +dangerous, and can occasion complications. I observed that during the +war between Mexico and France, in 1838, Count Mole, Minister of +Foreign Affairs, and the Premier of Louis Philippe, instructed the +admiral commanding the French navy in the Mexican waters, to oppose, +even by force, any attempt made by a neutral man-of-war to enter a +blockaded port. And it was not so dangerous then as it may be in this +civil war. But the chief clerk adviser of the Department found out +that President Polk's administration during the Mexican war granted a +similar permission, and, glad to have a precedent, his powerful brains +could not find out the difference between _then_ and _now_. + +The internal routine of the ministry, and the manner in which our +ministers are treated abroad by the Chief at home, is very strange, +humiliating to our agents in the eyes of foreign Cabinets. Cassius +Clay was instructed to propose to Russia our accession to the +convention of Paris, but was not informed from Washington that our +ministers at Paris, London, etc., were to make the same propositions. +When Prince Gortschakoff asked Cassius Clay if similar propositions +were made to the other cosigners of the Paris convention, our minister +was obliged to confess his utter ignorance about the whole proceeding. +Prince Gortschakoff good-naturedly inquired about it from his +ministers at Paris and London, and enlightened Cassius Clay. + +No ministry of foreign affairs in Europe would treat its agents in +such a trifling manner, and, if done, a minister would resent it. + +This mistake, or recklessness, is to be credited principally to the +internal chief, or director of the department, and not to the minister +himself. By and by, the chief clerks, these routinists in the former +coarse traditions of the Democratic administrations, will learn and +acquire better diplomatic and bureaucratic habits. + +If one calls the attention of influential Americans to the +mismanagement in the organization of the army; to the extraordinary +way in which everything, as organization of brigades, and the inner +service, the quartermaster's duty, is done, the general and inevitable +answer is, "We are not military; we are young people; we have to +learn." Granted; but instead of learning from the best, the latest, +and most correct authorities, why stick to an obsolete, senile, musty, +rotten, mean, and now-a-days impracticable routine, which is +all-powerful in all relating to the army and to the war? The Americans +may pay dear for thus reversing the rules of common sense. + +General Scott directs from his sleeping room the movements of the two +armies on the Potomac and in the Shenandoah valley. General Scott has +given the order to advance. At least a strange way, to have the +command of battle at a distance of thirty and one hundred miles, and +stretched on his fauteuil. Marshal de Saxe, although deadly sick, was +on the field at Fontenoy. What will be the result of this +experimentalization, so contrary to sound reason? + +Fighting at Bull Run. One o'clock, P. M. Good news. Gen. Scott says +that although we were 40-100 in disadvantage, nevertheless his plans +are successful--all goes as he arranged it--all as he foresaw it. +Bravo! old man! If so, I make _amende honorable_ of all that I said up +to this minute. Two o'clock, P. M. General Scott, satisfied with the +justness and success of his strategy and tactics--takes a nap. + +_Evening._--Battle lost; rout, panic. The army almost disbanded, in +full run. So say the forerunners of the accursed news. Malediction! +Malediction! + +What a horrible night and day! rain and cold; stragglers and +disbanded soldiers in every direction, and no order, nobody to gather +the soldiers, or to take care of them. + +As if there existed not any military or administrative authority in +Washington! Under the eyes of the two commanders-in-chief! Oh, +senility, imbecility, ignominy! In Europe, a commander of a city, or +any other military authority whatever, who should behave in such a +way, would be dismissed, nay, expelled, from military service. What I +can gather is, that the enemy was in full retreat in the centre and on +one flank, when he was reinforced by fresh troops, who outflanked and +turned ours. If so, the panic can be explained. Even old veteran +troops generally run when they are outflanked. + +Johnston, whom Patterson permitted to slip, came to the rescue of +Beauregard. So they say. It is _en petit_ Waterloo, with +Blucher-Johnston, and Grouchy-Patterson. But had Napoleon's power +survived after Waterloo, Grouchy, his chief of the staff, and even +Ney,[1] for the fault at Quatre-bras, would have been court-martialed +and shot. Here these blind Americans will thank Scott and Patterson. + + [Footnote 1: That such would have been the presumed fate of Ney at + the hands of Napoleon, I was afterwards assured by the old Duke of + Bassano, and by the Duchess Abrantes.] + +Others say that a bold charge of cavalry arrived on our rear, and +threw in disorder the wagons and the baggage gang. That is nothing +new; at the battle of Borodino some Cossacks, pouncing upon the French +baggage, created a panic, which for a moment staggered Napoleon, and +prevented him in time from reinforcing Ney and Davoust. But McDowell +committed a fault in putting his baggage train, the ambulances +excepted, on a road between the army and its reserves, which, in such +a manner, came not in action. By and by I shall learn more about it. + +The Congress has made a worse Bull Run than the soldiers. Not a single +manly, heroic word to the nation and the army. As if unsuccess always +was dishonor. This body groped its way, and was morally stunned by the +blow; the would-be leaders more than the mass. + +Suggested to Sumner to make, as the Romans did, a few stirring words +on account of the defeat. + +Some mean fellows in Congress, who never smelt powder, abused the +soldiers. Those fellows would have been the first to run. Others, +still worse, to show their abject flunkeyism to Scott, and to humbug +the public at large about their intimacy with this fetish, make +speeches in his defence. Scott broadly prepared the defeat, and now, +through the mouths of flunkeys and spit-lickers,[2] he attempts to +throw the fault on the thus called politicians. + + [Footnote 2: Foremost among them was the editor of the New York + Times, publishing a long article wherein he proved that he had + been admitted to General Scott's table, and that the General + unfolded to him, the editor, the great anaconda strategy. Exactly + the thing to be admired and gulped by a man of such _variegated_ + information as that individual. + + That little villianish "article" had a second object: it was to + filch subscribers from the Tribune, which broke down, not over + courageously.] + +The President telegraphed for McClellan, who in the West, showed +_rapidity of movement_, the first and most necessary capacity for a +commander. Young blood will be infused, and perhaps senility will be +thrown overboard, or sent to the Museum of the Smithsonian Institute. + +At Bull Run the foreign regiments ran not, but covered the retreat. +And Scott, and worse than he, Thomas, this black spot in the War +Department, both are averse to, and when they can they humiliate, the +foreigners. A member of Congress, in search of a friend, went for +several miles up the stream of the fugitive army; great was his +astonishment to hear spoken by the fugitives only the unmixed, pure +Anglo-Saxon. + +My friend, J. Wadsworth, behaved cool, brave, on the field, and was +devoted to the wounded. Now, as always, he is the splendid type of a +true man of the people. + +Poor, unhappy McDowell! During the days when he prepared the army, he +was well aware that an eventual success would be altogether attributed +to Scott; but that he, McDowell, would be the scapegoat for the +defeat. Already, when on Sunday morning the news of the first +successes was known, Scott swallowed incense, and took the whole +credit of it to himself. Now he accuses the politicians. + +Once more. Scott himself prepared the defeat. Subsequent elucidation +will justify this assertion. One thing is already certain: one of the +reasons of the lost battle is the exhaustion of troops which +fought--and the number here in Washington is more than 50,000 men. +Only an imbecile would divide the forces in such a way as to throw +half of it to attack a superior and entrenched enemy. But Scott wished +to shape the great events of the country in accordance with his +narrow, ossified brains, and with his peculiar patriotism; and he did +the same in the conduct of the war. + +I am sure some day or other it will come out that this immense +fortification of Manassas is a similar humbug to the masked batteries; +and Scott was the first to aggrandize these terrible national +nightmares. Already many soldiers say that they did not see any +fortifications. Very likely only small earthworks; if so, Scott ought +to have known what was the position and the works of an enemy encamped +about thirty miles from him. If he, Scott, was ignorant, then it shows +his utter imbecility; if he knew that the fortifications were +insignificant, and did not tell it to the troops, then he is worse +than an incapable chief. Up to the present day, all the military +leaders of ancient and modern times told their troops before a battle +that the enemy is not much after all, and that the difficulties to +overcome are rather insignificant. After the battle was won, +everything became aggrandized. Here everybody, beginning with Scott, +ardently rivalled how to scare and frighten the volunteers, by stories +of the masked batteries of Manassas, with its several tiers of +fortifications, the terrible superiority of the Southerners, etc., +etc. In Europe such behavior would be called treason. + +The administration and the influential men cannot realize that they +must give up their old, stupid, musty routine. McClellan ought to be +altogether independent of Scott; be untrammelled in his activity; have +large powers; have direct action; and not refer to Scott. What is this +wheel within a wheel? Instead of it, Scott, as by concession, cuts for +McClellan a military department of six square miles. Oh, human +stupidity, how difficult thou art to lift! + +Scott will paralyze McClellan as he did Lyon and Butler. Scott always +pushed on his spit-lickers, or favorites, rotten by old age. But Scott +has pushed aside such men as Wool and Col. Smith; refused the services +of many brave as Hooker and others, because they never belonged to his +flunkeys. + +Send to McClellan a plan for the reorganization of the army. + +1st. True mastership consists in creating an army with extant +elements, and not in clamoring for what is altogether impossible to +obtain. + +2d. The idea is preposterous to try to have a large thus-called +regular army. A small number, fifteen to twenty thousand men, divided +among several hundreds of thousands of volunteers, would be as a drop +of water in a lake. Besides, this war is to be decided by the great +masses of the volunteers, and it is uncivic and unpatriotic to in any +way nourish the wickedly-assumed discrimination between regulars and +volunteers. + +3d. Good non-commissioned officers and corporals constitute the sole, +sound, and easy articulations of a regiment. Any one who ever was in +action is aware of this truth. With good non-commissioned officers, +even ignorant lieutenants do very little harm. The volunteer regiments +ought to have as many good sergeants and corporals as possible. + +4th. To provide for this want, and for reasons mentioned above, the +relics of the regular army ought to be dissolved. Let us have one +army, as the enemy has. + +5th. All the rank and file of the army ought to be made at once +corporals and sergeants, and be distributed as much as possible among +the volunteers. + +6th. The non-commissioned regulars ought to be made commissioned +officers, and with officers of all grades be distributed and merged in +the one great army. + +For the first time since the armaments, I enjoyed a genuine military +view. McClellan, surrounded as a general ought to be, went to see the +army. It looks martial. The city, likewise, has a more martial look +than it had all the time under Scott. It seems that a young, strong +hand holds the ribbons. God grant that McClellan may preserve his +western vigor and activity, and may not become softened and dissolved +by these Washington evaporations. If he does, if he follows the +routine, he will become as impotent as others before him. Young man, +beware of Washington's corrupt but flattering influences. To the camp! +to the camp! A tent is better for you than a handsome house. The tent, +the fumes of bivouacs, inspired the Fredericks, the Napoleons, and +Washingtons. + +Up to this day they make more history in Secessia than here. Jeff. +Davis overshadows Lincoln. Jeff. Davis and his gang of malefactors are +pushed into the whirlpool of action by the nature of their crime; +here, our leaders dread action, and grope. The rebels have a clear, +decisive, almost palpable aim; but here * * + + + + +AUGUST, 1861. + + The truth about Bull Run -- The press staggers -- The Blairs + alone firm -- Scott's military character -- Seward -- Mr. Lincoln + reads the Herald -- The ubiquitous lobbyist -- Intervention -- + Congress adjourns -- The administration waits for something to + turn up -- Wade -- Lyon is killed -- Russell and his shadow -- + The Yankees take the loan -- Bravo, Yankees! -- McClellan works + hard -- Prince Napoleon -- Manassas fortifications a humbug -- + Mr. Seward Improves -- Old Whigism -- McClellan's powers enlarged + -- Jeff. Davis makes history -- Fremont emancipates in Missouri + -- The Cabinet. + + +The truth about Bull Run will, perhaps, only reach the people when it +becomes reduced to an historical use. I gather what I am sure is true. + +About three weeks ago General McDowell took upon himself the +responsibility to attack the enemy concentrated at Manassas. Deciding +upon this step, McDowell showed the determination of a true soldier, +and a cool, intelligent courage. According to rumors permeating the +whole North; rumors originated by secessionists in and around +Washington, and in various parts of the free States; rumors gulped by +a part of the press, and never contradicted, but rather nursed, at +headquarters, Manassas was a terrible, unknown, mysterious something; +a bugbear, between a fortress made by art and a natural fastness, +whose approaches were defended for miles by numberless masked +batteries, and which was filled by countless thousands of the most +ferocious warriors. Such was Manassas in public opinion when McDowell +undertook to attack this formidable American Torres Vedras, and this +with the scanty and almost unorganized means in men and artillery +allotted to him by the senile wisdom of General Scott. General +McDowell obtained the promise that Beauregard alone was to be before +him. To fulfil this promise, General Scott was to order Patterson to +keep Johnston, and a movement was to be made on the James River, so as +to prevent troops coming from Richmond to Manassas. As it was already +said, Patterson, a special favorite of General Scott, kindly allowed +Johnston to save Beauregard, and Jeff. Davis with troops from Richmond +likewise was on the spot. McDowell planned his plan very skilfully; no +European general would have done better, and I am sure that such will +be the verdict hereafter. Some second-rate mistakes in the execution +did not virtually endanger its success; but, to say the truth, +McDowell and his army were defeated by the imbecility of the supreme +military authority. Imbecility stabbed them in the back. + +One part of the press, stultified and stupefied, staggered under the +blow; the other part showed its utter degradation by fawning on Scott +and attacking the Congress, or its best part. The Evening Post +staggered not; its editors are genuine, laborious students, and, above +all, students of history. The editors of the other papers are +politicians; some of them are little, others are big villains. All, +intellectually, belong to the class called in America more or less +well-read men; information acquired by reading, but which in itself is +not much. + +The brothers Blair, almost alone, receded not, and put the defeat +where it belonged--at the feet of General Scott. + +The _rudis indigestaque moles_, torn away from Scott's hands, already +begins to acquire the shape of an army. Thanks to the youth, the +vigor, and the activity of McClellan. + +General Scott throws the whole disaster on politicians, and abuses +them. How ungrateful. His too lofty pedestal is almost exclusively the +work of politicians. I heard very, very few military men in America +consider Scott a man of transcendent military capacity. Years ago, +during the Crimean campaign, I spent some time at West Point in the +society of Cols. Robert Lee, Walker, Hardee, then in the service of +the United States, and now traitors; not one of them classed Scott +much higher above what would be called a respectable capacity; and of +which, as they said, there are many, many in every European army. + +If one analyzes the Mexican campaign, it will be found that General +Scott had, comparatively, more officers than soldiers; the officers +young men, full of vigor, and in the first gush of youth, who +therefore mightily facilitated the task of the commander. Their names +resound to-day in both the camps. + +Further, generals from the campaign in Mexico assert that three of the +won battles were fought against orders, which signifies that in Mexico +youth had the best of cautious senility. It was according to the law +of nature, and for it it was crowned with success. + +Mr. Seward has a very active intellect, an excellent man for current +business, easy and clear-headed for solving any second-rate +complications; but as for his initiative, that is another question. +Hitherto his initiative does not tell, but rather confuses. Then he +sustains Scott, some say, for future political capital. If so it is +bad; worse still if Mr. Seward sustains Scott on the ground of high +military fitness, as it is impossible to admit that Mr. Seward knows +anything about military affairs, or that he ever _studied_ the +description _of any battle_. At least, I so judge from his +conversation. + +Mr. Lincoln has already the fumes of greatness, and looks down on the +press, reads no paper, that dirty traitor the New York Herald +excepted. So, at least, it is generally stated. + +The enemies of Seward maintain that he, Seward, drilled Lincoln into +it, to make himself more necessary. + +Early, even before the inauguration, McDowell suggested to General +Scott to concentrate in Washington the small army, the depots +scattered in Texas and New Mexico. Scott refused, and this is called a +general! God preserve any cause, any people who have for a savior a +Scott, together with his civil and military partisans. + +If it is not direct, naked treason which prevails among the nurses, +and the various advisers of the people, imbecility, narrow-mindedness, +do the same work. Further, the way in which many leech, phlebotomize, +cheat and steal the people's treasury, is even worse than rampant +treason. I heard a Boston shipbuilder complain to Sumner that the +ubiquitous lobbyist, Thurlow Weed, was in his, the builder's, way +concerning some contracts to be made in the Navy Department, etc., +etc. Will it turn out that the same men who are to-day at the head of +affairs will be the men who shall bring to an end this revolt or +revolution? It ought not to be, as it is contrary to logic, and to +human events. + +Lincoln alone must forcibly remain, he being one of the incarnated +formulas of the Constitution, endowed with a specific, four years' +lasting existence. + +The Americans are nervous about foreign intervention. It is difficult +to make them understand that no intervention is to be, and none can be +made. Therein the press is as silly as the public at large. Certainly +France does not intend any meddling or intervention; of this I am +sure. Neither does England seriously. + +Next, if these two powers should even thirst for such an injustice, +they have no means to do it. If they break our blockades, we make war, +and exclude them from the Northern ports, whose commerce is more +valuable to them than that of the South. I do not believe the foreign +powers to be forgetful of their interest; they know better their +interests than the Americans. + +The Congress adjourned, abandoning, with a confidence unparalleled in +history, the affairs of the country in the hands of the not over +far-sighted administration. The majority of the Congress are good, and +fully and nobly represent the pure, clear and sure aspirations, +instincts, nay, the clear-sightedness of the people. In the Senate, as +in the House, are many, very many true men, and men of pure devotion, +and of clear insight into the events; men superior to the +administration; such are, above all, those senators and +representatives who do not attempt or aim to sit on a pedestal before +the public, before the people, but wish the thing to be done for the +thing itself. But for _the formula_ which chains their hands, feet, +and intellect, the Congress contained several men who, if they could +act, would finish the secession in a double-quick time. But the whole +people move in the treadmill of formulas. It is a pity that they are +not inspired by the axiom of the Roman legist, _scire leges non est +hoc verba earum tenere, sed vim ac potestatem_. Congress had positive +notions of what ought to be done; the administration, Micawber-like, +looks for that something which may turn up, and by expedients patches +all from day to day. + +What may turn up nobody can foresee; matter alone without mind cannot +carry the day. The people have the mind, but the official legal +leaders a very small portion of it. Come what will, I shall not break +down; I shall not give up the holy principle. If crime, rebellion, +_sauvagerie_, triumph, it will be, not because the people failed, but +it will be because mediocrities were at the helm. Concessions, +compromises, any patched-up peace, will for a century degrade the name +of America. Of course, I cannot prevent it; but events have often +broken but not bent me. I may be burned, but I cannot be melted; so if +secesh succeeds, I throw in a cesspool my document of naturalization, +and shall return to Europe, even if working my passage. + +It is maddening to read all this ignoble clap-trap, written by +European wiseacres concerning this country. Not one knows the people, +not one knows the accidental agencies which neutralize what is grand +and devoted in the people. + +Some are praised here as statesmen and leaders. A statesman, a leader +of such a people as are the Americans, and in such emergencies, must +be a _man_ in the fullest and loftiest comprehension. All the noblest +criteria of moral and intellectual manhood ought to be vigorously and +harmoniously developed in him. He ought to have a deep and lively +moral sense, and the moral perception of events and of men around him. +He ought to have large brains and a big heart,--an almost +all-embracing comprehension of the inside and outside of events,--and +when he has those qualities, then only the genius of foresight will +dwell on his brow. He ought to forget himself wholly and +unconditionally; his reason, his heart, his soul ought to merge in +the principles which lifted him to the elevated station. Who around me +approaches this ideal? So far as I know, perhaps Senator Wade. + +I wait and wait for the eagle which may break out from the White +House. Even the burning fire of the national disaster at Bull Run left +the egg unhatched. _Utinam sim falsus_, but it looks as if the slowest +brains were to deal with the greatest events of our epoch. Mr. Lincoln +is a pure-souled, well-intentioned patriot, and this nobody doubts or +contests. But is that all which is needed in these terrible +emergencies? + +Lyon is killed,--the only man of initiative hitherto generated by +events. We have bad luck. I shall put on mourning for at least six +weeks. They ought to weep all over the land for the loss of such a +man; and he would not have been lost if the administration had put him +long ago in command of the West. O General Scott! Lyon's death can be +credited to you. Lyon was obnoxious to General Scott, but the +General's influence maintains in the service all the doubtful +capacities and characters. The War Department, as says Potter, +bristles with secessionists, and with them the old, rotten, +respectable relics, preserved by General Scott, depress and nip in the +bud all the young, patriotic, and genuine capacities. + +As the sea corrodes the rocks against which it impinges, so egotism, +narrow-mindedness, and immorality corrode the best human +institutions. For humanity's sake, Americans, beware! + +Always the clouds of harpies around the White House and the +Departments,--such a generous ferment in the people, and such +impurities coming to the surface! + +Patronage is the stumbling stone here to true political action. By +patronage the Cabinet keeps in check Congressmen, Senators, etc. + +I learn from very good authority that when Russell, with his shadow, +Sam. Ward, went South, Mr. Seward told Ward that he, Seward, intends +not to force the Union on the Southern people, if it should be +positively ascertained that that people does not wish to live in the +Union! I am sorry for Seward. Such is not the feeling of the Northern +people, and such notions must necessarily confuse and make vacillating +Mr. Seward's--that is, Mr. Lincoln's--policy. Seward's patriotism and +patriotic wishes and expectations prevent him from seeing things as +they are. + +The money men of Boston decided the conclusion of the first national +loan. Bravo, my beloved Yankees! In finances as in war, as in all, not +the financiering capacity of this or that individual, not any special +masterly measures, etc., but the stern will of the people to succeed, +provides funds and means, prevents bankruptcy, etc. The men who give +money send an agent here to ascertain how many traitors are still kept +in offices, and what are the prospects of energetic action by the +administration. + +McClellan is organizing, working hard. It is a pleasure to see him, so +devoted and so young. After all, youth is promise. But already +adulation begins, and may spoil him. It would be very, very saddening. + +Prince Napoleon's visit stirs up all the stupidity of politicians in +Europe and here. What a mass of absurdities are written on it in +Europe, and even by Americans residing there. All this is more than +equalled by the _solemn_ and _wise_ speculations of the Americans at +home. Bar-room and coffee-house politicians are the same all over the +world, the same, I am sure, in China and Japan. To suppose Prince +Napoleon has any appetite whatever for any kind of American crown! +Bah! He is brilliant and intelligent, and to suppose him to have such +absurd plans is to offend him. But human and American gullibility are +bottomless. + +The Prince is a noble friend of the American cause, and freely speaks +out his predilection. His sentiments are those of a true Frenchman, +and not the sickly free-trade pro-slaveryism of Baroche with which he +poisoned here the diplomatic atmosphere. Prince Napoleon's example +will purify it. + +As I was sure of it, the great Manassas fortifications are a humbug. +It is scarcely a half-way fortified camp. So say the companions of the +Prince, who, with him, visited Beauregard's army. So much for the +great Gen. Scott, whom the companions of the Prince call a +_magnificent ruin_. + +The Prince spoke with Beauregard, and the Prince's and his companions' +opinion is, that McDowell planned well his attack, but failed in the +execution; and Beauregard thought the same. The Prince saw McClellan, +and does not prize him so high as we do. These foreign officers say +that most probably, on both sides, the officers will make most correct +plans, as do pupils in military schools, but the execution will depend +upon accident. + +Mr. Seward shows every day more and more capacity in dispatching the +regular, current, diplomatical business affairs. In all such matters +he is now at home, as if he had done it for years and years. He is no +more spread-eagle in his diplomatic relations; is easy and prompt in +all secondary questions relating to secondary interests, and daily +emerging from international complications. + +Hitherto the war policy of the administration, as inspired and +directed by Scott, was rather to receive blows, and then to try to +ward them off. I expect young McClellan to deal blows, and thus to +upturn the Micawber policy. Perhaps Gen. Scott believed that his name +and example would awe the rebels, and that they would come back after +having made a little fuss and done some little mischief. But Scott's +greatness was principally built up by the Whigs, and his hold on +Democrats was not very great. Witness the events of Polk's and +Pierce's administrations. His Mississippi-Atlantic strategy is a +delirium of a softening brain. Seward's enemies say that he puts up +and sustains Scott, because in the case of success Scott will not be +in Seward's way for the future Presidency. Mr. Lincoln, an old Whig, +has the Whig-worship for Scott; and as Mr. Lincoln, in 1851, stumped +for Scott, the candidate for the Presidency, the many eulogies +showered by Lincoln upon Scott still more strengthened the worship +which, of course, Seward lively entertains in Lincoln's bosom. Thus +the relics of Whigism direct now the destinies of the North. Mr. +Lincoln, Gen. Scott, Mr. Seward, form a triad, with satellites like +Bates and Smith in the Cabinet. But the Whigs have not the reputation +of governmental vigor, decision, and promptitude. + +The vitiated impulse and direction given by Gen. Scott at the start, +still prevails, and it will be very difficult to bring it on the right +track--to change the general as well as the war policy from the +defensive, as it is now, to the offensive, as it ought to have been +from the beginning. The North is five to one in men, and one hundred +to one in material resources. Any one with brains and energy could +suppress the rebellion in eight weeks from to-day. + +Mr. Lincoln in some way has a slender historical resemblance to Louis +XVI.--similar goodness, honesty, good intentions; but the size of +events seems to be too much for him. + +And so now Mr. Lincoln is wholly overshadowed by Seward. If by miracle +the revolt may end in a short time, Mr. Seward will have most of the +credit for it. In the long run the blame for eventual disasters will +be put at Mr. Lincoln's door. + +Thank heaven! the area for action and the powers of McClellan are +extended and increased. The administration seems to understand the +exigencies of the day. + +I am told that the patriotic and brave Senator Wade, disgusted with +the slowness and inanity of the administration, exclaimed, "I do not +wonder that people desert to Jeff. Davis, as he shows brains; I may +desert myself." And truly, Jeff. Davis and his gang make history. + +Young McClellan seems to falter before the Medusa-_ruin_ Scott, who is +again at his tricks, and refuses officers to volunteers. To carry +through in Washington any sensible scheme, more boldness is needed +than on the bloodiest battle-field. + +If Gen. Scott could have disappeared from the stage of events on the +sixth of March, his name would have remained surrounded with that halo +to which the people was accustomed; but now, when the smoke will blow +over, it may turn differently. I am afraid that at some future time +will be applied to Scott * * * _quia turpe ducunt parere minoribus, et +quć imberbi didicere, senes perdenda fateri_. + +Not self-government is on trial, and not the genuine principle of +democracy. It is not the genuine, virtual democracy which conspired +against the republic, and which rebels, but an unprincipled, infamous +oligarchy, risen in arms to destroy democracy. From Athens down to +to-day, true democracies never betrayed any country, never leagued +themselves with enemies. From the time of Hellas down to to-day, all +over the world, and in all epochs, royalties, oligarchies, +aristocracies, conspired against, betrayed, and sold their respective +father-lands. (I said this years ago in America and Europe.) + +Fremont as initiator; he emancipates the slaves of the disloyal +Missourians. Takes the advance, but is justified in it by the +slowness, nay, by the stagnancy of the administration. + +Gen. Scott opposed to the expedition to Hatteras! + +If it be true that Seward and Chase already lay the tracks for the +Presidential succession, then I can only admire their short-sightedness, +nay, utter and darkest blindness. The terrible events will be a +schooling for the people; the future President will not be a schemer +already shuffling the cards; most probably it will be a man who serves +the country, forgetting himself. + +Only two members in the Cabinet drive together, Blair and Welles, and +both on the right side, both true men, impatient for action, action. +Every day shows on what false principle this Cabinet was constructed, +not for the emergency, not in view to suppress the rebellion, but to +satisfy various party wranglings. Now the people's cause sticks in the +mud. + + + + +SEPTEMBER, 1861. + + What will McClellan do? -- Fremont disavowed -- The Blairs not in + fault -- Fremont ignorant and a bungler -- Conspiracy to destroy + him -- Seward rather on his side -- McClellan's staff -- A Marcy + will not do! -- McClellan publishes a slave-catching order -- The + people move onward -- Mr. Seward again -- West Point -- The + Washington defences -- What a Russian officer thought of them -- + Oh, for battles! -- Fremont wishes to attack Memphis; a bold + move! -- Seward's influence over Lincoln -- The people for + Fremont -- Col. Romanoff's opinion of the generals -- McClellan + refuses to move -- Manoeuvrings -- The people uneasy -- The staff + -- The Orleans -- Brave boys! -- The Potomac closed -- Oh, poor + nation! -- Mexico -- McClellan and Scott. + + +Will McClellan display unity in conception, and vigor in execution? +That is the question. He seems very energetic and active in organizing +the army; but he ought to take the field very soon. He ought to leave +Washington, and have his headquarters in the camp among the soldiers. +The life in the tent will inspire him. It alone inspired Frederick II. +and Napoleon. Too much organization may become as mischievous as the +no organization under Scott. Time, time is everything. The levies will +fight well; may only McClellan not be carried away by the notion and +the attempt to create what is called a perfect army on European +pattern. Such an attempt would be ruinous to the cause. It is +altogether impossible to create such an army on the European model, +and no necessity exists for it. The rebel army is no European one. +Civil wars have altogether different military exigencies, and the +great tactics for a civil war are wholly different from the tactics, +etc., needed in a regular war. Napoleon differently fought the +Vendeans, and differently the Austrians, and the other coalesced +armies. May only McClellan not become intoxicated before he puts the +cup to his lips. + +Fremont disavowed by Lincoln and the administration. This looks bad. I +have no considerable confidence in Fremont's high capacities, and +believe that his head is turned a little; but in this question he was +right in principle, and right in legality. A commander of an army +operating separately has the exercise of full powers of war. + +The Blairs are not to be accused; I read the letter from F. Blair to +his brother. It is the letter of a patriot, but not of an intriguer. +Fremont establishes an absurd rule concerning the breach of military +discipline, and shows by it his ignorance and narrow-mindedness. So +Fremont, and other bungling martinets, assert that nobody has the +right to criticise the actions of his commander. + +Fremont is ignorant of history, and those around him who put in his +head such absurd notions are a pack of mean and servile spit-lickers. +An officer ought to obey orders without hesitation, and if he does not +he is to be court-martialed and shot. But it is perfectly allowable to +criticise them; it is in human nature--it was, is, and will be done in +all armies; see in Curtius and other historians of Alexander of +Macedon. It was continually done under Napoleon. In Russia, in 1812, +the criticism made by almost all the officers forced Alexander I. to +leave the army, and to put Kutousoff over Barclay. In the last Italian +campaign Austrian officers criticised loudly Giulay, their commander, +etc., etc. + +Conspiracy to destroy Fremont on account of his slave proclamation. +The conspirators are the Missouri slaveholders: Senator Brodhead, old +Bates, Scott, McClellan, and their staffs. Some jealousy against him +in the Cabinet, but Seward rather on Fremont's side. + +McClellan makes his father-in-law, a man of _very_ secondary capacity, +the chief of the staff of the army. It seems that McClellan ignores +what a highly responsible position it is, and what a special and +transcendent capacity must be that of a chief of the staff--the more +so when of an army of several hundreds of thousands. I do not look for +a Berthier, a Gneisenau, a Diebitsch, or Gortschakoff, but a Marcy +will not do. + +Colonel Lebedeef, from the staff of the Emperor Alexander II., and +professor in the School of the Staff at St. Petersburg, saw here +everything, spoke with our generals, and his conclusion is that in +military capacity McDowell is by far superior to McClellan. Strange, +if true, and foreboding no good. + +Mr. Lincoln begins to call a demagogue any one who does not admire all +the doings of his administration. Are we already so far? + +McClellan under fatal influences of the rampant pro-slavery men, and +of partisans of the South, as is a Barlow. All the former associations +of McClellan have been of the worst kind--Breckinridgians. But perhaps +he will throw them off. He is young, and the elevation of his +position, his standing before the civilized world, will inspire and +purify him, I hope. Nay, I ardently wish he may go to the camp, to the +camp. + +McClellan published a slave-catching order. Oh that he may discard +those bad men around him! + +Struggles with evils, above all with domestic, internal evils, absorb +a great part of every nation's life. Such struggles constitute its +development, are the landmarks of its progress and decline. + +The like struggles deserve more the attention of the observer, the +philosopher, than all kinds of external wars. And, besides, most of +such external wars result from the internal condition of a nation. At +any rate, their success or unsuccess almost wholly depends upon its +capacity to overcome internal evils. A nation even under a despotic +rule may overcome and repel an invasion, as long as the struggle +against the internal evils has not broken the harmony between the +ruler and the nation. Here the internal evil has torn a part of the +constitutional structure; may only the necessary harmony between this +high-minded people and the representative of the transient +constitutional formula not be destroyed. The people move onward, the +formula vacillates, and seems to fear to make any bold step. + +If the cause of the freemen of the North succumbs, then humanity is +humiliated. This high-spirited exclamation belongs to Tassara, the +Minister from Spain. Not the diplomat, but the nobly inspired _man_ +uttered it. + +But for the authoritative influence of General Scott, and the absence +of any foresight and energy on the part of the administration, the +rebels would be almost wholly without military leaders, without naval +officers. The Johnsons, Magruders, Tatnalls, Buchanans, ought to have +been arrested for treason the moment they announced their intention to +resign. + +Mr. Seward has many excellent personal qualities, besides his +unquestionable eminent capacity for business and argument; but why is +he neutralizing so much good in him by the passion to be all in all, +to meddle with everything, to play the knowing one in military +affairs, he being in all such matters as innocent as a lamb? It is not +a field on which Seward's hazarded generalizations can be of any +earthly use; but they must confuse all. + +Seward is free from that coarse, semi-barbarous know-nothingism which +rules paramount, not the genuine people, but the would-be something, +the half-civilized _gentlemen_. Above all, know-nothingism pervades +all around Scott, who is himself its grand master, and it nestles +there _par excellence_ in more than one way. It is, however, to be +seen how far this pure American-Scott military wisdom is something +real, transcendent. Up to this day, the pure Americanism, West Point +schoolboy's conceit, have not produced much. The defences of +Washington, so much clarioned as being the product of a high +conception and of engineering skill,--these defences are very +questionable when appreciated by a genuine military eye. A Russian +officer of the military engineers, one who was in the Crimea and at +Sebastopol, after having surveyed these defences here, told me that +the Russian soldiers who defended Sebastopol, and who learned what +ought to be defences, would prefer to fight outside than inside of the +Washington forts, bastions, defences, etc., etc., etc. + +Doubtless many foreigners coming to this country are not much, but the +greatest number are soldiers who saw service and fire, and could be of +some use at the side of Scott's West Point greenness and presumption. + +If we are worsted, then the fate of the men of faith in principles +will be that of Sisyphus, and the coming generation for half a century +will have uphill work. + +If not McClellan himself, some intriguers around him already dream, +nay, even attempt to form a pure military, that is, a reckless, +unprincipled, unpatriotic party. These men foment the irritation +between the arrogance of the thus-called regular army, and the pure +abnegation of the volunteers. Oh, for battles! Oh, for battles! + +Fremont wished at once to attack Fort Pillow and the city of Memphis. +It was a bold move, but the concerted civil and military wisdom +grouped around the President opposed this truly great military +conception. + +Mr. Lincoln is pulled in all directions. His intentions are excellent, +and he would have made an excellent President for quiet times. But +this civil war imperatively demands a man of foresight, of prompt +decision, of Jacksonian will and energy. These qualities may be latent +in Lincoln, but do not yet come to daylight. Mr. Lincoln has no +experience of men and events, and no knowledge of the past. Seward's +influence over Lincoln may be explained by the fact that Lincoln +considers Seward as the alpha and omega of every kind of knowledge and +information. + +I still hope, perhaps against hope, that if Lincoln is what the masses +believe him to be, a strong mind, then all may come out well. Strong +minds, lifted by events into elevated regions, expand more and more; +their "mind's eye" pierces through clouds, and even through rocks; +they become inspired, and inspiration compensates the deficiency or +want of information acquired by studies. Weak minds, when transported +into higher regions, become confused and dizzy. Which of the two will +be Mr. Lincoln's fate? + +The administration hesitates to give to the struggle a character of +emancipation; but the people hesitate not, and take Fremont to their +heart. + +As the concrete humanity, so single nations have epochs of gestation, +and epochs of normal activity, of growth, of full life, of manhood. +Americans are now in the stage of manhood. + +Col. Romanoff, of the Russian military engineer corps, who was in the +Crimean war, saw here the men and the army, saw and conversed with the +generals. Col. R. is of opinion that McDowell is by far superior to +McClellan, and would make a better commander. + +It is said that McClellan refuses to move until he has an army of +300,000 men and 600 guns. Has he not studied Napoleon's wars? Napoleon +scarcely ever had half such a number in hand; and when at Wagram, +where he had about 180,000 men, himself in the centre, Davoust and +Massena on the flanks, nevertheless the handling of such a mass was +too heavy even for his, Napoleon's, genius. + +The country is--to use an Americanism--in a pretty fix, if this +McClellan turns out to be a mistake. I hope for the best. 600 guns! +But 100 guns in a line cover a mile. What will he do with 600? Lose +them in forests, marshes, and bad roads; whence it is unhappily a fact +that McClellan read only a little of military history, misunderstood +what he read, and now attempts to realize hallucinations, as a boy +attempts to imitate the exploits of an Orlando. It is dreadful to +think of it. I prefer to trust his assertion that, once organized, he +soon, very soon, will deal heavy and quick blows to the rebels. + +I saw some manoeuvrings, and am astonished that no artillery is +distributed among the regiments of infantry. When the rank and file +see the guns on their side, the soldiers consider them as a part of +themselves and of the regiment; they fight better in the company of +guns; they stand by them and defend them as they defend their colors. +Such a distribution of guns would strengthen the body of the +volunteers. But it seems that McClellan has no confidence in the +volunteers. Were this true, it would denote a small, very small mind. +Let us hope it is not so. One of his generals--a martinet of the first +class--told me that McClellan waits for the organization of _the +regulars_, to have them for the defence of the guns. If so, it is +sheer nonsense. These narrow-minded West Point martinets will become +the ruin of McClellan. + +McClellan could now take the field. Oh, why has he established his +headquarters in the city, among flunkeys, wiseacres, and spit-lickers? +Were he among the troops, he would be already in Manassas. The people +are uneasy and fretting about this inaction, and the people see what +is right and necessary. + +Gen. Banks, a true and devoted patriot, is sacrificed by the stupidity +of what they call here the staff of the great army, but which +collectively, with its chief, is only a mass of conceit and +ignorance--few, as General Williams, excepted. Banks is in the face of +the enemy, and has no cavalry and no artillery; and here are immense +reviews to amuse women and fools. + +Mr. Mercier, the French Minister, visited a considerable part of the +free States, and his opinions are now more clear and firm; above all, +he is very friendly to our side. He is sagacious and good. + +Missouri is in great confusion--three parts of it lost. Fremont is not +to be accused of all the mischief, but, from effect to cause, the +accusation ascends to General Scott. + +Gen. Scott insisted to have Gen. Harney appointed to the command of +Missouri, and hated Lyon. If, even after Harney's recall, Lyon had +been appointed, Lyon would be alive and Missouri safe. But hatred, +anxiety of rank, and stupidity, united their efforts, and prevailed. +Oh American people! to depend upon such inveterate blunderers! + +Were McClellan in the camp, he would have no flatterers, no +antechambers filled with flunkeys; but the rebels would not so easily +get news of his plans as they did in the affair on Munson's Hill. + +The Orleans are here. I warned the government against admitting the +Count de Paris, saying that it would be a _deliberate_ breach of good +comity towards Louis Napoleon, and towards the Bonapartes, who prove +to be our friends; I told that no European government would commit +itself in such a manner, not even if connected by ties of blood with +the Orleans. At the start, Mr. Seward heeded a little my advice, but +finally he could not resist the vanity to display untimely +spread-eagleism, and the Orleans are in our service. Brave boys! It is +a noble, generous, high-minded, if not an altogether wise, action. + +If a mind is not nobly inspired and strong, then the exercise of +power makes it crotchety and dissimulative in contact with men. To my +disgust, I witness this all around me. + +The American people, its institutions, the Union--all have lost their +virginity, their political innocence. A revolution in the +institutions, in the mode of life, in notions begun--it is going on, +will grow and mature, either for good or evil. Civil war, this most +terrible but most maturing passion, has put an end to the boyhood and +to the youth of the American people. Whatever may be the end, one +thing is sure--that the substance and the form will be modified; nay, +perhaps, both wholly changed. A new generation of citizens will grow +and come out from this smoke of the civil war. + +The Potomac closed by the rebels! Mischief and shame! Natural fruits +of the dilatory war policy--Scott's fault. Months ago the navy wished +to prevent it, to shell out the rebels, to keep our troops in the +principal positions. Scott opposed; and still he has almost paramount +influence. McClellan complains against Scott, and Lincoln and Seward +flatter McClellan, but look up to Scott as to a supernatural military +wisdom. Oh, poor nation! + +In Europe clouds gather over Mexico. Whatever it eventually may come +to, I suggested to Mr. Seward to lay aside the Monroe doctrine, not to +meddle for or against Mexico, but to earnestly protest against any +eventual European interference in the internal condition of the +political institutions of Mexico. + +Continual secondary, international complications, naturally growing +out from the maritime question; so with the Dutch cheesemongers, with +Spain, with England--all easily to be settled; they generate fuss and +trouble, but will make no fire. + +Gen. Scott's partisans complain that McClellan is very disrespectful +in his dealings with Gen. Scott. I wonder not. McClellan is probably +hampered by the narrow routine notions of Scott. McClellan feels that +Scott prevents energetic and prompt action; that he, McClellan, in +every step is obliged to fight Gen. Scott's inertia; and McClellan +grows impatient, and shows it to Scott. + + + + +OCTOBER, 1861. + + Experiments on the people's life-blood -- McClellan's uniform -- + The army fit to move -- The rebels treat us like children -- We + lose time -- Everything is defensive -- The starvation theory -- + The anaconda -- First interview with McClellan -- Impressions of + him -- His distrust of the volunteers -- Not a Napoleon nor a + Garibaldi -- Mason and Slidell -- Seward admonishes Adams -- + Fremont goes overboard -- The pro-slavery party triumph -- The + collateral missions to Europe -- Peace impossible -- Every + Southern gentleman is a pirate -- When will we deal blows? -- + Inertia! inertia! + + +As in the medićval epoch, and some time thereafter, anatomists and +physiologists experimented on the living villeins, that is, on +peasantry, serfs, and called this process _experientia in anima vili_, +so this naďve administration experiments in civil and in military +matters on the people's life-blood. + +McClellan, stirred up by the fools and peacocks around him, has sent +to the War Department a project of a showy uniform for himself and his +staff. It would be to laugh at, if it were not insane. McClellan very +likely read not what he signed. + +The army is in sufficient rig and organization to take the field; but +nevertheless McClellan has not yet made a single movement imperatively +prescribed by the simplest tactics, and by the simplest common sense, +when the enemy is in front. Not a single serious reconnoissance to +ascertain the real force of the enemy, to pierce through the curtain +behind which the rebels hide their real forces. It must be conceded to +the rebel generals that they show great skill in humbugging us. +Whenever we try to make a step we are met by a seemingly strong force +(tenfold increased by rumors spread by the secessionists among us, and +gulped by our stupidity), which makes us suppose a deep front, and a +still deeper body behind. And there is the humbug, I am sure. If, on +such an extensive line as the rebels occupy, the main body should +correspond to what they show in front, then the rebel force must +muster several hundreds of thousands. Such large numbers they have +not, and I am sure that four-fifths of their whole force constitutes +their vanguard, and behind it the main body is chaff. The rebels treat +us as if we were children. + +McClellan fortifies Washington; Fremont, St. Louis; Anderson asks for +engineers to fortify some spots in Kentucky. This is all a defensive +warfare, and not so will the rebel region be conquered. We lose time, +and time serves the rebels, as it increases their moral force. Every +day of their existence shows their intrinsic vitality. + +The theory of starving the rebels out is got up by imbeciles, wholly +ignorant of such matters; wholly ignorant of human nature; wholly +ignorant of the degree of energy, and of abnegation, which criminals +can display when firmly decided upon their purpose. This absurdity +comes from the celebrated anaconda Mississippi-Atlantic strategy. + +Oh! When in Poland, in 1831, the military chiefs concentrated all the +forces in the fortifications of Warsaw, all was gone. Oh for a dashing +general, for a dashing purpose, in the councils of the White House! +The constitutional advisers are deaf to the voice of the people, who +know more about it than do all the departments and the military +wiseacres. The people look up to find as big brains and hearts as are +theirs, and hitherto the people have looked up in vain. The radical +senators, as a King, a Trumbull, a Wade, Wilson, Chandler, Hale, etc., +the true Republicans in the last session of Congress--further, men as +Wadsworth and the like, are the true exponents of the character, of +the clear insight, of the soundness of the people. + +McClellan, and even the administration, seem not to realize that pure +military considerations cannot fulfil the imperative demands of the +political situation. + +_October 6th._--I met McClellan; had with him a protracted +conversation, and could look well into him. I do not attach any value +to physiognomies, and consider phrenology, craniology, and their +kindred, to be rather humbugs; but, nevertheless, I was struck with +the soft, insignificant inexpressiveness of his eyes and features. My +enthusiasm for him, my faith, is wholly extinct. All that he said to +me and to others present was altogether unmilitary and inexperienced. +It made me sick at heart to hear him, and to think that he is to +decide over the destinies and the blood of the people. And he already +an idol, incensed, worshipped, before he did anything whatever. +McClellan may have individual courage, so has almost every animal; but +he has not the decision and the courage of a military leader and +captain. He has no real confidence in the troops; has scarcely any +idea how battles are fought; has no confidence in and no notion of the +use of the bayonet. I told him that, notwithstanding his opinion, I +would take his worst brigade of infantry, and after a fortnight's +drill challenge and whip any of the best rebel brigades. + +Some time ago it was reported that McClellan considered this war had +become a duel of artillery. Fools wondered and applauded. I then +protested against putting such an absurdity in McClellan's mouth; now +I must believe it. To be sure, every battle is in part a duel of +artillery, but ends or is decided by charges of infantry or cavalry. +Cannonading alone never constituted and decided a battle. No position +can be taken by cannonading alone, and shells alone do not always +force an enemy to abandon a position. Napoleon, an artillerist _par +excellence_, considered campaigns and battles to be something more +than duels of artillery. The great battle of Borodino, and all others, +were decided when batteries were stormed and taken. Eylau was a battle +of charges by cavalry and by infantry, besides a terrible cannonading, +etc., etc. McClellan spoke with pride of the fortifications of +Washington, and pointed to one of the forts as having a greater +profile than had the world-renowned Malakoff. What a confusion of +notions, what a misappreciation of relative conditions! + +I cannot express my sad, mournful feelings, during this conversation +with McClellan. We spoke about the necessity of dividing his large +army into corps. McClellan took from the table an Army Almanac, and +pointed to the names of generals to whom he intended to give the +command of corps. He feels the urgency of the case, and said that Gen. +Scott prevented him from doing it; but as soon as he, McClellan, shall +be free to act, the division will be made. So General Scott is +everywhere to defend senile routine against progress, and the +experience of modern times. + +The rebels deserve, to the end of time, many curses from outraged +humanity. By their treason they forced upon the free institutions of +the North the necessity of curtailing personal liberty and other +rights; to make use of despotism for the sake of self-defence. + +The enemy concentrates and shortens his lines, and McClellan dares not +even tread on the enemy's heels. Instead of forcing the enemy to do +what we want, and upturn his schemes, McClellan seemingly does the +bidding of Beauregard. We advance as much as Beauregard allows us to +do. New tactics, to be sure, but at any rate not Napoleonic. + +The fighting in the West and some small successes here are obtained by +rough levies; and those imbecile, regular martinets surrounding +McClellan still nurse his distrust in the volunteers. All the wealth, +energy, intellect of the country, is concentrated in the hands of +McClellan, and he uses it to throw up entrenchments. The partisans of +McClellan point to his highly scientific preparations--his science. He +may have some little of it, but half-science is worse than thorough +ignorance. Oh! for one dare-devil in the Lyon, or in the old-fashioned +Yankee style. McClellan is neither a Napoleon, nor a Cabrera, nor a +Garibaldi. + +Mason and Slidell escaped to Havana on their way to Europe, as +commissioners of the rebels. According to all international +definitions, we have the full right to seize them in any neutral +vessel, they being political contrabands of war going on a publicly +avowed errand hostile to their true government. Mason and Slidell are +not common passengers, nor are they political refugees invoking the +protection of any neutral flag. They are travelling commissioners of +war, of bloodshed and rebellion; and it is all the same in whatever +seaport they embark. And if the vessel conveying them goes from +America to Europe, or _vice versa_, Mr. Seward can let them be seized +when they have left Havana, provided he finds it expedient. + +We lose time, and time is all in favor of the rebels. Every day +consolidates their existence--so to speak, crystallizes them. +Further--many so-called Union men in the South, who, at the start, +opposed secession, by and by will get accustomed to it. Secession +daily takes deeper root, and will so by degrees become _un fait +accompli_. + +Mr. Adams, in his official relations with the English government, +speaks of the rebel pirates as of lawful privateers. Mr. Seward +admonished him for it. Bravo! + +It is so difficult, not to say impossible, to meet an American who +concatenates a long series of effects and causes, or who understands +that to explain an isolated fact or phenomenon the chain must be +ascended and a general law invoked. Could they do it, various +bunglings would be avoided, and much of the people's sacrifices +husbanded, instead of being squandered, as it is done now. + +Fremont going overboard! His fall will be the triumph of the +pro-slavery party, headed by the New York Herald, and supported by +military old fogies, by martinets, and by double and triple political +and intellectual know-nothings. Pity that Fremont had no brilliant +military capacity. Then his fall could not have taken place. + +Mr. Seward is too much ruled by his imagination, and too hastily +discounts the future. But imagination ruins a statesman. Mr. Seward +must lose credit at home and abroad for having prophesied, and having +his prophecies end in smoke. When Hatteras was taken (Gen. Scott +protested against the expedition), Mr. S. assured me that it was the +beginning of the end. A diplomat here made the observation that no +minister of a European parliamentary government could remain in power +after having been continually contradicted by facts. + +Now, Mr. Seward devised these collateral missions to Europe. He very +little knows the habit and temper of European cabinets if he believes +that such collateral confidential agents can do any good. The European +cabinets distrust such irresponsible agents, who, in their turn, +weaken the influence and the standing of the genuine diplomatic +agents. Mr. S., early in the year, boasted to abolish, even in Europe, +the system of passports, and soon afterwards introduced it at home. So +his imagination carries him to overhaul the world. He proposes to +European powers a united expedition to Japan, and we cannot prevent at +home the running of the blockade, and are ourselves blockaded on the +Potomac. All such schemes are offsprings of an ambitious imagination. +But the worst is, that every such outburst of his imagination Mr. +Seward at once transforms into a dogma, and spreads it with all his +might. I pity him when I look towards the end of his political career. +He writes well, and has put down the insolent English dispatch +concerning the _habeas corpus_ and the arrests of dubious, if not +treacherous, Englishmen. Perhaps Seward imagines himself to be a +Cardinal Richelieu, with Lincoln for Louis XIII. (provided he knows as +much history), or may be he has the ambition to be considered a +Talleyrand or Metternich of diplomacy. But if any, he has some very, +very faint similarity with Alberoni. He easily outwits here men around +him; most are politicians as he; but he never can outwit the statesmen +of Europe. Besides, diplomacy, above all that of great powers, is +conceived largely and carried on a grand scale; the present diplomacy +has outgrown what is commonly called (but fallaciously) Talleyrandism +and Metternichism. + +McClellan and the party which fears to make a bold advance on the +enemy make so much fuss about the country being cut up and wooded; it +proves only that they have no brains and no fertility of expedients. +This country is not more cut up than is the Caucasus, and the woods +are no great, endless, primitive forests. They are rather groves. In +the Caucasus the Russians continually attack great and dense forests; +they fire in them several round shots, then grape, and then storm them +with the bayonet; and the Circassians are no worse soldiers than are +the Southrons. + +European papers talk much of mediation, of a peaceful arrangement, of +compromise. By intuition of the future the Northern people know very +well the utter impossibility of such an arrangement. A peace could not +stand; any such peace will establish the military superiority of the +arrogant, reckless, piratical South. The South would teem with +hundreds of thousands of men ready for any piratical, fillibustering +raid, enterprise, or excursion, of which the free States north and +west would become the principal theatres. Such a marauding community +as the South would become, in case of success, will be unexampled in +history. The Cylician pirates, the Barbary robbers, nay, the Tartars +of the 12th, 13th, and 14th centuries, were virtuous and civilized in +comparison with what would be an independent, man-stealing, and +man-whipping Southern agglomeration of lawless men. The free States +could have no security, even if _all_ the thus _called_ gentlemen and +men of honor were to sign a treaty or a compromise. The Southern +pestilential influence would poison not only the North, but this whole +hemisphere. The history of the past has nothing to be compared with +organized, legal piracy, as would become the thus-called Southern +chivalry on land and on sea; and soon European maritime powers would +be obliged to make costly expeditions for the sake of extirpating, +crushing, uprooting the nest of pirates, which then will embrace about +twelve millions,--_every_ Southern gentleman being a pirate at heart. + +This is what the Northern people know by experience and by intuition, +and what makes the people so uneasy about the inertia of the +administration. + +Mr. Lincoln, Mr. Seward, Gen. Scott, and other great men, are soured +against the people and public opinion for distrusting, or rather for +criticising their little display of statesmanlike activity. How +unjust! As a general rule, of all human sentiments, confidence is the +most scrutinizing one. If _confidence_ is bestowed, it wants to +perfectly know the _why_. But from the outset of this war the American +people gave and give to everybody full, unsuspecting confidence, +without asking the why, without even scrutinizing the actions which +were to justify the claim. + +Up to this day Secesh is the positive pole; the Union is the +negative,--it is the blow recipient. When, oh, when will come the +opposite? When will we deal blows? Not under McClellan, I suspect. + + + + +NOVEMBER, 1861. + + Ball's Bluff -- Whitewashing -- "Victoria! Old Scott gone + overboard!" -- His fatal influence -- His conceit -- Cameron -- + Intervention -- More reviews -- Weed, Everett, Hughes -- Gov. + Andrew -- Boutwell -- Mason and Slidell caught -- Lincoln + frightened by the South Carolina success -- Waits unnoticed in + McClellan's library -- Gen. Thomas -- Traitors and pedants -- The + Virginia campaign -- West Point -- McClellan's speciality -- When + will they begin to see through him? + + +The season is excellent for military operations, such as any Napoleon +could wish it. And we, lying not on our oars or arms, but in our beds, +as our _spes patrić_ is warmly and cosily established in a large +house, receiving there the incense and salutations of all flunkeys. +Even cabinet ministers crowd McClellan's antechambers! + +The massacre at Ball's Bluff is the work either of treason, or of +stupidity, or of cowardice, or most probably of all three united. + +No European government and no European nation would thus coolly bear +it. Any commander culpable of such stupidity would be forever +disgraced, and dismissed from the army. Here the administration, the +Cabinet, and all the Scotts, the McClellans, the Thomases, etc., +strain their brains and muscles to whitewash themselves or the +culprit--to represent this massacre as something very innocent. + +Victoria! Victoria! Old Scott, Old Mischief, gone overboard! So +vanished one of the two evil genii keeping guard over Mr. Lincoln's +brains. But it will not be so easy to redress the evil done by Scott. +He nailed the country's cause to such a turnpike that any of his +successors will perhaps be unable to undo what Old Mischief has done. +Scott might have had certain, even eminent, military capacity; but, +all things considered, he had it only on a small scale. Scott never +had in his hand large numbers, and hundreds of European generals of +divisions would do the same that Scott did, even in Mexico. Any one in +Europe, who in some way or other participated in the events of the +last forty years, has had occasion to see or participate in one single +day in more and better fighting, to hear more firing, and smell more +powder, than has General Scott in his whole life. + +Scott's fatal influence palsied, stiffened, and poisoned every noble +or higher impulse, and every aspiration of the people. Scott +diligently sowed the first seeds of antagonism between volunteers and +regulars, and diligently nursed them. Around his person in the War +Department, and in the army, General Scott kept and maintained +officers, who, already before the inauguration, declared, and daily +asserted, that if it comes to a war, few officers of the army will +unite with the North and remain loyal to the Union. + +He never forgot to be a Virginian, and was filled with all a +Virginian's conceit. To the last hour he warded off blows aimed at +Virginia. To this hour he never believed in a serious war, and now +_requiescat in pace_ until the curse of coming generations. + +McClellan is invested with all the powers of Scott. McClellan has more +on his shoulders than any man--a Napoleon not excepted--can stand; and +with his very limited capacity McClellan must necessarily break under +it. Now McClellan will be still more idolized. He is already a kind of +dictator, as Lincoln, Seward, etc., turn around him. + +In a conversation with Cameron, I warned him against bestowing such +powers on McClellan. "What shall we do?" was Cameron's answer; +"neither the President nor I know anything about military affairs." +Well, it is true; but McClellan is scarcely an apprentice. + +Again the intermittent fear, or fever, of foreign intervention. How +absurd! Americans belittle themselves talking and thinking about it. +The European powers will not, and cannot. That is my creed and my +answer; but some of our agents, diplomats, and statesmen, try to made +capital for themselves from this fever which they evoke to establish +before the public that their skill preserves the country from foreign +intervention. Bosh! + +All the good and useful produced in the life and in the economy of +nations, all the just and the right in their institutions, all the ups +and downs, misfortunes and disasters befalling them, all this was, is, +and forever will be the result of logical deductions from +pre-existing dates and facts. And here almost everybody forgets the +yesterday. + +A revolution imposes obligations. A revolution makes imperative the +development and the practical application of those social principles +which are its basis. + +The American Revolution of 1776 proclaimed self-government, equality +before all, happiness of all, etc.; it is therefore the peremptory +duty of the American people to uproot domestic oligarchy, based upon +living on the labor of an enslaved man; it has to put a stop to the +moral, intellectual, and physical servitude of both, of whites and of +colored. + +Eminent men in America are taunted with the ambition to reach the +White House. In itself it is not condemnable; it is a noble or an +ignoble ambition, according to the ways and means used to reach that +aim. It is great and stirring to see one's name recorded in the list +of Presidents of the United States; but there is still a record far +shorter, but by far more to be envied--a record venerated by our +race--it is the record of truly _great men_. The actually inscribed +runners for the White House do not think of this. + +No one around me here seems to understand (and no one is familiar +enough with general history) that protracted wars consolidate a +nationality. Every day of Southern existence shapes it out more and +more into a _nation_, with all the necessary moral and material +conditions of existence. + +Seeing these repeated reviews, I cannot get rid of the idea that by +such shows and displays McClellan tries to frighten the rebels in the +Chinaman fashion. + +The collateral missions to England, France, and Spain, are to add +force to our cause before the public opinion as well as before the +rulers. But what a curious choice of men! It would be called even an +unhappy one. Thurlow Weed, with his offhand, apparently sincere, if +not polished ways, may not be too repulsive to English refinement, +provided he does not buttonhole his interlocutionists, or does not pat +them on the shoulder. So Thurlow Weed will be dined, wined, etc. But +doubtless the London press will show him up, or some "Secesh" in +London will do it. I am sure that Lord Lyons, as it is his paramount +duty, has sent to Earl Russell a full and detailed biography of this +Seward's _alter ego_, sent _ad latus_ to Mr. Adams. Thurlow Weed will +be considered an agreeable fellow; but he never can acquire much +weight and consideration, neither with the statesmen, nor with the +members of the government, nor in saloons, nor with the public at +large. + +Edward Everett begged to be excused from such a false position offered +to him in London. Not fish, not flesh. It was rather an offence to +proffer it to Everett. The old patriot better knows Europe, its +cabinets, and exigencies, than those who attempted to intricate him in +this ludicrous position. He is right, and he will do more good here +than he could do in London--there on a level with Thurlow Weed! + +Archbishop Hughes is to influence Paris and France,--but whom? The +public opinion, which is on our side, is anti-Roman, and Hughes is an +Ultra Montane--an opinion not over friendly to Louis Napoleon. The +French clergy in every way, in culture, wisdom, instruction, theology, +manners, deportment, etc., is superior to Hughes in incalculable +proportions, and the French clergy are already generally anti-slavery. +Hughes to act on Louis Napoleon! Why! the French Emperor can outwit a +legion of Hugheses, and do this without the slightest effort. Besides, +for more than a century European sovereigns, governments, and +cabinets, have generally given up the use of bishops, etc., for +political, public, or confidential missions. Mr. Seward stirs up old +dust. All the liberal party in Europe or France will look astonished, +if not worse, at this absurdity. + +All things considered, it looks like one of Seward's personal tricks, +and Seward outwitted Chase, took him in by proffering a similar +mission to Chase's friend, Bishop McIlvaine. But I pity Dayton. He is +a high-toned man, and the mission of Hughes is a humiliation to +Dayton. + +Whatever may be the objects of these missions, they look like petty +expedients, unworthy a minister of a great government. + +Mason and Slidell caught. England will roar, but here the people are +satisfied. Some of the diplomats make curious faces. Lord Lyons +behaves with dignity. The small Bremen flatter right and left, and do +it like little lap-dogs. + +Governor Andrew of Massachusetts, ex-Governor Boutwell, are tip-top +men--men of the people. The Blairs are too heinous, too violent, in +their persecution of Fremont. Warned M. Blair not to protect one whom +Fremont deservedly expelled. But M. Blair, in his spite against +Fremont, took a mean adventurer by the hand, and entangled therein the +President. + +The vessel and the crew are excellent, and would easily obey the hand +of a helmsman, but there is the rub, where to find him? Lincoln is a +simple man of the prairie, and his eyes penetrate not the fog, the +tempest. They do not perceive the signs of the times--cannot embrace +the horizon of the nation. And thus his small intellectual insight is +dimmed by those around him. Lincoln begins now already to believe that +he is infallible; that he is ahead of the people, and frets that the +people may remain behind. Oh simplicity or conceit! + +Again, Lincoln is frightened with the success in South Carolina, as in +his opinion this success will complicate the question of slavery. He +is frightened as to what he shall do with Charleston and Augusta, +provided these cities are taken. + +It is disgusting to hear with what superciliousness the different +members of the Cabinet speak of the approaching Congress--and not one +of them is in any way the superior of many congressmen. + +When Congress meets, the true national balance account will be +struck. The commercial and piratical flag of the secesh is virtually +in all waters and ports. (The little cheese-eater, the Hollander, was +the first to raise a fuss against the United States concerning the +piratical flag. This is not to be forgotten.) 2d. Prestige, to a great +extent, lost. 3d. Millions upon millions wasted. Washington besieged +and blockaded, and more than 200,000 men kept in check by an enemy not +by half as strong. 4th. Every initiative which our diplomacy tried +abroad was wholly unsuccessful, and we are obliged to submit to new +international principles inaugurated at our cost; and, summing up, +instead of a broad, decided, general policy, we have vacillation, +inaction, tricks, and expedients. The people fret, and so will the +Congress. Nations are as individuals; any partial disturbance in a +part of the body occasions a general chill. Nature makes efforts to +check the beginning of disease, and so do nations. In the human +organism nature does not submit willingly to the loss of health, or of +a limb, or of life. Nature struggles against death. So the people of +the Union will not submit to an amputation, and is uneasy to see how +unskilfully its own family doctors treat the national disease. + +Port Royal, South Carolina, taken. Great and general rejoicing. It is +a brilliant feat of arms, but a questionable military and war policy. +Those attacks on the circumference, or on extremities, never can +become a death-blow to secesh. The rebels must be crushed in the +focus; they ought to receive a blow at the heart. This new strategy +seems to indicate that McClellan has not heart enough to attack the +fastnesses of rebeldom, but expects that something may turn up from +these small expeditions. He expects to weaken the rebels in their +focus. I wish McClellan may be right in his expectations, but I doubt +it. + +Officers of McClellan's staff tell that Mr. Lincoln almost daily comes +into McClellan's library, and sits there rather unnoticed. On several +occasions McClellan let the President wait in the room, together with +other common mortals. + +The English statesmen and the English press have the notion deeply +rooted in their brains that the American people fight for empire. The +rebels do it, but not the free men. + +Mr. Seward's emphatical prohibition to Mr. Adams to mention the +question of slavery may have contributed to strengthen in England the +above-mentioned fallacy. This is a blunder, which before long or short +Seward will repent. It looks like astuteness--_ruse_; but if so, it is +the resource of a rather limited mind. In great and minor affairs, +straightforwardness is the best policy. Loyalty always gets the better +of astuteness, and the more so when the opponent is unprepared to meet +it. Tricks can be well met by tricks, but tricks are impotent against +truth and sincerity. But Mr. Seward, unhappily, has spent his life in +various political tricks, and was surrounded by men whose intimacy +must have necessarily lowered and unhealthily affected him. All his +most intimates are unintellectual mediocrities or tricksters. + +Seward is free from that infamous know-nothingism of which this Gen. +Thomas is the great master (a man every few weeks accused of treason +by the public opinion, and undoubtedly vibrating between loyalty here +and sympathy with rebels). + +All this must have unavoidably vitiated Mr. Seward's better nature. In +such way only can I see plainly why so many excellent qualities are +marred in him. He at times can broadly comprehend things around him; +he is good-natured when not stung, and he is devoted to his men. + +As a patriot, he is American to the core--were only his domestic +policy straightforward and decided, and would he only stop meddling +with the plans of the campaign, and let the War Department alone. + +Since every part of his initiative with European cabinets failed, +Seward very skilfully dispatches all the minor affairs with +Europe--affairs generated by various maritime and international +complications. Were his domestic policy as correct as is now his +foreign policy, Seward would be the right man. + +Statesmanship emerges from the collision of great principles with +important interests. In the great Revolution, the thus called fathers +of the nation were the offsprings of the exigencies of the time, and +they were fully up to their task. They were vigorous and fresh; their +intellect was not obstructed by any political routine, or by tricky +political praxis. Such men are now needed at the helm to carry this +noble people throughout the most terrible tempest. So in these days +one hears so much about constitutional formulas as safeguards of +liberty. True liberty is not to be virtually secured by any framework +of rules and limitations, devisable only by statecraft. The perennial +existence of liberty depends not on the action of any definite and +ascertainable machinery, but on continual accessions of fresh and +vital influences. But perhaps such influences are among the noblest, +and therefore among the rarest, attributes of man. + +Abroad and here, traitors and some pedants on formulas make a noise +concerning the violation of formulas. Of course it were better if such +violations had been left undone. But all this is transient, and evoked +by the direst necessity. The Constitution was made for a healthy, +normal condition of the nation; the present condition is abnormal. +Regular functions are suspended. When the human body is ruined or +devoured by a violent disease, often very tonic remedies are +used--remedies which would destroy the organism if administered when +in a healthy, normal condition. A strong organism recovers from +disease, and from its treatment. Human societies and institutions pass +through a similar ordeal, and when they are unhinged, extraordinary +and abnormal ways are required to maintain the endangered society and +restore its equipoise. + +Examining day after day the map of Virginia, it strikes one that a +movement with half of the army could be made down from Mount Vernon by +the two turnpike roads, and by water to Occoquan, and from there to +Brentsville. The country there seems to be flat, and not much wooded. +Manassas would be taken in the rear, and surrounded, provided the +other half of the army would push on by the direct way from here to +Manassas, and seriously attack the enemy, who thus would be broken, +could not escape. This, or any plan, the map of Virginia ought to +suggest to the staff of McClellan, were it a staff in the true +meaning. Dybitsch and Toll, young colonels in the staff of Alexander +I., 1813-'14, originated the march on Paris, so destructive to +Napoleon. History bristles with evidences how with staffs originated +many plans of battles and of campaigns; history explains the paramount +influence of staffs on the conduct of a war. Of course Napoleon wanted +not a suggestive, but only an executive staff; but McClellan is not a +Napoleon, and has neither a suggestive nor an executive staff around +him. A Marcy to suggest a plan of a campaign or of a battle, to watch +over its execution! + +I spoke to McDowell about the positions of Occoquan and Brentsville. +He answered that perhaps something similar will be under +consideration, and that McClellan must show his mettle and capacity. I +pity McDowell's confidence. + +Besides, the American army as it was and is educated, nursed, brought +up by Gen. Scott,--the army has no idea what are the various and +complicated duties of a staff. No school of staff at West Point; +therefore the difficulty to find now genuine officers of the staff. +If McClellan ever moves this army, then the defectiveness of his staff +may occasion losses and even disasters. It will be worse with his +staff than it was at Jena with the Prussian staff, who were as +conceited as the small West Point clique here in Washington. + +West Point instructs well in special branches, but does not +necessarily form generals and captains. The great American Revolution +was fought and made victorious by men not from any military schools, +and to whom were opposed commanders with as much military science as +there was possessed and current in Europe. Jackson, Taylor, and even +Scott, are not from the school. + +I do not wish to judge or disparage the pupils from West Point, but I +am disgusted with the supercilious and ridiculous behavior of the +clique here, ready to form prćtorians or anything else, and poisoning +around them the public opinion. Western generals are West Point +pupils, but I do not hear them make so much fuss, and so +contemptuously look down on the volunteers. These Western generals +pine not after regulars, but make use of such elements as they have +under hand. The best and most patriotic generals and officers here, +educated at West Point, are numerous. Unhappily a clique, composed of +a few fools and fops, overshadows the others. + +McClellan's speciality is engineering. It is a speciality which does +not form captains and generals for the field,--at least such instances +are very rare. Of all Napoleon's marshals and eminent commanders, +Berthier alone was educated as engineer, and his speciality and high +capacity was that of a chief of the staff. Marescott or Todleben would +never claim to be captains. The intellectual powers of an engineer are +modeled, drilled, turned towards the defensive,--the engineer's brains +concentrate upon selecting defensive positions, and combine how to +strengthen them by art. So an engineer is rather disabled from +embracing a whole battle-field, with its endless casualties and space. +Engineers are the incarnation of a defensive warfare; all others, as +artillerists, infantry, and cavalry, are for dashing into the +unknown--into the space; and thus these specialities virtually +represent the offensive warfare. + +When will they begin to see through McClellan, and find out that he is +not the man? Perhaps too late, and then the nation will sorely feel +it. + +Mr. Seward almost idolizes McClellan. Poor homage that; but it does +mischief by reason of its influence on the public opinion. + + + + +DECEMBER, 1861. + + The message -- Emancipation -- State papers published -- Curtis + Noyes -- Greeley not fit for Senator -- Generalship all on the + rebel side -- The South and the North -- The sensationists -- The + new idol will cost the people their life-blood! -- The Blairs -- + Poor Lincoln! -- The Trent affair -- Scott home again -- The war + investigation committee -- Mr. Mercier. + + +McClellan is now all-powerful, and refuses to divide the army into +corps. Thus much for his brains and for his consistency. + +The message--a disquisition upon labor and capital; hesitancy about +slavery. The President wishes to be pushed on by public opinion. But +public opinion is safe, and expects from the official leader a decided +step onwards. The message gives no solution, suggests none, accounts +not for the lost time--foreshadows not a vigorous, energetic effort to +crush the rebellion; foreshadows not a vigorous, offensive war. The +message is an honest paper, but says not much. + +The question of emancipation is not clear even in the heads of the +leading emancipationists; not one thinks to give freeholds to the +emancipated. It is the only way to make them useful to themselves and +to the community. Freedom without land is humbug, and the fools speak +of exportation of the four millions of slaves, depriving thus the +country of laborers, which a century of emigration cannot fill again. +All these fools ought to be sent to a lunatic asylum. + +To export the emancipated would be equivalent to devastation of the +South, to its transformation into a wilderness. Small freeholds for +the emancipated can be cut out of the plantations of rebels, or out of +the public lands of each State--lands forfeited by the rebellion. + +State papers published. The instructions to the various diplomatic +agents betray a beginner in the diplomatic career. By writing special +instructions for each minister, Mr. Seward unnecessarily increased his +task. The cause, reasons, etc., of the rebellion are one and the same +for France or Russia, and a single explanatory circular for all the +ministers would have done as well and spared a great deal of labor. +Cavour wrote one circular to all cabinets, and so do all European +statesmen. So, as they are, the State papers are a curious +agglomeration of good patriotism and confusion. So the Minister to +England is to avoid slavery; the Minister to France has the contrary. +All this is not smartness or diplomacy, but rather confusion, +insincerity, and double-dealing. One must conclude that Lincoln and +Seward have themselves no firm opinion. The instructions to Mexico +would sound nobly-worded but for the confusion and the veil ordered to +be thrown upon the cause of secession. That to Italy, above all to +Austria, has a smack of a schoolmaster displaying his information +before a gaping boy. It is offensive to the Minister going to Vienna. +It may be suspected that some of these instructions were written to +make capital at home, to astonish Mr. Lincoln with the knowledge of +Europe and the familiarity with European affairs. All this display +will prove to Europeans rather an ignorance of Europe. The +correspondence on the Paris convention is splendid, although the +initiative taken by Seward on this question was a mistake. But he +argued well the case against the English and French reservations. + +Never any government whatever treated so tenderly its worst and most +dangerous enemies as does this government the Washington +secessionists, spies for the enemy, and spreading false news here to +frighten McClellan. + +The old regular, but partly worn-out Republican leaders throttle and +neutralize the new, fresh, vigorous accessions. So Curtis Noyes, one +of the most eminent and devoted men, could not come into the Senate +because Greeley wished to be elected. + +No living man has rendered greater services to the people during the +last twenty years than Greeley; but he ought to remain in his +speciality. Greeley is no more fit for a Senator than to take the +command of a regiment. Besides, the events already run over his head; +Greeley is slowly breaking down. + +McClellan is beset with all kinds of inventors, contractors, etc. He +mostly endorses their suggestions, and on this authority the most +extravagant orders are given by the War Department. All this ought to +be investigated. Somebody back of McClellan may be found as being the +real patron of these leeches. + +If the genius or capacity of a commander consists not only in closely +observing the movements of the enemy, but likewise in penetrating the +enemy's plans and in modifying his own in proportion as they are +deranged by an unexpected movement or a rapid march, then the +generalship is altogether on the other side, and on ours not a sign, +not a breath of it. + +A civil war is mostly the purifying fire in a nation's existence. It +is to be hoped that this great convulsion will purify the free States +by sounding the death-knell of these small intriguing politicians. The +American people at large will acquire earnestness, knowledge of men, +and clear insight into its own affairs. Tricky politicians will be +discarded, and true men backed by majorities. + +The South has for its leaders the chiefs who for years organized the +secession, who waged everything on its success, as life, honor, +fortune, and who incite and carry with them the ignorant masses. + +The reverse is in the North. Mr. Lincoln was not elected for +suppressing the rebellion, nor did he make his Cabinet in view of a +terrible national struggle for death or life. Neither Lincoln nor his +Cabinet are the inciters or the inspiring leaders of the people, but +only expressions--not _ad hoc_--of the national will. This is one +reason why the administration is slower than the people, and why the +rebel administration is quicker than ours. + +The second reason, and generated by the first, is, that every rebel +devotes his whole soul and energy to the success of the rebellion, +forcibly forgetting his individuality. Our thus called leaders think +first of their little selves, whose aggrandizement the public events +are to secure, and the public cause is to square itself with their +individual schemes. + +Such is the policy of almost all those at the helm here. Not one among +them is to be found deserving the name of a statesman, endowed with a +great devotion, and with a great power, for the service of a great and +noble aim. From the solemn hour that the fatherland honorably chains +him to its service, the genuine statesman exists no more for himself, +but for his country alone. If necessary, he ought to consider himself +a victim to the public good, even were the public unjust towards him. +He is to treat as enemies all the dirty, tricky, and mean passions and +men. His enemies will hate, but the country, his enemies included, +will esteem him. Such a man will be the genuine man of the American +people, but he exists not in the official spheres. + +It is for the first time in history that a young, insignificant man, +without a past, without any reason, is put in such a lofty position as +has been McClellan; he is to be literally kicked into greatness, and +into showing eventually courage. All this is a psychological problem! + +Kent's Commentary upon the qualifications of a President is the best +criticism upon Lincoln. + +These mosquitoes of public opinion, the sensation-seekers, the +sentimental preachers, the lecturers, the amateurs of the thus called +representative men, these oratorical falsifiers of history, but +considered here as luminaries, are already at their pernicious, nay, +accursed work. + +They poison the judgment of the people. These hero-seekers for their +sermons, lectures, and sensation productions, have already found all +the criteria of a hero in McClellan, even in his chin, in the back of +his horse, etc., etc., and now herald it all over the country. Curses +be upon them. + +No nation has ever raised idols with such facility as do the +Americans. Nay, I do not suppose that there ever existed in history a +nation with such a thirst for idols as this people. I may be a false +prophet; but this new idol, McClellan, will cost them their +life-blood. + +The Blairs are now staunch supporters of McClellan. It is +unpardonable. They ought to know, and they do know better. But Mr. +Blair wishes to be Secretary of War in Cameron's place, and wishes to +get it through McClellan. + +And poor Lincoln! I pity him; but his advisers may make out of him +something worse even than was Judas, in the curses of ages. + +Polybius asserts that when the Greeks wrote about Rome they erred and +lied, and when the Romans wrote of themselves they lied or boasted. +The same the English do in relation to themselves, and to Americans. +Above all, in this Trent affair, or excitement, all European writers +for the press, professors, doctors, etc., pervert facts, reason, and +international laws, forget the past, and lie or flatter, with a slight +exception, as is Gasparin. + +The Trent affair finished. We are a little humbled, but it was +expedient to terminate it so. With another military leader than +McClellan, we could march at the same time to Richmond, and invest +Canada before any considerable English force could arrive there. But +with such a hero at our head, better that it ends so. Europe will +applaud us, and the relation with England will become clarified. +Perhaps England would not have been so stiff in this Trent affair but +for the fixed idea in Russell's, Newcastle's, Palmerston's, etc., +heads that Seward wishes to pick a quarrel with England. + +The first weeks of Seward's premiership pointed that way. Mr. Seward +has the honors of the Trent affair. It is well as it is; the argument +is smart, but a little too long, and not in a genuine diplomatic +style. But Lincoln ought to have a little credit for it, as from the +start he was for giving the traitors up. + +The worst feature of the whole Trent affair is, that it brought back +home from France this old mischief, General Scott. He will again +resume his position as the first military authority in the country, +confuse the judgment of Lincoln, of the press, and of the people, and +again push the country into mire. + +The Congress appointed a War Investigating Committee, Senator Wade at +the head. There is hope that the committee will quickly find out what +a terrible mistake this McClellan is, and warn the nation of him. But +Lincoln, Seward, and the Blairs, will not give up their idol. + +Louis Napoleon said his word about the Trent affair. All things +considered, the conduct of the Emperor cannot be complained of. The +Thouvenel paper is serious, severe, but intrinsically not unfriendly. +Quite the contrary. Up to this time I am right in my reliance on Louis +Napoleon, on his sound, cool, but broad comprehension. + +Mr. Mercier behaves well, and he is to be relied on, provided we show +mettle and fight the traitors. Now, as the European imbroglio is +clarified, _at them_, _at them_! But nothing to hope or expect from +McClellan. I daily preach, but in the wilderness. Prince de Joinville +made a very ridiculous fuss about the Trent affair. + +Americans believe that a statesman must be an orator. Schoolboy-like, +they judge on English precedents. In England, the Parliament is +omnipotent; it makes and unmakes administrations, therefore oratory is +a necessary corollary in a statesman; but here the Cabinet acts +without parliamentary wranglings, and a Jackson is the true type of an +American statesman. Washington was not an orator, nor was Alexander +Hamilton. + + + + +JANUARY, 1862. + + The year 1861 ends badly -- European defenders of slavery -- + Secession lies -- Jeremy Diddlers -- Sensation-seekers -- + Despotic tendencies -- Atomistic Torquemadas -- Congress chained + by formulas -- Burnside's expedition a sign of life -- Will this + McClellan ever advance? -- Mr. Adams unhorsed -- He packs his + trunks -- Bad blankets -- Austria, Prussia, and Russia -- The + West Point nursery -- McClellan a greater mistake than Scott -- + Tracks to the White House -- European stories about Mr. Lincoln + -- The English ignorami -- The slaveholder a scarcely varnished + savage -- Jeff. Davis -- "Beauregard frightens us -- McClellan + rocks his baby" -- Fancy army equipment -- McClellan and his + chief of staff sick in bed -- "No satirist could invent such + things" -- Stanton in the Cabinet -- "This Stanton is the people" + -- Fremont -- Weed -- The English will not be humbugged -- Dayton + in a fret -- Beaufort -- The investigating committee condemn + McClellan -- Lincoln in the clutches of Seward and Blair -- Banks + begs for guns and cavalry in vain -- The people will awake! -- + The question of race -- Agassiz. + + +An ugly year ended in backing before England, having, at least, +relative right on our side. Further, the ending year has revealed a +certain incapacity in the Republican party's leaders, at least its +official leaders, to administer the country and to grasp the events. +If the new year shall be only the continuation of the faults, the +mistakes, and the incapacities prevailing during 1861, then the worst +is to be expected. + +The lowest in moral degradation is an European defending slavery here +or in Europe. Such Europeans are far below the condemned criminals. +Still lower are such Europeans who become defenders of slavery after +having visited plantations, where, in the shape of wines and +delicacies, they tasted human blood, and then, hyenas-like, smacked +their lips And thirsted for more. + +Always the same stories, lies, and humbugs concerning the hundreds of +thousands of rebels in Manassas. These lies are spread here in +Washington by the numerous secessionists--at large, by such ignoble +sheets as the New York Herald and Times; and McClellan seems to +willingly swallow these lies, as they justify his inaction and c----. + +The city is more and more crowded with Jeremy Diddlers, with +lecturers, with sensation-seekers, all of them in advance discounting +their hero, and showing in broad light their gigantic stupidity. One +of this motley finds in McClellan a Norman chin, the other muscle, the +third a brow for laurels (of thistle I hope), another a square, +military, heroic frame, another firmness in lips, another an +unfathomed depth in the eye, etc., etc. Never I heard in Europe such +balderdash. And the ladies--not the women and gentlewomen--are worse +than the men in thus stupefying themselves and those around them. + +The thus called arbitrary acts of the government prove how easily, on +the plea of patriotic necessity, a people, nay, the public opinion, +submits to arbitrary rule. All this, servility included, explains the +facility with which, in former times, concentrated and concrete +despotisms have been established. Here every such arbitrary action is +submitted to, because it is so new, and because the people has the +childish, naďve, but, to it, honorable confidence, that the power +entrusted by the people is used in the interest and for the welfare of +the people. But all the despots of all times and of all nations said +the same. However, in justice to Mr. Lincoln, he is pure, and has no +despotical longings, but he has around him some atomistic Torquemadas. + +It will be very difficult to the coming generations to believe that a +people, a generation, who for half a century was outrunning the time, +who applied the steam and the electro-magnetic telegraph, that the +same people, when overrun by a terrible crisis, moved slowly, waited +patiently, and suffered from the mismanagement of its leaders. This is +to be exclusively explained by the youthful self-consciousness of an +internal, inexhaustible vital force, and by the child-like +inexperience. + +The Congress, that is, the majority, shows that it is aware of the +urgency of the case, and of the dangerous position of the country. But +still the best in Congress are chained, hampered by the formulas. + +The good men in both the houses seem to be firmly decided not to +quietly stand by and assist in the murder of the nation by the +administrative and military incapacity. This was to be expected from +such men as Wade, Grimes, Chandler, Hale, Wilson, Sumner (too +classical), and other Republicans in the Senate, and from the numerous +pure, radical Republicans in the House. + +Burnside's expedition is a sign of life. But all these expeditions on +the circumference, even if successful, will be fruitless if no bold, +decided movement is at once made at the centre, at the heart of the +rebellion. But McClellan, as his supporters say, matures his +_strategical_ plans. O God! General Scott lost _by strategy_ +three-fourths of the country's cause, and very probably by strategy +McClellan will jeopardize what remains of it. + +Will this McClellan ever advance? If he lingers, he may find only rats +in Manassas. McClellan is ignorant of the great, unique rule for all +affairs and undertakings,--it is to throw the whole man in one thing +at one time. It is the same in the camp as in the study, for a captain +as for a lawyer, the savant, and the scholar. + +It is to be regretted that some of the men truly and thoroughly +devoted to the cause of freedom and of humanity, mix with it such an +enormous quantity of personal, almost childish vanity, as to puzzle +many minds concerning the genuine nobleness of their devotion. It is +to be regretted that those otherwise so self-sacrificing patriots +discount even their martyrdom and persecutions, and credit them to +their frivolous self-satisfaction. + +Most of the thus-called well-informed Americans rather skim over than +thoroughly study history. Above all, it applies to the general history +of the Christian era, and of our great epoch (from the second half of +the 18th century). Most of the Americans are only very superficially +familiar with the history of continental Europe, or know it only by +its contact with the history of England. Many of them are more +familiar with the classical wars of Alexander, Hannibal, Cćsar, etc., +than with those of Gustavus, Frederick II., and even of Napoleon. Were +it otherwise, _strategy_ would not to such an extent have taken hold +of their brains. + +Mr. Adams was terribly unhorsed during the Trent excitement in +England; he literally began to pack up his trunks, and asked a +personal advice from Lord John Russell. + +What a devoted patriot this Sandford in Belgium is; he has continual +_itchings in his hand_ to pay a _higher price_ for bad blankets that +they may not fall into the hands of secesh agents; so with cloth, so +perhaps with arms. _Oh, disinterested patriot!_ + +Austria and Prussia whipped in by England and France, and at the same +time glad to have an occasion to take the airs of maritime powers. +Austria and Prussia sent their advice concerning the Trent affair. The +kick of asses at what they suppose to be the dying lion. + +Austria and Prussia! Great heavens! Ask the prisons of both those +champions of violated rights how many better men than Slidell and +Mason groaned in them; and the conduct of those powers against the +Poles in 1831! Was it neutral or honest? + +I am sure that Russia will behave well, and abstain from coming +forward with uncalled-for and humiliating advice. Russia is a true +great power,--a true friend,--and such noble behavior will be in +harmony with the character of Alexander II., and with the friendliness +and clear perception of events held by the Russian minister here. I +hope that when the war is over the West Point nursery will be +reformed, and a general military organization introduced, such a one +as exists in Switzerland. + +McClellan is a greater mistake than was even Scott. McClellan knows +not the A B C of military history of any nation or war, or he would +not keep this army so in camp. He would know that after recruits have +been roughly instructed in the rudiments of a drill, the next best +instructor is fighting. So it was in the thirty years' war; so in the +American Revolution; so in the first French revolutionary wars. +Strategians, martinets, lost the battles, or rather the campaigns, of +Austerlitz, of Jena, etc. In 1813 German rough levies fought almost +before they were drilled, and at Bautzen French recruits were +victorious over Prussians, Russians, and Austrians. The secesh fight +with fresh levies, etc. + +Numerous political intriguers surrounding McClellan are busily laying +tracks for him to the White House. What will Seward and Chase say to +it, and even old Abe, who himself dreams of re-election, or at least +his friends do it for him? All these candidates forget that the surest +manner to reach the White House is not to think of it--to forget +oneself and to act. + +It is amusing to find in European papers all the various stories about +Mr. Lincoln. There he is represented as a violent, blood-thirsty +revolutionaire, dragging the people after him. In this manner, those +European imbeciles are acquainted with American events, character, +etc. They cannot find out that in decision, in clear-sightedness and +soundness of judgment, the people are far ahead of Mr. Lincoln and of +his spiritual or constitutional conscience-keepers. And the same +imbeciles, if not _canailles_, speak of a mob-rule over the President, +etc. Some one ought to enlighten those French and English supercilious +ignorami that something like a mob only prevails in such cities as New +York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore; and nine-tenths of such a mob are +mostly yet unwashed, unrepublicanized Europeans. The ninety-nine +one-hundredths of the freemen of the North are more orderly, more +enlightened, more law-abiding, and more moral than are the English +lordlings, somebodies, nobodies, and would-be somebodies. In the West, +lynch-law, to be sure, is at times used against brothels, bar-rooms, +gambling-houses, and thieves. It would be well to do the same in +London, were it not that most of the lynch-lawed may not belong to the +people. If the European scribblers were not past any honest impulse, +they would know that the South is the generator and the congenial +region for the mob, the filibusters, the revolver and the bowie-knife +rule. In the South the proportion of mobs to decency is the reverse of +that prevailing in the free States. The _slavery gentleman_ is a +scarcely varnished savage, for whom the highest law is his reckless +passion and will. + +If Jeff. Davis succeeds, he will be the founder of a new and great +slaveholding empire. His name will resound in after times; but history +will record his name as that of a curse to humanity. + +And so Davis is making history and Lincoln is telling stories. +Beauregard gets inspired by the fumes of bivouacs; McClellan by the +fumes of flatterers. Beauregard frightens us, McClellan rocks his +baby. Beauregard shares the camp-fires of his soldiers; he sees them +daily, knows them, as it is said, one by one; McClellan lives +comfortably in the city, and appears only to the soldiers as the great +Lama on special occasions. Camp-fellowship inspired all the great +captains and established the magnetic current between the leader and +the soldier. + +McClellan organized a board of generals, arriving daily from the +camps, to discuss some new fancy army equipment. And Lincoln, Seward, +Blair, and all the tail of intriguers and imbeciles, still admire him. +In no other country would such a futile man be kept in command of +troops opposed to a deadly and skilful enemy. + +For several weeks, McClellan and his chief of the staff (such as he +is) are sick in bed, and no one is _ad interim_ appointed to attend to +the current affairs of our army of 600,000, having the enemy before +their nose. Oh human imbecility! No satirist could invent such things; +and if told, it would not be believed in Europe. + +The McClellan-worship by the people at large is to be explained by the +firm, ardent will of the people to crush the rebels, and by the +general feeling of the necessity of a man for that purpose. Such is +the case with the true, confiding people in the country; but here, +contractors, martinets, and intriguers are the blowers of that +worship. Lincoln is as is the people at large; but a Seward, a Blair, +a Herald, a Times, and their respective and numerous tails,--as for +their motives, they are the reverse of Lincoln and of the people. + +Victories in Kentucky, beyond the circumference or the direct action +from here; they are obtained without strategy and by rough levies. But +this voice of events is not understood by the McClellan tross. + +Change in the Cabinet: Stanton, a new man, not from the parlor, and +not from the hacks. His bulletin on the victory in Kentucky +inaugurated a new era. It is a voice that nobody hitherto uttered in +America. It is the awakening voice of the good genius of the people, +almost as that which awoke Lazarus. This Stanton is the people; I +never saw him, but I hope he is the man for the events; perhaps he may +turn out to be _my_ statesman. + +I wish I could get convinced of the real superiority of Fremont. It is +true that he was treated badly and had natural and artificial +difficulties to over come; it is true that to him belongs the credit +of having started the construction of the mortar fleet; but likewise +it is true that he was, at the mildest, unsurpassingly reckless in +contracts and expenditures, and I shall never believe him a general. +With all this, Fremont started a great initiative at a time when +McClellan and three-fourths of the generals of his creation considered +it a greater crime to strike at a _gentleman_ slaveholder than to +strike at the Union. + +The courtesies and hospitalities paid to Thurlow Weed by English +society are clamored here in various ways. These courtesies prove the +high breeding and the good-will of a part, at least, of the English +aristocracy and of English statesmen. I do not suppose that Thurlow +Weed could ever have been admitted in such society if he were +travelling on his own merits as the great lobbyist and politician. At +the utmost, he would have been shown up as a _rara avis_. But +introduced to English society as the master spirit of Mr. Seward, and +as Seward's semi-official confidential agent, Thurlow Weed was +admitted, and even petted. But it is another question if this palming +of a Thurlow Weed upon the English high-toned statesmen increased +their consideration for Mr. Seward. The Duke of Newcastle and others +are not yet softened, and refuse to be humbugged. + +Whoever has the slightest knowledge of how affairs are transacted, is +well aware that the times of a personal diplomacy are almost gone. The +exceptions are very rare, very few, and the persons must be of other +might and intellectual mettle than a Sandford, Weed, or Hughes. Great +affairs are not conducted or decided by conversations, but by great +interests. Diplomatic agents, at the utmost, serve to keep their +respective governments informed about the run of events. Mr. Mercier +does it for Louis Napoleon; but Mr. Mercier's reports, however +friendly they may be, cannot much influence a man of such depth as +Louis Napoleon, and to imagine that a Hughes will be able to do it! I +am ashamed of Mr. Seward; he proves by this would-be-crotchety policy +how little he knows of events and of men, and how he undervalues Louis +Napoleon. Such humbug missions are good to throw dirt in the eyes of a +Lincoln, a Chase, etc., but in Europe such things are sent to +Coventry. And Hughes to influence Spain! Oh! oh! + +Dayton frets on account of the mission of Hughes. Dayton is right. +Generally Dayton shows a great deal of good sense, of good +comprehension, and a noble and independent character. He is not a +flatterer, not servile, and subservient to Mr. Seward, as are +others--Mr. Adams, Mr. Sandford, and some few other diplomatic agents. + +The active and acting abolitionists ought to concentrate all their +efforts to organize thoroughly and efficiently the district of +Beaufort. The success of a productive colony there would serve as a +womb for the emancipation at large. + +Mr. Seward declares that he has given up meddling with military +affairs. For his own sake, and for the sake of the country, I ardently +wish it were so; but--I shall never believe it. + +The Investigating Committee has made the most thorough disclosures of +the thorough incapacity of McClellan; but the McClellan men, Seward, +Blair, etc., neutralize, stifle all the good which could accrue to the +country from these disclosures. And Lincoln is in their clutches. The +administration by its influence prevents the publication of the +results of this investigation, prevents the truth from coming to the +people. Any hard name will be too soft for such a moral prevarication. + +McClellan is either as feeble as a reed, or a bad man. The disorder +around here is nameless. Banks compares it to the time of the French +Directory. Banks has no guns, no cavalry, and is in the vanguard. He +begs almost on his knees, and cannot get anything. And the country +pays a chief of the staff, and head of the staffers. + +The time must come, although it be now seemingly distant, that the +people will awake from this lethargy; that it will perceive how much +of the noblest blood of the people, how much time and money, have been +worse than recklessly squandered. The people will find it out, and +then they will ask those Cains at the wheel an account of the innocent +blood of Abel, the country's son, the country's cause. + +The defenders of, and the thus called moderate men on the question of +slavery, utter about it the old rubbish composed of the most thorough +ignorance and of disgusting fallacies, in relation to this pseudo +science, or rather lie, about races. More of it will come out in the +course of the Congressional discussions. Not one of them is aware that +independent science, that comparative anatomy, physiology, +psychology, anthropology, that philosophy of history altogether and +thoroughly repudiate all these superficially asserted, or +tried-to-be-established, intrinsic diversities and peculiarities of +races. All these would-be axioms, theories, are based on sand. In true +science the question of race as represented by the Southern school +partisans of slavery, with Agassiz, the so-called professor of +Charleston by European savans, at their head,--that question is at the +best an illusive element, and endangers the accuracy of induction. As +it presents itself to the unprejudiced investigator, race is nothing +more than the single manifestation of anterior stages of existence, +the aggregate expression of the pre-historic vicissitudes of a people. + +If those would-be knowing arguers on slavery, race, etc., were only +aware of the fact that such people as the primitive Greeks, or the +ancestors of classical Greeks, that the ancestors of the Latins, that +even the roving, robbing ancestors of the Anglo Saxons, in some way or +other, have been anthropophagi, and worshipped fetishes; and even as +thus called already civilized, they sacrificed men to gods,--could our +great pro-slavers know all this, they would be more decent in their +ignorant assertions, and not, so self-satisfied, strut about in their +dark ignorance. + +Those who are afraid that the freed negroes of the South will run to +the Northern free States, display an ignorance still greater than the +former. When the enslaved colored Americans in the South shall be +_all_ thoroughly emancipated in that now cursed region, then they will +remain in the, to them, congenial climate, and in the favorable +economical conditions of labor and of existence. Not only those +emancipated will not run North, but the colored population from the +free States, incited and stirred up by natural attractions, will leave +the North for the South, as small streamlets and rivulets run into a +large current or river. + +The rebels extend on an immense bow, nearly one hundred miles, from +the lower to the upper Potomac. Our army, two to one, is on the span +of the arc, and we do nothing. A French sergeant would be better +inspired than is McClellan. + + + + +FEBRUARY, 1862. + + Drifting -- The English blue book -- Lord John could not act + differently -- Palmerston the great European fuss-maker -- Mr. + Seward's "two pickled rods" for England -- Lord Lyons -- His + pathway strewn with broken glass -- Gen. Stone arrested -- + Sumner's resolutions infuse a new spirit in the Constitution -- + Mr. Seward beyond salvation -- He works to save slavery -- Weed + has ruined him -- The New York press -- "Poor Tribune" -- The + Evening Post -- The Blairs -- Illusions dispelled -- "All quiet + on the Potomac" -- The London papers -- Quill-heroes can be + bought for a dinner -- French opinion -- Superhuman efforts to + save slavery -- It is doomed! -- "All you worshippers of darkness + cannot save it!" -- The Hutchinsons -- Corporal Adams -- + Victories in the West -- Stanton the man! -- Strategy (hear! + hear!) + + +We are obliged, one by one, to eat our official high-toned assertions +and words, and day after day we drift towards putting the rebels on an +equal footing with ourselves. We declared the privateers to be pirates +(which they are), and now we proffer their exchange against our +colonels and other honorable prisoners. So one radical evil generates +numberless others. And from the beginning of the struggle this radical +evil was and is the want of earnestness, of a firm purpose, and of a +straight, vigorous policy by the administration. _Paullatim summa +petuntur_ may turn out true--but for the rebels. + +The publication of the English blue book, or of official +correspondence between Lord Lyons and Lord John Russell, throws a new +light on the conduct of the English Cabinet; and, anglophobe as I am, +I must confess that, all things considered, above all the +unhappily-justified distrust of England in Mr. Seward's policy,--from +the first day of our troubles Lord John Russell could not act +differently from what he did. Lord John Russell had to reconcile the +various and immense interests of England, jeopardized by the war, with +his sincere love of human liberty. Therein Lord John Russell differs +wholly from Lord Palmerston, this great European fuss-maker, who hates +America. As far as it was possible, Lord J. Russell remained faithful +to the noble (not hereditary, but philosophical) traditions of his +blood. Lord John Russell's letter to Lord Lyons (No. 17), February 20, +1861, although full of distrust in the future policy of Mr. Lincoln's +Cabinet towards England, is nevertheless an honorable document for his +name. + +Lord J. Russell was well aware that the original plan of Mr. Seward +was to annoy and worry England. Everything is known in this world, and +especially the incautious words and conversations of public men. +Months before the inauguration, Mr. Seward talked to senators of both +parties that he had in store "two pickled rods" for England. The one +was to be Green (always drunken), the Senator from Missouri, on +account of the colored man Anderson; the other Mr. Nesmith, the +Senator from Oregon, and the San Juan boundaries. Undoubtedly the +Southern senators did not keep secret the like inimical forebodings +concerning Mr. Seward's intentions towards England. Undoubtedly all +this must have been known to Lord J. Russell when he wrote the +above-mentioned letter, No. 17. + +More even than Lord John Russell's, Lord Lyons's official +correspondence since November, 1860, inspires the highest possible +respect for his noble sentiments and character. Above all, one who +witnessed the difficulties of Lord Lyons's position here, and how his +pathway was strewn with broken glass, and this by all kinds of hands, +must feel for him the highest and most sincere consideration. From the +official correspondence, Lord Lyons comes out a friend of humanity and +of human liberty,--just the reverse of what he generally was supposed +to be. And during the whole Trent affair, Lord Lyons's conduct was +discreet, delicate, and generous. Events may transform Lord Lyons into +an official enemy of the Union; but a mind soured by human meanness is +soothingly impressioned by such true nobleness in a diplomat and an +Englishman. + +Gen. Stone, of Ball's Bluff infamous massacre, arrested. Bravo! At the +best, Stone was one of those conceited regulars who admired slavery, +and who would have wished to save the Union in their own peculiar way. +I wish he may speak, as in all probability he was not alone. + +Sumner's resolutions infuse a new spirit in the Constitution, and +elevate it from the low ground of a dead formula. The resolutions +close the epoch of the Stories, of the Kents, of the Curtises, and +inaugurate a higher comprehension of American constitutionalism. +During this session Charles Sumner triumphantly and nobly annihilated +the aspersions of his enemies, representing him as a man of one hobby, +but lacking any practical ideas. His speech on currency was among the +best. Not so with his speech about the Trent affair. It is +superficial, and contains misconceptions concerning treaties, and +other blunders very strange in a would-be statesman. + +Ardently devoted to the cause of justice and of human rights, Sumner +weakens the influence which he ought to exercise, because he impresses +many with the notion that he looks more to the outside effect produced +by him than to the intrinsic value of the subject; he makes others +suppose that he is too fond of such effect, and, above all, of the +effect produced in Europe among the circle of his English and European +acquaintances. + +It is positively asserted that Lincoln agreed to take Mr. Seward in +the Cabinet, because Weed and others urgently represented that Mr. +Seward is the only man in the Republican party who is familiar with +Europe, with her statesmen, and their policy. O Lord! O Lord! And +where has Seward acquired all this information? Mr. Seward had not +even the first A B C of it, or of anything else connected with it. +And, besides, such a kind of special information is, at the utmost, of +secondary necessity for an American statesman. Marcy had it not, and +was a true, a genuine statesman. Undoubtedly, nature has endowed +Seward with eminent intellectual qualities, and with germs for an +eminent statesman. But the intellectual qualities became blunted by +the long use of crotchets and tricks of a politician, by the +associations and influence of such as Weed, etc.; thereby the better +germs became nipped, so to speak, in the bud. Mr. Seward's acquired +information by study, by instruction, and by reading, is quite the +reverse of what in Europe is regarded as necessary for a statesman. +Often, very often, I sorrowfully analyze and observe Mr. Seward, with +feelings like those evoked in us by the sight of a noble ruin, or of a +once rich, natural panorama, but now marred by large black spots of +burned and dead vegetation, or by the ashes of a volcano. + +Now, Mr. Seward is beyond salvation--a "disappointed man," as he +called himself in a conversation with Judge Potter, M. C.; he changed +aims, and perhaps convictions. For Mr. Seward, slavery is no more the +most hideous social disease; he abandoned that creed which elevated +him in the confidence of the people. Now he works to preserve as much +as possible of the curse of slavery; he does it on the plea of Union +and conservatism; but in truth he wishes to disorganize the pure +Republican party, which he hates since the Chicago Convention and +since the days of the formation of the Cabinet. Under the advice of +Weed, Mr. Seward attempts to form a (thus called) Union and +conservative party, which at the next turn may carry him into the +White House. + +Seward considers Weed his good genius; but in reality Weed has ruined +Seward. Now Mr. Seward supports _strategy_, imbecility, and McClellan. +The only explanation for me is, that Seward, participating in all +military counsels and strategic plans, and not understanding any of +them, finds it safer to back McClellan, and thus to deceive others +about his own ignorance of military matters. + +The press--the New York one--worse and worse; the majority wholly +degraded to the standard of the Herald and of the Times. The _poor_ +Tribune, daily fading away, altogether losing that bold, lofty spirit +of initiative to which for so many years the Tribune owed its +all-powerful and unparalleled influence over the free masses. Now, at +times, the Tribune is similar to an old, honest sexagenarian, +attempting to draw a night-cap over his ears and eyes. The flames of +the holy fire, so common once in the Tribune, flash now only at +distant, very distant epochs. The Evening Post towers over all of +them. If the Evening Post never at a jump went as far as once did the +Tribune, the Evening Post never made or makes a retrograde step; but +perhaps slowly, but steadily and boldly, moves on. The Evening Post is +not a paper of politicians or of jobbers, but of enlightened, +well-informed, and strong-hearted patriots and citizens. + +Mr. Blair, after all, is only an ambitious politician. My illusion +about both the brothers is wholly dispelled and gone. I regret it, but +both sustain McClellan, both look askant on Stanton, and belong to +the conditional emancipationists, colonizationists, and other RADICAL +preservers of slavery. All such form a class of superficial +politicians, of compromisers with their creed, and are corrupters of +others. + +How ardently I would prefer not to so often accuse others; but more +than forty years of revolutionary and public life and experience have +taught me to discriminate between deep convictions and assumed +ones--to highly venerate the first, and to keep aloof from the second. +Gold is gold, and pinchbeck is pinchbeck, in character as in metal. + +McClellan acts as if he had taken the oath to some hidden and veiled +deity or combination, by all means not to ascertain anything about the +condition of the enemy. Any European if not American old woman in +pants long ago would have pierced the veil by a strong reconnoissance +on Centreville. Here "all quiet on the Potomac." And I hear generals, +West Pointers, justifying this colossal offence against common sense, +and against the rudiments of military tactics, and even science. Oh, +noble, but awfully dealt with, American people! + +At times Mr. Seward talks and acts as if he lacked altogether the +perception of the terrible earnestness of the struggle, of the dangers +and responsibilities of his political position, as well now before the +people as hereafter before history. Often I can scarcely resist +answering him, Beware, beware! + +Lincoln belittles himself more and more. Whatever he does is done +under the pressure of events, under the pressure of the public +opinion. These agencies push Lincoln and slowly move him, +notwithstanding his reluctant heaviness and his resistance. And he a +standard-bearer of this noble people! + +Those mercenary, ignorant, despicable scribblers of the London Times, +of the Tory Herald, of the Saturday Review, and of the police papers +in Paris, as the Constitutionnel, the Pays, the Patrie, all of them +lie with unparalleled facility. Any one knows that those hungry +quill-heroes can be got for a good dinner and a _douceur_. + +I am sorry that the Americans ascribe to Louis Napoleon and to the +French people the hostility to human rights as shown by those +_échappés des bagnes de la littérature_. Louis Napoleon and the French +people have nothing in common with those literary blacklegs. + +The _Journal des Débats_, the _Opinion Nationale_, the _Presse_, the +_Sičcle_, etc., constitute the true and honest organs of opinion in +France. In the same way A. de Gasparin speaks for the French people +with more authority than does Michel Chevalier, who knows much more +about free trade, about canals and railroads, but is as ignorant of +the character, of the spirit, and of the institutions of the American +people, as he is ignorant concerning the man in the moon. So the +lawyer Hautefeuille must have received a fee to show so much ill-will +to the cause of humanity, and such gigantic ignorance. + +_Who began the civil war?_ is repeatedly discussed by those quill +cut-throats and allies on the Thames and on the Seine. + +Here some smaller diplomats (not Sweden, who is true to the core to +the cause of liberty), and, above all, the would-be fashionable +_galopins des légations_, are the cesspools of secession news, picked +up by them in secesh society. Happily, the like _galopins_ are the +reverse of the opinions of their respective chiefs. + +What superhuman efforts are made in Congress, and out of it, in the +Cabinet, in the White House, by Union men,--Seward imagines he leads +them,--by the weak-brained, and by traitors, to save slavery, if not +all, at least a part of it. Every concession made by the President to +the enemies of slavery has only one aim; it is to mollify their urgent +demands by throwing to them small crumbs, as one tries to mollify a +boisterous and hungry dog. By such a trick Lincoln and Seward try to +save what can be saved of the peculiar institution, to gratify, and +eventually to conciliate, the South. This is the policy of Lincoln, of +Seward, and very likely of Mr. Blair. Such political _gobe-mouche_ as +Doolittle and many others, are, or will be, taken in by this +manoeuvre. + +Scheme what you like, you schemers, wiseacres, politicians, and +would-be statesmen, nevertheless slavery is doomed. Humanity will have +the best against such pettifoggers as you. I know better. I have the +honor to belong to that European generation who, during this half of +our century, from Tagus and Cadiz to the Wolga, has gored with its +blood battle-fields and scaffolds; whose songs and aspirations were +re-echoed by all the horrible dungeons; by dungeons of the +blood-thirsty Spanish inquisition, then across Europe and Asia, to the +mines of Nertschinsk, in the ever-frozen Altai. We lost all we had on +earth; seemingly we were always beaten; but Portugal and Spain enjoy +to-day a constitutional regime that is an improvement on absolutism. +France has expelled forever the Bourbons, and universal suffrage, +spelt now by the French people, is a progress, is a promise of a great +democratic future. Germany has in part conquered free speech and free +press. Italy is united, Romanism is falling to pieces, Austria is +undermined and shaky, and broken are the chains on the body of the +Russian serf. All this is the work of the spirit of the age, and our +generation was the spirit's apostle and confessor. And so it will be +with slavery, and all you worshippers of darkness cannot save it. + +Not the one who strikes the first blow begins a civil war, but he who +makes the striking of the blow imperative. The Southern robbers cannot +claim exemption; they stole the arsenals, and struck the first blow at +Sumpter. So much for the infamous quill-heroes of the London Times, +the Herald, and _tutti quanti_. + +The highest crime is treason in arms, and this crime is praised and +defended by the English would-be high-toned press. But sooner or later +it will come out how much apiece was paid to the London Times, the +Herald, and the Saturday Review for their venomous articles against +the Union. + +McClellan expelled from the army the Hutchinson family. It is mean and +petty. Songs are the soul and life of the camp, and McClellan's +_heroic deeds_ have not yet found their minstrel. + +After all, McClellan has organized--nothing! McDowell has, so to +speak, formed the first skeletons of brigades, divisions, of parks of +artillery, etc. The people uninterruptedly poured in men and +treasures, and McClellan only continued what was commenced before him. + +I positively know that already in December Mr. Lincoln began to be +doubtful of McClellan's generalship. This doubtfulness is daily +increasing, and nevertheless Mr. Lincoln keeps that incapacity in +command because he does not wish _to hurt McClellan's feelings_. +Better to ruin the noble people, the country! I begin to draw the +conclusion that Mr. Lincoln's good qualities are rather negative than +positive. + +Mr. Adams complains that he is kept in the dark about the policy of +the administration, and cannot answer questions made to him in London. +But the administration, that is, Lincoln and Seward, are a little _a +la_ Micawber, expecting what may turn up. And, besides this, the great +orator _de lana caprina_ (Mr. Adams) deliberately degraded himself to +the condition of a corporal under Mr. Seward's orders. + +Victories in the West, results of the new spirit in the War +Department. Stanton will be the man. + +It is a curious fact that such commanders as Halleck, etc., sit in +cities and fight through those under them; and there are ignoble +flatterers trying to attribute these victories to McClellan, and to +his _strategy_. As if battles could be commanded by telegraph at one +thousand miles' distance. It is worse than imbecility, it is idiotism +and _strategy_. + +Stanton calls himself a man of one idea. How he overtops in the +Cabinet those myrmidons with their many petty notions! One idea, but a +great and noble one, makes the great men, or the men for great events. +Would God that the people may understand Stanton, and that +pettifoggers, imbeciles, and traitors may not push themselves between +the people and Stanton, and neutralize the only man who has _the one +idea_ to break, to crush the rebellion. + +Every day Mr. Lincoln shows his want of knowledge of men and of +things; the total absence of _intuition_ to spell, to see through, and +to disentangle events. + +If, since March, 1861, instead of being in the hands of pettifoggers, +Mr. Lincoln had been in the hands of _a man of one idea_ as is +Stanton, nine-tenths of the work would have been accomplished. + +McClellan's flunkeys claim for him the victories in the West. It is +impossible to settle which is more to be scorned in them, their +flunkeyism or their stupidity. + +_Lock-jaw_ expedition. For any other government whatever, in one even +of the most abject favoritism, such a humbug and silly conduct of the +commander and of his chief of the staff would open the eyes even of a +Pompadour or of a Dubarry. Here, _our great rulers and ministers_ shut +the more closely their mind's (?) eyes * * * * * + +For the first time in one of his dispatches Mr. Corporal Adams _dares_ +to act against orders, and mentions--but very slightly--slavery. Mr. +Adams observes to his chief that in England public opinion is very +sensitive; at last the old freesoiler found it out. + +How this public opinion in America is unable to see the things as they +naturally are. Now the public fights to whom to ascribe the victories +in the West. Common sense says, Ascribe them, 1st, to the person who +ordered the fight (Stanton); 2d, exclusively to the generals who +personally commanded the battles and the assaults of forts. Even +Napoleon did not claim for himself the glory for battles won by his +generals when in his, Napoleon's, absence. + +For weeks McClellan and his thus called staff diligently study +international law, strategy (hear, hear!), tactics, etc. His aids +translate for his use French and German writers. One cannot even apply +in this case the proverb, "Better late than never," as the like +hastily scraped and undigested sham-knowledge unavoidably must +obfuscate and wholly confuse McClellan's--not Napoleonic--brains. + +The intriguers and imbeciles claim the Western victories as the +illustration of McClellan's great _strategy_. Why shows he not a +little _strategy_ under his nose here? Any old woman would surround +and take the rebels in Manassas. + +Now they dispute to Grant his deserved laurels. If he had failed at +Donelson, the _strategians_ would have washed their hands, and thrown +on Grant the disaster. So did Scott after Bull Run. + +Mr. Lincoln, McClellan, Seward, Blair, etc., forget the terrible +responsibility for thus recklessly squandering the best blood, the +best men, the best generation of the people, and its treasures. But +sooner or later they will be taken to a terrible account even by the +Congress, and at any rate by history. + +It is by their policy, by their support of McClellan, that the war is +so slow, and the longer it lasts the more human sacrifices it will +devour, and the greater the costs of the devastation. Stanton alone +feels and acts differently, and it seems that the rats in the Cabinet +already begin their nightly work against him. These rats are so +ignorant and conceited! + +The celebrated Souvoroff was accused of cruelty because he always at +once stormed fortresses instead of investing them and starving out the +inhabitants and the garrisons. The old hero showed by arithmetical +calculations that his bloodiest assaults never occasioned so much loss +of human life as did on both sides any long siege, digging, and +approaches, and the starving out of those shut up in a fortress. This +for McClellan and for the intriguing and ignorant RATS. + + + + +MARCH, 1862. + + The Africo-Americans -- Fremont -- The Orleans -- Confiscation -- + American nepotism -- The Merrimac -- Wooden guns -- Oh shame! -- + Gen. Wadsworth -- The rats have the best of Stanton -- McClellan + goes to Fortress Monroe -- Utter imbecility -- The embarkation -- + McClellan a turtle -- He will stick in the marshes -- Louis + Napoleon behaves nobly -- So does Mr. Mercier -- Queen Victoria + for freedom -- The great strategian -- Senator Sumner and the + French minister -- Archbishop Hughes -- His diplomatic activity + not worth the postage on his correspondence -- Alberoni-Seward -- + Love's labor lost. + + +Men like this Davis, Wickliffe, and all the like _pecus_, roar against +the African race. The more I see of this doomed people, the more I am +convinced of their intrinsic superiority over all their white +revilers, above all, over this slaveholding generation, rotten, as it +is, to the core. When emancipated, the Africo-Americans in immense +majority will at once make quiet, orderly, laborious, intelligent, and +free cultivators, or, to use European language, an excellent +peasantry; when ninety-nine one-hundredths of slaveholders, either +rebels or thus called loyal, altogether considered, as human beings +are shams, are shams as citizens, and constitute caricatures and +monsters of civilization. + +Civilization! It is the highest and noblest aim in human destinies +when it makes the man moral and true; but civilization invoked by, +and in which strut traitors, slaveholders, and abettors of slavery, +reminds one of De Maistre's assertion, that the devil created the red +man of America as a counterfeit to man, God's creation in the Old +World. This so-called civilization of the slaveholders is the devil's +counterfeit of the genuine civilization. + +The Africo-Americans are the true producers of the Southern +wealth--cotton, rice, tobacco, etc. When emancipated and transformed +into small farmers, these laborious men will increase and ameliorate +the culture of the land; and they will produce by far more when the +white shams and drones shall be taken out of their way. In the South, +bristling with Africo-American villages, will almost disappear +fillibusterism, murder, and the bowie knife, and other supreme +manifestations of Southern _chivalrous high-breeding_. + +Fremont's reports and defence show what a disorder and insanity +prevailed under the rule of Scott. Fremont's military capacity perhaps +is equal to zero; his vanity put him in the hands of wily flatterers; +but the disasters in the West cannot be credited to him. Fremont +initiated the construction of the mortar flotilla on the Mississippi +(I positively know such is the fact), and he suggested the capture of +various forts, but was not sustained at this sham, the headquarters. + +These Orleans have wholly espoused and share in the fallacious and +mischievous notions of the McClellanites concerning the volunteers. +Most probably with the authority of their name, they confirm +McClellan's fallacious notions about the necessity of a great regular +army. The Orleans are good, generous boys, but their judgment is not +yet matured; they had better stayed at home. + +Confiscation is the great word in Congress or out of it. The property +of the rebels is confiscable by the ever observed rule of war, as +consecrated by international laws. When two sovereigns make war, the +victor confiscates the other's property, as represented by whole +provinces, by public domains, by public taxes and revenues. In the +present case the rebels are the sovereigns, and their property is +therefore confiscable. But for the sake of equity, and to compensate +the wastes of war, Congress ought to decree the confiscation of +property of all those who, being at the helm, by their political +incapacity or tricks contribute to protract the war and increase its +expense. + +Mr. Lincoln yields to the pressure of public opinion. A proof: his +message to Congress about emancipation in the Border States. Crumb No. +1 thrown--reluctantly I am sure--to the noble appetite of freemen. I +hope history will not credit Mr. Lincoln with being the initiator. + +American nepotism puts to shame the one practised in Europe. All +around here they keep offices in pairs, father and son. So McClellan +has a father in-law as chief of the staff, a brother as aid, and then +various relations, clerks, etc., etc., and the same in some other +branches of the administration. + +The Merrimac affair. Terrible evidence how active and daring are the +rebels, and we sleepy, slow, and self-satisfied. By applying the +formula of induction from effect to cause, the disaster occasioned by +the Merrimac, and any further havoc to be made by this iron +vessel,--all this is to be credited to McClellan. + +If Norfolk had been taken months ago, then the rebels could not have +constructed the Merrimac. Norfolk could have been easily taken any day +during the last six months, _but for strategy_ and the _maturing of +great plans_! These are the sacramental words more current now than +ever. Oh good-natured American people! how little is necessary to +humbug thee! + +Oh shame! oh malediction! The rebels left Centreville,--which turns +out to be scarcely a breastwork, with wooden guns,--and they slipped +off from Manassas. + +When McClellan got the news of the evacuation, he gravely considered +where to lean his right or left flanks, and after the consideration, +two days after the enemy _wholly_ completed the evacuation, McClellan +moves at the head of 80,000 men--to storm the wooden guns of +Centreville. Two hours after the news of the evacuation reached the +headquarters, Gen. Wadsworth asked permission to follow with his +brigade, during the night, the retreating enemy. But it was not +_strategy, not a matured plan_. If Gen. Wadsworth had been in command +of the army, not one of the rats from Manassas would have escaped. +The reasons are, that Gen. Wadsworth has a quick, clear, and +wide-encompassing conception of events and things, a clear insight, +and many other inborn qualities of mind and intellect. + +The Congress has a large number of very respectable capacities, and +altogether sufficient for the emergencies, and the Congress would do +more good but for the impediments thrown in its way by the +double-dealing policy prevailing in Mr. Lincoln's Cabinet and +administration. The majority in Congress represent well the spirit of +self-government. It is a pity that Congress cannot crush or purify the +administration. + +All that passes here is maddening, and I am very grateful to my father +and mother for having endowed me with a frame which resists the blows. + +The pursuit of the enemy abandoned, the basis of operations changed. +The rats had the best of Stanton. _Utinam sim falsus propheta_, but if +Stanton's influence is no more all-powerful, then there is an end to +the short period of successes. Mr. Lincoln's council wanted to be +animated by a pure and powerful spirit. Stanton was the man, but he is +not a match for impure intriguers. Also McClellan goes to Fortress +Monroe, to Yorktown, to the rivers. This plan reveals an utter +military imbecility, and its plausibility can only catch ----. + +1st. Common sense shows that the rebels ought to be cut off from their +resources, that is, from railroads, and from communication with the +revolted States in the interior, and to be precipitated into the +ocean. To accomplish it our troops ought to have marched by land to +Richmond, and pushed the enemy towards the ocean. Now McClellan pushes +the rebels from the extremity towards the centre, towards the focus of +their basis,--exactly what they want. + +I am sure that McClellan is allured to this strategy by the success of +the gunboats on the Mississippi. He wishes that the gunboats may take +Richmond, and he have the credit of it. + +The Merrimac is still menacing in Hampton Roads, and may, some day or +other, play havoc with the transports. The communications by land are +always more preferable than those by water--above all for such a great +army. A storm, etc., may do great mischief. + +McClellan assures the President, and the other intriguers and fools +constituting his supporters, that in a few days he will throw 55,000 +men on Yorktown. He and his staff to do such a thing, which would be a +masterpiece even for the French military leaders and their staffs! He, +McClellan, never knew what it was to embark an army. Those who believe +him are even greater imbeciles than I supposed them to be. Poor +Stanton, to be hampered by imbecility and intrigue! I went to +Alexandria to see the embarkation; it will last weeks, not days. + +From Yorktown to Richmond, the country is marshy, very marshy; +McClellan, a turtle, a _dasippus_, will not understand to move quick +and to overcome the impediments. Faulty as it is to drive the rebels +from the sea towards their centre, this false move would be corrected +by rash and decisive movements. But McClellan will stick in the +marshes, and may never reach Richmond by that road. + +Any man with common sense would go directly by land; if the army moves +only three miles a day it will reach Richmond sooner than by the other +way. Such an army in a spell will construct turnpike roads and +bridges, and if the rebels tear up the railroads, they likewise could +be easily repaired. Progressing in the slowest, in the most genuine +McClellan manner, the army will reach Richmond with less danger than +by the Peninsula. + +The future American historian ought to record in gold and diamonds the +names of those who in the councils opposed McClellan's new strategy. +Oh! Mr. Seward, Mr. Seward, why is your name to be recorded among the +most ardent supporters of this _strategy_? + +Jeff. Davis sneers at the immense amount of money, etc., spent by Mr. +Lincoln. As he, Jeff. Davis, is still quietly in Richmond, and his +army undestroyed, of course he is right to sneer at Mr. Lincoln and +McClellan, whom he, Jeff. Davis, kept at bay with wooden guns. + +Senator Sumner takes airs to defend or explain McClellan. The Senator +is probably influenced by Blair. The Senator cannot be classed among +traitors and intriguers supporting the _great strategian_. Perhaps +likewise the Senator believes it to be _distingué_ to side with +_strategy_. + +If the party and the people could have foreseen that civil war was +inevitable, undoubtedly Mr. Lincoln would not have been elected. But +as the cause of the North would have been totally ruined by the +election of Lincoln's Chicago competitor, Mr. Lincoln is the lesser of +the two evils. + +A great nuisance is this competition for all kinds of news by the +reporters hanging about the city, the government, and the army. Some +of these reporters are men of sense, discernment, and character; but +for the sake of competition and priority they fish up and pick up what +they can, what comes in their way, even if such news is altogether +beyond common sense, or beyond probability. + +In this way the best among the newspapers have confused and misled the +sound judgment of the people; so it is in relation to the overwhelming +numbers of the rebels, and by spreading absurdities concerning +relations with Europe. The reporters of the Herald and of the Times +are peremptorily instructed to see the events through the perverted +spectacles of their respective bosses. + +Mr. Adams gets either frightened or warm. Mr. A. insists on the +slavery question, speaks of the project of Mason and Slidell in London +to offer certain moral concessions to English anti-slavery +feeling,--such as the regulations of marriage, the repeal of laws +against manumission, etc. Mr. Adams warns that these offers may make +an impression in England. + +When all around me I witness this revolting want of energy,--Stanton +excepted,--this vacillation, these tricks and double-dealings in the +governmental spheres, then I wish myself far off in Europe; but when I +consider this great people outside of the governmental spheres, then I +am proud to be one of the people, and shall stay and fall with them. + +How meekly the people accept the disgrace of the wooden guns and of +the evacuation of Manassas! It is true that the partisans of +McClellan, the traitors, the intriguers, and the imbeciles are +devotedly at work to confuse the judgment of the people at large. + +Mr. Dayton's semi-official conversation with Louis Napoleon shows how +well disposed the Emperor was and is. The Emperor, almost as a favor, +asks for a decided military operation. And in face of such news from +Europe, Lincoln, Seward, and Blair sustain the _do-nothing +strategian_! + +Until now Louis Napoleon behaves nobly, and not an atom of reproach +can be made by the American people against his policy; and our policy +many times justly could have soured him, as the acceptation of the +Orleans, etc. No French vessels ran anywhere the blockade; secesh +agents found very little if any credit among French speculators. Very +little if any arms, munitions, etc., were bought in France. And in +face of all these positive facts, the American wiseacres here and in +Europe, all the bar-room and street politicians here and there, all +the would-be statesmen, all the sham wise, are incessant in their +speculations concerning certain invisible, deep, treacherous schemes +of Louis Napoleon against the Union. This herd is full of stories +concerning his deep hatred of the North; they are incessant in their +warnings against this dangerous and scheming enemy. Some Englishmen in +high position stir up this distrust. On the authority of letters +repeatedly received from England, Senator Sumner is always in fits of +distrust towards the policy of France. The last discovery made by all +these deep statesmen here and in France is, that Louis Napoleon +intends to take Mexico, to have then a basis for cooperation with the +rebels, and to destroy us. But Mexico is not yet taken, and already +the allies look askance at each other. Those great Anglo-American +Talleyrands, Metternichs, etc., bring down the clear and large +intellect of Louis Napoleon to the atomistic proportions of their own +sham brains. I do not mean to foretell Louis Napoleon's policy in +future. Unforeseen emergencies and complications may change it. I +speak of what was done up to this day, and repeat, _not the slightest +complaint can be made against Louis Napoleon_. And in justice to Mr. +Mercier, the French minister here, it must be recorded that he +sincerely seconds the open policy of his sovereign. Besides, Mr. +Mercier now openly declares that he never believed the Americans to be +such a great and energetic people as the events have shown them to be. +I am grateful to him for this sense of justice, shared only by few of +his diplomatic colleagues. + +In one word, official and unofficial Europe, in its immense majority, +is on our side. The exceptions, therefore, are few, and if they are +noisy, they are not intrinsically influential and dangerous. The +truest woman, Queen Victoria, is on the side of freedom, of right, and +of justice. This ennobles even her, and likewise ennobles our cause. +Not the bad wishes of certain Europeans are in our way, but our +slowness, the McClellanism and its supporters. + +_Quidquid delirant reges, plectuntur achivi!_ The _achivi_ is the +people, and the McClellanists are the _reges_. + +Mr. Seward, elated by victories, insinuates to foreign powers that +they may stop the "recognition of belligerents." Oh imagination! Such +things ought not even to be insinuated, as logic and common sense +clearly show that the foreign cabinets cannot do it, and thus stultify +themselves. Seward believes that his rhetoric is irresistible, and +will move the cabinets of France and of England. * * * Not the +"recognition of belligerents;" let the rebels slip off from Manassas, +etc. Mr. Seward would do better for himself and for the country to +give up meddling with the operations of the war, and backing the +bloodless campaigns of the _strategian_. But Mr. Seward, carried away +by his imagination, believes that the cabinets will yield to his +persuasive voice, and then, oh! what a feather in his diplomatic cap +before the befogged Mr. Lincoln, and before the people. But _pia +desideria_. + +In all the wars, as well as in all the single campaigns and battles, +every _captain_ deserving this name aimed at breaking his enemy in the +centre or at seizing his basis of operations, wherefrom the enemy +draws its resources and forces. The great _strategian_ changed all +this; he goes directly to the circumference instead of aiming at the +heart. + +Mr. Seward, answering Mr. Dayton's dispatch concerning his, Dayton's, +conversation with Louis Napoleon, points to Europe being likewise +menaced by revolutionists. Unnecessary spread-eagleism, and an awful +want of any, even diplomatic, tact. I hope that Mr. Dayton, who has so +much sound sense and discernment, will keep to himself this freak of +Mr. Seward's untamable imagination. + +Under the influence of insinuations received from his English friends, +Senator Sumner said to Mr. Mercier (I was present) that with every +steamer he expects a joint letter of admonition directed by the French +and English to our government. Mr. Mercier retorted, "How can you, +sir, have such notions? you are too great a nation to be treated in +this way. Such letters would do for Greece, etc., but not for you." I +was sorry and glad for the lesson thus given. + +Archbishop Hughes was not over-successful in France, and went off +rather second-best in the opinion of the press, of the public, and of +the Catholic, even ultra-Montane clergy of France. All this on +account of his conditional anti-slaverism and unconditional +pro-slaverism. All this was easily to be foreseen. His Eminence is in +Rome, and from Rome is to influence Spain in our favor. + +Oh diplomacy! oh times of Capucine and Jesuit fathers and of Abbes! +We, the children of the eighteenth century, we recall you to life. I +do not suppose that the whole diplomatic activity of his Eminence is +worth the postage of his correspondence. But Uncle Sam is generous, +and pays him well. So it is with Thurlow Weed, who tries to be +economical, is unsuccessful, and cries for more monish. A schoolboy on +a spree! + +It seems that Weed loses not his time, and tries with Sandford to turn +_a penny_ in Belgium. Oh disinterested saviors of the country, and +patriots! + +But for this violent development of our domestic affairs, Mr. Seward +would have appeared before the world as the mediator between the Pope +and the insubordinate European nations, sovereigns, and cabinets. + +Oh, Alberoni! oh, imaginary! It beats any of the wildest poets. In +justice it must be recorded, that this great scheme of mediation was +dancing before Mr. Seward's imagination at the epoch when he was sure +that, once Secretary of State, his speeches would be current and read +all over the South; and they, the speeches, would crush and extinguish +secession. This Mr. Seward assured one of the patriotic members of +Buchanan's expiring Cabinet. + +Mr. Seward is now busy building up a conservative Union party North +and South to preserve slavery, and to crush the rampant Sumnerism, as +Thurlow Weed calls it, and advises Seward to do so. + +Mr. Seward's unofficial agents, Thurlow Weed, his Eminence, and +others, are untiring in the incense of their benefactor. Occasionally, +Mr. Lincoln gets a small share of it. + +Sandford in Paris and Brussels, Mr. Adams and Thurlow Weed in London, +work hard to assuage and soften the harsh odor in which Mr. Seward is +held, above all, among certain Englishmen of mark. It seems, however, +that _love's labor is lost_, and Mr. Adams, scholar-like, explains the +unsuccess of their efforts by the following philosophy: That in great +convulsions and events it is always the most eminent men who become +selected for violent and vituperative attacks. This is Mr. Seward's +fate, but time will dispel the falsehoods, and render him justice. +Well, be it so. + +Weed tried hard to bring the Duke of Newcastle over to Mr. Seward; but +the Duke seems perfectly unmoved by the blandishments, etc. To think +that the strict and upright Duke, who knows Weed, could be shaken by +the ubiquitous lobbyist! Rather the other way. + +One not acquainted with Mr. Seward's ardent republicanism may suspect +him of some dictatorial projects, to judge from the zeal with which +some of the diplomatic agents in Europe, together with the unofficial +ones there, extol to all the world Mr. Seward's transcendent +superiority over all other eminent men in America. Are the European +statesmen to be prepared beforehand, or are they to be befogged and +prevented from judging for themselves? If so, again is _love's labor +lost_. European statesmen can perfectly take Mr. Seward's measure from +his uninterrupted and never-fulfilled prophecies, and from other +diplomatic stumblings; and one look suffices European men of mark to +measure a Hughes, a Weed, a Sandford, and _tutti quanti_. + +In Mr. Lincoln's councils, Mr. Stanton alone has the vigor, the +purity, and the simplicity of a man of deep convictions. Stanton alone +unites the clear, broad comprehension of the exigencies of the +national question with unyielding action. He is the _statesman_ so +long searched for by me. He, once a friend of McClellan, was not +deterred thereby from condemning that do-nothing _strategy_, so +ruinous and so dishonorable. Stanton is a Democrat, and therefore not +intrinsically, perhaps not even relatively, an anti-slavery man, but +he hesitates not now to destroy slavery for the preservation of the +Union. I am sure that every day will make Stanton more clear-sighted, +and more radical in the question of Union and rebellion. And Seward +and Blair, who owe their position to their anti-slavery principles, +_arcades ambo_, try now to save something of slavery, and turn against +Stanton. + + + + +APRIL, 1862. + + Immense power of the President -- Mr. Seward's Egeria -- + Programme of peace -- The belligerent question -- Roebucks and + Gregories scums --Running the blockade -- Weed and Seward take + clouds for camels --Uncle Sam's pockets -- Manhood, not money, + the sinews of war --Colonization schemes -- Senator Doolittle -- + Coal mine speculation --Washington too near the seat of war -- + Blair demands the return of a fugitive slave woman -- Slavery is + Mr. Lincoln's "_mammy_" -- He will not destroy her -- Victories + in the West -- The brave navy --McClellan subsides in mud before + Yorktown -- Telegraphs for more men -- God will be tired out! -- + Great strength of the people --Emancipation in the District -- + Wade's speech -- He is a monolith --Chase and Seward -- N. Y. + Times -- The Rothschilds -- Army movements and plans. + + +If the military conduct of McClellan, from the first of January to the +day of the embarkation of the troops for Yorktown--if this conduct +were tried by French marshals, or by the French chief staff, or by the +military authorities and chief staffs of Prussia, Russia, and even of +Austria, McClellan would be condemned as unfit to have any military +command whatever. I would stake my right hand on such a verdict; and +here the would-be strategians, the traitors, the intriguers, and the +imbeciles prize him sky-high. + +Only by personal and close observation of the inner working of the +administrative machinery is it possible to appreciate and to +understand what an immense power the Constitution locates in the +hands of a President. Far more power has he than any constitutional +sovereign--more than is the power of the English sovereign and of her +Cabinet put together. In the present emergencies, such a power in the +hands of a Wade or of a Stanton would have long ago saved the country. + +Mr. Seward looks to all sides of the compass for a Union party in the +South, which may rise politically against the rebels. That is the +advice of Weed, Mr. Seward's Egeria. I doubt that he will find many, +or even any. First kill the secesh, destroy the rebel power, that is, +the army, and then look for the Union men in the South. Mr. Seward, in +his generalizations, in his ardent expectations, etc., etc., forgets +to consider--at least a little--human nature, and, not to speak of +history, this _terra incognita_. Blood shed for the nationality makes +it grow and prosper; a protracted struggle deepens its roots, carries +away the indifferent, and even those who at the start opposed the +move. All such, perhaps, may again fall off from the current of +rebellion, but that current must first be reduced to an imperceptible +rivulet; and Mr. Seward, sustaining the do-nothing strategian, acts +against himself. + +Mr. Seward's last programme is, after the capture of Richmond and of +New Orleans, to issue a proclamation--to offer terms to the rebels, to +restore the old Union in full, to protect slavery and all. For this +reason he supports McClellan, as both have the same plan. Of such a +character are the assurances given by Mr. Seward to foreign diplomats +and governments. He tries to make them sure that a large Union party +will soon be forthcoming in the South, and again sounds his +vaticinations of the sacramental ninety days. I am sorry for this his +incurable passion to play the Pythoness. It is impossible that such +repeated prophecies shall raise him high in the estimation of the +European statesmen. Impossible! Impossible! whatever may be the +contrary assertions of his adulators, such as an Adams, a Sandford, a +Weed, a Bigelow, a Hughes, and others. When Mr. Seward proudly +unveiled this his programme, a foreign diplomat suggested that the +Congress may not accept it. Mr. Seward retorted that he cares not for +Congress; that he will appeal to the people, who are totally +indifferent to the abolition of slavery. + +Why does Mr. Seward deliberately slander the American people, and this +before foreign diplomats, whose duty it is to report all Mr. Seward's +words to their respective governments? Such words uttered by Mr. +Seward justify the assertions of Lord John Russell, of Gladstone, +those true and high-minded friends of human liberty, that the North +fights for empire and not for a principle. The people who will answer +to Mr. Seward's appeal will be those whose creed is that of the New +York Herald, the Boston Courier, the people of the Fernando and Ben +Woods, of the Vallandighams, etc. + +What is the use of urging on the foreign Cabinets--above all, England +and France--to rescind the recognition of belligerents? They cannot +do it. It does not much--nay, not any--harm, as the English +speculators will risk to run the blockade if the rebels are +belligerent or not. And besides, the English and French Cabinets may +throw in Mr. Seward's face the decisions of our own prize courts, who, +on the authority of Mr. Seward's blockade, in their judicial +decisions, treat the rebels as belligerents. The European statesmen +are more cautious and more consequential in their acts than is our +Secretary. + +As it stands now, the conduct of the English government is very +correct, and not to be complained of. I do not speak of the infamous +articles in the Times, Herald, etc., or of the Gregories and such +scums as the Roebucks; but I am satisfied that Lord John Russell +wishes us no harm, and that it is our own policy which confuses and +makes suspicious such men as Russell, Gladstone, and others of the +better stamp. + +As for the armaments of secesh vessels in Liverpool and the Bahamas, +it is so perfectly in harmony with the English mercantile character +that it is impossible for the government to stop it. + +The English merchant generally considers it as a lawful enterprise to +run blockades; in the present case the premium is immense; it is so in +a twofold manner. 1st, the immediate profits on the various cargoes +exchanged against each other by a successful running of the blockade; +such profits must equal several hundred per cent. 2d, the prospective +profits from an eventual success of the rebellion for such friends as +are now supporting the rebels. These prospects must be very alluring, +and are partly justified by our slow war, slow policy. I am sure that +the like armaments for the secessionists are made by shares owned by +various individuals; the individual risk of each shareholder being +comparatively insignificant when compared with the prospective gains. + +If Seward, McClellan, and Blair had not meddled with Stanton, not +weakened his decisions, nor befogged Mr. Lincoln, Richmond would be in +our hands, together with Charleston and Savannah; and all the +iron-clad vessels built in England for secesh would be harmless. + +Mr. Weed and Mr. Seward expect Jeff. Davis to be overthrown by their +imaginary Southern Union party. O, wiseacres! if both of you had only +a little knowledge of human nature--not of that one embodied in +lobbyists--and of history, then you would be aware that if Jeff. Davis +is to be deposed it will be by one more violent than he, and you would +not speculate and take clouds for camels. During the weeks of +embarkation for Yorktown, the thorough incapacity of McClellan's chief +of the staff was as brilliant as the cloudless sun. It makes one +shudder to think what it will be when the campaign will be decidedly +and seriously going on. + +It is astonishing, and psychologically altogether incomprehensible, to +see persons, justly deserving to be considered as intelligent, deny +the evidence of their own senses; forbid, so to speak, their sound +judgment to act; to be befogged by thorough imbeciles; to consider +incapacity as strategy, and to take imbecility for deep, mysterious, +great combinations and plans. Even the Turks could not long be +humbugged in such a way. + +No sovereign in the world, not even Napoleon in his palmiest days, +could thus easily satisfy his military whims concerning the most +costly and variegated material for an army, as does McClellan. He +changes his plans; every such change is gorgeously satisfied and +millions thrown away. Guns, mortars, transports, spades, etc., appear +at his order as if by charm; and all this to veil his utter +incapacity. This Yorktown expedition uncovers Washington and the +North, and such a deep plan could have been imagined only by a +_strategian_. + +What are doing in Europe all these various agents of Mr. Seward, and +paid by Uncle Sam? all these Weeds, Sandfords, Hughes, Bigelows, and +whoever else may be there? They cannot find means in their brains to +better direct, inform, or influence the European press. Almost all the +articles in our favor are only defensive and explanatory; the +offensive is altogether carried by the secesh press in England and in +France. But to deal offensive blows, our agents would be obliged to +stand firm on human principles, and show up all the dastardly +corruption of slavery, of slaveholders, and of rebels. Such a warfare +is forbidden by Mr. Seward's policy; and perhaps if such a Weed should +speak of corruption, some English secesh may reprint Wilkeson's +letter. In one word, our cause in Europe is very tamely represented +and carried on. Members of the Chamber of Deputies in Paris complain +that they can nowhere find necessary information concerning certain +facts. There Seward's agents have not even been able to correct the +fallacies about the epoch of the Morrill tariff,--fallacies so often +invoked by the secesh press,--and many other similar statements. I +shall not wonder if the public opinion in Europe by and by may fall +off from our cause. Our defensive condition there justifies the +assumptions of the secesh. As we dare not expose their crimes, the +public in Europe must come to this conclusion, that secesh may be +right, and may begin to consider the North as having no principle. + +And to think that all these agents heavily phlebotomize Uncle Sam's +pockets to obtain such contemptible results! + +Many persons, some among them of influence and judgment, still speak +and speculate upon what they call the starving of the rebellion. They +calculate upon the comparative poverty of the rebels, repeating the +fallacious adage, that money is the sinews of war. Money is so, but +only in a limited degree, and more limited than is generally supposed; +more limited even now when war is a very expensive pastime. + +This fallacy, first uttered by the aristocrat Thucydides, was repeated +over and over again until it became a statesmanlike creed. But even +Thucydides gave not to that _dictum_ such a general sense, and +Macchiavelli scorned the fallacy and exposed it. When poor, the +Spartans have been the bravest. The historical halo surrounding the +name of Sparta originated at that epoch when the use of money and of +gold had been almost forbidden. The wealth of Athens began after the +victories over the Persians; but those victories were won when the +Athenians were comparatively poor. So it was with the Romans until the +subjugation of Carthage, and in modern Europe the Swiss, etc., etc., +etc. + +Manhood in a people, and self-sacrifice, are the genuine sinews of +war; wealth alone saved no nation from disgrace and from death, nay, +often accelerated the catastrophe. + +The colonization of Africo-Americans is still discussed; very likely +inspired by Seward and by his Yucatan schemes. Senator Doolittle runs +himself down at a fearful rate. I regret Doolittle's mistake. Those +colonizers forget that if they should export even 100,000 persons a +year, an equal number will be yearly born at home, not to speak of +other impossibilities. If carried on on a small scale, this scheme +amounts to nothing; and on a grand scale it is altogether impossible, +besides being as stupid as it is recklessly cruel. Only those persons +insist on colonization who hate or dread general emancipation. + +When the slaves shall be emancipated, then the owners of plantations +will be forced to offer very acceptable terms to the newly made free +laborers to have their plantations cultivated, which otherwise must +become waste and useless lands, and the planters themselves poor +starving wretches. With very little of governmental interference, the +mutual relation between planter and laborer can be regulated, and the +planter will be the first to oppose colonization. + +Look from whatever side you like, a colonization schemer is a cruel +deceiver, he is an enemy of emancipation, and if he claims to be an +emancipator then he is an enemy of the planter and of the prosperity +of the southern region. + +Besides, the present scheme of colonization to Chiriqui is an infamous +speculation to help some Ambrosio Thompson to work coal mines in that +part of Central America. That individual has a grant for some lands in +Chiriqui, and there these poor victims are to be exported. The grant +itself is contested by the New Grenadian government. Those poor +coolies will be the prey of speculators; there will arise claims +against the Grenadian government--a rich mine for lobbyists and +claimants. Infamy! and these fathers of the country are as blind as +moles. Central America is always in convulsions, and of course the +colonists will be robbed by every party of those semi-savages. The +colonists being Methodists, etc., will be pointed out by the stupid +Catholic clergy as being heretics and miscreants. + +Washington's proximity to the theatre of war in Virginia is the +greatest impediment for rapid movements; it is the ruin of generals +and of armies. + +Being within reach of the seat of government and of the material +means, the generals are never ready, but always have something to +complete, something to ask for, and so days after days elapse. In all +other countries and governments of the world the commanders move on, +and the objects of secondary necessity are sent after them. + +In all other countries and wars the principal aim of commanders is to +become conspicuous by rapidity of movements. The paramount glory is to +have achieved and obtained important results with comparatively +limited means. Here, the greater the slowness with which they move, +the greater captains they are; and the more expensive their +operations, the surer they are of the applause of the administration, +and of a great many f----. + +After all, the above is the result of pre-existing causes. Slowness, +indecision, and waste of money, are the prominent features of this +administration. + +Stanton excepted, I again think of the dictum of Professor Steffens, +and every day believe it more. + +Mr. Blair worse and worse; is more hot in support of McClellan, more +determined to upset Stanton, and I heard him demand the return of a +poor fugitive slave woman to some of Blair's Maryland friends. + +Every day I am confirmed in my creed that whoever had slavery for +_mammy_ is never serious in the effort to destroy it. Whatever such +men as Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Blair will do against slavery, will never +be radical by their own choice or conviction, but will be done +reluctantly, and when under the unavoidable pressure of events. + +Mr. Seward restive and bitter against all who criticise. Mr. Seward +assumes that everybody does his best, and ought therefore to be +applauded. But Mr. Seward forgets the proverb about hell being paved +with good intentions. In this terrible emergency the people want men +who _really_ do the best, and not those who only try and intend to do +it. + +McClellan had the full sway so long--appointed so many, perhaps more +than sixty, brigadier generals--that it is not astonishing when those +appointees prefer rather not to see for themselves, but blindly +"hurrah" for their creator. + +Victories in the West, triumphantly establishing the superiority of +our soldiers in open battle-fields, and the superiority of all +generals who are distant from any contact with Washington, as Pope, +Grant, Curtis, Mitchell, Sigel, and others. The brave navy,--this pure +democratic element which assures the greatest results, and makes the +less laudatory noise. The navy is admirable; the navy is the purest +and most glorious child of the people. + +The destruction of the rebellion saves the future generations of the +Southern whites. Secession would for centuries have bred and raised +only formidable social hyenas. + +McClellan subsided in mud before Yorktown. Any other, only even +half-way, military capacity commanding such forces would have made a +lunch of Yorktown. But our troops are to dig, perhaps their graves, +to the full satisfaction of Mr. Lincoln, Mr. Seward, and Mr. Blair. + +McClellan telegraphs for more men, and he has more already than he can +put in action, and more than he has room for. He subsides in digging. +The rebels will again fool him as they fooled him in Manassas. If +McClellan could know anything, then he would know this--that nothing +is so destructive to an army as sieges, as diggings, and camps, and +nothing more disciplines and re-invigorates men, makes them true +soldiers, than does marching and fighting. Poor Stanton! how he must +suffer to be overruled by imbeciles and intriguers. McClellan +telegraphing for reinforcements plainly shows how unmilitary are his +brains. He and a great many here believe that the greater the mass of +troops, the surer the victory. History mostly teaches the contrary; +but speak to American wiseacres about history! He, McClellan, and +others on his side, ignore the difficulty of handling or swinging an +army of 100,000 men. + +A good general, confident in his troops, will not hesitate to fight two +to three. But McClellan feels at ease when he can, at the least, have +two to one. In Manassas he had three to one, and conquered--wooden guns! +We will see what he will conquer before Yorktown. + +Louis Napoleon always well disposed, but of course he cannot swallow +Mr. Seward's demand about belligerents. I am so glad and so proud that +up to this day events justify my confidence in the French policy, +although our policy may tire not only Louis Napoleon, but tire the God +whom we worship and invoke. I should not wonder if God, tired by such +McClellans, Lincolns, Sewards, Blairs, etc., finally gives us the cold +shoulder. This demand concerning belligerents is a diplomatic and +initiative step made by Mr. Seward; it is unsuccessful, as are all his +initiatives, and no wonder. + +Mr. Lincoln, incited by Mr. Seward and by Mr. Blair, overrules the +opinion of the purest, the ablest, and the most patriotic men in +Congress--that of Stanton, and of the few good generals unbefogged by +McClellanism. Such a power as the Constitution gives to a President is +the salvation of the people when in the hands of a Jackson, but when +in the hands of a Lincoln, ----! + +The muscular strength of the American people, and the strength of its +backbone, beat all the Herculeses and Atlases supporting the globe. +Any other people would have long ago broke down under the policy and +the combined weight of Lincoln, Seward, and McClellan. + +Mr. Lincoln is forced out again from one of his pro-slavery +entrenchments; he was obliged to yield, and to sign the hard-fought +bill for emancipation in the District of Columbia; but how +reluctantly, with what bad grace he signed it! Good boy; he wishes not +to strike his _mammy_; and to think that the friends of humanity in +Europe will credit this emancipation not where it is due, not to the +noble pressure exercised by the high-minded Northern masses, but to +this Kentucky ----. + +Senator Wade made a powerful speech in relation to the arrest of +General Stone. It was powerful, patriotic, and rises to the skies over +the Lilliputian oratory of the thus-called scholars, etc. Wade is a +monolith,--he is cut out full in a rock. + +It seems that the new law increasing the number of judges for the +Supreme Court weakened many backbones. Congress ought to have added +the clause that a senator can be nominated only after six years from +the day of the promulgation. + +Mr. Seward again chalked before the dazzled eyes of foreign powers +certain future military operations; but again events have been so +impolite as to upturn Mr. Seward's prophecies. + +The report of the Senate committee on the destruction of Norfolk +speaks of the "insane delusion" of the administration. I am proud to +have considered it in the same light about a year ago. + +Mr. Thouvenel politely but logically refuses to acquiesce in Mr. +Seward's demand concerning the belligerents. Thouvenel's reasons are +plausible. The support given to strategy by Mr. Seward,--that support +does more mischief to us than do all the pirates and all the +violations of blockade. Let us take Richmond,--a thing impossible with +McClellan,--and take by land Charleston, Savannah, etc.; then the +pirates and belligerents are strangulated. And--as says Gen. +Sherman--Savannah and Charleston could have been taken several months +ago. Orders from Washington forbade to do it; and it would be curious +to ascertain how far Mr. Seward is innocent in the perpetration of +these orders. + +Chase and Seward dear-dearing each other! Amusing! Kilkenny cats! At +this game Seward will have the best of Chase, who is not a match for +tricks. + +The New York Times attacks Capt. Dahlgren, of the Navy Yard. It is in +the nature of the "little villain" to bespatter men of such devotion, +patriotism, and eminent capacity as is Captain Dahlgren. + +Thurlow Weed calls the Tribune "infernal," because it wishes a serious +war, and thus prevents the raising of a Union party in the South, so +flippantly looked for by him and Mr. Seward, his pupil. I see the time +coming when all these _gentlemen_ of the concessions, of the +not-hurting policy,--when all these conservative seekers for the Union +party will try, Pilatus-like, to wash their hands of the innocent +blood; but you shall try, and not succeed, to whitewash your stained +hands; you have less excuses on your side than had the Roman proconsul +on his side. + +When Mr. Mercier was in Richmond, some of the rebel leaders and +generals told him that they believed not their senses on learning that +McClellan was going to Yorktown; that he never could have selected a +better place for them, and that they were sure of his destruction on +the Peninsula. + +Perhaps McClellan wished to try his hand and rehearse the siege of +Sebastopol. + +If McClellan's ignorance of military history were not so well +established, he would know that since Archimedes, down to Todleben, +more genius was displayed in the defence than in the attack of any +place. The making of approaches, parallels, etc., is an affair of +engineering school routine. Napoleon took Toulon rather as an +artillerist, who, having, calculated the reach of projectiles, put his +battery on a spot wherefrom he shelled Toulon. Napoleon took Mantua by +destroying the Austrian army which hastened to the relief of the +fortress. But the great American strategian knows better, and +satisfies (as said above) the rebels. + +The New York Herald, the New York Times, and other staunch supporters +of McClellan, again and again trumpet that the rebels fear McClellan, +that they consider him to be the ablest general opposed to them. The +rebels are smart, and so is their ally, the New York Herald. As for +the Times, it is only a flunkeying "little villain." + +McDowell, Banks, Fremont have about 70,000 men; the last two are +nearly at the head of the Shenandoah valley; they could unite with +McDowell, and march and take Richmond. They beg to be ordered to do +it, and so wishes Stanton; but, fatally befogged by McClellan, by +McClellan's clique in the councils, or by strategians, Lincoln +emphatically forbids any junction, any movement; the President forbids +McDowell to take Fredericksburg, or to throw a bridge across the +river. And thus McClellan prevents any glorious military operation; is +losing in the mud a hundred men daily by disease, and Mr. +Lincoln--still infatuated. But infatuation is the disease of small and +weak brains. + +Rothschild in Paris, and very likely the Rothschilds in London, are +for the North. But if the Rothschilds show that they well understand +and respect the Old Testament, whose spirit is anti-slavery, they show +they understand better the true Christian spirit than do the +Christians. The Rothschilds show themselves more thoroughly of our +century than are such Michel Chevaliers, or such impure Roebucks, and +all the supporters of free trade in human flesh. + +McClellan's supporters, and such strategians as Blair and Seward, +assert that McClellan's plan was ruined by not sending McDowell to +Gloucester; that then the whole rebel army would have been caught in a +trap. That silly plan to go to the Peninsula is defended in a still +more silly way. + +By McDowell's going to Gloucester, Washington would have been wholly +at the mercy of an army of thirty to forty thousand men; the +celebrated defences of Washington, this result of the united wisdom of +Scott and McClellan, facilitating to the rebel army a raid on +Washington. + +Further; McClellan, in concocting and _maturing_ his thus called +plans, probably believes that the rebels will do just the thing which, +in his calculations, he wishes them to do; and such erroneous +suppositions are the sole basis of his _plans_. But the rebels +repeatedly showed themselves by far too smart for his _Napoleonic_ +brains; and besides, not much wit to the rebel generals was necessary +to see through and through what the great Napoleon was about, by +ordering McDowell to Gloucester. Of course, the rebel generals would +not have had the politeness towards McClellan to sheepishly accede to +his wishes, and go into the trap. The whole plan was worse than +childish, and I am glad to learn that several generals showed brains +to condemn it. The whole plan was up to the comprehension of +McClellanites, of consummate strategians in McClellan's official +tross, for those in the Cabinet and out of it. + +Would God that all this ends not in disasters. If it ends well it will +be the first time success has crowned such transcendent incapacity. + + + + +MAY, 1862. + + Capture of New Orleans -- The second siege of Troy -- Mr. Seward + lights his lantern to search for the Union-saving party -- + Subserviency to power -- Vitality of the people -- Yorktown + evacuated -- Battle of Williamsburg -- Great bayonet charge! -- + Heintzelman and Hooker -- McClellan telegraphs that the enemy + outnumber him -- The terrible enemy evacuate Williamsburg -- The + track of truth begins to be lost -- Oh Napoleon! -- Oh spirit of + Berthier! -- Dayton not in favor -- Events are too rapid for + Lincoln -- His integrity -- Too tender of men's feelings -- + Halleck -- Ten thousand men disabled by disease -- The Bishop of + Orleans -- The rebels retreat without the knowledge of McNapoleon + -- Hunter's proclamation -- Too noble for Mr. Lincoln -- + McClellan again subsides in mud -- Jackson defeats Banks, who + makes a masterly retreat -- Bravo, Banks! -- The aulic council + frightened -- Gov. Andrew's letter -- Sigel -- English opinion -- + Mr. Mill -- Young Europa -- Young Germany -- Corinth evacuated -- + Oh, generalship! -- McDowell grimly persecuted by bad luck. + + +The capture of New Orleans. The undaunted bravery of the Navy--this +most beautiful leaf in the American history. The Navy fights without +talk and _strategy_, because it does not look to win the track to the +White House. The capture of New Orleans may lead the rebels to +evacuate Yorktown and to fool the great strategian. + +It is a very threatening symptom, that no genuine harmony--nay, no +sympathy--exists between the best, the purest, the most intelligent, +the most energetic members of both the Houses of Congress and the +President, including the leading spirit of his Cabinet. The New York +Herald is the principal supporter of Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Seward; in +the Congress their supporters are the Democrats, and all those who +wish to make concessions to the South, who ardently wish to preserve +slavery, and in any way to patch up the quarrel. + +In times as trying as are the present ones, such a shameful and +dangerous anomaly must, in the long run, destroy either the government +or the nation. If it turns out differently here, the exclusive reason +thereof will be the great vitality of the people. All the deep and +dangerous wounds inflicted by the policy of the administration will be +healed by the vigorous, vital energy of the people. + +"For Heaven's sake finish quick your war!" Such are the +exclamations--nay, the prayers--coming from the French statesmen, as +Fould and others, from our devoted friends, as Prince Napoleon, and +from all the famishing, but nevertheless nobly-behaving, operatives in +England. And here McClellan inaugurates before Yorktown a second siege +of Troy or of Sebastopol; Lincoln forbids the junction of McDowell +with Banks and Fremont, by which Richmond could be easily taken from +the west side, where it ought to be attacked; and Mr. Seward reads the +like dispatches and backs McClellan; Mr. S. lights his lantern in +search North and South of the Union-saving party! + +Speak to me of subserviency to power by European aristocrats, +courtiers, etc.! What almost every day I witness here of subserviency +of influential men to the favored and office-distributing power, all +things compared and considered, beats whatever I saw in Europe, even +in Russia at the Nicolean epoch. + +General Cameron, in his farewell speech, said that at the beginning of +the civil war General Scott told him, Cameron, that he, Scott, never +in his life was more pained than when a Virginian reminded him of his +paramount duties to his State. I take note of this declaration, as it +corroborates what a year ago I said in this diary concerning the +disastrous hesitations of General Scott. + +It is said that Turtschininoff is all in all in General Mitchell's +command. Turtschininoff is a genuine and distinguished officer of the +staff, and educated in that speciality so wholly unknown to +West-Pointers. Several among the foreigners in the army are thoroughly +educated officers of the staff, and would be of great use if employed +in the proper place. But envy and know-nothingism are doubly in their +way. Besides, the foreign officers have no tenderness for the Southern +cause and Southern chivalry, and would be in the cause with their +whole heart. + +By the insinuations of an anonymous correspondent in the Tribune, Mr. +Seward tries to re-establish his anti-slavery reputation. But how is +it that foreign diplomats, that the purest of his former political +friends, consider him to be now the savior of what he once persecuted +in his speeches? + +At every step this noble people vindicates and asserts the vitality of +self-government, continually jeopardized by the inexhaustible errors +of the policy followed by the master-spirits in the administration. +European doctors, prophets, vindictive enemies like the London Times, +the Saturday Review, etc., and the French journals of the police, all +of them are daily--nay, hourly--baffled in their expectations--paper +money and no bankruptcy, no inflation, bonds equal to gold, etc., etc. +And all this, not because there is any great or even small statesman +or financier at the head of the administration, but because the people +at large have confidence in themselves, in their own energies; because +they have the determination to succeed, and not to be bankrupt; not to +discredit their own decisions. All these phenomena, so new in the +history of nations, are incomprehensible to European wiseacres; they +are too much for the hatred and dulness of the Europeans in France, +England, and for that of the many Europeans here. + +Yorktown evacuated!--under the nose of an army of 160,000 men, and +within the distance of a rifle shot!--evacuated quietly, of course, +during several days. One cannot abstain from saying Bravo! to the +rebel generals. Their high capacity forces the mind to an involuntary +applause. Traitors, intriguers, and imbeciles applaud, extol the +results of the bloodless strategy. McClellan is used by the rebels +only to be fooled by them. It must be so. It is one proof more of the +transcendent capacity of the strategian, and, above all, of the +capacity and efficiency of the chief of the staff of the great army. +Such an operation as that of Yorktown, anywhere else, would be +considered as the highest disgrace; here, glorifications of strategy. +McClellan's bulletins from Yorktown describe the rebel fortifications +as being almost impregnable. Of course impregnable! but only to him. + +Battle at Williamsburg; and McClellan and his so perfect staff +altogether ignorant of the whole bloody but honorable affair as fought +against terrible odds by Heintzelman and Hooker; but the great +Napoleon's bulletin mentions a _real_--Oh hear! hear the great +Mars!--_charge with the bayonet_, made at the other extremity of +Williamsburg, and in which from twenty to forty men were killed! + +Heintzelman's and Hooker's personal conduct, and that of their troops, +was heroic beyond name. McClellan ignored the battle; ignored what was +going on, and, as it is said, gave orders to Sumner not to support +Heintzelman. + +McClellan telegraphs that the enemy far outnumbers him (fears count +doubly), but that he will do his utmost and his best. This Napoleon of +the New York Herald's manufacture in everything is the reverse of all +the leaders and captains known in history: all of them, when before +the battle they addressed their soldiers, represented the enemy as +inferior and contemptible; after the battle was won, the enemy was +extolled. + +From the first of his addresses to this his last dispatch from +Williamsburg, McClellan always speaks of the terrible enemy whom he is +to encounter; and in this last dispatch he tries to frighten not only +his army, but the whole country. During the night _the terrible enemy_ +evacuated Williamsburg; McClellan breathes more free, takes fresh +courage, and his bulletin estimates the enemy's forces at 50,000. + +The track of truth begins to be lost. By comparing dates, bulletins, +and notes, it results that at the precise minute when McClellan +telegraphed his wail concerning the large numbers of the enemy and the +formidable fortifications of Williamsburg, the rebels were evacuating +them, pressed and expelled therefrom by Hooker, Kearney, and +Heintzelman. Oh Napoleon! Oh spirits not only of Berthier and of +Gneisenau, but of the most insignificant chiefs of staffs, admire your +caricature at the head of the army commanded by this freshly-backed +Napoleon! + +A foreign diplomat was in McClellan's tent before Yorktown, on the eve +of the day when the rebels wholly evacuated it. One of McClellan's +aids suggested to the general that the comparative silence of the +rebel artillery might forebode evacuation. "Impossible!" answered the +New York Herald's Napoleon. "I know everything that passes in their +camp, and I have them fast." (I have these details from the +above-mentioned diplomat.) In the same minute, when the strategian +spoke in this way, at least half of the rebel army had already +withdrawn from Yorktown. Comments thereupon are superfluous. + +Dayton, from Paris, very sensibly objects to the policy of insisting +that England and France shall annul their decision concerning the +belligerents. Dayton considers such a demand to be, for various +reasons, out of season. I am sure that Dayton is respected by Louis +Napoleon and by Thouvenel on account of his sound sense and rectitude, +although he _parleys not_ French. Dayton must impress everybody +differently from that French parleying claims' prosecutor and +itinerant agent of a sewing machine, who breakfasts in Brussels with +Leopold, and the same day dines in Paris with Thouvenel, and may +take his supper in h----l, so far as the interest of the cause is +concerned. But Dayton seems not to be in favor with the department. + +The admirers of McClellan assert that one parallel digged by him was +sufficient to frighten the rebels and force them to evacuate. Good for +what it is worth for such mighty ignorant brains. The mortars, the +hundred-pounders, frightened the rebels; they break down not before +parallels, strategy, or Napoleon, but before the intellectual +superiority of the North, in the present case embodied in mortars and +other armaments. + +Following the retreating enemy, McClellan loses more prisoners than he +makes from the enemy. A new and perfectly original, perfectly _sui +generis_ mode of warfare, but altogether in harmony with all the other +martial performances of the pet of the New York Herald, of Messrs. +Seward and Blair, and of the whole herd of intriguers and imbeciles. + +People who approach him say that Mr. Lincoln's conceit groweth every +day. I guess that Seward carefully nurses the weed as the easiest way +to dominate over and to handle a feeble mind. + +Since Mr. Mercier judges by his own eyes, and not by those of former +various Washington associations, his inborn soundness and perspicacity +have the upper hand. He is impartial and just to both parties; he is +not bound to have against the rebels feelings akin to mine, but he is +well disposed, and wishes for the success of the Union. + +The events are too grand and too rapid for Lincoln. It is impossible +for him to grasp and to comprehend them. I do not know any past +historical personality fully adequate to such a task. Happily in this +occurrency, the many, the people at large, by its grasp and +forwardness, supplies and neutralizes the inefficiency or the +tergiversations, intrigues and double-dealings of the few, of the +official leaders, advisers, etc. + +I willingly concede to Mr. Lincoln all the best and most variegated +mental and intellectual qualities, all the virtues as claimed for him +by his eulogists and friends. I would wish to believe, as they do, Mr. +Lincoln to be infallible and impeccable. But all those qualities and +virtues represented to form the residue of his character, all shining +when in private life, some way or other are transformed from positives +into negatives, since Mr. Lincoln's contact with the pulsations and +the hurricane of public life. Thus Mr. Lincoln's friends assert that +all his efforts tend to conciliate parties and even individuals. This +candor was beneficial and efficient in the court or bar-rooms, or +around a supper table in Springfield. It was even more so, perhaps, +when seasoned with stories more or less * * * But one who tries to +conciliate between two antipodic principles, or between pure and +impure characters, unavoidably must dodge the principal points at +issue. Such is the stern law of logic. Who dodges, who biasses, +unavoidably deviates from that straight and direct way at the end of +which dwells truth. Further: feeble, expectative and vacillating +minds, deprived of the faculty to embrace in all its depth and +extension the task before them,--such minds cannot have a clear +purpose, nor the firm perception of ways and means leading to the aim, +and still less have they the sternness of conviction so necessary for +men dealing with such mighty events, on which depend the life and +death of a society. Such men hesitate, postpone, bias and deviate from +the straight way. Such men believe themselves in the way to truth, +when they are aside of it. It results therefrom, that when certain +amiable qualities, such as conciliation, a little dodging, hesitation, +etc., are practised in private life and in a very restrained area, +their deviations from truth are altogether imperceptible, and they are +then positive good qualities, nay, virtues. But such qualities, +transported and put into daily friction with the tempestuous +atmosphere of human events, lose their ingenuousness, their innocence, +their good-naturedness; the imperceptibility of their intrinsic +deviation becomes transparent and of gigantic dimensions. + +Mr. Lincoln's crystal-pure integrity prevented not the most frightful +dilapidation, nay, robbing of the treasury by contractors, etc., etc. +Nor has it kept pure his official household. His friend Lamon and the +to-be-formed regiments; the splendid equipages and _coupes_ of his +youthful secretaries, to be sure, came not from Springfield, etc., +etc., nor sees he through the rascally scheme of the Chiriqui +colonization. + +Mr. Lincoln, his friends assert, does not wish to hurt the feelings of +any one with whom he has to deal. Exceedingly amiable quality in a +private individual, but at times turning almost to be a vice in a man +entrusted with the destinies of a nation. So he never could decide to +hurt the feelings of McClellan, and this after all the numerous proofs +of his incapacity. But Mr. Lincoln hurts thereby, and in the most +sensible manner, the interests, nay, the lives, of the twenty millions +of people. I am sure that McClellan may lose the whole army, and why +not if he continues as he began? and Mr. Lincoln will support and keep +him, as to act otherwise would hurt McClellan's, Marcy's, Seward's, +and perhaps Blair's feelings. + +Finally, Mr. Lincoln, advised, they say, by Mr. Seward, holds in +contempt public opinion as manifested by the press, with the exception +of the incense burnt to him by the New York Herald. If this is true, +Mr. Lincoln's mind is cunningly befogged. + +It is very soothing for the quiet of private life to ignore +newspapers; but all over Europe men in power, sovereigns and +ministers, carefully and daily study and watch the opinions of the +newspapers, and principally of those which oppose and criticise them. + +Such, Mr. Lincoln, is the wisdom of the truly experienced statesman. +Better ask Louis Napoleon than Seward. + +I am astonished that concerning Mexico Louis Napoleon was taken in by +Almonte. Experience ought to have fully made him familiar with the +general policy of political refugees. This policy was, is, and will be +always based on imaginary facts. + +Political refugees befog themselves and befog others. And this Mr. de +Saligny must be a d----; Louis Napoleon ought to expel him from the +service. + +Halleck likewise seems to lay the track to the White House. Nothing +has been done since he took the command in person. Halleck, as does +also McClellan, tries to make all his measures so sure, so perfect, +that he misses his aim, and becomes fooled by the enemy. In war, as in +anything else, after having quickly prepared and taken measures, a man +ought to act, and rely as much as possible on fortune--that is, on his +own acuteness--how to cut the knot when he meets it in his path. + +Halleck before Corinth, and McClellan before Manassas and Yorktown, +both spend by far more time than it took Napoleon from Boulogne and +Bretagne to march into the heart of Germany, surround and capture Mack +at Ulm, and come in view of Vienna. + +The French and English naval officers in the Mississippi assured our +commanders that it was impossible to overcome the various defences +erected by the rebels. Our men gave the lie to those envious +forebodings. McClellan, in a dispatch, assures the Secretary of War +that he, McClellan, will take care of the gunboats. _Risum teneatis._ + +The most contemptible flunkeys on the face of the earth are the +wiseacres, and the thus-called framers of public opinion. Until yet +McClellan, literally, has not stood by when a cartridge was burned, +and they sing hosanna for him. + +Ten thousand men have been disabled by diseases before Yorktown; add +to it the several thousands in a similar way disabled in the camp +before Manassas, and it makes more than would have cost two battles, +fought between the Rappahannock and Richmond,--battles which must have +settled the question. + +Although ultra-Montane, the Bishop of Orleans nobly condemns slavery. +The Bishop's pastoral is an answer to H. E., Archbishop of New York. +The French bishop therein is true to the spirit of the Catholic +church. The Irish archbishop, compared to him, appears a dabbler in +Romanism. + +During the administration of Pierce and of Buchanan, the Democratic +senators ruled over the President and the Cabinet. Perhaps it is not +as it ought to be; but for the salvation of the country it were +desirable that a curb be put on Mr. Lincoln, Mr. Seward, Mr. Blair, by +the Republican senators, by men like Wade, Wilson, Chandler, Grimes, +Fessenden, Hale, and others. + +The retreat of the rebels was masterly conducted, and their pursuit by +McClellan has no name. Nowhere has this Napoleon got at them. The +affair at Williamsburg was bravely done by Heintzelman and Hooker; but +it was done without the knowledge of McNapoleon, and contrary to his +expectations and strategy. This he confesses in one of his _masterly_ +bulletins. Perhaps McNapoleon ignored Heintzelman's corps' heroic +actions, because neither Heintzelman, nor Hooker, nor Kearney worship +_strategy, and the deep, well-matured plans of Mc_. + +General Hunter's proclamation in South Carolina is the greatest social +act in the course of this war. How pale and insignificant are Mr. +Lincoln's disquisitions aside of that proclamation, which is greeted +in heaven by angels and cherubim--provided they are a reality. + +Of course Mr. Lincoln overrules General Hunter's proclamation. It is +too human, too noble, too great, for the tall Kentuckian. Many say +that Seward, Blair, Seaton from the Intelligencer, and other Border +State patriots, pressed upon Lincoln. I am sure that it gave them very +little trouble to put Mr. Lincoln straight ---- with slaveocracy. +Henceforth every Northern man dying in the South is to be credited to +Mr. Lincoln! + +Mr. Lincoln again publishes a disquisition, and points to the signs of +the times. But does Mr. Lincoln perceive other, more awful, signs of +the times? Does he see the bloody handwriting on the wall, condemning +his unnatural, vacillating, dodging policy? + +All things considered, it will not be astonishing in Europe if they +lose patience and sneer at the North, when they learn that McClellan +is continually doing strategy; when they will read his bulletins; when +they will find out that from West Point to Richmond he pursued the +enemy at the _enormous_ speed of two miles a day,--and that of course +nobody was hurt,--and finally, that, surrounded by a brilliant and +costly staff, he was ignorant of the condition of the roads, and of +the existence of marshes and swamps into which he plunged the army. + +The President repeatedly speaks of his strong will to restore the +Union. Very well; but why not use for it the best, the most decided, +and the most thorough means and measures? + +Continually I meet numbers and numbers of soldiers who are discharged +because disabled in the camps during winter. Thus McClellan's +bloodless strategy deprived several thousands of their health, without +in the least hurting the enemy. And daily I meet numbers of +able-bodied Africo-Americans, who would make excellent soldiers. I +decided to try to form a regiment of the Africo-Americans, and, after +whipping the F. F. V.'s, establish, beyond doubt, the perfect equality +of the thus called races. + +McClellan subsides in mud,--digs,--and the sick list of the army +increases hourly at a fearful ratio. And McClellan refuses to slaves +admittance within his lines. If, at least, McClellan was a fighting +general; but a mud-mole as he ------. Any other general in any other +country, in Asia, in Africa, etc., would use any elements whatever +within his grasp, by using which he could strengthen his own and +weaken the enemy's resources. McNapoleon knows better! + +One of the best diplomatic documents by Mr. Seward is that on Mexico; +and so is also the policy pursued by him. Why does Mr. Seward dabble +in war and strategy at home? + +McClellan digs, and by his wailings has disorganized the corps of +McDowell, and of Banks, who retreats and is pressed by Jackson. The +men who advised, or the McClellan worshippers who prevented the union +of McDowell with Banks and Fremont, are as criminal as any one can be +in Mr. Lincoln's councils. + +Now Jackson is reorganized; he penetrated between Fremont and Banks, +who were sorely weakened by transferring continually divisions from +one to another army, and this between the Chickahominy and the lower +Shenandoah. + +New diplomatic initiative by Mr. Seward. France and England are +requested to declare to the rebels that they have no support to +expect from the above-mentioned powers. + +This initiative would be splendid if it could succeed; but it cannot, +and for the same logical reasons as failed the recent initiative about +belligerents. Such unsuccessful initiatives are lowering the +consideration of that statesman who makes them. Such failures show a +want of diplomatic and statesmanlike perspicacity. + +The nation is assured by Mr. Lincoln and by Mr. Seward that a perfect +harmony prevails in the Cabinet. Beautiful if true. + +General Banks attacked by Jackson and defeated; but, although +surrounded, makes a masterly retreat, without even being considerably +worsted. Bravo, Banks! Such retreats do as much honor to a general as +a won battle. + +This bold raid of Jackson--a genuine general--wholly disorganized that +army which, if united weeks ago, could have taken Richmond, and +rendered Jackson's brilliant dash impossible. The military aulic +council of the President is frightened out of its senses, and asks the +people for 100,000 defenders. General Wadsworth advised not to thus, +without any necessity, frighten the country. + +On this occasion Governor Andrew, of Massachusetts, wrote a scorching +letter to the administration on account of General Hunter's +proclamation. Governor Andrew always acts, speaks, and writes to the +point. + +This alarming appeal, so promptly responded to, has its good, as it +will show to Europe the untired determination of the free States. + +The President took it into his head to direct himself, by telegraph, +the military operations from Fredericksburg to Shenandoah. The country +sees with what results. The military advisers of the President seem no +better than are his civil advisers--Seward, Blair, etc. If the +President earnestly wishes to use his right as Commander-in-Chief, +then he had better take in person the command of the army of the +Potomac. + +There McClellan's diggings and strategy neutralize the gallantry of +the generals and of the troops. There action, not digging, is needed. +I wrote to the President; suggesting to make Sigel his chief of the +staff (Sigel has been educated for it), and then to let our generals +fight under his, the President's, eyes. + +Great injustice was and is done to Mr. Seward by the lying and very +extensively spread rumor that he is often intoxicated. I am sure that +it is not so, and I contradict it with all my might. At last I +discovered the reason of the rumor. It is Mr. Seward's unhappy passion +for generalizations. He goes off like a rocket. Most people hearing +him become confused, understand nothing, are unable to follow him in +his soarings, and believe him to be intoxicated. His devotees alone +get in ecstacies when these rockets fly. + +Every time after any success of our troops, that perfidious sheet, the +London Times, puts on innocent airs, and asks, "Why are the Americans +so bitter against England?" Why? At every disaster the Times pours +upon the North the most malicious, poisonous, and lacerating +derisions; derisions to pierce the skin of a rhinoceros. When in that +strain no feeling is respected by this lying paper. + +Derision of the North was the Times's order of the day even before the +civil war really began. People, who probably have it from the fountain +itself, assert that in one of his hours of whiskey expansion the great +Russell let the cat out, and confessed that the Times's firm purpose +was, and is, to definitely break the Union. + +Until this hour that reptile's efforts have been unsuccessful; it +could not even bring the Cabinet over to its heinous purposes. A +counterpoise and a counter poison exist in England's higher spheres, +and I credit it to that noblest woman the queen, to Earl Russell, and +to some few others. + +The would-be English _noblesse_, the Tories, and all the like genuine +nobodies, or _would-be_ somebodies, affect to side with the South. +They are welcome to such an alliance, and even parentage. _Similis +simili gaudet._ Nobody with his senses considers the like +_gentlemen_ as representing the progressive, humane, and enlightened +part of the English nation; the American people may look down upon +their snobbish hostility. J. S. Mill--not to speak of his +followers--has declared for the cause of the North. His intellectual +support more than gorgeously compensates the cause of right and of +freedom, even for the loss or for the sneers of the whole +aristocracy, and of snobdom, of somebodies and of would-be gentlemen +of the whole Britannia Empire, including the Canadian beggarly +manikins. + +By their arrogance the Englishmen are offensive to all the nations of +the world; but they are still more so by their ingrained snobbyism. +(See about it Hugo Grotius.) Further: During the last thirty years the +London Times and the Lord Fussmaker Palmerston have done more to make +us hate England than even did the certain inborn and not over-amiable +traits in the English character. + +A part of the young foreign diplomacy here have a very strong secesh +bend; they consider the slaveholders to be aristocrats, and thus like +to acquire an aristocratic perfume. But, aristocratically speaking, +most of this promiscuous young Europa are parvenus, and the few titled +among them have heraldically no noble blood in their veins. No wonder +that here they mistake monstrosities for real noblesse. Enthusiastic +is young Germany--that is, young Bremen. + +Young European Spain here is remarkably discreet, as in the times of a +Philip II., of an Alba. + +Corinth evacuated under the nose of Halleck, as Manassas and Yorktown +have been evacuated under the nose of McClellan. Nay, Halleck, equally +strong as was the enemy, the first day of the evacuation ignores what +became of Beauregard with between sixty and eighty thousand men. Oh +generalship! Gen. Halleck is a gift from Gen. Scott. If Halleck makes +not something better, it will turn out to be a very poor gift. _Timeo +Danaos_, etc., concerning the North and the gifts from "_the highest +military authority in the land_." + +McDowell is grimly persecuted by bad luck. Since March, twice he +organized an excellent and strong corps, with which he could have +marched on Richmond, and both times his corps was wholly +disorganized--first by McClellan's wails for more, the second time by +the President and his aulic council. And now all the ignorance and +stupidity, together with all the McClellanites, accuse McDowell. Pity +that he was so near Washington; otherwise his misfortune could not +have so thoroughly occurred. + + + + +JUNE, 1862. + + Diplomatic circulars seasoned by stories -- Battle before + Richmond -- Casey's division disgraced -- McClellan afterwards + confesses he was misinformed -- Fair Oaks -- "Nobody is hurt, + only the bleeding people" -- Fremont disobeys orders -- N. Y. + Times, World, and Herald, opinion-poisoning sheets -- Napoleon + never visible before nine o'clock in the morning -- Hooker and + the other fighters soldered to the mud -- Senator Sumner shows + the practical side of his intellect -- "Slavery a big job!" -- + McClellan sends for mortars -- Defenders of slavery in Congress + worse than the rebels -- Wooden guns and cotton sentries at + Corinth -- The navy is glorious -- Brave old Gideon Welles! -- + July 4th to be celebrated in Richmond! -- Colonization again -- + Justice to France -- New regiments -- The people sublime! -- + Congress -- Lincoln visits Scott -- McDowell -- Pope -- + Disloyalty in the departments. + + +Mr. Seward takes off from Mr. Adams the gag on the question of +slavery. Perhaps even Mr. Adams might have been a little fretting. A +long speculative dispatch, wherein, among some good things, one finds +some generalizations and misstatements concerning the distress in +Ireland, generated by want of potatoes (vide Parl. De.), and not from +want of cotton, as says Mr. Seward--a confession that the government +"covers the weakness of the insurgents" and "takes care of the welfare +of the insurgents." What a tenderness, and what an ingratitude of the +rebels to acknowledge it by blows! Another confession, more precious, +that the poor slaves are the best and the only bravely devoted Union +men in the South, although occasionally shot for their devotion by our +generals, expelled from the lines (vide Halleck's order No. 3), and +delivered to the tender mercies of their masters. Finally, _immediate_ +emancipation is held before the eyes of the English statesmen rather +as a Medusa head; then a kind of story--perhaps to please Mr. +Lincoln--or quotation from _some_ writer, etc. So far as I recollect, +it is for the first time that diplomatic circulars are seasoned by +stories. But, _dit moi qui tu hante je te dirai qui tu es_. + +Mr. Seward repeatedly asserts, in writing and in words, that he has no +eventual views towards the White House. Well, it may be so or not. But +if his friends may succeed in carrying his nomination, then, of +course, reluctantly, he will bend his head to the people's will, +and--accept. When in past centuries abbots and bishops were elected, +they _reluctantly_ accepted fat abbeys and bishoprics; the investiture +was given in the sacramental words, _accipe onus pro peccatis_. + +A battle by Richmond. McClellan telegraphs a victory, and it comes out +that we lost men, positions, camps, and artillery. The President +patiently bears such humbugging, and the country--submits. + +McClellan disgraces a part of the brave General Casey's division. +Whatever might have been the conduct of the soldiers in detail, one +thing is certain, that the division was composed of rough levies; +that they fought three hours, being almost surrounded by overwhelming +forces; that they kept ground until reinforcements came; that the +breaking of the division cannot be true, or was only partial, and that +McClellan was not at all on the ground. + +This battle of Fair Oaks is another evidence of the transcendent +incapacity of the chief of the staff of the army of the Potomac, and +of Gen. McClellan's veracity. In a subsequent bulletin the general +confesses that he was misinformed concerning the conduct of Gen. +Casey's division. + +In any other army in the world, a chief of the staff who would assign +to a division a post so advanced, so isolated, so cut off from the +rest of the army, as was Gen. Casey's position,--such a chief of the +staff would be at once dismissed. Here, oh here, nobody is hurt, +nobody is to be hurt--only the bleeding people. + +As to the conduct of the soldiers, they fought well; thorough veterans +scarcely could have behaved better. McClellan turns out worse even +than I expected. + +The President's campaign against Jackson--very unsuccessful. Fremont +came not up to the mark; disobeyed orders. No excuse whatever for such +disobedience. + +One is at a loss which is to be more admired, the ignorance or the +impudence of such opinion-confusing and opinion-poisoning sheets as +the New York Times, the World, the Herald, etc. They sing _hosanna_ +for McClellan's victories. In advance they praise the to-be-fought +battles on selected fields of battle, and after the plans have been +matured for weeks, nay for months. + +A plan of a whole campaign, a general survey of it, may be prepared +and matured long before the campaign begins. But to mature for weeks a +plan of a battle! All the genuine great captains seldom had the +selection of a field of battle, as they rapidly moved in search of or +to meet their enemies, and fought them where they found them. For the +same reason, they scarcely had more than forty-eight hours to mature +their plans. Such is the history and the character of nine-tenths of +the great battles fought in the world. + +When Napoleon overthrew Prussia and Austria, he beforehand prepared +those campaigns; but neither Jena, Eylau, Friedland, Austerlitz or +Wagram were the fields of battle of his special choice. But Napoleon +moved his armies as did all the great captains before him, and as must +do all great captains after him. Only American great captains sit down +in the mud and dig. + +At times in the West, Pope, Mitchell, Nelson, Grant moved their +forces, and beat the enemy. I am sure that these brave generals and +the braves of the army of the Potomac most certainly are early risers. +A certain Napoleon never is visible before nine o'clock in the +morning. So I hear from a French officer who is not in the service, +but follows the movements of the Potomac army. + +In McClellan's army Heintzelman, Hooker, Kearney, Sumner, and many +others, would move quick, would fight and beat; but a leaden weight +presses, and solders them to the mud. I must write an article to the +press concerning the rapidity of movements,--this golden rule for any +conduct of a war. + +Since he was in the field, McNapoleon neither planned nor assisted in +person in any encounter. When are his great plans to burst out? + +In one of his recently published dispatches, Mr. Seward makes an awful +mistake in trying to establish the difference between a revolution and +a civil war, as to their respective relations to foreign interference +and support. A little knowledge of history, and a less presumption, +would have spared to him such an exposure. A revolution in a nation +can be effected, and generally is effected, without a foreign +intervention, and without even an appeal to it. Most of the civil wars +look to foreign help. So teaches history, whatever may be Mr. Seward's +contrary generalizations. + +Mr. Seward is unrelenting in his efforts to build up the Union-saving +slavery party, and is sure, as he says, to be able to manage the +Republicans, in and out of Congress. We shall see. + +Senator Sumner very well discusses the tax-bill, and again shows the +practical side of his intellect. Sumner proves that a laborious +intellect can grasp and master the most complicated matters. If Sumner +could only have more experience of men and things, he would not be so +Germanly--_naďve_. + +Mr. Seward triumphantly publishes the Turkish hatti, by which pirates +are excluded from the Ottoman ports. Oh, Jemine! to be patronized by +the Turks! Misfortune brings one with strange bedfellows. + +On the occasion of the organization of slaves at Beaufort, Mr. Lincoln +exclaimed, "Slavery is a big job, and will smother us!" It will, if +dealt with in your way, Mr. President. + +McClellan sends for mortars and hundred-pounders; these monsters are +to fight, but not he. Well, even so, if possible. + +The Southern leaders send to Europe officers of artillery to buy arms +and ammunition, and are well served. Our good administration sends +speculators, railroad engineers, agents of sewing machines, and the +arms bought by them kill our own soldiers, and not the enemies. + +English papers taunt the Americans that in one hundred years the +country must become a monarchy. The Americans have now a foretaste of +some among the features of monarchy, among others of favoritism. The +Pompadours and the Dubarrys could not have sustained a McClellan at +the cost of so many lives and so many millions. Then the dabbling in +war, and other etc.'s, performed in the most approved Louis XIV.'s or +Nicolean style. + +Worse than the rebels, and by far more abject and degraded, are the +defenders of slavery, of treason, and of rebellion in the Congress, in +the press, and in the public opinion. No gallows high enough for +them. + +McClellan crowds the marshes with heavy artillery, and may easily lose +them at the smallest disaster. His army is overburdened with artillery +in a country where the moving of guns must be exceedingly difficult, +nay, often impossible. And then the difficulty of having such a large +number of men drilled for the service of guns. Scarcely any army in +Europe possesses artillerists in such numbers as are now required +here. Few guns well served make more execution than large numbers of +them fired at random. + +Instead of concentrating his army and attacking at once the rebels in +Richmond, McClellan extends his army over nearly sixty miles! To keep +such an extensive line more than 300,000 would be required. Oh, +heavens! this man is more ignorant of warfare than his worst enemies +have suspected him. + +It is reported that at Corinth the rebels had not only wooden guns, +but cotton manikins as sentries. God grant it may not be true, as it +would make the slow, pedantic Halleck even below McClellan. + +The future historian will be amazed, bewildered, nay, he may lose his +senses, discovering the heaps of confusion and of ignorance which +caused the disasters of Banks, the escape of Jackson, etc., etc. + +It is impossible to resist the admiration inspired by the skill, the +daring, the fertility of intellectual resources displayed by the +rebels; all this is so thoroughly contrasted by what is done by our +legal chiefs. + +Pity that such manhood is shown in the defence of the most infamous +cause ever known in the history of the world. To conquer an +independence with the sole object to procreate, to breed, to traffic +in, and to whip slaves! + +The navy is glorious everywhere, and not fussy. The people can never +sufficiently remunerate the navy, if patriotic services are to be +remunerated. The same would be with the army but for the Napoleons! + +The published correspondence between the rebels Rust and Hunter fully +justifies my confidence in Louis Napoleon's sound judgment. That +publication clearly establishes how the press here is wholly unable to +conceive or to comprehend the policy of the great European nations. +The press heaps outrages and nurses suspicions against Napoleon. The +Sandfords and others knowingly stir up suspicions to make believe that +their smartness averts the evil. Poor chaps! When great interests are +at stake, neither their fuss, nor any dispatch, however elaborate, can +exercise a shadow of influence. + +It seems that a Babylonian confusion prevails in the movements, in the +distribution, and in the combination of the various parts of the army +under McClellan. I should wonder if it were otherwise, with such a +general and supported by such a chief of the staff. + +Brave old Gideon Welles (Neptune) instructing his sailors to fight, +and not to calculate, and "not to deliver anybody against his personal +wish." + +These imbecile reporters and letter-writers for the press, and other +sensationists, make me enraged with their sneers at the poverty of the +rebels. If so, the more heroism. They forget the "beggars" of the +Dutch insurrection against Philip II. + +The cat is out, and I am sorry for it. The world is informed that the +revolution is finished, and now the civil war begins. Oh generalizer! +oh philosopher of history! oh prophet as to the speedy end of the +civil _war_! Oh stop, oh stop! Not by digging will your pet McClellan +bring the war to a speedy close. + +I am often enraged against myself not to be able to admire Mr. Seward, +and to be obliged to judge his whole policy in such, perhaps too +severe, a manner. What can I do, what can I do? No one, not even Gen. +Scott and Mr. Lincoln, since January, 1861, has exercised an influence +equal to Mr. Seward's on the affairs of the country, and _amicus +Plato, etc., sed magis amica veritas_. + +Mr. Seward believes that July 4th will be celebrated by us in +Richmond. He and McClellan spread this hope; Doolittle believes it. We +could be in Richmond any day under any other general, not a Napoleon; +we may never be there if led on by McClellan, inspired by Mr. Seward's +policy. + +The French amateur in McClellan's army is disgusted with McNapoleon, +and speaks with contempt of the reckless waste of men, of material, +etc. He calls it cruel, brainless, and uses a great many other +exclamations. + +The healthful activity of Stanton, his broad and clear perception of +almost all exigencies of these critical times, are continually baffled +and neutralized by the allied McClellan, Blair, Seward, New York Times +and New York Herald. Such an alliance can easily confuse even the +strongest brains. + +The colonization again on the _tapis_, and all the wonted display of +ignorance, stupidity, ill-will, and phariseeism towards genuine +liberty. + +Seward gave up his Yucatan scheme. Chiriqui has the lead. And finally, +some foreign diplomats try to make conspicuous their little royalties. +So Denmark tries to cultivate the barren rocks of St. Thomas with the +poor captives. It will be a new kind of apprenticeship under cruel +masters. I hear that Mr. Lincoln is caught in the trap, and that a +convention _ad hoc_ is soon to be concluded. This time, at least, Mr. +Seward's name will remain outside. + +I am uneasy, fearing we may commit some spread-eagleism towards France +during this present Mexican imbroglio. I will do my utmost to explain +to influential senators the truth concerning Louis Napoleon's +political conduct towards the North, the absurdity of any hostile +demonstration against France, and the dirt constituting the substratum +of the new Mexican treaty. + +"French policy may change towards us," say the anti-Napoleons; "Louis +Napoleon will unmask his diplomatic batteries," etc., etc. + +Well, Louis Napoleon may change when he finds that we are incorrigible +imbeciles, and that the great interests, which to defend is his duty, +are jeopardized; but not before. As for masked batteries, I considered +worse than fools all those who believed in masked batteries at +Manassas; and in the same light I consider all the believers in +diplomatic masked batteries. I was not afraid of the one, and am not +of the other. + +Not one single French vessel has run, or attempted to run, the +blockade; not one has left the ports of France, or of the French West +Indies, loaded with arms or ammunition for the insurgents. As for the +barking of French papers, or of some second or third rate saloons, +barkings thus magnified by American letter-writers, I know too much of +Paris and of society to take notice of it. I am sure that the whole +rebel tross in Paris, male and female, have not yet been admitted into +any single saloon of the _real_ good or high society in Paris, and +never will be. A thus called _highly accomplished and fashionable +lady_ from New Orleans, or from Washington, may easily be taken for a +country dress-maker, or for a chamber-maid, not fit for first families +of the genuine good and high society in Paris, and all over Europe. + +Stanton, the true patriot, frets in despair at McClellan's keeping the +army in the unhealthiest place of Virginia. Stanton's opponents, the +rats, find all right, even the deaths by disease. In the end +McClellan is to be all the better for it. Is there no penitentiary for +all this mob? + +New regiments pour in, the people are sublime in their devotion; only +may these regiments not become sacrificed to the Jaggernaut of +imbecility. + +Whatever may say its revilers, this Congress will have a noble and +pure page in American history. I speak of the majority. + +The Congress showed energy, clear and broad comprehension and +appreciation of the events and of men. The Congress was ready for +every sacrifice, and would have accelerated the crushing of the +rebellion but for the formulas, and for the inadequacy of the majority +in the administration. If the Congress had no great leaders, the +better for it; it had honest and energetic men, and their leader was +their purpose, their pure belief in the justice of their cause and in +the people. Such leaders elevate higher any political body than could +ever a Clay, a Webster, etc., etc. + +The Congress is palsied by the inefficiency of the administration, and +but for this, the Congress would have done far more for the salvation +of the country. All the best men in Congress support Stanton, and this +alone speaks volumes. It is a curse that the administration is so +independent of the Congress. Oh, why this Congress possesses not the +omnipotence of an English Parliament? Then the Congress would have +prevented all the evils hitherto brought upon the country by the +vacillating military and general policy. Step by step this policy +brings the country to the verge of an abyss, and it will tax all the +energy of the people not to be precipitated in it. + +Mr. Lincoln has gone to get inspiration and information from Gen. +Scott. Good God! Can this man never go out from this rotten treadmill? +One more advice from the "great ruin," and the country will also be a +ruin. + +Flatterers, sensation writers, and all this _magna clientum caterva_ +extol to the skies Mr. Lincoln's firmness and straightforwardness. The +firmness is located, and is to be discovered in various places--in the +lips, in the chin, in the jaw, and God knows where else. I cannot +detect any firmness in his actions beyond that of sticking to +McClellan,--of whom he has the worst opinion,--and of resisting the +emancipation and the arming of Africo-Americans. He has firmness in +letting the country be ruined. + +McClellan's bulletins constitute the most original and strange +collection of style in general, and of military style in particular. +Capt. Morin says that the first thing is to teach McClellan how to +write military bulletins. + +Mr. Seward's crew of politicians is busily at work among congressmen, +etc., to prepare a strong party in support of the administration's +eventual concessions to slavery, in case Richmond is taken. Ultra +Democratic, half secession Senators are sounded. + +The more the events complicate, the more they require a powerful, +all-embracing mind, but in the same proportion subside Mr. Lincoln, +Mr. Seward, Mr. Weed, and all the rest of the great men. Alone the +people and their true men subside not. + +Poor McDowell suffers for the sins of others--above all, for those of +Mr. Lincoln and of his aulic council. He is internally broken down, +but behaves nobly; not as does this poor Fremont, whose disappearance +from the military scene cannot and must not be regretted. He is not a +military capacity; he was again badly surrounded, and his last battle +was fought at random, without any unity. I spoke about it with various +foreign officers serving under him, and all agree in the incapacity of +Fremont and of his staff. + +Gen. Pope, a man for the circumstances, acted well in the West; at +last a new man. + +McClellan inaugurated new tactics. It is to approach the enemy's army +by parallels and by trenches. He will not take or scare the enemy, but +he will immortalize his name far above the immortality of all not +great generals. + +Night and day ambulances are conveying the sick and wounded here, and +large numbers, thousands upon thousands, going north. One must cry +tears of blood to witness such destruction, such a sacrifice of the +noblest people on the shrine of utter military incapacity. And the +traitors, the imbeciles, and the intriguers sing _hallelujah_ to +McClellan, and daily throw their slime at Stanton. + +From time to time rumors and complaints are made concerning the +ill-will or disloyalty of some of the _employés_ in the Departments. +The explanation thereof may be that some of the thus called old +fogies, above all in the War Department, may be unfriendly to the war +without being disloyal. Such venerables took root in comfortable +situations; they slowly trod in the easy path of rusty and musty +routine, and at once the war shook them to the bone, exposing the +incapacity and the inefficiency of many; it forced upon them the +horror of _cogitandi_ about new matters, and an amount of daily duties +to be performed in offices which formerly equalled sinecures. Further, +these relics dread to be superseded by more active and intelligent +men; and _inde irć_. + + + + +JULY, 1862. + + Intervention -- The cursed fields of the Chickahominy -- Titanic + fightings, but no generalship -- McClellan the first to reach + James river -- The Orleans leave -- July 4th, the gloomiest since + the birth of the republic -- Not reinforcements, but brains, + wanted; and brains not transferable! -- The people run to the + rescue -- Rebel tactics -- Lincoln does not sacrifice Stanton -- + McClellan not the greatest culprit -- Stanton a true statesman -- + The President goes to James river -- The Union as it was, a + throttling nightmare! -- A man needed! -- Confiscation bill + signed -- Congress adjourned -- Mr. Dicey -- Halleck, the + American Carnot -- Lincoln tries to neutralize the confiscation + bill -- Guerillas spread like locusts. + + +When at epochs of great social convulsions events and circumstances +put certain individuals into an eminent or elevated position, their +names become intertwined with the great epoch. In the eyes of the +masses and of the vulgar observers, such names acquire a high +importance on account of the commonly made confusion between +circumstances and personal merit, and, moonlight-like, such names +reverberate not their own, but a borrowed splendor. Thus much for the +official pilots of this great people. + +The usual paroxysm of the foreign intervention fever. It ought to be +so easy to understand, that out of self-respect foreign powers will +not risk any intervention on paper; and to make an effective +intervention a hundred thousand men will be necessary, as the first +course. For such a service no foreign power is prepared. Intervention +is silly talk. McClellan and all kinds of his supporters do more for +the South than could England and France united. + +It was a poor trick to gather by telegraph the signatures of the +governors for an offer of troops to the President. It was done for +effect in Europe; but events seem to have a grudge against Mr. Seward; +the same steamer carried over the Atlantic the news of our defeats in +the Chickahominy swamps. + +To attempt a change of such an extensive basis as was occupied by our +army under the eyes of a daring, able, skilful enemy, in a country +wooded and marshy, and without roads! This movement was perhaps +necessary, and could not be avoided; but why at the start had such a +basis been selected? Such a selection made disasters inevitable, and +they followed. + +All kinds of accounts pour in from these cursed fields of the +Chickahominy. Foreign officers--whose veracity I can believe--speak +enthusiastically of the undaunted bravery of the volunteers and of +their generals; _but a general generalship_ was not to be found during +those titanic fightings. What I gathered from the _suite_ of the +Orleans is, that Gen. McClellan was totally confused, was totally +ignorant of the condition of the corps, was never within distance to +give or to be asked for orders, and was the first to reach the banks +of the James and to sleep on board the gunboat Galena. At Winchester, +Banks in person covered the retreat. + +The Orleans left. I pity them; they will be hooted in Europe. They +shared some of McClellan's fallacious and petty notions, and very +likely they have been gulled by the McClellan-Seward expectations of +taking Richmond before July 4th. + +Gen. Hunter's letter about fugitive slaves, and rebels fugitive from +the flag of the Union, is the noblest contra distinction. No rhetor +could have invented it. Hang yourselves, oh rhetors! + +_July 4th._--The gloomiest since the birth of this republic. Never was +the country so low, and after such sacrifices of blood, of time, and +of money; and all this slaughtered to that Juggernaut of strategy, and +to the ignoble motley of his supporters. + +Oh you widows, bereaved mothers, sisters, and sweethearts, cry for +vengeance! Cry for vengeance, you shadows of the dead of the malaria, +or fallen in the defence of your country's honor. Stupidity has +stabbed in the back more deadly wounds than did the enemy in front. +This is the 4th of July. Oh! my old heart and my, not weak, mind are +bursting with grief. + +The people, the masses, sacrifice their blood, their time, their +fortune. What sacrifice the official leaders and pilots? All is net +gain for them. Thousands and thousands of families will be +impoverished for life, nay, for generations. It is those nameless +heroes on the fields of battle who alone uphold the honor of the +American name, as it is the people at large who have the true +statesmanship, and not the appointed guardsmen. + +Rats, hounds, all the vermin, all the impure beasts, are after +Stanton, for his not having sent reinforcements to McClellan; but none +existed, and McClellan has exhausted and devoured all the reserves. +Not reinforcements, but brains, were wanted, and brains are not +transferable. + +The people, sublime, runs again to the rescue, and Mr. Seward is so +sacrilegious, so impious, as to say that the people is generally slow. +He is fast on the road of confusion. + +I am sure that the whole movement and attack of the rebels was made, +as it could be made, at the utmost with 60,000 to 70,000 men, if even +with such a number. The rebels never attacked our whole line, but +always threw superior forces on some weak and isolated point. This the +rebels did during the last battles. The rebels showed great +generalship. Jackson is already the legendary hero, and deserves to +be. + +McClellan never attacked, but _always_ was surprised and forced to +fight, so the rebels were sure that he would not dare anything to +counteract and counter-manoeuvre their daring; so the rebel generals +had perfect ease for the execution of their bold but skilful plans. + +Lincoln sacrifices not Stanton, not even to Seward, to Blair, and to +the slaveocrats in Congress. That is something. + +McClellan publishes a pompous order of the day for the 4th of July, +and apes the phraseology of Napoleon's bulletins from times when by a +blow Napoleon overthrew empires. + +What I can gather from the accounts of the seven days' fighting is, +that during the battle at Gaines' Mills (to speak technically), +positively the whole army was without any basis. But traitors, +imbeciles and intriguers rend the air and the skies with their praises +of the great strategy and of the brilliant generalship. + +I am aware how difficult it will be to convince the heroic army--that +is, its rank and file--that their disasters result from want of +generalship, and not from any inferiority in numbers. All over the +world incapable commanders raise the outcry of deficiency in numbers +to cover therewith their personal deficiency of brains. Similar events +to McClellan's wails, and the confusion they create in the armies and +in the people, are nothing new in the history of wars. + +A fleet of gunboats covers the army on the James river. Once McClellan +condescendingly boasted that he would take care of the gunboats. The +worst is, that these gunboats could have done service against +Charleston, Mobile, Savannah, etc. + +After all, McClellan is not the greatest culprit. It is not his fault +that he is without military brains and without military capacity. He +tried to do the best, according to his poor intellect. The great, +eternally-to-be-damned malefactors are those who kept him in command +after having had repeated proofs of his incapacity; and still greater +are those constitutional advisers who supported McClellan against the +outcry of the best in the Cabinet and in the nation. A time may come +when the children of those malefactors will be ashamed of their +fathers' names, and--curse them. + +I have not scorn enough against the revilers and accusers of Stanton. +If Stanton could have had his free will, far different would be the +condition of affairs. Stanton's first appearance put an end to the +prevailing lethargy, and marked a new and glorious era. But, ah! how +short! The rats and the vermin were afraid of him, and took shelter +behind the incarnated strategy. Stanton embraced and embraces the +_ensemble_ of the task and of the field before him. And this +politician, Blair, to be his critic! If Stanton had been left +undisturbed in the execution of his duties as the Secretary of War, +McClellan would have been obliged to march directly to Richmond, and +the brainless strategy in the Peninsula would have been crushed in the +bud. If Stanton had not been undermined, not only the people would +have been saved from terrible disasters, but McClellan, Lincoln, +Seward, and Blair would have been saved from reproaches and from +malediction. + +Stanton likewise shows himself to be a true statesman. A Democrat in +politics, he very likely never was such a violent and decided opponent +of slavery as the Sewards and Blairs professed to be throughout their +whole lives. But now Stanton pierces the fog, perceives the +unavoidable exigencies, and is an emancipationist, when the Sewards +and the Blairs try to compromise, nay, virtually to preserve slavery. + +_July 10th._--The rebels won time to increase and gather their forces +from the south. McClellan's army may not prevent their turning against +Pope, who has too small a body to resist or to cover the whole line +from Fredericksburg to the Shenandoah. If the rebels attack Pope he +must retreat and concentrate before Washington; and then again begins +the uphill work. The people generally pour in blood, time and money; +but brains, brains are needed, and, without violating the formulas, +the people cannot inaugurate brains. Whatever the people may do, the +same quacks and bunglers will over again commit the same blunders. +Nothing can teach a little foresight to the helmsman and to some of +his seconds. Rocked by his imagination, Mr. Seward never sees clearly +the events before him and what they generate. + +The call for three hundred thousand men will be responded to. The men +will come; but will statesmanship and generalship come with them? I am +afraid that the rebels, operating with promptness and energy, may give +no time to the levies to be fully organized; the rebels will press on +Washington. + +McClellan reports to the President that he has only 50,000 men left. +The President goes to James river, and finds 83,000 ready for action. +Was it ignorance in McClellan, or his inborn disrespect of truth, or +disrespect of the country, or something worse, that made him make such +a report? And all this passes, and Mr. Lincoln cannot hurt McClellan, +although a gory shroud extends over the whole country. + +A secretary of the French consul is here, and confirms my speculations +concerning the numbers of the rebels in the last battles on the +Chickahominy. The current and authoritative opinion in Richmond is, +that from the Potomac to the Rio Grande the rebel force never exceeded +300,000 men. If so, the more glory; and it must be so, according to +the rational analysis of statistics. + +Mr. Seward writes a skilful dispatch to explain the battles on the +Chickahominy. But no skill can succeed to bamboozle the cold, +clear-sighted European statesmen. + +No doubt Mr. Seward sincerely wished to save the Union in his own way +and according to his peculiar conception, and, after having +accomplished it, disappear from the political arena, surrounded by the +halo of national gratitude. + +But even for this aim of reconstruction of the Union as it was, Mr. +Seward, at the start, took the wrong track, and took it because he is +ignorant of history and of the logic in human affairs. To save the +Union as it was, it was imperatively necessary to strike quick and +crushing blows, and to do this in May, June, etc., 1861. Mr. Seward +could have realized then what now is only a throttling nightmare--_the +Union as it was_. But Mr. Seward sustained a policy of delays and not +of blows; the struggle protracts, and, for reasons repeatedly +mentioned, the suppression of rebellion becomes more and more +difficult, and the reconstruction of the old Union as it was a +_mirage_ of his imagination. + +But it is not Thurlow Weed, and others of that stamp, who could +enlighten Mr. Seward on such subjects--far, far above their vulgar and +mean politicianism. It is now useless to accuse and condemn Congress +for its so-called violence, as does Mr. Seward, and to assert that but +for Congress he, Mr. Seward, would have long ago patched up the +quarrel. The Congress may be as tame as a lamb, and as subject as a +foot-sole. Mr. Seward may on his knees proffer to the rebels a +compromise and the most stringent safeguards for slavery; to-day the +rebels will spurn all as they would have spurned it during the whole +year. The rebels will act as Mason did when in the Senate hall Mr. +Seward asked the traitor to be introduced to Mr. Lincoln. + +The country is in more need of a man than of the many hundreds of +thousands of new levies. + +Some time ago Mr. Seward gathered around him his devotees in Congress +(few in number), and unveiled to them that nobody can imagine what +superhuman efforts it cost him to avert foreign intervention. Very +unnecessary demonstration, as he knows it well himself, and, if it +gets into the papers, may turn out to be offensive to the two +cabinets, as they give to Mr. Seward no reason for making such +statements. Should England and France ever decide upon any such step, +then Mr. Seward may write as a Cicero, have all the learning of a +Hugo Grotius, of a Vattel, and of all other publicists combined; he +may send legions of Weeds and Sandfords to Europe, and all this will +not weigh a feather with the cabinets of London and of Paris. + +Further, no foreign powers occasioned our defeats _in the +Chickahominy_, but those who were enraptured with the Peninsula +strategy. + +Mr. Seward's letter to the great meeting in New York shows that not +his patriotism, but his confidence in success, is slightly notched. + +Nobody doubts his patriotism; but Mr. Seward tried to shape mighty +events into a mould after his not-over-gigantic mind, and now he frets +because these events tear his sacrilegious hand. + +After much opposition, vacillation, hesitation, and aversion, the +President signed the confiscation and emancipation bill. A new +evidence of how devotedly he wishes to avert any deadly blows from +slavery,--this national shame. + +The Congress adjourned after having done everything good, and what was +in its power. It separated, leaving the country's cause in a worse +condition than it was a year ago, after the Bull Run day. Many, nay, +almost all the best members of both houses are fully aware in what +hands they left the destinies of the nation. Many went away with +despair in their hearts; but the constitutional formula makes it +impossible for them to act, and to save what so badly needs a savior. + +Intervention fever again. The worst intervention is perpetrated at +home by imbeciles, by intriguers, by traitors, and by the--spades. + +Mr. Dicey, an Englishman who travelled or travels in this +country,--Mr. D. is the first among his countrymen who understands the +events here, and who is just toward the true American people;--Mr. D. +truly says that the people fight without a general, and without a +statesman, and are the more to be admired for it. + +Mr. Seward tries to appear grand before the foreign diplomats, and +talks about Cromwell, Louis Napoleon, _coup d'États_ against the +Congress, and about his regrets to be in the impossibility to imitate +them. Only think, Cromwell, Napoleon I., Napoleon III., Seward! Such +dictatorial dreams may explain Mr. Seward's partiality for General +McClellan, whom Seward may perhaps wish to use as Louis Napoleon used +Gen. St. Arnoud. + +Halleck is to be the American Carnot. But any change is an +improvement. If Halleck extricates the army on the James river, and +saves it from malaria,--this enemy more deadly than Jackson and +McClellan combined,--then for this single action Halleck deserves well +of the country, and his Corinth affair will, at least in part, be +atoned for. + +Mr. Lincoln makes a new effort to save his _mammy_, and tries to +neutralize the confiscation bill. Mr. Lincoln will not make a step +beyond what is called the Border-States' policy; and it may prove too +late when he will decide to honestly execute the law of Congress. Mr. +Seward gets into hysterics at the hateful name of Congress. Similar +spite he showed to a delegation from the city of New York, upbraiding +some of its members, and assuring them that delegations are not +needed,--that the administration is fully up to the task. Yes, Stanton +is, but how about some others? + +Poor Mr. Lincoln! he must stand all the mutual puffs of Seward and +Sandford, and some more in store for him when the Weeds and Hughes +will come and give an account of their doings in Europe. + +The report of the battle against Casey, as published by the rebel +General Johnston, is a masterpiece of military style, and shows how +skilfully the attack was combined. The Southern leaders have +exclusively in view the triumph of their cause. With many of our +leaders, the people's cause is made to square with their little +selfishness. + +Guerillas spread like locusts. Perhaps they are the results of our +Union-searching, slavery-saving policy. + + + + +AUGUST, 1862. + + Emancipation -- The President's hand falls back -- Weed sent for + -- Gen. Wadsworth -- The new levies -- The Africo-Americans not + called for -- Let every Northern man be shot rather! -- End of + the Peninsula campaign -- Fifty or sixty thousand dead -- Who is + responsible? -- The army saved -- Lincoln and McClellan -- The + President and the Africo-Americans -- An Eden in Chiriqui -- + Greeley -- The old lion begins to awake -- Mr. Lincoln tells + stories -- The rebels take the offensive -- European opinion -- + McClellan's army landed -- Roebuck -- Halleck -- Butler's + mistakes -- Hunter recalled -- Terrible fighting at Manassas -- + Pope cuts his way through -- Reinforcements slow in coming -- + McClellan reduced in command. + + +_Vulgatior fama est_, that Mr. Lincoln was already raising his hand to +sign a stirring proclamation on the question of emancipation; that +Stanton was upholding the President's arm that it might not grow weak +in the performance of a sacred duty; that Chase, Bates, and Welles +joined Stanton; but that Messrs. Seward and Blair so firmly objected +that the President's outstretched hand slowly began to fall back; that +to precipitate the mortification, Thurlow Weed was telegraphed; that +Thurlow Weed presented to Mr. Lincoln the Medusa-head of Irish riots +in the North against the emancipation of slaves in the South; that Mr. +Lincoln's mind faltered (oh, Steffens) before such a Chinese shadow, +and that thus once more slavery was saved. _Relata refero._ + +General Wadsworth is the good genius of the poor and oppressed race. +But for Wadsworth's noble soul and heart the Lamons and many other +blood-hounds in Washington would have given about three-fourths of the +fugitives over to the whip of the slavers. + +Within the last four weeks 600,000 new levies are called to arms. With +the 600,000 men levied previously, it is the heaviest draft ever made +from a population. No emperor or despot ever did it in a similar lapse +of time. The appreciation current here is, that the twenty millions of +inhabitants can easily furnish such a quota; but the truth is that the +draft, or the levy, or the volunteering, is made from about three +millions of men between the ages of twenty and forty years. One +million two hundred thousand in one year is equal to nearly 36-100, +and this from the most vital, the most generative, and most productive +part of the population. + +The same analysis and percentage applied to the statistics of the +population in the rebel States gives a little above 300,000 men under +arms; however, the percentage of the drafts from the full-aged +population in the South can be increased by some 15-100 over the +percentage in the North. This increase is almost exclusively +facilitated by the substratum of slavery, and our administration +devotedly takes care _ne detrimentum capiat_ that peculiar +institution. + +The last draft could be averted from the North if the four millions of +loyal Africo-Americans were called to arms. But Mr. Lincoln, with the +Sewards, the Blairs, and others, will rather see every Northern man +shot than to touch the palladium of the rebels. + +These new enormous masses will crush the rebellion, provided they are +not marshalled by strategy; but nevertheless the painful confession +must be made, that our putting in the field of three to one rebel may +confuse a future historian, and contribute to root more firmly that +stupid fallacy already asserted by the rebels, and by some among their +European upholders, of the superiority of the Southern over the +Northern thus called race. Such a stigma is inflicted upon the brave +and heroic North by the strategy, and by the vacillating, slave-saving +policy of the administration. + +This is the more painful for me to record, as most of the foreign +officers in our service, and who are experienced and good judges, most +positively assert the superior fighting qualities of the Union +volunteers over the rebels. Our troops are better fed, clad and armed, +but over our army hovers the thick mist of strategy and indecision; +the rebels are led not by anaconda strategians, but by fighting +generals, desperate, and thus externally heroic; energy inspires their +councils, their administration, and their military leaders. + +If Stanton and Halleck succeed in extricating the army on the James +river, then they will deserve the gratitude of the people. The malaria +there must be more destructive than would be many battles. + +Events triumphantly justify Stanton's opposition to the Peninsula +strategy and campaign. So ends this horrible sacrifice; between fifty +and sixty thousand killed or dead by diseases. The victims of this +holocaust have fallen for their country's cause, but the +responsibility for the slaughter is to be equally divided between +McClellan, Lincoln, Seward and Blair. Even Sylla had not on his soul +so much blood as has the above quatuor. When, after the victory over +the allied Samnites and others, at the Colline gate of Rome, Sylla +ordered the massacre of more than four thousand prisoners who laid +down their arms; when his lists of proscription filled with blood Rome +and other cities of Italy, Sylla so firmly consolidated the supremacy +of the _Urbs_ over Italy and over the world, that after twenty +centuries of the most manifold vicissitudes, transformations and +tempests, this supremacy cannot yet be upturned. But the holocaust to +strategy resulted in humiliating the North and in heaping glory on the +Southern leaders. + +If the newly called 600,000 men finish the rebellion before Congress +meets, then slavery is saved. To save slavery and to avoid +emancipation was perhaps the secret aim of Mr. Lincoln, Seward, and +Blair; who knows but that of Halleck, when the administration called +for the additional 300,000 men? + +Persons who approach Halleck say that he is a thorough pro-slavery +partisan. His order No. 3, the opinion of some officers of his staff, +and his associations, make me believe in the truth of that report. + +Mr. Seward says _sub rosa_ to various persons, that slavery is an +obsolete question, and he assures others that emancipation is a fixed +fact, and is no more to be held back; that he is no more a +conservative. How are we to understand this man? If Mr. Seward is +sincere, then his last transformation may prove that he has given up +the idea of finding a Union party in the South, or that he wishes to +reconquer--what he has lost--the confidence of the party. But this +return on his part may prove _troppo tardi_. + +The army of the Potomac is saved; the heroes, martyrs, and sufferers +are extricated from the grasp of death. This epopee in the history of +the civil war will immortalize the army, but the strategian's +immortality will differ from that of the army. + +England and France firm in their neutrality. Lord John Russell's +speeches in Parliament are all that can be desired. + +Will it ever be thoroughly investigated and elucidated why, after the +evacuation of Corinth, the onward march of our everywhere-victorious +Western armies came at once to a stand-still? The guerillas, the +increase of forces in Richmond, and some eventual disasters, may be +directly traced to this inconceivable conduct on the part of the +Western commanders or of the Commander-in-chief. Was not some +Union-searching at the bottom of that stoppage? When, months ago, a +false rumor was spread about the evacuation of Memphis and Corinth, +Mr. Seward was ready to start for the above-mentioned places, of +course in search of the Union feeling. Perhaps others were drawn into +this Union-searching, Union and slavery-restoring conspiracy. + +I have most positive reasons to believe that Gen. Halleck wished to +remove Gen. McClellan from the command of the army. The President +opposed to it. Men of honor, of word, and of truth, and who are on +intimate footing with Mr. Lincoln, repeatedly assured me that, in his +conversation, the President judges and appreciates Gen. McClellan as +he is judged and appreciated by those whom his crew call his enemies. +With all this, Mr. Lincoln, through thin and thick, supports McClellan +and maintains him in command. Such a double-dealing in the chief of a +noble people! Seemingly Mr. Seward and Mr. Blair always exercise the +most powerful influence. Both wished that the army remain in the +malarias of the James river. Whatever be their reasons, one shudders +in horror at the case with which all those culprits look on this +bloody affair. Oh you widowed wives, mothers, and sweethearts! oh you +orphaned children! oh you crippled and disabled, you impoverished and +ruined, by sacrificing to your country more than do all the Lincolns, +McClellans, Blairs, and Sewards! Some day you will ask a terrible +account, and if not the present day, posterity will avenge you. + +It is very discouraging to witness that the President shows little or +no energy in his dealings with incapacities, and what a mass of +intrigues is used to excuse and justify incapacity when the nation's +life-blood runs in streams. Without the slightest hesitation any +European government would dismiss an incapable commander of an army, +and the French Convention, that type of revolutionary and +nation-saving energy, dealt even sharper with military and other +incapacities. + +Regiments after regiments begin to pour in, to make good the deadly +mistakes of our rulers. The people, as always, sublime, inexhaustible +in its sacrifices! God grant that administrative incompetency may +become soon exhausted! + +Mr. Seward told a diplomat that his (Seward's) salary was $8,000, and +he spends double the amount; thus sacrificing to the country $8,000. +When I hear such reports about him, I feel ashamed and sorrowful on +his account. Such talk will not increase esteem for him among +foreigners and strangers; and although I am sure that Mr. Seward +intended to make a joke, even as such it was worse than a poor one. + +In his interview with a deputation composed of Africo-Americans, Mr. +Lincoln rehearsed all the clap-trap concerning the races, the +incompatibility to live together, and other like _bosh_. Mr. Lincoln +promised to them an Eden--in Chiriqui. Mr. Lincoln promised them--what +he ought to know is utterly impossible and beyond his power--that they +will form an independent community in a country already governed by +orderly and legally organized States, as are New Grenada and Costa +Rica. Happily even for Mr. Lincoln's name, the logic of human events +will save from exposure his ignorance of international laws, and his +too light and too quick assertions. I pity Mr. Lincoln; his honesty +and unfamiliarity with human affairs, with history, with laws, and +with other like etceteras, continually involve him in unnecessary +scrapes. + +The proclamation concerning the colonization is issued. It is a +display of ignorance or of humbug, or perhaps of both. Some of the +best among Americans do not utter their condemnation of this +colonization scheme, because the President is to be allowed _to carry +out his hobby_. The despots of the Old World will envy Mr. Lincoln. +Those despots can no more _carry out their hobbies_. The _Roi s'amuse_ +had its time; but the _il bondo can_ of some here, at times, beats +that of the _Italina in Algero_. + +The two letters of Greeley to the President show that the old, +indomitable lion begins to awake. As to Mr. Lincoln's answer, it reads +badly, and as for all the rest, it is the eternal dodging of a vital +question. + +Mr. Lincoln's equanimity, although not so stoical, is unequalled. In +the midst of the most stirring and exciting--nay, death-giving--news, +Mr. Lincoln has always a story to tell. This is known and experienced +by all who approach him. Months ago I was in Mr. Lincoln's presence +when he received a telegram announcing the crossing of the Mississippi +by Gen. Pope, at New Madrid. Scarcely had Mr. Lincoln finished the +reading of the dispatch, when he cracked (that is the sacramental +word) two not very washed stories. + +When the history of this administration shall become well known, +contemporary and future generations will wonder and be puzzled to know +how the most intelligent and enlightened people in the world could +produce such fruits and results of self-government. + +The rebel chiefs take the offensive; they unfold a brilliancy in +conception and rapidity in execution of which the best generals in any +army might be proud. McClellan's army was to be prevented from uniting +with Pope. But it seems that Pope manoeuvres successfully, and +approaches McClellan. + +If only our domestic policy were more to the point, England and France +could not be complained of. Mr. Mercier behaves here as loyally as can +be wished, and carefully avoids evoking any misunderstandings +whatever. So do Louis Napoleon, Mr. Thouvenel, Lord John Russell, +notwithstanding Mr. Seward's all-confusing policy. Mr. Mercier never, +never uttered in my presence anything whatever which in the slightest +manner could irritate even the _thinnest-skinned_ American. + +As I expected, Louis Napoleon and Mr. Thouvenel highly esteem Mr. +Dayton; and it will be a great mistake to supersede Mr. Dayton in +Paris by the travelling agent of the sewing machine. It seems that +such a change is contemplated in certain quarters, because the agent +parleys poor French. Such a change will not be flattering, and will +not be agreeable to the French court, to the French cabinet, and to +the French good society. + +On the continent of Europe sympathy begins to be unsettled, unsteady. +As independence is to-day the watchword in Europe, so the cause of the +rebels acquires a plausible justification. Various are the reasons of +this new counter current. Prominent among them is the vacillating, and +by Europeans considered to be INHUMAN, policy of Mr. Lincoln in regard +to slavery, the opaqueness of our strategy, and the brilliancy of the +tactics of the rebel generals, and, finally, the incapacity of our +agents to enlighten European public opinion, and to explain the true +and horrible character of the rebellion. Repeatedly I warned Mr. +Seward, telling him that the tide of public opinion was rising against +us in Europe, and I explained to him the causes; but of course it was +useless, as his agents say the contrary, and say it for reasons easily +to be understood. + +McClellan's army landed, and he is to be in command of all the troops. +I congratulate all therein concerned about this new victory. Bleed, oh +bleed, American people! Mr. Lincoln and _consortes_ insisted that +McClellan remain in command. SISTE TANDEM CARNIFEX! + +Mr. Roebuck, M. P., the gentleman! About thirty years ago, when +entering his public career as a member for Bath, Mr. Roebuck was +publicly slapped in the face during the going on of the election. A +few years ago Mr. Roebuck went to Vienna in the interests of some +lucrative railroad or Lloyd speculation, and returned to England a +fervent and devoted admirer of the Hapsburgs, and a reviler of all +that once was sacred to the disciple of Jeremy Bentham. + +General Halleck may become the savior of the country. I hope and +ardently wish that it may be so, although his qualifications for it +are of a rather doubtful nature. Gen. Halleck wrote a book on military +science, as he wrote one on international laws, and both are laborious +compilations of other people's labors and ideas. But perhaps Halleck, +if not inspired, may become a regular, methodical captain. Such was +Moreau. + +Also, Gen. Halleck is not to take the field in person. I am told that +it was so decided by Mr. Lincoln, against Halleck's wish. What an +anomalous position of a commander of armies, who is not to see a field +of battle! Such a position is a genuine, new American invention, but +it ought not to be patented, at least not for the use of other +nations. It is impossible to understand it, and it will puzzle every +one having sound common sense. + +Gen. Butler commits a mistake in taunting and teasing the French +population and the French consul in New Orleans. When Butler was going +there, Mr. Seward ought to have instructed him concerning our friendly +relations with Louis Napoleon, and concerning the character of the +French consul in New Orleans, who was not partial to secesh. There may +be some secesh French, but the bulk, if well managed, would never take +a decided position against us as long as we were on friendly terms +with Louis Napoleon. + +The President is indefatigable in his efforts to--save slavery, and to +uphold the policy of the New York Herald. + +It is said that General Hunter is recalled, and so was General Phelps +from New Orleans; General Phelps could not coolly witness the +sacrilegious massacre of the slaves. The inconceivable partiality of +the President for McClellan may, after all, be possibly explained by +the fact that Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Seward see in McClellan a--savior of +slavery. + +During two days' terrible fighting at Manassas, at Bull Run, and all +around, Pope cut his way through, but the reinforcements from +McClellan's army in Alexandria are _slow_ in coming. McClellan and his +few pets among the generals may not object to see Pope worsted. Such +things happened in other armies, even almost under the eyes of +Napoleon, as in the campaign on the Elbe, in 1813. Any one worth the +name of a general, when he has no special position to guard, and hears +the roar of cannon, by forced marches runs to the field of battle. Not +any special orders, but the roar of cannon, attracted and directed +Desaix to Marengo, and Mac Mahon to Magenta. The roar of cannon shook +the air between Bull Run and Alexandria, and ---- General McClellan +and others had positive orders to run to the rescue of Pope. + +I should not wonder if the President, enthusiasmed by this new exploit +of McClellan, were to nominate him for his, the President's, eventual +successor; Mr. Blair will back the nomination. + +It is said that during these last weeks, Wallach, the editor of the +unwashed _Evening Star_, is in continual intercourse with the +President. _Arcades ambo._ + +McClellan reduced in command; only when the life of the nation was +almost breathing its last. This concession was extorted from Mr. +Lincoln! What will Mr. Seward say to it? + + + + +SEPTEMBER, 1862. + + _Consummatum est!_ -- Will the outraged people avenge itself? -- + McClellan satisfies the President -- After a year! -- The truth + will be throttled -- Public opinion in Europe begins to abandon + us -- The country marching to its tomb -- Hooker, Kearney, + Heintzelman, Sigel, brave and true men -- Supremacy of mind over + matter -- Stanton the last Roman -- Inauguration of the pretorian + regime -- Pope accuses three generals -- Investigation prevented + by McClellan -- McDowell sacrificed -- The country inundated with + lies -- The demoralized army declares for McClellan -- The + pretorians will soon finish with liberty -- Wilkes sent to the + West Indian waters -- Russia -- Mediation -- Invasion of Maryland + -- Strange story about Stanton -- Richmond never invested -- + McClellan in search of the enemy -- Thirty miles in six days -- + The telegrams -- Wadsworth -- Capitulation of Harper's Ferry -- + Five days' fighting -- Brave Hooker wounded -- No results -- No + reports from McClellan -- Tactics of the Maryland campaign -- + Nobody hurt in the staff -- Charmed lives -- Wadsworth, Judge + Conway, Wade, Boutwell, Andrew -- This most intelligent people + become the laughing-stock of the world! -- The proclamation of + emancipation -- Seward to the Paisley Association -- Future + complications -- If Hooker had not been wounded! -- The military + situation -- Sigel persecuted by West Point -- Three cheers for + the carriage and six! -- How the great captain was to catch the + rebel army -- Interview with the Chicago deputation -- Winter + quarters -- The conspiracy against Sigel -- Numbers of the rebel + army -- Letters of marque. + + +The intrigues, the insubordination of McClellan's pets, have almost +exclusively brought about the disasters at Manassas and at Bull Run, +and brought the country to the verge of the grave. But the people are +not to know the truth. + +CONSUMMATUM EST! The people's honor is stained--the country's cause on +the verge of the grave. Will this outraged people avenge itself on the +four or five diggers? + +Old as I am, I feel a more rending pain now than I felt thirty years +ago when Poland was entombed. Here are at stake the highest interests +of humanity, of progress, of civilization. I find no words to utter my +feelings; my mind staggers. It is filled with darkness, pain, and +blood. + +Mr. Lincoln is the standard-bearer of the policy of the New York +Herald. So, before him, were Pierce and Buchanan. + +It is said that General McClellan fully satisfied the President of his +(the General's) complete innocence as to the delays which exclusively +generated the last disasters; also Gen. McClellan has justified +himself on military grounds. I wish the verdict of innocence may be +uttered by a court-martial of European generals. At any rate, the +country was thrown into an abyss. + +_After a year!_--One hundred thousand of the best, bravest, the most +devoted men slaughtered; hundreds and hundreds of millions squandered; +the army again in the entrenchments of Washington; everywhere the +defensive and losses; the enemy on the Potomac, perhaps to invade the +free States; but McClellan is in command, his headquarters as +brilliant and as numerous as a year ago; the mean flunkeys at their +post; only the country's life-blood pours in streams; but--that is of +no account. + +No acids are so dissolving and so corrosive as is the air of +Washington on patriotism. How few resist its action! Among the few are +Stanton, Chase (a passive patriot), Wadsworth, Dahlgren, and those +grouping around Stanton; so is Welles; likewise Fox; but they are +powerless. Washington is likewise the greatest garroter of truth; and +I am sure that the truth about the last battles will be throttled and +never elucidated. + +_September 3._--The Cabinets of France and of England will have a very +hard stand to resist the pressure of public opinion, carried away by +the skill and by the plausible heroism of the rebels. Public opinion +will be clamorous that something be done in favor of the rebels. +Happily, nothing else can be done but a war, and this saves us. But if +the rebels succeed without Europe, the more glory for their chiefs, +the more ignominy for ours. Public opinion begins to abandon us in +Europe. Already I have explained some of the reasons for it. + +The country is marching to its tomb, but the grave-diggers will not +confess their crime and their utter incapacity to save it. This their +stubbornness is even a greater crime. Will Halleck warn the country +against McClellan's incapacity? + +We have such generals as Hooker, Heintzelman, Kearney, etc., who +fought continually, and with odds against them, and who never were +worsted. Those three, among the best of the army, fought under Pope +and mutineered not. In any other country such men would receive large, +even the superior command; here the palm belongs to the incapable, +the _slow_, and to the flatterer. The same with Sigel. His corps is +reduced to 6,000 men; common sense shows that he ought to have at +least 25,000 under him. Sigel begged the President to have more men; +the President sent him to Halleck and McClellan, who both snubbed him +off. By my prayer Sigel, although disheartened, went to Stanton, who +received him friendly and warmly, and promised to do his utmost. +Stanton will keep his word, if only the West Point envy will not +prevent him. + +Hooker, Kearney, and Heintzelman were not in favor at the headquarters +in the Peninsula, and their commands have been continually +disorganized in favor of the pets of the Commander-in-Chief. The +country knows what the three braves did since Yorktown down to the +last day--the country knows that at the last disasters at Bull Run +these heroic generals did their fullest duty. But not even their +advice is asked at the double headquarters. Stanton alone cannot do +everything. Rats may devour a Hercules. + +It seems certain that the rebel generals have various foreign officers +in their respective staffs. The rebels wish to assure the success of +their cause; here many have only in view their personal success. The +President, although not a Blucher, may make a Gneisenau out of Sigel, +who has in view only the success of the cause, and no prospects +towards the White House. Sigel would understand how to organize a +genuine staff. + +Most of the foreigners who came to serve here came with the intention +to fight for the sacred principle of freedom, and without any further +views whatever of career and aggrandizement. In this respect Americans +are not just towards these foreigners, and the great men at +headquarters will prefer to see all go to pieces than to use the +capacity of foreigners, above all in the artillery and for the staff +duties. + +The mind--that is, Jeff. Davis, Jackson, Lee, etc.--has the best of +the matter--that is, Lincoln, McClellan, Blair, and Seward; however, +these positions are reversed when one considers the masses on both +sides. But on our side the matter commands and presses down the mind; +on the rebel side the mind of the chiefs vivifies, exalts, attracts, +and directs the matter. And the results thereof are, that not the +rebellion, but the North, is shaking. + +As _a_, not only as _the_ President, Mr. Lincoln represents nothing +beyond the unavoidable constitutional formula. For all other purposes, +as an acting, directing, inspiring, or combining power or agency, Mr. +Lincoln becomes a myth. His reality is only manifested by preserving +slavery, by sticking to McClellan, by distributing offices, by +receiving inspirations from Mr. Seward, and by digging the country's +grave. So it is from March 4, 1861, up to this, September 5th, 1862. +What else Mr. Lincoln may eventually incarnate is not now perceptible. + +Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Seward piloted the country among breakers and +rocks, from which to extricate the country requires a man who is to be +the burning focus of the whole people's soul. + +Other nations at times reached the bottom of an abyss, and they came +up again when from the tempest rending them emerged such a savior. But +here the formula may render impossible the appearance of such a +savior. The formula is the nation's hearse. The formula has +neutralized the best men in Congress, the best men in the Cabinet, as +is Stanton. + +The people have decided not, _propter vitam vivendi perdere causas_; +but the various formulas, the schemers, the grave-diggers, and the +aspirants for the White House, think differently. + +The almost daily changes made by Mr. Lincoln in the command of the +forces are the best evidences of his good-intentioned--debility. + +Harmony belongs to the primordial laws of nature; it is the same for +human societies. But here no harmony exists between the purest, the +noblest, and the most patriotic portion of the people, and the +official exponent of the people's will, and of its higher and purer +aspirations. So here all jars dissonantly; all is confusion, because +avenged must be every violation of nature's law. + +I cannot believe that at this deadly crisis the salvation can come +from Washington. The best man here has not his free action. And the +rest of them are the country's curse. Mr. Lincoln, with McClellan, +Seward, Blair, Halleck, and scores of such, are as able to cope with +this crisis as to stop the revolution of our planet. + +_Up to this day_, from among those foremost, the only man whose hands +remain unstained with the country's, his mother's, and his brethren's +blood, the last Roman, is Stanton. + +_September 7._--During last night troops marched to meet the enemy, +saluting with deafening shouts and cheers the residence of McClellan; +spit-lickers as a Kennedy, giving the sign by waving his hat. Such +shouts would cheer up the mind but for the fact that they were mostly +raised for the victory over those who demanded an investigation of the +causes of _slowness_ and insubordination,--those exclusive causes of +the defeat of Pope's army. Those shouts were thrown out as defiance to +justice, to truth, and to law. Those shouts marked the inauguration of +the _pretorian regime_. General McClellan and other generals have +forced the President to _postpone_ the investigation into the conduct +of the _slow_ and of the insubordinate generals, all three special +favorites of McClellan. General McClellan appeared before the soldiers +surrounded by his _old identical staff_, by a tross of flatterers, +and, Oh heavens! in the cortege Senator Wilson! Oh, _sancta_ not +_simplicitas_, but ---- Oh, clear-sighted Republican! + +Subsequently, I learned that Senator Wilson was present for a moment, +and only by a pure accident, at that ovation. + +_Laeszt Dich dem Teufel bey'm Haare packen, so hat Er Dich bey'm +Kopfe_, says Lessing, and so it may become here with this first +success of the pretorians, or even worse than pretorians; these here +are Yanitschars of a Sultan. + +Pope and his army accuse three generals of insubordination and mutiny +on the field of battle. McClellan prevents investigation; the brutal +rule of Yanitschars is inaugurated, thanks to you, Messrs. Seward and +Blair. + +McDowell sacrificed to the Yanitschars; he is the scapegoat and the +victim to popular fallacy, to the imbecility of the press, and, above +all, to the intriguers and to the conspiracy of the mutinous pets of +McClellan. Weeks and weeks ago, I foretold to McDowell that such would +be his fate, and that only in after-times history will be just towards +him. + +The country begins to be inundated and opinion poisoned by all kinds +of the most glaring lies, invented and spread by the staffs, and the +imbecile, blind partisans of McClellan. Here are some from among the +lies. + +In January (oh hear, oh hear!) General McClellan with 50,000 men +intended to make a _flying_ (oh hear, oh hear!) expedition to +Richmond, but Lincoln and Stanton opposed it. This lie divides itself +into two points. 1st lie. In January, nobody opposed General +McClellan's will, and, besides, he was sick. 2d lie. If he was so +pugnacious in January, why has he not made with the same number of men +a flying expedition only to Centreville, right under his nose? + +Emanating from the staff, such a lie is sufficient to show the +military capacity of those who concocted it. + +Second lie. That the expedition to Yorktown and the Peninsula strategy +were forced upon McClellan. I hope that the Americans have enough +memory left, and enough self-respect to recollect the truth. + +Further, the above staff asserts that, when the truth will be known +about the campaign, and the fightings in the Chickahominy, then +justice will be done to McClellan. + +Always and everywhere lost battles, bad and ignorant generalship, +require explanations, justifications, and commentaries. Well-fought +battles are justified on the spot, the same day, and by results. No +one asks or makes comments upon the fighting of Jackson. Austerlitz, +Jena, were commented on, explained, some of the chiefs were justified, +but--by Austrian and Prussian commentators. + +Until to-day French writers discuss, analyze, and comment upon the +fatal battle of Waterloo. At Waterloo Napoleon was in the square of +his heroic guards; but during the seven days' fighting on the +Chickahominy, what regiment, not to say a square, saw in its midst the +American Napoleon? + +A thousand others, similar to the above-mentioned lies, will be or are +already circulated; the mass of the people will use its common sense, +and the lies must perish. + +On September 7th, Gen. McClellan gave his word to the President to +start to the army at 12 o'clock, but started at 4 P. M. with a long +train of well-packed wagons for himself and for his staff. To be +sure, Lee, Jackson, and all the other rebel chiefs together, have not +such a train; if they had, they would not be to-day on the Potomac and +in Maryland. Most certainly those quick-moving rebels start at least +an hour earlier than they are expected to do. + +_September 9._--Up to this day Mr. Lincoln ought to have discovered +whose advice transformed him into a standard-bearer of the policy of +the New York Herald, and made him push the country to the verge of the +grave; and, nevertheless, Mr. Lincoln is deaf to the voice of all true +and pure patriots who point out the malefactors. + +Secondary events; as a lost battle, etc., depend upon material causes; +but such primordial events as is the thorough miscarriage of Mr. +Lincoln's anti-rebellion policy,--such events are generated by moral +causes. + +Jefferson Davis, Lee, Jackson, and all the generals down to the last +Southern bush-whacker, incarnate the violent and hideous passion of +slavery, now all-powerful throughout the South. Here, Lincoln, Seward, +McClellan, Blair, Halleck, etc., incarnate the negation of the purest +and noblest aspirations of the North. Stanton alone is inspired by a +national patriotic idea. No unity, no harmony between the people and +the leaders; this discord must generate disasters. + +All over the country the lie is spread that the army demanded the +reappointment of McClellan. First, the three mutinous generals did it; +but not a Kearney, the Bayard of America; very likely not Hooker and +Heintzelman--all of them soldiers, patriots, and men of honor; nor +very likely was it demanded by Keyes. I do not know positively what +was the conduct of Gen. Sumner. Gen. Burnside owes what he is, glory +and all, to McClellan. Burnside's honest gratitude and honest want of +judgment have contributed more than anything else to inaugurate the +regime of the pretorians, to justify mutiny. Halleck's conduct in all +this is veiled in mystery; it is so at least for the present; and as +truth will be kept out of sight, the country may never know the truth +about those shameful proceedings. + +I learn that Heintzelman, against his own judgment, agreed in the +McClellan movement. Well, if this is true, then, of course, the army, +for a long time misled by uninterrupted intrigues, misled by papers +such as the New York Herald and the Times,--the army or the soldiers +mightily contributed to bring about this fatal crisis. An army +composed of intelligent Americans, blinded, stultified by intriguers, +declares for a general who never, up to this day, covered with glory +his or the army's name. After this nothing more is to be expected, and +no disaster on the field of battle, no dissolution of a national +principle, can astonish my mind. Cursed be those who thus demoralized +the sound judgment of the soldiers! Cursed be my personal experience +of men and of things which makes me despair! But when an army or +soldiers become intellectually brought down to such a standard, then +the holiest cause will always be lost. Oh for a man to save the cause +of humanity! But if even such a man should appear, these pretorians +will turn against him. + +The pretorians, with the New York Herald as their flag, will soon +finish with liberty at home. McClellan, Barlow, the brothers Wood, and +Bennett, may very soon be at the helm, with the 100,000 pretorians for +support. _Similia similibus_; and here disgrace is to cure disgrace. + +These helpless grave-diggers, above all, Seward, are on the way to +pick a quarrel with England, sending a flying gunboat fleet under +Wilkes into the West Indian waters. At this precise moment it were +better to be very cautious, and rather watch strongly our coasts with +the same gunboats. + +_September 11._--A military genius at once finds out the point where +blows are to be struck, and strikes them with lightning-like speed. +The rebels act in this manner; but what point was found out, what +blows were ever dealt by McClellan? + +Individuals similar to McClellan were idolized by the Roman +pretorians, and this idolatry marks the epoch of the utmost +demoralization and degradation of the Roman empire. Witnessing such a +phenomenon in an army of American volunteers, one must give up in +despair any confidence in manhood and in common sense. + +The Journal of St. Petersburg of August 6th semi-officially refutes +the insinuations that Russia intends to recognize the South, or to +unite with France and England for any such purpose, or for mediation. +The language of the article is noble and friendly, as is all which up +to this day has been done by Alexander II. Mr. Stoeckl, the Russian +minister here, considerably contributes that such sound and friendly +views on the condition of our affairs are entertained by the Russian +Cabinet. + +_September 11._--Imbeciles agitate the question of mediation. European +cabinets will not offer it now, and nobody, not even the rebels, would +accept. No possible terms and basis exist for any mediation. A Solomon +could not find them out. If Jackson and Lee were to shell Washington, +then only the foreign ministers may be requested to step in and to +settle the terms of a capitulation or of an evacuation. The foreign +ministers here could act as mediators only if asked; not otherwise. I +am sure it will come out that the invasion of Maryland by the rebels +is made under the pressure exercised in Richmond by the Maryland +chivalry in the service of the rebellion. These runaways probably +promised an insurrection in Maryland, provided a rebel force crosses +the Potomac. (Wrote it to England.) + +All around helplessness and confusion. Conscientiously I make all +possible efforts to record what I believe to be true, and then truth +will take care of herself. + +After the study of the campaigns of Frederick II., above all, after +the study of those marvellous campaigns, combinations, manoeuvres of +Napoleon, to witness every day the combinations of McClellan is more +disgusting, more nauseous for the mind, than can be for the stomach +the strongest dose of emetic. + +The last catastrophe at Bull Run and at Manassas has a slight +resemblance with the catastrophe at Waterloo. The conduct of the +mutinous generals here is similar to the conduct of some of the French +generals during the battle of Ligny and Quatre-Bras. But here was +mutiny, and there demoralization produced by general and deeply rooted +and fatally unavoidable causes. The demoralization of the French +generals came at the end of a terrible epoch of struggles and +sacrifices, of material exhaustion, when the faith in the destinies of +Napoleon was extinct; here mutiny and demoralization seize upon the +newly-born era. + +_September 13._--What a good-natured people are the Americans! A +regiment of Pennsylvania infantry quartered for the night on the +sidewalk of the streets; officers, of course, absent; the poor +soldiers stretched on the stones, when so many empty large buildings, +when the empty (intellectually and materially empty) White House could +have given to the soldiers comfortable night quarters. It can give an +idea how they treat the soldiers in the field, if here in Washington +they care so little for them. But McClellan has forty wagons for his +staff, and forty ambulances--no danger for the latter to be used. In +European armies aristocratic officers would not dare to treat soldiers +in this way--to throw them on the pavement without any necessity. + +More than once in my life, after heavy fighting, I laid down the +knapsack for a cushion, snow for a mattrass and for a blanket; but by +the side of the soldiers, the generals, the staffs, and the officers +shared similar bedsteads. + +I hear strange stories about Stanton, and about his having ruefully +fallen in McClellan's lap. If so, then one more _man_, one more +illusion, and one more creed in manhood gone overboard, drowned in +meanness, in moral cowardice, and subserviency. + +The worshippers of strategy and of Gen. McClellan try to make the +public swallow, that the investment of Richmond by him was a +magnificent display of science, and would have been a success but for +50,000 more men under his command. + +To invest any place whatever is to cut that place from the principal, +if not from all communications with the country around, and thus +prevent, or make dangerous or difficult, the arrival of provisions, of +support, etc. + +Our gunboats, etc., in the York and the James rivers have virtually +invested Richmond on the eastern side; but that part of the Peninsula +did not constitute the great source of life for the rebel army. The +principal life-arteries for Richmond ran through four-fifths of a +circle, beginning from the southern banks of the James river and +running to the southern banks of the Rapidan and of the Rappahannock. +Through that region men, material, provisions poured into Richmond +from the whole South, and that whole region around Richmond was left +perfectly open; but strategy concentrated its wisdom on the +comparatively indifferent eastern side of the Chickahominy marshes, +and cut off the rebels from--nothing at all. + +_September 13._--General McClellan, in search of the enemy, during the +first six days makes thirty miles! Finds the enemy near Hagerstown. No +more time for strategy. + +_September 14._--General McClellan telegraphs to General Halleck +(_meliores ambo_) that he, McClellan, has "_the most reliable +information that the enemy is 190,000 strong in Maryland and in +Pennsylvania, besides 70,000 on the other side of the Potomac_." (The +same bosh about the numbers as in the Peninsula.) + +The Generals Burnside, Hooker, Sumner, Reno, fought the battle at +Hagerstown, and drove the enemy before them. General McClellan reports +a victory, _but expects the enemy to renew the fighting next day in a +considerable force_--(as at Williamsburg). McClellan telegraphs to +Halleck, "_Look for an attack on Washington._" The enemy retreats to +recross the Potomac! + +_September 15._--General Wadsworth suggested to the President one of +those bold movements by which campaigns are terminated by one blow: +"To send Heintzelman and him, Wadsworth, with some 25,000 men, to +Gordonsville (here and in Baltimore about 90,000 men), and thus cut +off the enemy from Richmond, and prevent him from rallying his +forces." But General Halleck opposes such a Murat's dash, on account +of McClellan's "looked-for attack on Washington"--by his, +McClellan's, imagination. + +_September 17._--When I wrote the above about Wadsworth and +Heintzelman, I was under the impression that the victory announced by +McClellan, Sept. 14, was more decisive; that as he had fresh the whole +corps of Fitz John Porter, and the greatest part of that of Franklin, +and other supports sent him from Washington, he would give no respite +to the enemy, and push him into the Potomac. It turned out +differently. + +The loss by capitulation of Harper's Ferry. It is a blow to us, and +very likely a disgraceful affair, not for the soldiers, but for the +commanders. + +_September 19._--Five days' fighting. Our brave Hooker wounded; +tremendous loss of life on both sides, and no decisive results. These +last battles, and those on the Chickahominy, that of Shiloh, in one +word all the fightings protracted throughout several consecutive days, +are almost unexampled in history. These horrible episodes establish +the bravery, the endurance of the soldiers, the bravery and the +ability of some among the commanders of the corps, of the divisions, +etc., and the absence of any _generalship in the commander_. + +_September 20._--Until this day Gen. McClellan has not published one +single detailed report about any of his operations since the +evacuation of Manassas in March. Thus much for the staff of the army +of the Potomac. We shall see what detailed report he will publish of +the campaign in Maryland. McClellan's bulletins from Maryland are +twins to his bulletins from the Peninsula; and there may be very +little difference between the _gained_ victories. To-day he is +ignorant of the movements of the enemy, and has more than 30,000 fresh +troops in hand. + +As in the Peninsula, so in Maryland. Although having nearly one-third +more men than the enemy, General McClellan never forced the enemy to +engage at once its whole force, never attacked the rebels on their +whole line, and never had any positive notion about the number and the +position of the opposing forces. + +The rebels had the Potomac in their rear; our army pressed them in +front, and--the rebels escaped. + +I appeal to such military heroes as Hooker; I appeal to thousands of +our brave soldiers, from generals down to the rank and file, and +further I appeal to all women with hearts and brains here and in +Europe. + +_September 20._--Gen. Mansfield killed at the head of his brigade. I +ask his forgiveness for all the criticism made upon him in this diary. +Last year, at the beginning of the war, Gen. Mansfield acted under the +orders of Gen. Scott. This explains all. + +As in the slaughters of the Chickahominy, so in the Maryland +slaughters, _nobody hurt_ in McClellan's numerous staff. Thank Heaven! +Not only his life is charmed, but the charm extends over all who +surround him,--men and beasts. + +A malediction sticks to our cause. Hooker badly, very badly wounded. +Hooker fought the greatest number of fights,--was never worsted in the +Peninsula, nor in the August disasters, and he alone has the supreme +honor of a nick-name, by the troopers' baptism: the _Fighting Joe_. +Hooker, not McClellan, ought to command the army. But no pestilential +Washington clique, none of the West-Pointers, back him, and the pets, +the pretorians, may have refused to obey his orders. + +After the escape of the rebels from Manassas in March, and after the +evacuation of Yorktown, all the intriguers and traitors grouped around +the New York Herald, and the imbeciles around the New York Times, +prized high _the masterly strategy_ and its bloodless victories. Now, +in dead, by powder and disease, in crippled, etc., McClellan destroyed +about 100,000 men, and the country's honor is bleeding, the country's +cause is on the verge of a precipice. + +How rare are men of civic heroism, of fearless civic courage; men of +the creed: _perisse mon nom mais que la patrie soit sauvée._ + +General Wadsworth feels more deeply and more painfully the disasters, +nay, the disgrace, of the country, than do almost all with whom I meet +here. During the Congress, similar were the feelings of Senator Wade, +Judge Potter, and of many other Congressmen in both the Houses. So +feel Boutwell, Andrew, the Governor of Massachusetts, and I am sure +many, many over the country. But the sensation-men and preachers, +lecturers, etc., all are to be * * * * + +_September 22._--By Mr. Seward's policy and by McClellan's strategy +and war-bulletins the bravest and the most intelligent people became +the laughing-stock of Europe and of the world. And thus is witnessed +the hitherto in history unexampled phenomenon of a devoted and brave +people of twenty millions, mastering all the wealth and the resources +of modern civilization, worsted and kept at bay by four to five +million rebels, likewise brave, but almost beggared, and cut off from +all external communications. + +_Sept. 23._--Proclamation _conditionally_ abolishing slavery from +1863. The _conditional_ is the last desperate effort made by Mr. +Lincoln and by Mr. Seward to save slavery. Poor Mr. Lincoln was +obliged to strike such a blow at his _mammy_! The two statesmen found +out that it was dangerous longer to resist the decided, authoritative +will of the masses. The words "resign," "depose," "impeach," were more +and more distinct in the popular murmur, and the proclamation was +issued. + +Very little, if any, credit is due to Mr. Lincoln or to Mr. Seward for +having thus late and reluctantly _legalized_ the stern will of the +immense majority of the American people. For the sake of sacred truth +and justice I protest before civilization, humanity, and posterity, +that Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Seward intrinsically are wholly innocent of +this great satisfaction given to the right, and to national honor. + +The absurdity of colonization is preserved in the proclamation. How +could it have been otherwise? + +But if the rebellion is crushed before January 1st, 1863, what then? +If the rebels turn loyal before that term? Then the people of the +North will be cheated. Happily for humanity and for national honor, +Mr. Lincoln's and Mr. Seward's benevolent expectations will be +baffled; the rebels will spurn the tenderly proffered leniency; these +rebels are so ungrateful towards those who "cover the weakness of the +insurgents," &c. (See the celebrated, and by the American press much +admired, despatch in May or June, 1862, Seward to Adams.) + +The proclamation is written in the meanest and the most dry routine +style; not a word to evoke a generous thrill, not a word reflecting +the warm and lofty comprehension and feelings of the immense majority +of the people on this question of emancipation. Nothing for humanity, +nothing to humanity. Whoever drew it, be he Mr. Lincoln or Mr. Seward, +it is clear that the writer was not in it either with his heart or +with his soul; it is clear that it was done under moral duress, under +the throttling pressure of events. How differently Stanton would have +spoken! + +General Wadsworth truly says, that never a noble subject was more +belittled by the form in which it was uttered. + +Brazilian m----s are much disturbed by the proclamation. + +_Sept. 23._--In his answer to the Paisley Parliamentary Reform +Association, Mr. Seward complains that the sympathy of Europe turns +now for secession. + +O Mr. Seward, Mr. Seward, who is it that contributed to turn the +current against the cause of right and of humanity? Months ago I and +others warned you; the premonitory signs and the reasons of this +change have been pointed out to you. Now you slander Europe, of which +you know as little as of the inhabitants of the moon. The generous +populations of the whole of Europe expected and waited for a positive, +unhesitating, clear recognition of human rights; day after day the +generous European minds expected to see some positive, authoritative +fact confirm that lofty conception which, at the start of this +rebellion, they had of the cause of the North. But the pure, generous +tendencies of the American people became officially, authoritatively +misrepresented; the public opinion in Europe became stuffed with empty +generalizations, with official but unfulfilled prophecies, and with +cold declamations. Those official generalizations, prophecies, and +declamations, the supineness shown by the administration in the +recognition of human rights, all this began to be considered in Europe +as being sanctioned by the whole American people; and generous +European hearts and minds began to avert in disgust from the +_misrepresented_ cause of the North. + +Two issues are before history, before the philosophy of history, and +before the social progress of our race. The first issue is the +struggle between the pure democratic spirit embodied in the Free +States, and the fetid remains of the worst part of humanity embodied +in the South. The second issue is between the perennial vitality of +the principle of self-government in the people, and the transient and +accidental results of the self-government as manifested in Mr. +Lincoln, in Mr. Seward, and their followers. I hope that this Diary +will throw some light on the second issue, and vindicate the perennial +against the transient and the accidental. + +_Sept. 24._--If the events of this war should progress as they are +foreshadowed in the proclamation of September 22, then the application +of this proclamation may create inextricable complications. Not only +in one and the same State, but in one and the same district, nay, even +in the same township, after January 1st, 1863, may be found +Africo-Americans, portions of whom are emancipated, the others in +bondage. But the stern logic of events will save the illogical, +pusillanimous, confused half-measure, as it now is. (O Steffens!) + +General McClellan confesses that if Hooker had not been wounded, then +_the road_, by which the retreat of the rebels might have been cut +off, would have been taken. Such a declaration is the most emphatic +recognition of Hooker's superior military capacity. Seldom, however, +has the loss of a general commanding only _en second_, or a wing, as +did Hooker, decided the fortunes of the day. Why did not McClellan +take _the road_ himself, after Hooker was obliged to leave the field? +When Desaix, Bessičres, and Lannes fell, Napoleon nevertheless won +the respective battles. + +_Sept. 25._--The military position of the rebels in Winchester seems +to me one of the best they ever held in this war. Winchester is the +centre of which Washington, Harper's Ferry, Williamsport, nay, even +Wheeling, seem to be the circumference. Our army under McClellan is +almost beyond the circle, crosses not the Potomac, and is now only to +watch the enemy. So much for the great McClellan's victory. Truly, the +enemy may be taken in the rear, its communications with Richmond, &c., +cut off and destroyed; but _we are safe_ on the Potomac, and this is +sufficient. McClellan is _the man of large conceptions and rapid +execution_. The best generals are _hors de combat_; as to Halleck, O, +it is not to think, not to speak. Well, I may be mistaken, but I +clearly see all this on the map of Virginia. + +_Sept. 25._--The West Point spirit persecutes Sigel with the utmost +rage. The West Point spirit seemingly wishes to have Sigel dishonored, +defeated, even if the country be thereby destroyed. The Hallecks, &c., +keep him in a subordinate position; _three days ago_ his corps was a +little over seven thousand, almost no cavalry, and most of the +artillery without horses, and he in front. + +The more I scrutinize the President's thus called emancipation +proclamation, the more cunning and less good will and sincerity I find +therein. I hope I am mistaken. But the proclamation is only an act of +the military power,--is evoked by military necessity,--and not a +civil, social, humane act of justice and equity. + +The only good to be derived from this proclamation is, that for the +first time the word _freedom_, and a general comprehension of +"emancipation," appear in an official act under the sanction of the +formula, and are inaugurated into the official, the constitutional +life of the nation. In itself it is therefore a great event for a +people so strictly attached to legality and to formulas. + +I do not recollect to have read in the history of any great, or even +of a small captain,--above all of such a one when between thirty-four +and thirty-six years old,--that he followed the army under his command +in a travelling carriage and six, when the field of operations +extended from fifty to seventy miles. Three cheers for McClellan, for +his carriage and six! + + HOW THE GREAT CAPTAIN WAS TO CATCH THE WHOLE REBEL ARMY IN + MANASSAS, IN FEBRUARY AND MARCH, A. D. 1862. + +It was to have been done by a brilliant and unsurpassable stroke of +combined strategy, tactics, manoeuvres, marches, and swimmings; also +on land and water. (O, hear! O, hear!) + +As every body knows, the rebels were encamped in the so _fearful_ +strongholds of Centreville and Manassas, all the time fooling the +commander-in-chief of the federal army in relation to their _immense_ +numbers. To attack the rebels in front, or to surround them by the +Occoquan and Brentsville, would have been a too--simple operation; by +a special, an immense, space-embracing anaconda strategy, the rebel +army was to be cut off from the whole of rebeldom, and forced to +surrender _en masse_ to the inventor of (the not yet patented, I hope) +bloodless victories. To accomplish such an immense result, a fleet of +transports was already ordered to be gathered at Annapolis. On them in +ten or fifteen days (O, hear!) an army of fifty to sixty thousand, +most completely equipped, was to be embarked, plus forty thousand in +Washington, all this to sail under the personal command of the +general-in-chief, and sail towards Richmond. Richmond taken, the rebel +army at Manassas would have been cut off, and obliged to surrender on +any terms. + +The above splendid conception was, and still is, peddled among the +army and among the nation by the admirers of, and the devotees of, +anaconda strategy. + +The expedition was to land at the mouth of the Tappahannock, a small +port, or rather a creek, used for shipping of a small quantity of +tobacco. As the port or creek has only some small attempts at wharves, +the landing of such an enormous army, with parks of artillery, with +cavalry, pontoons, and material for constructing bridges,--the landing +would not have been executed in weeks, if in months; but the projector +of the plan, perfectly losing the notion of time, calculated for ten +days. From that port the _flying_ expedition was to march directly on +Richmond through a country having only common field and dirt roads, +and this in a season when all roads generally are in an impassable +condition, through a country intersected by marshy streams, principal +among them the Matapony and the Pamunkey--to march towards Richmond +and the Chickahominy marshes. It seems that Chickahominy exercised an +attractive, Armida-like charm on the great strategian. An army loaded +with such immense trains would have sufficiently destroyed all the +roads, and rendered them impassable for itself; and the _flying_ +expedition would at once have been transformed into an expedition +sticking in the mud, similar to that subsequent in the peninsula. The +enemy was in possession of Fredericksburg and of the railroad to +Hanover Court House on one flank, and of all the best roads north of +and through Chickahominy marshes on the other flank. The _flying_ +expedition would have had for base Tappahannock and a dirt road. O +strategy! O stuff! + +The much-persecuted General McDowell exposed the worse than crudity of +the brilliant conception. By doing this, McDowell saved the country, +the administration, and the strategian from immense losses and from a +nameless shame. It is due to the people that the administration lay +before the public the scheme and the refutation. A look on the map of +Virginia must convince even the simplest mind of the brilliancy of +this conception. + +During all this time spent in such masterly operations, the rebel army +in Manassas was to quietly look on, to wait, and not move, not +retreat on Richmond. Early in March, at once the rebel army, always +undisturbed, quietly disappeared from Manassas; and this is the best +evidence of the depth of that brilliant combination, peddled under the +name of the _flying expedition to Richmond_, projected for January, +February, or March. I appeal to the verdict of sound reason; the +parties are, common sense _versus_ anaconda strategy and bloodless +victories. + +_Sept. 27._--The proclamation issued by the war power of the President +is not yet officially notified to those who alone are to execute +it--the armies and their respective commanders. Who is to be taken in? +The papers publish a detailed account of an interview between the +President and an anti-slavery deputation from Chicago. The deputation +asked for stringent measures in the spirit of the law of Congress, +which orders the emancipation of the slaves held by the rebels. The +President combated the reasons alleged by the deputation, and tried to +establish the danger and the inefficiency of the measure. A few days +after the above-mentioned debate, the President issued the +proclamation of September 22. Are his heart, his soul, and his +convictions to be looked for in the debate, or in the proclamation? + +The immense majority of the people, from the inmost of its heart, +greets the proclamation--a proof how deeply and ardently was felt its +necessity. The gratitude shown to Mr. Lincoln for having thus executed +the will of his master,--this gratitude is the best evidence how this +whole people is better, has a loftier comprehension of right and duty, +than have its elected servants. + +McClellan already speaks that the campaign is finished, and the army +is to go into winter quarters. If the people, if the administration, +and if the army will stand this, then they will justly deserve the +scorn of the whole civilized and uncivilized world. But with such +civil and military chiefs all is possible, all may be expected to be +included in their programme of--vigorous operations. + +_Sept. 28._--For some weeks I watch a conspiracy of the West Pointers, +of the commanders-in-chief, of the staffs, and of the double +know-nothing cliques united against Sigel. The aim seems to be to put +Sigel and his purposely-reduced and disorganized forces in such a +condition and position that he may be worsted or destroyed by the +enemy. To avoid dishonoring the forces under him, to avoid exposing +them to slaughter, and to avoid being thus himself dishonored, Sigel +ought to resign, and make public the reasons of his resignation. A few +days ago, I wrote and warned the Evening Post; but--but-- + +The Richmond papers confirm what I supposed concerning the motives +which pushed the rebel army across the Potomac. As the Marylanders +rose not in arms, and joined not the rebel army, the invaders had +nothing else to do but to retreat and to recross the Potomac. +McClellan ought to have thrown them into the river, which Hooker, if +not wounded, would have done, or if he had the command of our army. + +The rebels would have retreated into Virginia, even without being +attacked by McClellan, even if he only followed them, say at one day's +distance. Not having destroyed the rebels, McClellan, in reality, and +from the military stand point, accomplished very little--near to +nothing. Hooker estimates the rebel force, at the utmost, at eighty +thousand men, and that is all that they could have. McClellan had +about one hundred and twenty thousand. And--and he is to be considered +the savior of Maryland and of Pennsylvania. O, good American people! +The genuine Napoleon won all his great battles against armies which +considerably outnumbered his. + +Mr. Seward menaces England with issuing _letters of marque_ against +the Southern privateers. The menace is ridiculous, because it will not +be carried out, and, if carried out, it will become still more +ridiculous; it would be a very poor compliment to the navy to use the +whole power of private enterprise against a few rovers, and it would +be an official recognition of the rebels in the condition of +belligerents. _Quousque tandem_--O SEWARD--_abutere patientiam +nostram?_ + +_Sept. 30._--Nearly three weeks after the battle of Antietam, General +McClellan publishes what he and they call a report of his operations +in Maryland; in all not twenty lines, and devoted principally to +establish--on probabilities--the numerical losses of the enemy. The +report is a fit _pendant_ to his bulletins; is excellent for bunkum, +and to make other people justly laugh at us. + + + + +OCTOBER, 1862. + + Costly Infatuation -- The do-nothing strategy -- Cavalry on lame + horses -- Bayonet charges -- Antietam -- Effect of the + proclamation -- Disasters in the West -- The abolitionists not + originally hostile to McClellan -- Helplessness in the War + Department -- Devotedness of the people -- McClellan and the + proclamation -- Wilkes -- Colonel Key -- Routine engineers -- + Rebel raid into Pennsylvania -- Stanton's sincerity -- O, + unfighting strategians! -- The administration a success -- _De + gustibus_ -- Stuart's raid -- West Point -- St. Domingo -- The + President's letter to McClellan -- Broad church -- The elections + -- The Republican party gone -- The remedy at the polls -- + McClellan wants to be relieved -- Mediation -- Compromise -- The + rhetors. -- The optimists -- The foreigners -- Scott and Buchanan + -- Gladstone -- Foreign opinion and action -- Both the extremes + to be put down -- Spain -- Fremont's campaign against Jackson -- + Seward's circular -- General Scott's gift -- "O, could I go to a + camp!" -- McClellan crosses the Potomac -- Prays for rain -- + Fevers decimate the regiments -- Martindale and Fitz John Porter + -- The political balance to be preserved -- New regiments -- O, + poor country! + + +With what a bloody sacrifice of men this people pays for its +infatuation in McClellan, for the moral cowardice of its official +leaders, and the intrigues and the imbecility of the regulars, of some +among the West Pointers, of traitors led by the New York Herald, by +the World, and by certain Unionists on the outside, and secessionists +at heart! All these combined nourish the infatuation. All things +compared, Napoleon cost not so much to the French people, and at least +Napoleon paid it in glory. Mind and heart sicken to witness all this +here. The question to-day is, not to strengthen other generals, as +Heintzelman and Sigel, and to take the enemy in the rear, but to give +a _chance_ to McClellan to win the ever-expected, and not yet by him +won, _great battle_. McClellan continually calls for more men; all the +vital forces of the people are absorbed by him; and when he has large +numbers, he is incapable of using and handling them; so it was at the +Chickahominy, so it was at Antietam. In the way that McClellan acts +now, he may use up all the available forces of the people, if nobody +has the courage to speak out; besides, any warning voice is drowned in +the treacherous intrigues of the clique, in imbecility and +infatuation. + +At the meeting of the governors, at the various public conventions, in +the thus called public resolutions--platforms, in one word--wherever, +in any way. North, West, and East, the public life of the people has +made its voice heard: _a vigorous prosecution of the war_ was, and is, +earnestly recommended to the administration. All this will be of no +avail. By this time, by bloody and bitter experience, the American +people ought to have learned it. With his civil and military aids and +lieutenants, as the McClellans, the Hallecks, the Sewards, Mr. Lincoln +has been at work; and at the best, they have shown their utter +incapacity, if not ill-will, to carry the war on vigorously and upon +strictly military principles. Many persons in Washington know that Mr. +Seward last winter firmly backed the _do-nothing_ strategy, in the +firm belief that the rebels would be worried out, and submit without +fighting. To those statesmen and Napoleons, Carnots, &c., it is as +impossible to manoeuvre with rapidity, to strike boldly and decidedly, +as to dance on their _well-furnished_ heads. Only such a good-natured +people as the Americans can expect _something_ from that whole +_caterva_. To expect from Mr. Lincoln's Napoleons, Carnots, &c., +vigorous and rapid military operations, is the same as to mount +cavalry on thoroughly lame horses, and order it to charge _ŕ fond de +train_. + +The worshippers of McClellan peddle that the Antietam victory became +neutralized because the enemy fell back on its second and third line. +Whatever may be in this falling back on lines, and accepting all as it +is represented, one thing is certain, that when commanders win +victories, generally they give no time to the enemy to fall back in +order on its second and third lines. But every thing gets a new stamp +under the new Napoleon. A few hours after the Antietam battle, General +McClellan telegraphed that he "_knew not_ if the enemy retreated into +the interior or to the Potomac." O, O! + +Many from among the European officers here have some experience of the +manoeuvring of large bodies--experience acquired on fields of battle, +and on reviews, and those camp manoeuvres annually practised all over +Europe. In this way the European officers, more or less, have the +_coup d'oeil_ for space and for the _terrain_, so necessary when an +army is to be put in positions on a field of battle, and which _coup +d'oeil_ few young American officers had the occasion to acquire. If +judiciously selected for the duties of the staffs, such European +officers would be of use and support to generals but for jealousy and +the West Point cliques. + +During this whole war I hear every body, but above all the West Point +wiseacres and strategians, assert that charges with the bayonet and +hand-to-hand fighting are exceedingly rare occurrences in the course +of any campaign. It is useless to speak to all those great judges of +experience and of history. + +In the account of the battles of Ligny and of Waterloo, Thiers +mentions four charges with the bayonet and hand-to-hand fighting at +Ligny, and nine at Waterloo, wherein one was made by the English, one +was made by Prussians and by French, and one by the French with +bayonet against English cavalry. In 1831 the Poles used the bayonet +more than it was used in any one campaign known in history. O, West +Point! + +It deserves to be noticed that the conspirators against Pope and +McDowell, and the pet pretorians of September 6 and 7, distinguished +themselves not very much in the battle of Antietam. Hooker commanded +McDowell's corps. + +To the number of evils inflicted upon this country by the McClellan +infatuation, must be added the fact that many young men, with +otherwise sound intellects, have been taken in, stultified, poisoned +beyond cure, by high-sounding words, as strategy, all-embracing +scientific combinations, &c.--words identified with incapacity, +defeats, and intrigue. + +In all probability, Hooker alone, when he fought, had a fixed plan at +the Antietam battle. As for a general plan, aiming either to throw the +enemy into the river, or to cut him from the river, or to accomplish +something final and decisive, seemingly no such plan existed. It looks +as if they had ignored, at the headquarters, what kind of positions +were occupied by the enemy; and the only purpose seems to have been to +fight, but without having any preconceived plan. This, at least, is +the conclusion from the manner in which the battle was fought. If any +plan had existed, the brave army would have executed it; but the enemy +retreated in order, and rather unmolested. _As always, so this time, +the bravery of the army did every thing; and, as a matter of course, +the generalship did--nothing._ + +_Oct. 4._--The proclamation of September 22 may not produce in Europe +the effect and the enthusiasm which it might have evoked if issued a +year ago, as an act of justice and of self-conscientious force, as an +utterance of the lofty, pure, and ardent aspirations and will of a +high-minded people. Europe may see now in the proclamation an action +of despair made in the duress of events; (and so it is in reality for +Mr. Lincoln, Seward, and their squad.) And in this way, a noble deed, +outpouring from the soul of the people, is reduced to pygmy and mean +proportions by ----. The name is on every body's lips. + +But it was impossible to issue this proclamation last year; at that +time the master-spirit of Mr. Lincoln's administration emphatically +assured the diplomats that the Union will be preserved, _were +slavery--to rule in Boston_. + +The continued disasters in the West can easily be explained by the +fact, that those rotten skeletons, Crittenden, Davis, and Wickliffe +control the operations of the generals. + +_Among the countless lies peddled by McClellan's worshippers, the most +enormous and the most impudent is that one by which they attempt to +explain, what in their lingo they call, the hostility of the +abolitionists towards McClellan. Concerning this matter, I can speak +with perfect knowledge of almost all the circumstances._ + +_Not one abolitionist of whatever hue, not one republican whatever, +was in any way troubled or thought about the political convictions of +General McClellan at the time when he was put at the head of the army. +All the abolitionists and republicans, who then earnestly wished, and +now wish, to have the rebellion crushed, expected General McClellan to +do it by quick, decisive, soldier-like, military operations, +manoeuvres, and fights. Senators Wade, Chandler, Trumbull, &c., in +October, 1861, principally aided McClellan to become independent of +General Scott. When, however, weeks and months elapsed without any +soldier-like action, manifestation, or enterprise whatever, all those +who were in earnest began to feel uneasy, began to murmur, not in +reference to any political opinions, whatever, held by General +McClellan, but solely and exclusively on account of his military +supineness. All those who ardently wished, and wish, that neither +slaveholders nor slavery be hurt in any way, such ones early grouped +themselves around General McClellan, believing to have found in him +the man after their own heart. That cesspool of all infamies, the New +York Herald, became the mouthpiece of all the like hypocrites. They +and the Herald were the first to pervert and to misrepresent the +indignation evoked by the do-nothing or nobody-hurt strategy, and to +call it the abolition outcry against their fetish._ + +Scarcely will it be believed what disorder, what helplessness, and +what incapacity rule paramount in the expedition of any current +business in the strictly military part of the War Department. It is +worse than any imaginable red-tape and circumlocution. And all this, +being considered a speciality and a technicality, is in the exclusive +hands of the adjutant general, a master spirit among the West +Pointers. Generally, all relating to the thus celebrated organization +of the army is an exclusive work of the West Point wisdom--is handled +by West Pointers; and, nevertheless, the general comprehension of all +details in relation to an army, how it is to be handled, all the +military details of responsibility, of higher discipline, &c., all +this is confusion, and strikes with horror any one either familiar +with such matters or using freely his sound sense. A narrow routine +which may have been innocuous with an army of sixteen thousand with +General Scott and in peace, became highly mischievous when the army +increased more than fifty times, and the war raged furiously. All this +confusion is specially produced by the wiseacres and doctors of +routine. Undoubtedly it reacts on the army, and shows of what use for +the country is, and was, that whole old nursery. + +Wherever one turns his eyes, every where a deep line separates the +patriotic activity of the people from the official activity. With the +people all is sacrifice, devotion, grandeur, and purity of purpose, by +great and small, by rich and poor, and with the poor, if possible, +even more than with the rich. With the highest and higher officials it +is either weakness, or egotism, or coolness, or intrigue, or +ignorance, or helplessness. The exceptions are few, and have been +repeatedly pointed out. + +_Oct. 8._--General McClellan's order to the army concerning the +President's proclamation shows up the man. Not a word about the object +in the proclamation, but rather unveiled insinuations that the army is +dissatisfied with emancipation, and that it may mutiny. The army ought +to feel highly honored by such insinuations in that lengthy +disquisition about his (McClellan's) position and the duties of the +army. For the honor of the brave, armed citizen-patriots it can be +emphatically asserted that the patriotic volunteers better know their +duties than do those who preach to them. Some suspect that Mr. Seward +drew the paper for McClellan, but I am sure this cannot be. It may +have been done by Bennett or some other of the Herald, or by Barlow. +If this order is the result of Mr. Lincoln's visit to the camp, and of +a transaction with Mac-Napoleon, then the President has not thereby +increased the dignity of his presidential character. + +Wilkes's Spirit of the Times incommensurably towers above the New York +Press by its dauntless patriotism; by its clear, broad, and deep +comprehension of the condition of the country. + +Colonel Key's disclosures concerning the McClellan-Halleck programme, +not to destroy the rebels and the rebellion until the next +presidential election, are throttled by the dismissal of the colonel. +But what he said, if put by the side of the words of the order to the +army, that "the remedy for political errors, if any are committed, is +to be found only in the action of the people at the polls,"--all this +ought to open even the most obtuse intellects. + +Poor (Carlyle fashion) old Greeley hurrahs for McClellan and for the +order No. 163 to the army. O for new and young men to swim among new +and young events! + +_Oct. 11._--Will any body in this country have the patriotic courage +to reform the army? that is, to dismiss from the service the West +Point clique in Washington and in the army of the Potomac. Such a +proof of strong will cannot be expected from the President; but +perhaps Congress may show it. Those first and second scholars or +graduates from West Point are all routine engineers; and who ever +heard of whole armies commanded, moved, and manoeuvred by engineers? +American invention; but not to be patented for Europe. + +_Oct. 11._--The rebel raid into Pennsylvania, under the nose of +McClellan. Is there any thing in the world capable of opening this +people's eyes? + +I doubt if at any time, and in the life of any great or small people, +there existed such a galaxy of civil and military rulers, chiefs, and +leaders, stripped of nobler manhood, as are the _great men_ here. The +blush of honor never burned their cheeks! O, the low politicians! Some +persons doubt Stanton's sincerity in his dealings with individuals. I +am not a judge thereof; but were it so, it can easily be forgiven if +he only remains sincere and true to the cause. + +One is amazed and even aghast at the impudence of the McClellan and +West Point cliques. In their lingo, heroes like Kearney, like Hooker +and Heintzelman, all such are superciliously mentioned as _only +fighting generals_. O, unfighting strategians! + +Stuart's brilliant raid was executed the day of McClellan's bombastic +proclamation about his having cleared Pennsylvania and Maryland of the +enemy. On the same day McClellan and other generals straggled about +the country, visiting cities hundreds of miles distant from the camp. +And such generals complain of straggling! Make the army fight! +inspire with confidence the soldier--then he will not straggle. + +The Evening Post, October 13, demonstrates that up to this day Mr. +Lincoln's administration is "a grand and brilliant success." Well, _de +gustibus non est disputandum_. Others may rightly think that the +achievements enumerated by the Evening Post are exclusively due to the +people; that by the people they were forced upon the administration, +(Stanton and the navy excepted;) and that the numerous failures, the +waste of human life, of money, and of time, are to be logically and +directly traced to the administration. O, subserviency! + +The McClellanites are indignant against the Pennsylvanians for not +having caught Stuart and his three thousand horses. Bravo! And what is +the army for? and, above all, what are the so expensive commander and +his staff for? + +It is perhaps natural that many from among the republican leaders +attempt to prop up the reputation of Mr. Lincoln's administrative +capacity, to kindle a halo around his name, and to sponge the waste of +blood, of means, and of time, from the tracks of his Seward-Scott-Blair +administration; but stern historical justice shall not, and cannot, do +it. + +Whatever be the high _military and scientific prowess_ shown by the +first West Point graduates and scholars, all this in no way +compensates for the _summum_ of perverted notions which are reared +there, and for the mock, sham, and clownish aristocracy by which a +high-toned West Pointer is easily recognized. Of course many and many +are the exceptions; many West Point pupils are animated by the noblest +and purest American spirit; but the genuine West Point spirit consists +in sneering and looking down with contempt at the mother and nurse; +that is, at the purely republican, purely democratic political +institutions, at the broad political and intellectual freedom to which +those clown-aristocrats owe their rearing, their little bit of +information, and those shoulder-stripes by which they are so mightily +inflated. + +What silly talk, to compare the St. Domingo insurrection with the +eventual results of emancipation in the South! In St. Domingo the +slaves were obliged to tear their liberty from the slaveholding +planter, and from a government siding with the oppressor. Here the +lawful government gives liberty to a peaceful laborer, and the planter +is an outlawed traitor. But the genuine pro-slavery democrat is +stupidly obtuse. + +_Oct. 18._--A few days ago the President wrote a letter to McClellan, +with ability and lucidity, exposing to view the military urgency of a +movement on the enemy with an army of one hundred and forty thousand +men, as has now McClellan at Harper's Ferry. But the letter ends by +saying that all that it contains is _not_ to be considered by +McNapoleon as being an order. Of course Mac obeys--the last injunction +of the letter. Mr. Lincoln wishes not to hurt the great Napoleon's +feelings; as for hurting the country, the people, the cause, this is +of--no consequence! Ah! to witness all this is to be chained, and to +die of thirst within the reach of the purest water. + +Reverend Dr. Unitarian Sensation's broad church, admirer of the +Southern gentleman, and a Jeremy Diddler. + +_Oct. 18._--The elections in several of the States evidence the deep +imprint upon the country of Lincoln-Seward disorganizing, because from +the first day vacillating, undecided, both-ways policy. The elections +reverberate the moral, the political, and the belligerent condition in +which the country is dragged and thrown by those two _master spirits_. +No decided principle inspires them and their administration, and no +principle leads and has a decided majority in the elections; neither +the democrats nor the republicans prevail; neither freedom nor +submission is the watchword; and finally, neither the North nor the +South is decidedly the master on the fields of battle. All is +confusion! + +Scarcely one genuine republican was, or is, in the cabinet; the +republican party is completely on the wane--and perhaps beyond +redemption; all this is a logical result, and was easily to be +foreseen by any body,--only not by the wiseacres of the party, not by +the republican papers in New York, as the Times, the Tribune, and the +Evening Post, only not by the Sumners, Doolittles, and many of the +like leaders, all of whom, when, about a year ago, warned against such +a cataclysm, self-confidently smiled; but who soon will cry more +bitter tears than did the daughters of Judah over the ruins of +Jerusalem. + +And now likewise the phrase in McClellan's order No. 163, about "the +remedy at the polls," the disclosures made by Colonel Key, receive +their fullest, but ominous and cursed, signification; and now the +blind can see that it is policy, and not altogether incapacity, in +McClellan to have made a war to preserve slavery and the rebels. And +thus McClellan outwitted Mr. Lincoln. + +In general, human nature is passionately attracted, nay, is subdued, +by energy, above all by civic intrepidity. It would have been so easy +for Mr. Lincoln to carry the masses, and to avoid those disasters at +the polls! But stubbornness is not energy. + +From a very reliable source I learn that a few days after the battle +of Antietam, General McClellan, or at least General or Colonel Marcy, +of McClellan's staff, insinuated to the President that General +McClellan would wish to be relieved from the command of the army, and +be assigned to quiet duties in Washington--very likely to supersede +Halleck. And the President seized not by the hairs the occasion to get +rid of the nation's nightmare, together with the pets of the commander +of the army of the Potomac. McClellan acted honestly in making the +above insinuation; he is now, in part at least, irresponsible for any +future disaster and blood. + +_Oct. 20._--I have strong indications that European powers, as England +and France, are very sanguine to mediate, but would do it only if, and +when, _asked_ by our government. Those two governments, or some other +half-friendly, may, semi-officially, insinuate to Mr. Seward to make +such a demand. A few months ago, already Mr. Dayton wrote from Paris +something about such a step. Mr. Seward is desperate, downcast, and +may believe he can serve his country by committing the cabinet to some +such combination. I must warn Stanton and others. + +In the Express and in the World the New York Herald found its masters +in ignominy. + +More or less mean, contemptible ambition among the helmsmen, but +patriotism, patriotic ambition are below zero--here in Washington. For +the sake and honor of human nature, I pray to destiny Stanton may not +fail, and still count among the Wadsworths, the Wades, and the like +pure patriots. + +The democratic elections and majorities united to Mr. Seward may +enforce a compromise, and God knows if Mr. Lincoln will oppose it to +the last. Then the only seeming salvation of the north will be the +indomitable decision of the rebels not to accept any terms except a +full recognition. + +_Oct. 22._--The incapacity of the military wiseacres borders on +idiotism, if not on something worse. To do nothing McClellan absorbs +every man, and keeps one hundred and forty thousand men on the +Maryland side of the Potomac. Sigel has only a small command of twelve +thousand men, in a position where, with one quarter of what is useless +under McClellan, with his skill, his activity, and the _truly_ +patriotic devotion of his troops, of his officers, and of the +commanders under him, Sigel would force the rebels to retreat from +Winchester, and otherwise damage them far more than _will_ or can do +such McClellans, Hallecks, and all this c----e. + +One of the greatest misfortunes for the American people is to have +considered as statesmen the rhetors, the petty politicians, and the +speech-makers. Now, those rhetors, petty politicians, and +speech-makers are at the helm, are in the Senate, and--ruin the +country. + +The optimists and the subservients still console themselves and +confuse the people by asserting that Mr. Lincoln will yet _come out_ +as a man and a statesman. Previous to such a happy change the +country's honor and the country's political and material vitality will +_run out_. + +More than a year ago Mr. Seward said to the Prince Salm and to me, +that this war ought to be fought out by foreigners; that the Americans +fought the revolutionary war, but now they are devoted to peaceful +pursuits; and that it is the duty of Europeans to save this refuge +from the thraldoms in the old world. + +Now, I see that Mr. Seward was right, although in a sense different +from that in which he uttered the above sentence. + +The Irish excepted, all the other foreign-born Americans, but +preëminently the Germans, are more in communion with the lofty, pure, +and humane element in the thus called American principle, are +therefore more in communion with the creed of the immense majority of +Americans, than are they, the present dabblers in politics, the +would-be leaders, (civil and military,) the would-be statesmen, all of +whom are eaten up by the admixture into what is vital and perennial in +the signification of America, of all that in itself is local, muddy, +petty, accidental, and transient. + +_Oct. 23._--The recent publication of General Scott's letter, and of a +writing to President Buchanan, confirms my opinion that "the highest +military authority in the land" faltered after March 4, 1861, and +inaugurated that defensive warfare wherein we _stick_ on the Potomac +until this day. + +Pseudo-liberal right-honorable Gladstone asserts that Jeff. Davis "has +made the South a nation;" then Abraham Lincoln, with W. H. Seward and +G. B. McClellan, have destroyed a noble and generous nation. + +England may now recognize the South, France may join in it, but other +great European powers, as Russia, Spain, Prussia, Austria, will not +follow in such a wake. The recognition will not materially improve the +condition of the rebels, nor raise the blockade. But as soon as +recognized, Jeff. D. may ask for a mediation, which the people--if not +Mr. Seward--will spurn. An armed mediation remains to be applied, +wherein, likewise, the other European powers will not concur. An armed +mediation between the two principles will be the _summum_ of infamy to +which English aristocracy and English mercantilism can degrade itself; +if Louis Napoleon joins therein, then his crown is not worth two +years lease, provided the Orleans have ---- + +If we should succumb under the united efforts of imbecility, of +pro-slavery treason, of Anglo-Franco-European and of American perjury, +then + + Ultima coelestis terram Astrća reliquit. + +_Oct. 25._--Only two or three days ago, in a conversation with a +diplomat, Mr. Seward asserted that both the extreme parties will be +mastered--that is, the secessionists and the abolitionists. So Mr. +Seward confesses the _credo_ and the gospel of the New York Herald, +the World, the Journal of Commerce, the National Intelligencer, and +other similar organs of secession. + +Notwithstanding the numerous complications naturally generated by the +vicinity of Cuba to Secessia, the Spanish government, Count Serrano, +the captain-general of Cuba, and Tassara, the Spanish minister here, +all have maintained the most loyal relations towards the Federal +government. It were to be very much regretted if a drunkard or a +brute, as in the affair of the Montgomery, should disturb such +relations. + +_Oct. 26._--McClellan-Blair-Seward tactics are crowned with splendid +success. By his _simplicity_ Mr. Lincoln aided therein as much as he +could. The bad season is in; any successful campaign impossible. The +rebels will be safe, and Gladstone justified. + +It is so difficult to find out the truth concerning Fremont's campaign +against Jackson, that some generalship may, after all, be credited to +him. At any rate Fremont is a better general than McClellan and the +pets in command under him, and Fremont is with his heart and soul in +the cause, of which the McClellanites cannot be accused, all of them, +their fetish included, having no heart and no soul. + +Old Europe, and, above all, official Europe, and even the Gladstones, +must be vindicated. Official Europe generally appreciates nations by +their leaders. Europe demands from such leaders actions and proofs of +statesmanship, of high capacity, if not of heroism. The attempt to +astonish Europe by speeches, by oratory, and, still worse, by +second-rate legal arguments, by what is called papers here, and in +Europe diplomatic circulars and despatches, is the same as the attempt +to eclipse bright sunlight with a burning candle. But our orators, +and, above all, Mr. Seward, flooded the European and the English +statesmen with their, at the best, indifferent productions. Official +Europe was favored with a shower of three various editions of _papers +relating to foreign relations_ in 1862, issued by the _State +Department_, together with the Sanfords, the Weeds, the Hugheses, _et +hoc genus omne_. Undoubtedly, the traitor Mason shows in England more +of fire than does the cold, stiff, prickly, and dignified son and +grandson of Presidents; and then the average of our press! O, Jemima! + +In his circular, September 22, to our agents in Europe, Mr. Seward +belies not himself. The emancipation is rather coldly announced, and +it is visible that neither Mr. Seward's heart nor soul is in it. + +The President has now the most reliable information that when Corinth +was invested by Halleck, the rebel troops were wholly demoralized, and +the enemy was astonished not to be attacked, as very little resistance +would have been made. So much for General Scott's gift in Halleck. + +The almost daily occurrences here long ago would have exasperated the +hot-headed and warm-hearted nations in Europe, and treason would have +become their watchword. O American people! thou art warm-hearted, but +of _unparallelled endurance_! + +No European nation, not even the Turks, would patiently bear such a +condition of affairs. Every where the sovereign would have been forced +to change, or to modify, the _personnel_ of his ministers and +advisers; and Mr. Lincoln is in the hands of Messrs. Seward and Blair, +both worse even than McClellan, and--cannot shake them off. + +Now, for the first time in my life, I realize why, during the last +stages of the dissolution of the Roman empire, honest men escaped into +monasteries, or why, at certain epochs of the great French revolution, +the best men went to the army. + +Ah! to witness here the meanest egotism, imbecility, and intrigue, +coolly, one by one, destroy the honor and the future of this noble +people. Curse upon my old age! above all, curse upon my obesity! +Curse upon my poverty! What a cesspool! what a mire! Only legal +slaughterers all around! O, could I go to a camp! but, of course, not +to one under McClellan. Sigel's camp. Sigel's men are not soulless; +they fight for an idea, without an eye to the White House. + +The rhetors, the stump-speakers, the politicians, and the intriguers +hold the power, and--humanity and history shudder at the results. + +_Oct. 29._--McClellan, with his wonted intrepidity and rapidity, +crossed the Potomac from all directions, pushes on Winchester, +and--will find there wherefrom every animal willingly discharges +itself. + +A foreign diplomat, one of the most eminent in the whole _corps_, said +yesterday, "No living being so ardently prays for rain as does +McClellan; rain will prevent fighting, marching, &c." Such is the +estimation of our hero. + +Fevers decimated many regiments at Harper's Ferry. If McClellan would +have marched only five miles a day, fighting even such battles without +any generalship, as he did at Antietam, the army would be healthier, +and by this time would be in Richmond. + +The decision of the court of inquiry between a patriot and the +incarnation of West Point McClellanism, between Martindale and that +Fitz-John Porter, ought to open the eyes of any one, but--not those of +Mr. Lincoln. + +Only two days ago Mr. Lincoln declared, that the reason why McClellan +and his pets are not removed is, not any confidence in McClellan's +capacity, but to preserve the political balance between the republican +and the democratic parties. + +If there exist such spiritual creations as providence, genii, or +angels watching over the destinies of nations, then, at the sight of +Lincoln-Seward-Blair doings, providence, angels, genii avert their +faces in despair. + +_Oct. 30._--New regiments coming in. It cuts into the deepest of the +heart to see such noble and devoted fellows going to be again wantonly +slaughtered by the combined military and civic inefficiency of +McClellan-Lincoln-Seward, and, above all, by their utter +heartlessness. + +When the rebels invaded Maryland, the _fighting_ generals, as +Heintzelman, advised to mass the troops between the rebels and the +Potomac, cut them from their bases and communications, push them +towards the North without a possibility of escape, instead of throwing +them back on the Potomac. Harper's Ferry would have been saved. Every +progress made by the rebels in a Northern direction would have assured +their ruin; soon their ammunition would have been exhausted, and +surrender was inevitable. But this bold plan of a _fighting_ general +could not be comprehended by pets and pretorians. Since, daily and +daily occasions occur to destroy the rebels; but that is not the game. +Instead of cutting the rebels from Gordonsville and Richmond, which +could have been done any time during the last five weeks if +Heintzelman and Sigel were not so thoroughly weakened by an ignorant, +or worse, distribution of troops, McClellan with all his might pushes +the rebels back to Richmond, back on their bases and their resources. +O, poor country! + +Even I feel humiliated to continually ascertain, by various direct and +indirect sources from Europe, in what little estimation--if not +worse--is held our administration by the principal statesmen and +governments of the old world. + + + + +NOVEMBER, 1862. + + Empty rhetoric -- The future dark and terrible -- Wadsworth + defeated -- The official bunglers blast every thing they touch -- + Great and holy day! McClellan gone overboard! -- The planters -- + Burnside -- McClellan nominated for President -- Awful events + approaching -- Dictatorship dawns on the horizon -- The + catastrophe. + + +O God, O God! to witness how, by the hands of +Lincoln-Seward-McClellan, this noblest human structure is +crumbled--and, perhaps, soon + + Pulvere vix tactć poterunt monstrare ruinć. + +May God preserve this people--those noble patriots, of which +Wadsworth, Wade, Potter of Wisconsin, Stanton, Governor Andrew, and +many others are the types, when the country will be ruined and rended +by the firm, Lincoln-Seward-McClellan, to realize the pang,-- + + Nessun maggior' dolor' che ricordarsi dell tempo felice + Nella miseria. + +O, I know what it is! + +Mr. Seward's letter, October 28, to Messrs. Connover and Palmer, is a +display of that empty rhetoric whose dust he is wont to throw into the +eyes of the good-natured masses. His plea for united action--of course +with him--is the most bitter irony on himself. Mr. Seward's policy and +action are at the helm, and he piloted "our noble ship of state" on +worse breakers than those "of eighteen months ago." + +Mr. Seward's letter is dumb on the object of the Cooper meeting. Of +course, Mr. Seward would rather swallow a viper than applaud the +abolition of slavery. + +_Nov. 5._--Lincoln-Seward politically slaughtered the republican +party, and with it the country's honor. The future looks dark and +terrible. I shudder. Dishonor on all sides. Lincoln will not +understand to use the lease of power left to him--or to fall as a man. +But to be candid, most of the thus called leaders prepared this +defeat, and most of them at the last moment may lack decision and +dignity. How repeatedly I warned the Sumners, Wilsons, and other +wiseacres, that such will be the end, that the people at large will +become exasperated by Lincoln's administration! + +The issue brought before the people was all but dignified. It would +have been better to make a straightforward issue against the +incapacity and the democratic ill-will of McClellan, than to dodge the +question, and force honest and noble men to speak against their +convictions. The issue, as made, was concocted by journalists, by +politicians; but not by statesmen, not by genuine great leaders. + +Seward triumphs. His insincerity preëminently contributed to defeat +Wadsworth. Mephisto-like, he rejoices in thus having humbled the pure +and radical patriots. + +At any rate, I shall try to expose Seward. _Arrive que pourra._ But +for him the sacred cause would have been victorious, and now--horror! +horror! + +The pro-Romanist clergy is more furiously and savagely pro-slavery +than are the Rhetts, the Yanceys, in the South; the poor +Africo-Americans are, if not the truest Christians in this country, at +any rate their Christianity is sublime when compared with the +pro-Romanism. + +O, for civic intrepidity, or all is lost! High-minded, intrepid, +self-forgetful civism and abnegation alone can avert the catastrophe. +Such is the mass of the people--but its leaders! + +_Nov. 8._--Hooker has the military instinct in him which lights the +fire, and the inspiration of the god of battles; as Halleck has +nothing of the one and of the other, and as Mr. Lincoln is--Mr. +Lincoln, so Hooker is not to be put in command of the army. Lincoln +and Halleck will find out their man. _Similis simili gaudet_, or, +_przywitala sie dupa z wiechciem_. + +_Nov. 9._--The official bunglers have blasted every thing they +touched: the people's virgin enthusiasm and unparalleled devotion; +they have endangered the country's safety. It is to hope for a miracle +to expect any thing for the better at the hands of the bunglers. Will +the shallow rhetors, will the would-be leaders in the Congress, be as +subservient to the bunglers as they have been up to this hour? + +_Nov. 9._--Great and holy day! McClellan gone overboard! Better late +than never. But this belated act of justice to the country cannot +atone for all the deadly disasters, will not remove the fearful +responsibility from Lincoln-Seward-Blair, for having so long sustained +this horrible vampire. Now is Seward's turn to jump. + +It must be acknowledged, in justice to the average of the better class +of planters, that the superficial, sociable intercourse with them is +more easy, and what is commonly considered more European, than is +similar intercourse with any corresponding class in the North. Therein +consists the whole attraction exercised by the Southerners on +Europeans visiting America--the diplomats included. I, for one, am +always uneasy, anxious, as if touching hot iron, when in intercourse +here with men with whom I am very intimate, (on the outside,) and who +now are in power. I never felt so out of the track when--once--in +intercourse with sovereigns, and with eminent men in Europe. + +_Nov. 11._--General Burnside succeeds to McClellan--gives a military +ovation to his predecessor. In his order of the day, Burnside pays +homage to McClellan, and thus implicitly condemns the government. +Burnside permits McClellan to issue such a parting word as must shake +the army and the country. + +_Nov. 12._--The democrats nominate McClellan for the next presidency. +Thus Mr. Lincoln's helplessness, Seward's hatred of the republican +creed, the treason, the imbecility, the intrigues of various others, +the lack of civic energy in the New York republican press and in the +republican politicians, except some repeatedly mentioned in this +Diary,--all this combined has built up a pedestal for such a +McClellan! + +Strange and awful events may occur even before the end of Mr. +Lincoln's administration. The democratic leaders are perverse, +unprincipled, reckless, daring beyond conception; success is their +creed, and no conscience, no honor restrain them; and in the +management of the public opinion and of their party the democrats have +evidenced a skill far above that of the republican leaders; further, +the democrats evoke the vilest, the most brutish passions dormant in +the masses; the democrats are supported by all that is brutal, savage, +ignorant, and sordid; and, to crown and strengthen all, the democrats, +united to Romanist priesthood, rule over the Irishry. + +And thus the relentless hatred with which the democrats persecute any +elevated, noble, humane aspiration; the helplessness, the incapacity +of the official and unofficial leaders of the republican party: both +these agencies combined may deal such a blow to the pure and humane +republican creed that it may not recover therefrom during the next +twenty-five years. + +To sum up,-- + +_Dictatorship with McClellan_ seems to dawn upon the horizon; the +smallest disaster--Burnside, ah!--will precipitate the catastrophe. I +pray to God (and for the first time) that I may be mistaken. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DIARY FROM MARCH 4, 1861, TO +NOVEMBER 12, 1862*** + + +******* This file should be named 28926-8.txt or 28926-8.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/8/9/2/28926 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at <a href = "http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre> +<p>Title: Diary from March 4, 1861, to November 12, 1862</p> +<p>Author: Adam Gurowski</p> +<p>Release Date: May 22, 2009 [eBook #28926]</p> +<p>Language: English</p> +<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p> +<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DIARY FROM MARCH 4, 1861, TO NOVEMBER 12, 1862***</p> +<br><br><center><h4>E-text prepared by David Edwards, Christine P. Travers,<br> + and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br> + (<a href="http://www.pgdp.net/c/">http://www.pgdp.net</a>)<br> + from digital material generously made available by<br> + Internet Archive<br> + (<a href="http://www.archive.org">http://www.archive.org</a>)</h4></center><br><br> +<center> +<table width="65%" border=0 bgcolor="ddddff" cellpadding=10> + <tr> + <td valign="top"> + Note: + </td> + <td> + Images of the original pages are available through + Internet Archive. See + <a href="http://www.archive.org/details/diarycivilwar01gurouoft"> + http://www.archive.org/details/diarycivilwar01gurouoft</a> + </td> + </tr> +</table> +<p> </p> +<table width="65%" border=0 bgcolor="ddddff" cellpadding=10> + <tr> + <td align="center"> + Transcriber's Note + </td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td> + Obvious printer's errors have been corrected. Hyphenation and + accentuation have been standardised. All other inconsistencies + are as in the original. The author's spelling has been retained. + </td> + </tr> +</table> +</center> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" noshade> +<p> </p> + +<h1>DIARY,<br> +<span class="small">FROM</span><br> +<span class="smaller">MARCH 4, 1861, TO NOVEMBER 12, 1862.</span></h1> + +<p class="smaller center">BY</p> + +<h2>ADAM GUROWSKI.</h2> + +<p class="p4 smaller center">BOSTON:<br> +LEE AND SHEPARD,<br> +SUCCESSORS TO PHILLIPS, SAMPSON & CO.<br> +1862.</p> + +<p class="p2 smaller center">Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1862, by<br> +LEE AND SHEPARD,<br> +In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of +Massachusetts.</p> + +<p class="p4 center high smcap">Dedicated<br> +TO<br> +THE WIDOWED WIVES, THE BEREAVED MOTHERS, SISTERS,<br> +SWEETHEARTS, AND ORPHANS<br> +IN<br> +THE LOYAL STATES.</p> + + +<p class="p4 center"><i>On doit ŕ son pays sa fortune, sa vie, mais avant tout la Vérité.</i></p> + +<p class="p2">In this Diary I recorded what I heard and saw myself, and what I heard +from others, on whose veracity I can implicitly rely.</p> + +<p>I recorded impressions as immediately as I felt them. A life almost +wholly spent in the tempests and among the breakers of our times has +taught me that the first impressions are the purest and the best.</p> + +<p>If they ever peruse these pages, my friends and acquaintances will +find therein what, during these horrible national trials, was a +subject of our confidential conversations and discussions, what in +letters and by mouth was a subject of repeated forebodings and +warnings. Perhaps these pages may in some way explain a phenomenon +almost unexampled in history,—that twenty millions of people, brave, +highly intelligent, and mastering all the wealth of modern +civilization, were, if not virtually overpowered, at least so long +kept at bay by about five millions of rebels.</p> + +<p class="right10">GUROWSKI.</p> + +<p class="smcap">Washington, November, 1862.</p> + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="pageiii" name="pageiii"></a>(p. iii)</span> CONTENTS.</h3> + +<div class="toc"> +<p class="p2 center">MARCH, 1861.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">Inauguration day —</span> The message — Scott watching at the door of the + Union — The Cabinet born — The Seward and Chase struggle — The New + York radicals triumph — The treason spreads — The Cabinet pays old + party debts — The diplomats confounded — Poor Senators! — Sumner is + like a hare tracked by hounds — Chase in favor of recognizing the + revolted States — Blunted axes — Blair demands action, brave + fellow! — The slave-drivers — The month of March closes — No + foresight! no foresight! <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page013">13</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center">APRIL, 1861.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">Seward parleying with the rebel commissioners —</span> Corcoran's + dinner — The crime in full blast! — 75,000 men called + for — Massachusetts takes the lead — Baltimore — Defence of + Washington — Blockade discussed — France our friend, not + England — Warning to the President — Virginia secedes — Lincoln + warned again — Seward says it will all blow over in sixty to + ninety days — Charles F. Adams — The administration undecided; the + people alone inspired — Slavery must perish! — The Fabian + policy — The Blairs — Strange conduct of Scott — Lord Lyons — Secret + agent to Canada, <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page022">22</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center"><span class="pagenum"><a id="pageiv" name="pageiv"></a>(p. iv)</span> MAY, 1861.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">The administration tossed by expedients —</span> Seward to + Dayton — Spread-eagleism — One phasis of the American Union + finished — The fuss about Russell — Pressure on the administration + increases — Seward, Wickoff, and the Herald — Lord Lyons menaced + with passports — The splendid Northern army — The administration + not up to the occasion — The new men — Andrew, Wadsworth, Boutwell, + Noyes, Wade, Trumbull, Walcott, King, Chandler, Wilson — Lyon + jumps over formulas — Governor Banks needed — Butler takes + Baltimore with two regiments — News from England — The + "belligerent" question — Butler and Scott — Seward and the + diplomats — "What a Merlin!" — "France not bigger than New + York!" — Virginia invaded — Murder of Ellsworth — Harpies at the + White House, <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page037">37</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center">JUNE, 1861.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">Butler emancipates slaves —</span> The army not + organized — Promenades — The blockade — Louis Napoleon — Scott all in + all — Strategy! — Gun contracts — The diplomats — Masked + batteries — Seward writes for "bunkum" — Big Bethel — The Dayton + letter — Instructions to Mr. Adams, <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page050">50</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center">JULY, 1861.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">The Evening Post —</span> The message — The administration caught + napping — McDowell — Congress slowly feels its way — Seward's great + facility of labor — Not a Know-Nothing — Prophesies a speedy + end — Carried away by his imagination — Says "secession is + over" — Hopeful views — Politeness of the State department — Scott + carries on the <span class="pagenum"><a id="pagev" name="pagev"></a>(p. v)</span> campaign from his sleeping room — Bull + Run — Rout — Panic — "Malediction! Malediction!" — Not a manly word + in Congress! — Abuse of the soldiers — McClellan sent + for — Young-blood — Gen. Wadsworth — Poor McDowell! — Scott + responsible — Plan of reorganization — Let McClellan beware of + routine, <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page060">60</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center">AUGUST, 1861.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">The truth about Bull Run —</span> The press staggers — The Blairs alone + firm — Scott's military character — Seward — Mr. Lincoln reads the + Herald — The ubiquitous lobbyist — Intervention — Congress + adjourns — The administration waits for something to turn + up — Wade — Lyon is killed — Russell and his shadow — The Yankees + take the loan — Bravo, Yankees! — McClellan works hard — Prince + Napoleon — Manassas fortifications a humbug — Mr. Seward + improves — Old Whigism — McClellan's powers enlarged — Jeff. Davis + makes history — Fremont emancipates in Missouri — The Cabinet, <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page078">78</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center">SEPTEMBER, 1861.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">What will McClellan do? —</span> Fremont disavowed — The Blairs not in + fault — Fremont ignorant and a bungler — Conspiracy to destroy + him — Seward rather on his side — McClellan's staff — A Marcy will + not do! — McClellan publishes a slave-catching order — The people + move onward — Mr. Seward again — West Point — The Washington + defences — What a Russian officer thought of them — Oh, for + battles! — Fremont wishes to attack Memphis; a bold + move! — Seward's influence over Lincoln — The people for + Fremont — Col. Romanoff's opinion of the generals — McClellan + refuses to move — Manœuvrings — The people uneasy — The + staff — The Orleans — Brave boys! — The Potomac closed — Oh, poor + nation! — Mexico — McClellan and Scott, <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page092">92</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center"><span class="pagenum"><a id="pagevi" name="pagevi"></a>(p. vi)</span> OCTOBER, 1861.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">Experiments on the people's life-blood —</span> McClellan's uniform — The + army fit to move — The rebels treat us like children — We lose + time — Everything is defensive — The starvation theory — The + anaconda — First interview with McClellan — Impressions of him — His + distrust of the volunteers — Not a Napoleon nor a Garibaldi — Mason + and Slidell — Seward admonishes Adams — Fremont goes overboard — The + pro-slavery party triumph — The collateral missions to + Europe — Peace impossible — Every Southern gentleman is a + pirate — When will we deal blows? — Inertia! inertia! <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page104">104</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center">NOVEMBER, 1861.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">Ball's Bluff —</span> Whitewashing — "Victoria! Old Scott gone + overboard!" — His fatal influence — His + conceit — Cameron — Intervention — More reviews — Weed, Everett, + Hughes — Gov. Andrew — Boutwell — Mason and Slidell caught — Lincoln + frightened by the South Carolina success — Waits unnoticed in + McClellan's library — Gen. Thomas — Traitors and pedants — The + Virginia campaign — West Point — McClellan's speciality — When will + they begin to see through him? <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page115">115</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center">DECEMBER, 1861.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">The message —</span> Emancipation — State papers published — Curtis + Noyes — Greeley not fit for Senator — Generalship all on the rebel + side — The South and the North — The sensationists — The new idol + will cost the people their life-blood! — The Blairs — Poor + Lincoln! — The Trent affair — Scott home again — The war + investigation committee — Mr. Mercier, <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page129">129</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center"><span class="pagenum"><a id="pagevii" name="pagevii"></a>(p. vii)</span> JANUARY, 1862.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">The year 1861 ends badly —</span> European defenders of + slavery — Secession lies — Jeremy + Diddlers — Sensation-seekers — Despotic tendencies — Atomistic + Torquemadas — Congress chained by formulas — Burnside's expedition + a sign of life — Will this McClellan ever advance? — Mr. Adams + unhorsed — He packs his trunks — Bad blankets — Austria, Prussia, + and Russia — The West Point nursery — McClellan a greater mistake + than Scott — Tracks to the White House — European stories about Mr. + Lincoln — The English ignorami — The slaveholder a scarcely + varnished savage — Jeff. Davis — "Beauregard frightens + us — McClellan rocks his baby" — Fancy army equipment — McClellan + and his chief of staff sick in bed — "No satirist could invent + such things" — Stanton in the Cabinet — "This Stanton is the + people" — Fremont — Weed — The English will not be humbugged — Dayton + in a fret — Beaufort — The investigating committee condemn + McClellan — Lincoln in the clutches of Seward and Blair — Banks + begs for guns and cavalry in vain — The people will awake! — The + question of race — Agassiz, <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page137">137</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center">FEBRUARY, 1862.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">Drifting —</span> The English blue book — Lord John could not act + differently — Palmerston the great European fuss-maker — Mr. + Seward's "two pickled rods" for England — Lord Lyons — His pathway + strewn with broken glass — Gen. Stone arrested — Sumner's + resolutions infuse a new spirit in the Constitution — Mr. Seward + beyond salvation — He works to save slavery — Weed has ruined + him — The New York press — "Poor Tribune" — The Evening Post — The + Blairs — Illusions dispelled — "All quiet on the Potomac" — The + London papers — Quill-heroes can be bought for a dinner — French + opinion — Superhuman efforts to save slavery — It is doomed! — "All + you worshippers of darkness cannot save it!" — The + Hutchinsons — Corporal Adams — Victories in the West — Stanton the + man! — Strategy (hear!) <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page151">151</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center"><span class="pagenum"><a id="pageviii" name="pageviii"></a>(p. viii)</span> MARCH, 1862.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">The Africo-Americans —</span> Fremont — The + Orleans — Confiscation — American nepotism — The Merrimac — Wooden + guns — Oh shame! — Gen. Wadsworth — The rats have the best of + Stanton — McClellan goes to Fortress Monroe — Utter imbecility — The + embarkation — McClellan a turtle — He will stick in the + marshes — Louis Napoleon behaves nobly — So does Mr. Mercier — Queen + Victoria for freedom — The great strategian — Senator Sumner and + the French minister — Archbishop Hughes — His diplomatic activity + not worth the postage on his + correspondence — Alberoni-Seward — Love's labor lost, <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page165">165</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center">APRIL, 1862.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">Immense power of the President —</span> Mr. Seward's Egeria — Programme of + peace — The belligerent question — Roebucks and Gregories + scums — Running the blockade — Weed and Seward take clouds for + camels — Uncle Sam's pockets — Manhood, not money, the sinews of + war — Colonization schemes — Senator Doolittle — Coal mine + speculation — Washington too near the seat of war — Blair demands + the return of a fugitive slave woman — Slavery is Mr. Lincoln's + "<i>mammy</i>" — He will not destroy her — Victories in the West — The + brave navy — McClellan subsides in mud before Yorktown — Telegraphs + for more men — God will be tired out! — Great strength of the + people — Emancipation in the District — Wade's speech — He is a + monolith — Chase and Seward — N. Y. Times — The Rothschilds — Army + movements and plans, <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page180">180</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center">MAY, 1862.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">Capture of New Orleans —</span> The second siege of Troy — Mr. Seward + lights his lantern to search for the Union-saving + party — Subserviency to <span class="pagenum"><a id="pageix" name="pageix"></a>(p. ix)</span> power — Vitality of the + people — Yorktown evacuated — Battle of Williamsburg — Great bayonet + charge! — Heintzelman and Hooker — McClellan telegraphs that the + enemy outnumber him — The terrible enemy evacuate + Williamsburg — The track of truth begins to be lost — Oh + Napoleon! — Oh spirit of Berthier! — Dayton not in favor — Events + are too rapid for Lincoln — His integrity — Too tender of men's + feelings — Halleck — Ten thousand men disabled by disease — The + Bishop of Orleans — The rebels retreat without the knowledge of + McNapoleon — Hunter's proclamation — Too noble for Mr. + Lincoln — McClellan again subsides in mud — Jackson defeats Banks, + who makes a masterly retreat — Bravo, Banks! — The aulic council + frightened — Gov. Andrew's letter — Sigel — English opinion — Mr. + Mill — Young Europa — Young Germany — Corinth evacuated — Oh, + generalship! — McDowell grimly persecuted by bad luck, <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page198">198</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center">JUNE, 1862.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">Diplomatic circulars seasoned by stories —</span> Battle before + Richmond — Casey's division disgraced — McClellan afterwards + confesses he was misinformed — Fair Oaks — "Nobody is hurt, only + the bleeding people" — Fremont disobeys orders — N. Y. Times, + World, and Herald, opinion-poisoning sheets — Napoleon never + visible before nine o'clock in the morning — Hooker and the other + fighters soldered to the mud — Senator Sumner shows the practical + side of his intellect — "Slavery a big job!" — McClellan sends for + mortars — Defenders of slavery in Congress worse than the + rebels — Wooden guns and cotton sentries at Corinth — The navy is + glorious — Brave old Gideon Welles! — July 4th to be celebrated in + Richmond! — Colonization again — Justice to France — New + regiments — The people sublime! — Congress — Lincoln visits + Scott — McDowell — Pope — Disloyalty in the departments, <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page218">218</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center"><span class="pagenum"><a id="pagex" name="pagex"></a>(p. x)</span> JULY, 1862.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">Intervention —</span> The cursed fields of the Chickahominy — Titanic + fightings, but no generalship — McClellan the first to reach James + river — The Orleans leave — July 4th, the gloomiest since the birth + of the republic — Not reinforcements, but brains, wanted; and + brains not transferable! — The people run to the rescue — Rebel + tactics — Lincoln does not sacrifice Stanton — McClellan not the + greatest culprit — Stanton a true statesman — The President goes to + James river — The Union as it was, a throttling nightmare! — A man + needed! — Confiscation bill signed — Congress adjourned — Mr. + Dicey — Halleck, the American Carnot — Lincoln tries to neutralize + the confiscation bill — Guerillas spread like locusts, <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page233">233</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center">AUGUST, 1862.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">Emancipation —</span> The President's hand falls back — Weed sent + for — Gen. Wadsworth — The new levies — The Africo-Americans not + called for — Let every Northern man be shot rather! — End of the + Peninsula campaign — Fifty or sixty thousand dead — Who is + responsible? — The army saved — Lincoln and McClellan — The + President and the Africo-Americans — An Eden in + Chiriqui — Greeley — The old lion begins to awake — Mr. Lincoln + tells stories — The rebels take the offensive — European + opinion — McClellan's army landed — Roebuck — Halleck — Butler's + mistakes — Hunter recalled — Terrible fighting at Manassas — Pope + cuts his way through — Reinforcements slow incoming — McClellan + reduced in command, <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page245">245</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center">SEPTEMBER, 1862.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin"><i>Consummatum est!</i> —</span> Will the outraged people avenge + itself? — McClellan satisfies the President — After a year! — The + truth will be throttled — Public opinion in Europe begins to + abandon us — The country <span class="pagenum"><a id="pagexi" name="pagexi"></a>(p. xi)</span> marching to its tomb — Hooker, + Kearney, Heintzelman, Sigel, brave and true men — Supremacy of + mind over matter — Stanton the last Roman — Inauguration of the + pretorian regime — Pope accuses three generals — Investigation + prevented by McClellan — McDowell sacrificed — The country + inundated with lies — The demoralized army declares for + McClellan — The pretorians will soon finish with liberty — Wilkes + sent to the West Indian waters — Russia — Mediation — Invasion of + Maryland — Strange story about Stanton — Richmond never + invested — McClellan in search of the enemy — Thirty miles in six + days — The telegrams — Wadsworth — Capitulation of Harper's + Ferry — Five days' fighting — Brave Hooker wounded — No results — No + reports from McClellan — Tactics of the Maryland campaign — Nobody + hurt in the staff — Charmed lives — Wadsworth, Judge Conway, Wade, + Boutwell, Andrew — This most intelligent people become the + laughing-stock of the world! — The proclamation of + emancipation — Seward to the Paisley Association — Future + complications — If Hooker had not been wounded! — The military + situation — Sigel persecuted by West Point — Three cheers for the + carriage and six! — How the great captain was to catch the rebel + army — Interview with the Chicago deputation — Winter quarters — The + conspiracy against Sigel — Numbers of the rebel army — Letters of + marque, <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page258">258</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center">OCTOBER, 1862.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">Costly infatuation —</span> The do-nothing strategy — Cavalry on lame + horses — Bayonet charges — Antietam — Effect of the + Proclamation — Disasters in the West — The Abolitionists not + originally hostile to McClellan — Helplessness in the War + Department — Devotedness of the people — McClellan and the + proclamation — Wilkes — Colonel Key — Routine engineers — Rebel raid + into Pennsylvania — Stanton's sincerity — Oh, unfighting + strategians — The administration a success — <i>De + gustibus</i> — Stuart's raid — West Point — St. Domingo — The + President's letter to McClellan — Broad church — The elections — The + Republican party gone — The remedy at the polls — McClellan + <span class="pagenum"><a id="pagexii" name="pagexii"></a>(p. xii)</span> wants to be relieved — Mediation — Compromise — The + rhetors — The optimists — The foreigners — Scott and + Buchanan — Gladstone — Foreign opinion and action — Both the + extremes to be put down — Spain — Fremont's campaign against + Jackson — Seward's circular — General Scott's gift — "Oh, could I go + to a camp!" — McClellan crosses the Potomac — Prays for + rain — Fevers decimate the regiments — Martindale and Fitz John + Porter — The political balance to be preserved — New regiments — O + poor country! <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page288">288</a></span></p> + +<p class="p2 center">NOVEMBER, 1862.</p> + +<p><span class="minmargin">Empty rhetoric —</span> The future dark and terrible — Wadsworth + defeated — The official bunglers blast everything they + touch — Great and holy day! McClellan gone overboard! — The + planters — Burnside — McClellan nominated for President — Awful + events approaching — Dictatorship dawns on the horizon — The + catastrophe, <span class="ralign5"><a href="#page311">311</a></span></p> +</div> + +<h1><span class="pagenum"><a id="page013" name="page013"></a>(p. 013)</span> DIARY.</h1> + +<h3>MARCH, 1861.</h3> + +<p class="resume">Inauguration day — The message — Scott watching at the door of the + Union — The Cabinet born — The Seward and Chase struggle — The New + York radicals triumph — The treason spreads — The Cabinet pays old + party debts — The diplomats confounded — Poor Senators! — Sumner is + like a hare tracked by hounds — Chase in favor of recognizing the + revolted States — Blunted axes — Blair demands action, brave + fellow! — The slave-drivers — The month of March closes — No + foresight! no foresight!</p> + + +<p>For the first time in my life I assisted at the simplest and grandest +spectacle—the inauguration of a President. Lincoln's message good, +according to circumstances, but not conclusive; it is not positive; it +discusses questions, but avoids to assert. May his mind not be +altogether of the same kind. Events will want and demand more +positiveness and action than the message contains assertions. The +immense majority around me seems to be satisfied. Well, well; I wait, +and prefer to judge and to admire when actions will speak.</p> + +<p>I am sure that a great drama will be played, equal to any one known in +history, and that the insurrection of the slave-drivers will not end +in <span class="pagenum"><a id="page014" name="page014"></a>(p. 014)</span> smoke. So I now decide to keep a diary in my own way. I +scarcely know any of those men who are considered as leaders; the more +interesting to observe them, to analyze their mettle, their actions. +This insurrection may turn very complicated; if so, it must generate +more than one revolutionary manifestation. What will be its +march—what stages? Curious; perhaps it may turn out more interesting +than anything since that great renovation of humanity by the great +French Revolution.</p> + +<p>The old, brave warrior, Scott, watched at the door of the Union; his +shadow made the infamous rats tremble and crawl off, and so Scott +transmitted to Lincoln what was and could be saved during the +treachery of Buchanan.</p> + +<p>By the most propitious accident, I assisted at the throes among which +Mr. Lincoln's Cabinet was born. They were very painful, but of the +highest interest for me, and I suppose for others. I participated some +little therein.</p> + +<p>A pledge bound Mr. Lincoln to make Mr. Seward his Secretary of State. +The radical and the puritanic elements in the Republican party were +terribly scared. His speeches, or rather demeanor and repeated +utterances since the opening of the Congress, his influence on Mr. +Adams, who, under Seward's inspiration, made his speech <i>de lana +caprina</i>, and voted for compromises and concessions,—all this spread +and fortified the general and firm belief that Mr. Seward was ready to +give up many from among the cardinal articles of the Republican creed +of <span class="pagenum"><a id="page015" name="page015"></a>(p. 015)</span> which he was one of the most ardent apostles. They, the +Republicans, speak of him in a way to remind me of the dictum, "<i>omnia +serviliter pro dominatione</i>," as they accuse him now of subserviency +to the slave power. The radical and puritan Republicans likewise dread +him on account of his close intimacy with a Thurlow Weed, a Matteson, +and with similar not over-cautious—as they call them—lobbyists.</p> + +<p>Some days previous to the inauguration, Mr. Seward brought Mr. Lincoln +on the Senate floor, of course on the Republican side; but soon Mr. +Seward was busily running among Democrats, begging them to be +introduced to Lincoln. It was a saddening, humiliating, and revolting +sight for the galleries, where I was. Criminal as is Mason, for a +minute I got reconciled to him for the scowl of horror and contempt +with which he shook his head at Seward. The whole humiliating +proceeding foreshadowed the future policy. Only two or three +Democratic Senators were moved by Seward's humble entreaties. The +criminal Mason has shown true manhood.</p> + +<p>The first attempt of sincere Republicans was to persuade Lincoln to +break his connection with Seward. This failed. To neutralize what was +considered quickly to become a baneful influence in Mr. Lincoln's +councils, the Republicans united on Gov. Chase. This Seward opposed +with all his might. Mr. Lincoln wavered, hesitated, and was bending +rather towards Mr. Seward. The struggle was terrific, lasted several +days, when Chase was <span class="pagenum"><a id="page016" name="page016"></a>(p. 016)</span> finally and triumphantly forced into +the Cabinet. It was necessary not to leave him there alone against +Seward, and perhaps Bates, the old cunning Whig. Again terrible +opposition by Seward, but it was overcome by the radicals in the +House, in the Senate, and outside of Congress by such men as Curtis, +Noyes, J. S. Wadsworth, Opdyke, Barney, &c., &c., and Blair was +brought in. Cameron was variously opposed, but wished to be in by +Seward; Welles was from the start considered sound and safe in every +respect; Smith was considered a Seward man.</p> + +<p>From what I witnessed of Cabinet-making in Europe, above all in France +under Louis Philippe, I do not forebode anything good in the coming-on +shocks and eruptions, and I am sure these must come. This Cabinet as +it stands is not a fusion of various shadowings of a party, but it is +a violent mixing or putting together of inimical and repulsive forces, +which, if they do not devour, at the best will neutralize each other.</p> + +<p>Senator Wilson answered Douglass in the Senate, that "when the +Republican party took the power, treason was in the army, in the navy, +in the administration," etc. Dreadful, but true assertion. It is to be +seen how the administration will act to counteract this ramified +treason.</p> + +<p>What a run, a race for offices. This spectacle likewise new to me.</p> + +<p>The Cabinet Ministers, or, as they call them here, the Secretaries, +have old party debts to pay, old sores to avenge or to heal, and all +this by distributing <span class="pagenum"><a id="page017" name="page017"></a>(p. 017)</span> offices, or by what they call it +here—patronage. Through patronage and offices everybody is to serve +his friends and his party, and to secure his political position. Some +of the party leaders seem to me similar to children enjoying a +long-expected and ardently wished-for toy. Some of the leaders are as +generals who abandon the troops in a campaign, and take to travel in +foreign parts. Most of them act as if they were sure that the battle +is over. It begins only, but nobody, or at least very few of the +interested, seem to admit that the country is on fire, that a terrible +struggle begins. (Wrote in this sense an article for the National +Intelligencer; insertion refused.) They, the leaders, look to create +engines for their own political security, but no one seems to look +over Mason and Dixon's line to the terrible and with lightning-like +velocity spreading fire of hellish treason.</p> + +<p>The diplomats utterly upset, confused, and do not know what god to +worship. All their associations were with Southerners, now traitors. +In Southern talk, or in that of treacherous Northern Democrats, the +diplomats learned what they know about this country. Not one of them +is familiar, is acquainted with the genuine people of the North; with +its true, noble, grand, and pure character. It is for them a terra +incognita, as is the moon. The little they know of the North is the +few money or cotton bags of New York, Boston, Philadelphia,—these +would-be betters, these dinner-givers, and whist-players. The +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page018" name="page018"></a>(p. 018)</span> diplomats consider Seward as the essence of Northern +feeling.</p> + +<p>How little the thus-called statesmen know Europe. Sumner, Seward, etc. +already have under consideration if Europe will recognize the secesh. +Europe recognizes <i>faits accomplis</i>, and a great deal of blood will +run before secesh becomes <i>un fait accompli</i>. These Sewards, Sumners, +etc. pay too much attention to the silly talk of the European +diplomats in Washington; and by doing this these would-be statesmen +prove how ignorant they are of history in general, and specially +ignorant of the policy of European cabinets. Before a struggle decides +a question a recognition is bosh, and I laugh at it.</p> + +<p>The race, the race increases with a fearful rapidity. No flood does it +so quick. Poor Senators! Some of them must spend nights and days to +decide on whom to bestow this or that office. Secretaries or Ministers +wrangle, <i>fight</i> (that is the word used), as if life and death +depended upon it.</p> + +<p>Poor (Carlylian-meaning) good-natured Senator Sumner, in his earnest, +honest wish to be just and of service to everybody, looks as a hare +tracked by hounds; so are at him office-seekers from the whole +country. This hunting degrades the hounds, and enervates the patrons.</p> + +<p>I am told that the President is wholly absorbed in adjusting, +harmonizing the amount of various salaries bestowed on various States +through its office-holders and office-seekers.</p> + +<p>It were better if the President would devote his <span class="pagenum"><a id="page019" name="page019"></a>(p. 019)</span> time to +calculate the forces and resources needed to quench the fire. Over in +Montgomery the slave-drivers proceed with the terrible, unrelenting, +fearless earnestness of the most unflinching criminals.</p> + +<p>After all, these crowds of office-hunters are far from representing +the best element of the genuine, laborious, intelligent people,—of +its true healthy stamina. This is consoling for me, who know the +American people in the background of office-hunters.</p> + +<p>Of course an alleviating circumstance is, that the method, the system, +the routine, oblige, nay force, everybody to ask, to hunt. As in the +Scriptures, "Ask, and you will get; or knock, and it will be opened." +Of course, many worthy, honorable, deserving men, who would be +ornaments to the office, must run the gauntlet together with the +hounds.</p> + +<p>It is reported, and I am sure of the truth of the report, that +Governor Chase is for recognizing, or giving up the revolted Cotton +States, so as to save by it the Border States, and eventually to fight +for their remaining in the Union. What logic! If the treasonable +revolt is conceded to the Cotton States, on what ground can it be +denied to the thus called Border States? I am sorry that Chase has +such notions.</p> + +<p>It is positively asserted by those who ought to know, that Seward, +having secured to himself the Secretaryship of State, offered to the +Southern leaders in Congress compromise and concessions, to assure, by +such step, his confirmation by the Democratic <span class="pagenum"><a id="page020" name="page020"></a>(p. 020)</span> vote. The +chiefs refused the bargain, distrusting him. All this was going on for +weeks, nay months, previous to the inauguration, so it is asserted. +But Seward might have been anxious to preserve the Union at any price. +His enemies assert that if Seward's plan had succeeded, virtually the +Democrats would have had the power. Thus the meaning of Lincoln's +election would have been destroyed, and Buchanan's administration +would have been continued in its most dirty features, the name only +being changed.</p> + +<p>Old Scott seems to be worried out by his laurels; he swallows incense, +and I do not see that anything whatever is done to meet the military +emergency. I see the cloud.</p> + +<p>Were it true that Seward and Scott go hand in hand, and that both, and +even Chase, are blunted axes!</p> + +<p>I hear that Mr. Blair is the only one who swears, demands, asks for +action, for getting at them without losing time. Brave fellow! I am +glad to have at Willard's many times piloted deputations to the doors +of Lincoln on behalf of Blair's admission into the Cabinet. I do not +know him, but will try to become nearer acquainted.</p> + +<p>But for the New York radical Republicans, already named, neither Chase +nor Blair would have entered the Cabinet. But for them Seward would +have had it totally his own way. Members of Congress acted less than +did the New Yorkers.</p> + +<p>The South, or the rebels, slave-drivers, slave-breeders, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page021" name="page021"></a>(p. 021)</span> +constitute the most corrosive social decompositions and impurities; +what the human race throughout countless ages successively toiled to +purify itself from and throw off. Europe continually makes terrible +and painful efforts, which at times are marked by bloody destruction. +This I asserted in my various writings. This social, putrefied evil, +and the accumulated matter in the South, pestilentially and in various +ways influenced the North, poisoning its normal healthy condition. +This abscess, undermining the national life, has burst now. Somebody, +something must die, but this apparent death will generate a fresh and +better life.</p> + +<p>The month of March closes, but the administration seems to enjoy the +most beatific security. I do not see one single sign of +foresight,—this cardinal criterion of statesmanship. Chase measures +the empty abyss of the treasury. Senator Wilson spoke of treason +everywhere, but the administration seems not to go to work and to +reconstruct, to fill up what treason has disorganized and emptied. +Nothing about reorganizing the army, the navy, refitting the arsenals. +No foresight, no foresight! either statesmanlike or administrative. +Curious to see these men at work. The whole efforts visible to me and +to others, and the only signs given by the administration in concert, +are the paltry preparations to send provisions to Fort Sumpter. What +is the matter? what are they about?</p> + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page022" name="page022"></a>(p. 022)</span> APRIL, 1861.</h3> + +<p class="resume">Seward parleying with the rebel commissioners — Corcoran's + dinner — The crime in full blast! — 75,000 men called + for — Massachusetts takes the lead — Baltimore — Defence of + Washington — Blockade discussed — France our friend, not + England — Warning to the President — Virginia secedes — Lincoln + warned again — Seward says it will all blow over in sixty to + ninety days — Charles F. Adams — The administration undecided; the + people alone inspired — Slavery must perish! — The Fabian + policy — The Blairs — Strange conduct of Scott — Lord Lyons — Secret + agent to Canada.</p> + + +<p>Commissioners from the rebels; Seward parleying with them through some +Judge Campbell. Curious way of treating and dealing with rebellion, +with rebels and traitors; why not arrest them?</p> + +<p>Corcoran, a rich partisan of secession, invited to a dinner the rebel +commissioners and the foreign diplomats. If such a thing were done +anywhere else, such a pimp would be arrested. The serious diplomats, +Lord Lyons, Mercier, and Stoeckl refused the invitation; some smaller +accepted, at least so I hear.</p> + +<p>The infamous traitors fire on the Union flag. They treat the garrison +of Sumpter as enemies on sufferance, and here their commissioners go +about free, and glory in treason. What is this administration about? +Have they no blood; are they fishes?</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page023" name="page023"></a>(p. 023)</span> The crime in full blast; <i>consummatum est.</i> Sumpter +bombarded; Virginia, under the nose of the administration, secedes, +and the leaders did not see or foresee anything: flirted with +Virginia.</p> + +<p>Now, they, the leaders or the administration, are terribly startled; +so is the brave noble North; the people are taken unawares; but no +wonder; the people saw the Cabinet, the President, and the military in +complacent security. These watchmen did nothing to give an early sign +of alarm, so the people, confiding in them, went about its daily +occupation. But it will rise as one man and in terrible wrath. <i>Vous +le verrez mess. les Diplomates.</i></p> + +<p>The President calls on the country for 75,000 men; telegram has +spoken, and they rise, they arm, they come. I am not deceived in my +faith in the North; the excitement, the wrath, is terrible. Party +lines burn, dissolved by the excitement. Now the people is in fusion +as bronze; if Lincoln and the leaders have mettle in themselves, then +they can cast such arms, moral, material, and legislative, as will +destroy at once this rebellion. But will they have the energy? They do +not look like Demiourgi.</p> + +<p>Massachusetts takes the lead; always so, this first people in the +world; first for peace by its civilization and intellectual +development, and first to run to the rescue.</p> + +<p>The most infamous treachery and murder, by Baltimoreans, of the +Massachusetts men. Will the cowardly murderers be exemplarily +punished?</p> + +<p>The President, under the advice of Scott, seems <span class="pagenum"><a id="page024" name="page024"></a>(p. 024)</span> to take +coolly the treasonable murders of Baltimore; instead of action, again +parleying with these Baltimorean traitors. The rumor says that Seward +is for leniency, and goes hand in hand with Scott. Now, if they will +handle such murderers in silk gloves as they do, the fire must spread.</p> + +<p>The secessionists in Washington—and they are a legion, of all hues +and positions—are defiant, arrogant, sure that Washington will be +taken. One risks to be murdered here.</p> + +<p>I entered the thus called Cassius Clay Company, organized for the +defence of Washington until troops came. For several days patrolled, +drilled, and lay several nights on the hard floor. Had compensation, +that the drill often reproduced that of Falstaff's heroes. But my +campaigners would have fought well in case of emergency. Most of them +office-seekers. When the alarm was over, the company dissolved, but +each got a kind of certificate beautifully written and signed by +Lincoln and Cameron. I refused to take such a certificate, we having +had no occasion to fight.</p> + +<p>The President issued a proclamation for the blockade of the Southern +revolted ports. Do they not know better?</p> + +<p>How can the Minister of Foreign Affairs advise the President to resort +to such a measure? Is the Minister of Foreign Affairs so willing to +call in foreign nations by this blockade, thus transforming a purely +domestic and municipal question into an international, public one?</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page025" name="page025"></a>(p. 025)</span> The President is to quench the rebellion, a domestic fire, +and to do it he takes a weapon, an engine the most difficult to +handle, and in using of which he depends on foreign nations. Do they +not know better here in the ministry and in the councils? Russia dealt +differently with the revolted Circassians and with England in the so +celebrated case of the Vixen.</p> + +<p>The administration ought to know its rights of sovereignty and to +close the ports of entry. Then no chance would be left to England to +meddle.</p> + +<p>Yesterday N—— dined with Lord Lyons, and during the dinner an +anonymous note announced to the Lord that the proclamation of the +blockade is to be issued on to-morrow. N——, who has a romantic turn, +or rather who seeks for <i>midi ŕ 14-3/4 heures</i>, speculated what lady +would have thus violated a <i>secret d'État</i>.</p> + +<p>I rather think it comes from the Ministry, or, as they call it here, +from the Department. About two years ago, when the Central Americans +were so teased and maltreated by the filibusters and Democratic +administration, a Minister of one of these Central American States +told me in New York that in a Chief of the Departments, or something +the like, the Central Americans have a valuable friend, who, every +time that trouble is brewing against them in the Department, gives +them a secret and anonymous notice of it. This friend may have +transferred his kindness to England.</p> + +<p>How will foreign nations behave? I wish I may <span class="pagenum"><a id="page026" name="page026"></a>(p. 026)</span> be misguided +by my political anglophobia, but England, envious, rapacious, and the +Palmerstons and others, filled with hatred towards the genuine +democracy and the American people, will play some bad tricks. They +will seize the occasion to avenge many humiliations. Charles Sumner, +Howe, and a great many others, rely on England,—on her anti-slavery +feeling. I do not. I know English policy. We shall see.</p> + +<p>France, Frenchmen, and Louis Napoleon are by far more reliable. The +principles and the interest of France, broadly conceived, make the +existence of a powerful Union a statesmanlike European and world +necessity. The cold, taciturn Louis Napoleon is full of broad and +clear conceptions. I am for relying, almost explicitly, on France and +on him.</p> + +<p>The administration calls in all the men-of-war scattered in all +waters. As the commercial interests of the Union will remain +unprotected, the administration ought to put them under the protection +of France. It is often done so between friendly powers. Louis Napoleon +could not refuse; and accepting, would become pledged to our side.</p> + +<p>Germany, great and small, governments and people, will be for the +Union. Germans are honest; they love the Union, hate slavery, and +understand, to be sure, the question. Russia, safe, very safe, few +blackguards excepted; so Italy. Spain may play double. I do not expect +that the Spaniards, goaded to the quick by the former fillibustering +administrations, will have judgment enough to find <span class="pagenum"><a id="page027" name="page027"></a>(p. 027)</span> out that +the Republicans have been and will be anti-fillibusters, and do not +crave Cuba.</p> + +<p>Wrote a respectful warning to the President concerning the unavoidable +results of his proclamation in regard to the blockade; explained to +him that this, his international demonstration, will, and forcibly +must evoke a counter proclamation from foreign powers in the interest +of their own respective subjects and of their commercial relations. +Warned, foretelling that the foreign powers will recognize the rebels +as belligerents, he, the President, having done it already in some +way, thus applying an international mode of coercion. Warned, that the +condition of belligerents, once recognized, the rebel piratical crafts +will be recognized as privateers by foreign powers, and as such will +be admitted to all ports under the secesh flag, which will thus enjoy +a partial recognition.</p> + +<p>Foreign powers may grumble, or oppose the closing of the ports of +entry as a domestic, administrative decision, because they may not +wish to commit themselves to submit to a paper blockade. But if the +President will declare that he will enforce the closing of the ports +with the whole navy, so as to strictly guard and close the maritime +league, then the foreign powers will see that the administration does +not intend to humbug them, but that he, the President, will only +preserve intact the fullest exercise of sovereignty, and, as said the +Roman legist, he, the President, "<i>nil sibi postulat quod non aliis +tribuit</i>." And so he, the President, will only execute the laws +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page028" name="page028"></a>(p. 028)</span> of his country, and not any arbitrary measure, to say with +the Roman Emperor, "<i>Leges etiam in ipsa arma imperium habere +volumus.</i>" Warned the President that in all matters relating to this +country Louis Napoleon has abandoned the initiative to England; and to +throw a small wedge in this alliance, I finally respectfully suggested +to the President what is said above about putting the American +interests in the Mediterranean under the protection of Louis Napoleon.</p> + +<p>Few days thereafter learned that Mr. Seward does not believe that +France will follow England. Before long Seward will find it out.</p> + +<p>All the coquetting with Virginia, all the presumed influence of +General Scott, ended in Virginia's secession, and in the seizure of +Norfolk.</p> + +<p>Has ever any administration, cabinet, ministry—call it what name you +will—given positive, indubitable signs of want and absence of +foresight, as did ours in these Virginia, Norfolk, and Harper's Ferry +affairs? Not this or that minister or secretary, but all of them ought +to go to the constitutional guillotine. Blindness—no mere +short-sightedness—permeates the whole administration, Blair excepted. +And Scott, the politico-military adviser of the President! What is the +matter with Scott, or were the halo and incense surrounding him based +on bosh? Will it be one more illusion to be dispelled?</p> + +<p>The administration understood not how to save or defend Norfolk, nor +how to destroy it. No name to be found for such concrete incapacity. +The rebels <span class="pagenum"><a id="page029" name="page029"></a>(p. 029)</span> are masters, taking our leaders by the nose. +Norfolk gives to them thousands of guns, &c., and nobody cries for +shame. They ought to go in sackcloth, those narrow-sighted, blind +rulers. How will the people stand this masterly administrative +demonstration? In England the people and the Parliament would impeach +the whole Cabinet.</p> + +<p>Charles Sumner told me that the President and his Minister of Foreign +Affairs are to propose to the foreign powers the accession of the +Union to the celebrated convention of Paris of 1856. All three +considered it a master stroke of policy. They will not catch a fly by +it.</p> + +<p>Again wrote respectfully to Mr. Lincoln, warning him against a too +hasty accession to the Paris convention. Based my warning,—</p> + +<p>1st. Not to give up the great principles contained in Marcy's +amendment.</p> + +<p>2d. Not to believe or suppose for a minute that the accession to the +Paris convention at this time can act in a retroactive sense; +explained that it will not and cannot prevent the rebel pirates from +being recognized by foreign powers as legal privateers, or being +treated as such.</p> + +<p>3d. For all these reasons the Union will not win anything by such a +step, but it will give up principles and chain its own hands in case +of any war with England. Supplicated the President not to risk a step +which logically must turn wrong.</p> + +<p>Baltimore still unpunished, and the President parleying with various +deputations, all this under the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page030" name="page030"></a>(p. 030)</span> guidance of Scott. I begin +to be confused; cannot find out what is the character of Lincoln, and +above all of Scott.</p> + +<p>Governors from whole or half-rebel States refuse the President's call +for troops. The original call of 75,000, too small in itself, will be +reduced by that refusal. Why does not the administration call for more +on the North, and on the free States? In the temper of this noble +people it will be as easy to have 250,000 as 75,000, and then rush on +them; submerge Virginia, North Carolina, etc.; it can be now so easily +done. The Virginians are neither armed nor organized. Courage and +youth seemingly would do good in the councils.</p> + +<p>The free States undoubtedly will vindicate self-government. Whatever +may be said by foreign and domestic croakers, I do not doubt it for a +single minute. The free people will show to the world that the +apparently loose governmental ribbons are the strongest when everybody +carries them in him, and holds them. The people will show that the +intellectual magnetism of convictions permeating the million is by far +stronger than the commonly called governmental action from above, and +it is at the same time elastic and expansive, even if the official +leaders may turn out to be altogether mediocrities. The self-governing +free North will show more vitality and activity than any among the +governed European countries would be able to show in similar +emergencies. This is my creed, and I have faith in the people.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page031" name="page031"></a>(p. 031)</span> The infamous slavers of the South would even be honored if +named Barbary States of North America.</p> + +<p>Before the inauguration, Seward was telling the diplomats that no +disruption will take place; now he tells them that it will blow over +in from sixty to ninety days. Does Seward believe it? Or does his +imagination or his patriotism carry him away or astray? Or, perhaps, +he prefers not to look the danger in the face, and tries to avert the +bitter cup. At any rate, he is incomprehensible, and the more so when +seen at a distance.</p> + +<p>Something, nay, even considerable efforts ought to be made to +enlighten the public opinion in Europe, as on the outside, +insurrections, nationalities, etc., are favored in Europe. How far the +diplomats sent by the administration are prepared for this task?</p> + +<p>Adams has shown in the last Congress his scholarly, classical +narrow-mindedness. Sanford cannot favorably impress anybody in Europe, +neither in cabinets, nor in saloons, nor the public at large. He looks +and acts as a <i>commis voyageur</i>, will be considered as such at first +sight by everybody, and his features and manners may not impress +others as being distinguished and high-toned.</p> + +<p>Every historical, that is, human event, has its moral and material +character and sides. To ignore, and still worse to blot out, to reject +the moral incentives and the moral verdict, is a crime to the public +at large, is a crime towards human reason.</p> + +<p>Such action blunts sound feelings and comprehension, increases the +arrogance of the evil-doers. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page032" name="page032"></a>(p. 032)</span> The moral criterion is absolute +and unconditional, and ought as such unconditionally to be applied to +the events here. Things and actions must be called by their true +names. What is true, noble, pure, and lofty, is on the side of the +North, and permeates the unnamed millions of the free people; it ought +to be separated from what is sham, egotism, lie or assumption. Truth +must be told, never mind the outcry. History has not to produce pieces +for the stage, or to amuse a tea-party.</p> + +<p>Regiments pour in; the Massachusetts men, of course, leading the van, +as in the times of the tea-party. My admiration for the Yankees is +justified on every step, as is my scorn, my contempt, etc., etc., of +the Southern <i>chivalrous</i> slaver.</p> + +<p>Wrote to Charles Sumner expressing my wonder at the undecided conduct +of the administration; at its want of foresight; its eternal parleying +with Baltimoreans, Virginians, Missourians, etc., and no step to tread +down the head of the young snake. No one among them seems to have the +seer's eye. The people alone, who arm, who pour in every day and in +large numbers, who transform Washington into a camp, and who crave for +fighting,—the people alone have the prophetic inspiration, and are +the genuine statesmen for the emergency.</p> + +<p>How will the Congress act? The Congress will come here emerging from +the innermost of the popular volcano; but the Congress will be +manacled by formulas; it will move not in the spirit of the +Constitution, but in the dry constitutionalism, and the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page033" name="page033"></a>(p. 033)</span> +Congress will move with difficulty. Still I have faith, although the +Congress never will seize upon parliamentary omnipotence. Up to +to-day, the administration, instead of boldly crushing, or, at least, +attempting to do it; instead of striking at the traitors, the +administration is continually on the lookout where the blows come +from, scarcely having courage to ward them off. The deputations +pouring from the North urge prompt, decided, crushing action. This +thunder-voice of the twenty millions of freemen ought to nerve this +senile administration. The Southern leaders do not lose one minute's +time; they spread the fire, arm, and attack with all the fury of +traitors and criminals.</p> + +<p>The Northern merchants roar for the offensive; the administration is +undecided.</p> + +<p>Some individuals, politicians, already speak out that the slaveocratic +privileges are only to be curtailed, and slavery preserved as a +domestic institution. Not a bit of it. The current and the development +of events will run over the heads of the pusillanimous and +contemptible conservatives. Slavery must perish, even if the whole +North, Lincoln and Seward at its head, should attempt to save it.</p> + +<p>Already they speak of the great results of Fabian policy; Seward, I am +told, prides in it. Do those Fabiuses know what they talk about? +Fabius's tactics—not policy—had in view not to expose young, +disheartened levies against Hannibal's unconquered veterans, but +further to give time to Rome to restore her exhausted means, to +recover political influences <span class="pagenum"><a id="page034" name="page034"></a>(p. 034)</span> with other Italian independent +communities, to re-conclude broken alliances with the cities, etc. But +is this the condition of the Union? Your Fabian policy will cost +lives, time, and money; the people feels it, and roars for action. +Events are great, the people is great, but the official leaders may +turn out inadequate to both.</p> + +<p>What a magnificent chance—scarcely equal in history—to become a +great historical personality, to tower over future generations. But I +do not see any one pointing out the way. Better so; the principle of +self-government as the self-acting, self-preserving force will be +asserted by the total eclipse of great or even eminent men.</p> + +<p>The administration, under the influence of drill men, tries to form +twenty regiments of regulars, and calls for 45,000 three years' +volunteers. What a curious appreciation of necessity and of numbers +must prevail in the brains of the administration. Twenty regiments of +regulars will be a drop in water; will not help anything, but will be +sufficient to poison the public spirit. Citizens and people, but not +regulars, not hirelings, are to fight the battle of principle. +Regulars and their spirit, with few exceptions, is worse here than +were the Yanitschars.</p> + +<p>When the principle will be saved and victorious, it will be by the +devotion, the spontaneity of the people, and not by Lincoln, Scott, +Seward, or any of the like. It is said that Seward rules both Lincoln +and Scott. The people, the masses, do not <span class="pagenum"><a id="page035" name="page035"></a>(p. 035)</span> doubt their +ability to crush by one blow the traitors, but the administration +does.</p> + +<p>What I hear concerning the Blairs confirms my high opinion of both. +Blair alone in the Cabinet represents the spirit of the people.</p> + +<p>Something seems not right with Scott. Is he too old, or too much of a +Virginian, or a hero on a small scale?</p> + +<p>If, as they say, the President is guided by Scott's advice, such +advice, to judge from facts, is not politic, not heroic, not thorough, +not comprehensive, and not at all military, that is, not broad and +deep, in the military sense. It will be a pity to be disappointed in +this national idol.</p> + +<p>Scott is against entering Virginia, against taking Baltimore, against +punishing traitors. Strange, strange!</p> + +<p>Diplomats altogether out of their senses; they are bewildered by the +uprising, by the unanimity, by the warlike, earnest, unflinching +attitude of the masses of the freemen, of my dear Yankees. The +diplomats have lost the compass. They, duty bound, were diplomatically +obsequious to the power held so long by the pro-slavery party. They +got accustomed to the arrogant assumption and impertinence of the +slavers, and, forgetting their European origin, the diplomats +tacitly—but for their common sense and honor I hope +reluctantly—admitted the assumptions of the Southern banditti to be +in America the nearest assimilation to the chivalry and nobility of +old Europe. Without taking the cudgel in defence <span class="pagenum"><a id="page036" name="page036"></a>(p. 036)</span> of European +nobility, chivalry, and aristocracy, it is sacrilegious to compare +those infamous slavers with the old or even with the modern European +higher classes. In the midst of this slave-driving, slave-worshipping, +and slave-breeding society of Washington, the diplomats swallowed, +gulped all the Southern lies about the Constitution, state-rights, the +necessity of slavery, and other like infamies. The question is, how +far the diplomats in their respective official reports transferred +these pro-slavery common-places to their governments. But, after all, +the governments of Europe will not be thoroughly influenced by the +chat of their diplomats.</p> + +<p>Among all diplomats the English (Lord Lyons) is the most sphinx; he is +taciturn, reserved, listens more than he speaks; the others are more +communicative.</p> + +<p>What an idea have those Americans of sending a secret agent to Canada, +and what for? England will find it out, and must be offended. I would +not have committed such an absurdity, even in my palmy days, when I +conspired with Louis Napoleon, sat in the councils with Godefroi +Cavaignac, or wrote instructions for Mazzini, then only a beginner +with his <i>Giovina Italia</i>, and his miscarried Romarino attempt in +Savoy.</p> + +<p>Of what earthly use can be such <i>politique provocatrice</i> towards +England? Or is it only to give some money to a hungry, noisy, and not +over-principled office-seeker?</p> + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page037" name="page037"></a>(p. 037)</span> MAY, 1861.</h3> + +<p class="resume">The administration tossed by expedients — Seward to + Dayton — Spread-eagleism — One phasis of the American Union + finished — The fuss about Russell — Pressure on the administration + increases — Seward, Wickoff, and the Herald — Lord Lyons menaced + with passports — The splendid Northern army — The administration + not up to the occasion — The new men — Andrew, Wadsworth, Boutwell, + Noyes, Wade, Trumbull, Walcott, King, Chandler, Wilson — Lyon + jumps over formulas — Governor Banks needed — Butler takes + Baltimore with two regiments — News from England — The + "belligerent" question — Butler and Scott — Seward and the + diplomats — "What a Merlin!" — "France not bigger than New + York!" — Virginia invaded — Murder of Ellsworth — Harpies at the + White House.</p> + + +<p>Rumors that the President, the administration, or whoever has it in +his hands, is to take the offensive, make a demonstration on Virginia +and on Baltimore. But these ups and downs, these vacillations, are +daily occurrences, and nothing points to a firm purpose, to a decided +policy, or any policy whatever of the administration.</p> + +<p>A great principle and a great cause cannot be served and cannot be +saved by half measures, and still less by tricks and by paltry +expedients. But the administration is tossed by expedients. Nothing is +hitherto done, and this denotes a want of any firm decision.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward's letter to Dayton, a first manifesto to foreign nations, +and the first document of the new <span class="pagenum"><a id="page038" name="page038"></a>(p. 038)</span> Minister of Foreign +Affairs. It is bold, high-toned, and American, but it has dark +shadows; shows an inexperienced hand in diplomacy and in dealing with +events. The passages about the frequent changes in Europe are +unnecessary, and unprovoked by anything whatever. It is especially +offensive to France, to the French people, and to Louis Napoleon. It +is bosh, but in Europe they will consider it as <i>une politique +provocatrice</i>.</p> + +<p>For the present complications, diplomatic relations ought to be +conducted with firmness, with dignity, but not with an arrogant, +offensive assumption, not in the spirit of spread-eagleism; no brass, +but reason and decision.</p> + +<p>Americans will find out how absolute are the laws of history, as stern +and as positive as all the other laws of nature. To me it is clear +that one phasis of American political growth, development, &c., is +gone, is finished. It is the phasis of the Union as created by the +Constitution. This war—war it will be, and a terrible one, +notwithstanding all the prophecies of Mr. Seward to the contrary—this +war will generate new social and constitutional necessities and new +formulas. New conceptions and new passions will spring up; in one +word, it will bring forth new social, physical, and moral creations: +so we are in the period of gestation.</p> + +<p>Democracy, the true, the noble, that which constitutes the +signification of America in the progress of our race—democracy will +not be destroyed. All the inveterate enemies here and in Europe, all +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page039" name="page039"></a>(p. 039)</span> who already joyously sing the funeral songs of democracy, +all of them will become disgraced. Democracy will emerge more pure, +more powerful, more rational; destroyed will be the most infamous +oligarchy ever known in history; oligarchy issued neither from the +sword, nor the gown, nor the shop, but wombed, generated, cemented, +and sustained by traffic in man.</p> + +<p>The famous Russell, of the London Times, is what I always thought him +to be—a graphic, imaginative writer, with power of description of all +he sees, but not the slightest insight in events, in men, in +institutions. Russell is not able to find out the epidermis under a +shirt. And they make so much fuss about him; Seward brings him to the +first cabinet dinner given by the President; Mrs. Lincoln sends him +bouquets; and this man, Russell, will heap blunders upon blunders.</p> + +<p>The pressure on the administration for decided, energetic action +increases from all sides. Seldom, anywhere, an administration receives +so many moral kicks as does this one; but it seems to stand them with +serenity. Oh, for a clear, firm, well-defined purpose!</p> + +<p>The country, the people demands an attack on Virginia, on Richmond, +and Baltimore; the country, better than the military authorities, +understands the political and military necessities; the people has the +consciousness that if fighting is done instantly, it will be done +cheaply and thoroughly by a move of its finger. The administration can +double the number <span class="pagenum"><a id="page040" name="page040"></a>(p. 040)</span> of men under arms, but hesitates. What +slow coaches, and what ignorance of human nature and of human events. +The knowing ones, the wiseacres, will be the ruin of this country. +They poison the sound reason of the people.</p> + +<p>What the d—— is Seward with his politicians' policy? What can +signify his close alliance with such outlaws as Wikoff and the Herald, +and pushing that sheet to abuse England and Lord Lyons? Wikoff is, so +to speak, an inmate of Seward's house and office, and Wikoff declared +publicly that the telegram contained in the Herald, and so violent +against England and Lord Lyons, was written under Seward's dictation. +Wikoff, I am told, showed the MS. corrected in Seward's handwriting. +Lord Lyons is menaced with passports. Is this man mad? Can Seward for +a moment believe that Wikoff knows Europe, or has any influence? He +may know the low resorts there. Can Seward be fool enough to irritate +England, and entangle this country? Even my anglophobia cannot stand +it. Wrote about it warning letters to New York, to Barney, to Opdyke, +to Wadsworth, &c.</p> + +<p>The whole District a great camp; the best population from the North in +rank and file. More intelligence, industry, and all good national and +intellectual qualities represented in those militia and volunteer +regiments, than in any—not only army, but society—in Europe. +Artisans, mechanics of all industries, of trade, merchants, bankers, +lawyers; all pursuits and professions. Glorious, heart-elevating +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page041" name="page041"></a>(p. 041)</span> sight! These regiments want only a small touch of military +organization.</p> + +<p>Weeks run, troops increase, and not the first step made to organize +them into an army, to form brigades, not to say divisions; not yet two +regiments manœuvring together. What a strange idea the military +chief or chiefs, or department, or somebody, must have of what it is +to organize an army. Not the first letter made. Can it be ignorance of +this elementary knowledge with which is familiar every corporal in +Europe? When will they start, when begin to mould an army?</p> + +<p>The administration was not composed for this emergency, and is not up +to it. The government hesitates, is inexperienced, and will +unavoidably make heaps of mistakes, which may endanger the cause, and +for which, at any rate, the people is terribly to pay. The loss in men +and material will be very considerable before the administration will +get on the right track. It is painful to think, nay, to be sure of it. +Then the European anti-Union politicians and diplomats will credit the +disasters to the inefficiency of self-government. The diplomats, +accustomed to the rapid, energetic action of a supreme or of a +centralized power, laugh at the trepidation of ours. But the fault is +not in the principle of self-government, but in the accident which +brought to the helm such an amount of inexperience. Monarchy with a +feeble head is even in a worse predicament. Louis XV., the Spanish and +Neapolitan Bourbons, Gustavus IV., &c., are thereof the historical +evidences.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page042" name="page042"></a>(p. 042)</span> May the shock of events bring out new lights from the people! +One day the administration is to take the initiative, that is, the +offensive, then it recedes from it. No one understands the +organization and handling of such large bodies. They are to make their +apprenticeship, if only it may not to be too dearly paid. But they +cannot escape the action of that so positive law in nature, in +history, and, above all, absolute in war.</p> + +<p>Wrote to Charles Sumner, suggesting that the ice magnates send here +from Boston ice for hospitals.</p> + +<p>The war now waged against the free States is one made by the most +hideous <i>sauvagerie</i> against a most perfectioned and progressive +civilization. History records not a similar event. It is a hideous +phenomenon, disgracing our race, and it is so, look on it from +whatever side you will.</p> + +<p>A new man from the people, like Governor Andrew, of Massachusetts, +acts promptly, decisively; feels and speaks ardently, and not as the +rhetors. Andrew is the incarnation of the Massachusetts, nay, of the +genuine American people. I must become acquainted with Andrew. +Thousands of others like Andrew exist in all the States. Can anybody +be a more noble incarnation of the American people than J. S. +Wadsworth? I become acquainted with numerous men whom I honor as the +true American men. So Boutwell, of Massachusetts, Curtis Noyes, +Senator Wade, Trumbull, Walcott, from Ohio, Senator King, Chandler, +and many, many true patriots. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page043" name="page043"></a>(p. 043)</span> Senator Wilson, my old friend, +is up to the mark; a man of the people, but too mercurial.</p> + +<p>Captain or Major Lyon in St. Louis, the first initiator or revelator +of what is the absolute law of necessity in questions of national +death or life. Lyon jumped over formulas, over routine, over clumsy +discipline and martinetism, and saved St. Louis and Missouri.</p> + +<p>It is positively asserted that General Scott's first impression was to +court-martial Lyon for this breach of discipline, for having acted on +his own patriotic responsibility.</p> + +<p>Can Scott be such a dried-up, narrow-minded disciplinarian, and he the +Egeria of Lincoln! Oh! oh!</p> + +<p>Diplomats tell me that Seward uses the dictatorial I, speaking of the +government. Three cheers for the new Louis XIV.!</p> + +<p>Governor Banks would be excellent for the <i>Intendant Général de +l'Armée</i>: they call it here <i>General Quartermaster</i>. Awful disorder +and slowness prevail in this cardinal branch of the army. Wrote to +Sumner concerning Banks.</p> + +<p>Gen. Butler took Baltimore; did what ought to have been done a long +time ago. Butler did it on his own responsibility, without orders. +Butler acted upon the same principle as Lyon, and, <i>horrabile dictu</i>, +astonished, terrified the parleying administration. Scott wishes to +put Butler under arrest; happily Lincoln resisted his boss (so Mr. +Lincoln called Scott before a deputation from Baltimore). Scott, +Patterson, and Mansfield made a beautiful <i>strategical</i> <span class="pagenum"><a id="page044" name="page044"></a>(p. 044)</span> +horror! They began to speak of strategy; plan to approach Baltimore on +three different roads, and with about 35,000 men. Butler did it one +morning with two regiments, and kicked over the senile strategians in +council.</p> + +<p>The administration speaks with pride of its forbearing, that is, +parleying, policy. The people, the country, requires action. +<i>Congressus impar Achilli</i>: Achilles, the people, and <i>Congressus</i> the +forbearing administration.</p> + +<p>Music, parades, serenades, receptions, &c., &c., only no genuine +military organization. They do it differently on the other side of the +Potomac. There the leaders are in earnest.</p> + +<p>Met Gov. Sprague and asked him when he would have a brigade; his +answer was, soon; but this soon comes very slow.</p> + +<p>News from England. Lord John Russell declared in Parliament that the +Queen, or the English government, will recognize the rebels in the +condition of "belligerents." O England, England! The declaration is +too hasty. Lord John cannot have had news of the proclamation of the +blockade when he made that declaration. The blockade could have served +him as an excuse for the haste. English aristocracy and government +show thus their enmity to the North, and their partiality to slavers. +What will the anglophiles of Boston say to this?</p> + +<p>Neither England or France, or anybody in Europe, recognized the +condition of "belligerents" to Poles, when we fought in Russia in +1831. Were <span class="pagenum"><a id="page045" name="page045"></a>(p. 045)</span> the Magyars recognized as such in 1848-'49? Lord +Palmerston called the German flag hard names in the war with Denmark +for Schleswig-Holstein; and now he bows to the flag of slavers and +pirates. If the English statesmen have not some very particular reason +for this hasty, uncalled-for condescension to the enemies of humanity, +then curse upon the English government. I recollect that European +powers recognized the Greeks "belligerents" (Austria opposed) in their +glorious struggle against the slavers, the Turks. But then this +stretching of positive, international comity,—this stretching was +done in the interest of freedom, of right, and of humanity, against +savages and slaughterers. On the present occasion England did the +reverse. O England, England, thou Judas Iscariot of nations! Seward +said to John Jacob Astor, and to a New York deputation, that this +English declaration concerning "belligerents" is a mere formality, +having no bearing at all. I told the contrary to Astor and to others, +assuring them that Mr. Seward will soon find, to the cost of the +people and to his own, how much complication and trouble this <i>mere +formality</i> will occasion, and occasion it before long. Is Seward so +ignorant of international laws, of general or special history, or was +it only said to throw dust?</p> + +<p>Wrote about the "belligerents" a warning letter to the President.</p> + +<p>Butler, in command of Fortress Monroe, proposes to land in Virginia +and to take Norfolk; Scott, the highest military authority in the +land, opposes. Has <span class="pagenum"><a id="page046" name="page046"></a>(p. 046)</span> Scott used up his energy, his sense, and +even his military judgment in defending Washington before the +inauguration? He is too old; his brains, <i>cerebellum</i>, must be dried +up.</p> + +<p>Imbecility in a leader is often, nay always, more dangerous than +treason; the people can find out—easily, too—treason, but is +disarmed against imbecility.</p> + +<p>What a thoughtlessness to press on Russia the convention of Paris? +Russia has already a treaty with America, but in case of a war with +England, the Russian ports on the Pacific, and the only one accessible +to Americans, will be closed to them by the convention of Paris.</p> + +<p>The governors of the States of Ohio, Illinois, Pennsylvania assure the +protection of their respective States to the Union men of the Border +States. What a bitter criticism on the slow, forbearing policy of the +administration. Mr. Lincoln seems to be a rather slow intellect, with +slow powers of perception. However, patience; perhaps the shock of +events will arouse and bring in action now latent, but good and +energetic qualities. As it stands now, the administration, being the +focus of activity, is tepid, if not cold and slow; the circumference, +that is, the people, the States, are full of fire and of activity. +This condition is altogether the reverse of the physiological and all +other natural laws, and this may turn out badly, as nature's laws +never can be with impunity reversed or violated.</p> + +<p>The diplomats complain that Seward treats them <span class="pagenum"><a id="page047" name="page047"></a>(p. 047)</span> with a +certain rudeness; that he never gives them time to explain and speak, +but interrupts by saying, "I know it all," etc. If he had knowledge of +things, and of the diplomatic world, he would be aware that the more +firmness he has to use, the more politeness, even fastidiousness, he +is to display.</p> + +<p>Scott does not wish for any bold demonstration, for any offensive +movement. The reason may be, that he is too old, too crippled, to be +able to take the field in person, and too inflated by conceit to give +the glory of the active command to any other man. Wrote to Charles +Sumner in Boston to stir up some inventive Yankee to construct a +wheelbarrow in which Scott could take the field in person.</p> + +<p>In a conversation with Seward, I called his attention to the fact that +the government is surrounded by the finest, most complicated, intense, +and well-spread web of treason that ever was spun; that almost all +that constitutes society and is in a daily, nay hourly, contact with +the various branches of the Executive, all this, with soul, mind, and +heart is devoted to the rebels. I observed to him that <i>si licet +exemplis in parvo grandibus uti</i>. Napoleon suffered more from the +bitter hostility of the <i>faubourg St. Germain</i>, than from the armies +of the enemy; and here it is still worse, as this hostility runs out +into actual, unrelenting treason. To this Mr. Seward answered with the +utmost serenity, "that before long all this will change; that when he +became governor of New York, a similar hostility prevailed between the +two sections of that State, but <span class="pagenum"><a id="page048" name="page048"></a>(p. 048)</span> soon he pacified +everything." What a Merlin! what a sorcerer!</p> + +<p>Some simple-minded persons from the interior of the State of New York +questioned Mr. Seward, in my presence, about Europe, and "what they +will do there?" To this, with a voice of the Delphic oracle, he +responded, "that after all France is not bigger than the State of New +York." Is it possible to say such trash even as a joke?</p> + +<p>Finally, the hesitations of General Scott are overcome. "Virginia's +sacred soil is invaded;" Potomac crossed; looks like a beginning of +activity; Scott consented to move on Arlington Heights, but during two +or three days opposed the seizure of Alexandria. Is that all that he +knows of that hateful watchword—strategy—nausea repeated by every +ignoramus and imbecile?</p> + +<p>Alexandria being a port of entry, and having a railroad, is more a +strategic point for the invasion of Virginia than are Arlington +Heights.</p> + +<p>The brave Ellsworth murdered in Alexandria, and Scott insisted that +Alexandria be invaded and occupied by night. In all probability, +Ellsworth would not have been murdered if this villanous nest had been +entered by broad daylight. As if the troops were committing a crime, +or a shameful act! O General Scott! but for you Ellsworth would not +have been murdered.</p> + +<p>General McDowell made a plan to seize upon Manassas as the centre of +railroads, the true defence of Washington, and the firm foothold in +Virginia. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page049" name="page049"></a>(p. 049)</span> Nobody, or only few enemies, were in Manassas. +McDowell shows his genuine military insight. Scott, and, as I am told, +the whole senile military council, opposed McDowell's plan as being +too bold. Do these mummies intend to conduct a war without boldness?</p> + +<p>Thick clouds of patriotic, well-intentioned harpies surround all the +issues of the executive doors, windows, crevasses, all of them ready +to turn an honest, or rather dishonest, penny out of the fatherland. +Behind the harpies advance the busy-bodies, the would-be +well-informed, and a promiscuous crowd of well-intentioned +do-nothings.</p> + + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page050" name="page050"></a>(p. 050)</span> JUNE, 1861.</h3> + +<p class="resume">Butler emancipates slaves — The army not + organized — Promenades — The blockade — Louis Napoleon — Scott all in + all — Strategy! — Gun contracts — The diplomats — Masked + batteries — Seward writes for "bunkum" — Big Bethel — The Dayton + letter — Instructions to Mr. Adams.</p> + + +<p>The emancipation of slaves is virtually inaugurated. Gen. Butler, once +a hard pro-slavery Democrat, takes the lead. <i>Tempora mutantur et +nos</i>, &c. Butler originated the name of <i>contrabands of war</i> for +slaves faithful to the Union, who abandon their rebel masters. A +logical Yankee mind operates as an <i>accoucheur</i> to bring that to +daylight with which the events are pregnant.</p> + +<p>The enemies of self-government at home and abroad are untiring in +vaticinations that a dictatorship now, and after the war a strong +centralized government, will be inaugurated. I do not believe it. +Perhaps the riddle to be solved will be, to make a strong +administration without modifying the principle of self-government.</p> + +<p>The most glorious difference between Americans and Europeans is, that +in cases of national emergencies, every European nation, the Swiss +excepted, is called, stimulated to action, to sacrifices, either by a +chief, or by certain families, or by some high-standing <span class="pagenum"><a id="page051" name="page051"></a>(p. 051)</span> +individual, or by the government; here the people forces upon the +administration more of all kinds of sacrifices than the thus called +rulers can grasp, and the people is in every way ahead of the +administration.</p> + +<p>Notwithstanding that a part of the army crossed the Potomac, very +little genuine organization is done. They begin only to organize +brigades, but slowly, very slowly. Gen. Scott unyielding in his +opposition to organizing any artillery, of which the army has very, +very little. This man is incomprehensible. He cannot be a clear-headed +general or organizer, or he cannot be a patriot.</p> + +<p>As for the past, single regiments are parading in honor of the +President, of members of the Cabinet, of married and unmarried +<i>ladies</i>, but no military preparatory exercise of men, regiments, or +brigades. It sickens to witness such <i>incurie</i>.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward promenading the President from regiment to regiment, from +camp to camp, or rather showing up the President and himself. Do they +believe they can awake enthusiasm for their persons? The troops could +be better occupied than to serve for the aim of a promenade for these +two distinguished personalities.</p> + +<p>Gen. Scott refuses the formation of volunteer artillery and of new +cavalry regiments, and the active army, more than 20,000 men, has a +very insufficient number of batteries, and between 600 and 800 +cavalry. Lincoln blindly follows his boss. Seward, of course, sustains +Scott, and confuses Lincoln. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page052" name="page052"></a>(p. 052)</span> Lincoln, Scott, Seward and +Cameron oppose offers pouring from the country. To a Mr. M——, from +the State of New York, who demanded permission to form a regiment of +cavalry, Mr. Lincoln angrily answered, that (patriotic) offers give +more "trouble to him and the administration than do the rebels."</p> + +<p>The debates of the English Parliament raise the ire of the people, +nay, exasperate even old fogyish Anglo-manes.</p> + +<p>Persons very familiar with the domestic relations of Gen. Scott assure +me that the vacillations of the old man, and his dread of a serious +warfare, result from the all-powerful influence on him of one of his +daughters, a rabid secessionist. The old man ought to be among relics +in the Patent office, or sent into a nursery.</p> + +<p>The published correspondence between Lord Lyons and Lord Russell +concerning the blockade furnishes curious revelations.</p> + +<p>When the blockade was to be declared, Mr. Seward seems to have been a +thorough novice in the whole matter, and in an official interview with +Lord Lyons, Mr. Seward was assisted by his chief clerk, who was +therefore the quintessence of the wisdom of the foreign affairs, a man +not even mastering the red-tape traditions of the department, without +any genuine instruction, without ideas. For this chief clerk, all that +he knew of a blockade was that it was in use during the Mexican war, +that it almost yearly occurred in South American waters, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page053" name="page053"></a>(p. 053)</span> and +every tyro knows there exists such a thing as a blockade. But that was +all that this chief clerk knew. Lord Lyons asked for some special +precedents or former acts of the American government. The chief, and +his support, the chief clerk, ignored the existence of any. Lord Lyons +went home and sent to the department American precedents and +authorities. No Minister of Foreign Affairs in Europe, together with +his chief clerk, could ever be caught in such a <i>flagrante delicto</i> of +ignorance. This chief clerk made Mr. Seward make <i>un pas de clerc</i>, +and this at the start. As Lord Lyons took a great interest in the +solution of the question of blockade, and as the chief clerk was the +<i>oraculum</i> in this question, these combined facts may give some clue +to the anonymous advice sent to Lord Lyons, and mentioned in the month +of April.</p> + +<p>Suggested to Mr. Seward to at once elevate the American question to a +higher region, to represent it to Europe in its true, holy character, +as a question of right, freedom, and humanity. Then it will be +impossible for England to quibble about technicalities of the +international laws; then we can beat England with her own arms and +words, as England in 1824, &c., recognized the Greeks as belligerents, +on the plea of aiding freedom and humanity. The Southern insurrection +is a movement similar to that of the Neapolitan brigands, similar to +what partisans of the Grand Dukes of Tuscany or Modena may attempt, +similar to any—for argument's sake—supposed insurrection of any +Russian bojŕrs <span class="pagenum"><a id="page054" name="page054"></a>(p. 054)</span> against the emancipating Czar. Not in one +from among the above enumerated cases would England concede to the +insurgents the condition of belligerents. If the Deys of Tunis and +Tripoli should attempt to throw off their allegiance to the Sultan on +the plea that the Porte prohibits the slave traffic, would England +hurry to recognize the Deys as belligerents?</p> + +<p>Suggested to Mr. Seward, what two months ago I suggested to the +President, to put the commercial interests in the Mediterranean, for a +time, under the protection of Louis Napoleon.</p> + +<p>I maintain the right of closing the ports, against the partisans of +blockade. <i>Qui jure suo utitur neminem lćdit</i>, says the Roman +jurisconsult.</p> + +<p>The condition of Lincoln has some similarity with that of Pio IX. in +1847-48. Plenty of good-will, but the eagle is not yet breaking out of +the egg. And as Pio IX. was surrounded by this or that cardinal, so is +Mr. Lincoln by Seward and Scott.</p> + +<p>Perhaps it may turn out that Lincoln is honest, but of not +transcendent powers. The war may last long, and the military spirit +generated by the war may in its turn generate despotic aspirations. +Under Lincoln in the White House, the final victory will be due to the +people alone, and he, Lincoln, will preserve intact the principle +which lifted him to such a height.</p> + +<p>The people is in a state of the healthiest and most generous +fermentation, but it may become soured <span class="pagenum"><a id="page055" name="page055"></a>(p. 055)</span> and musty by the +admixture of Scott-Seward vacillatory powders.</p> + +<p>Scott is all in all—Minister or Secretary of War and +Commander-in-chief. How absurd to unite those functions, as they are +virtually united here, Scott deciding all the various military +questions; he the incarnation of the dusty, obsolete, everywhere +thrown overboard and rotten routine. They ought to have for Secretary +of War, if not a Carnot, at least a man of great energy, honesty, of +strong will, and of a thorough devotion to the cause. Senator Wade +would be suitable for this duty. Cameron is devoted, but I doubt his +other capacities for the emergency, and he has on his shoulders +General Scott as a dead weight.</p> + +<p>Charles Sumner, Mr. Motley, Dr. Howe, and many others, consider it as +a triumph that the English Cabinet asked Mr. Gregory to postpone his +motion for the recognition of the Southern Confederacy. Those +gentlemen here are not deep, and are satisfied with a few small crumbs +thrown them by the English aristocracy. Generally, the thus-called +better Americans eagerly snap at such crumbs.</p> + +<p>It is clear that the English Cabinet wished this postponement for its +own sake. A postponement spares the necessity to Russells, +Palmerstons, Gladstones, and <i>hoc genus omne</i>, to show their hands. +Mr. Adams likewise is taken in.</p> + +<p><i>Military organization</i> and <i>strategic points</i> are the watchwords. +<i>Strategic points</i>, strategy, are natural excrescences of brains which +thus shamefully conceive <span class="pagenum"><a id="page056" name="page056"></a>(p. 056)</span> and carry out what the abused +people believe to be <i>the</i> military organization.</p> + +<p>Strategy—strategy repeats now every imbecile, and military fuss +covers its ignorance by that sacramental word. Scott cannot have in +view the destruction of the rebels. Not even the Austrian Aulic +Council imagined a strategy combined and stretching through several +thousands of miles.</p> + +<p>The people's strategy is best: to rush in masses on Richmond; to take +it now, when the enemy is there in comparatively small numbers. +Richmond taken, Norfolk and the lost guns at once will be recovered. +So speaks the people, and they are right; here among the wiseacres not +one understands the superiority of the people over his own little +brains.</p> + +<p>Warned Mr. Seward against making contracts for arms with all kinds of +German agents from New York and from abroad. They will furnish and +bring, at the best, what the German governments throw out as being of +no use at the present moment. All the German governments are at work +to renovate their fire-arms.</p> + +<p>The diplomats more and more confused,—some of them ludicrously so. +Here, as always and everywhere, diplomacy, by its essence, is +virtually <i>statu quo</i>; if not altogether retrograde, is conservative, +and often ultra conservative. It is rare to witness diplomacy <i>in +toto</i>, or even single diplomats, side with progressive efforts and +ideas. English diplomacy and <span class="pagenum"><a id="page057" name="page057"></a>(p. 057)</span> diplomats do it at times; but +then mostly for the sake of political intrigue.</p> + +<p>Even the great events of Italy are not the child of diplomacy. It went +to work <i>clopin, clopan</i>, after Solferino.</p> + +<p>Not one of the diplomats here is intrinsically hostile to the Union. +Not one really wishes its disruption. Some brag so, but that is for +small effect. All of them are for peace, for <i>statu quo</i>, for the +grandeur of the country (as the greatest consumer of European +imports); but most of them would wish slavery to be preserved, and for +this reason they would have been glad to greet Breckinridge or Jeff. +Davis in the White House.</p> + +<p>Some among the diplomats are not virtually enemies of freedom and of +the North; but they know the North from the lies spread by the +Southerners, and by this putrescent heap of refuse, the Washington +society. I am the only Northerner on a footing of intimacy with the +diplomats. They consider me an <i>exalté</i>.</p> + +<p>It must be likewise taken into account,—and they say so +themselves,—that Mr. Seward's oracular vaticinations about the end of +the rebellion from sixty to ninety days confuse the judgment of +diplomats. Mr. Seward's conversation and words have an official +meaning for the diplomats, are the subject of their dispatches, and +they continually find that when Mr. Seward says yes the events say no.</p> + +<p>Some of the diplomats are Union men out of obedience to a lawful +government, whatever it be; <span class="pagenum"><a id="page058" name="page058"></a>(p. 058)</span> others by principle. The few +from Central and South American republics are thoroughly sound. The +diplomats of the great powers, representing various complicated +interests, are the more confused, they have so many things to +consider. The diplomatic tail, the smallest, insignificant, fawn to +all, and turn as whirlwinds around the great ones.</p> + +<p>Scott continually refused the formation of new batteries, and now he +roars for them, and hurries the governors to send them. Governor +Andrew, of Massachusetts, weeks ago offered one or two rifled +batteries, was refused, and now Scott in all hurry asks for them.</p> + +<p>The unhappy affair of Big Bethel gave a shock to the nation, and +stirred up old Scott, or rather the President.</p> + +<p>Aside of strategy, there is a new bugbear to frighten the soldiers; +this bugbear is the masked batteries. The inexperience of commanders +at Big Bethel makes already <i>masked batteries</i> a terror of the +country. The stupid press resounds the absurdity. Now everybody begins +to believe that the whole of Virginia is covered with masked +batteries, constituting, so to speak, a subterranean artillery, which +is to explode on every step, under the feet of our army. It seems that +this error and humbug is rather welcome to Scott, otherwise he would +explain to the nation and to the army that the existence of numerous +masked batteries is an absolute material and military impossibility. +The terror prevailing now may do great mischief.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page059" name="page059"></a>(p. 059)</span> Mr. Seward was obliged to explain, exonerate, expostulate, +and neutralize before the French Cabinet his famous Dayton letter. I +was sure it was to come to this; Mr. Thouvenel politely protested, and +Mr. Seward confessed that it was written for the American market +(alias, for <i>bunkum</i>). All this will make a very unfavorable +impression upon European diplomats concerning Mr. Seward's diplomacy +and statesmanship, as undoubtedly Mr. Thouvenel will semi-officially +confidentially communicate Mr. Seward's <i>faux pas</i> to his colleagues.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward emphatically instructs Mr. Adams to exclude the question of +slavery from all his sayings and doings as Minister to England. Just +to England! That Mr. Adams, once the leader of the constitutional +anti-slavery party, submits to this obeisance of a corporal, I am not +astonished, as everything can be expected from the man who, in support +of the compromise, made a speech <i>de lana caprina</i>; but Senator +Sumner, Chairman of the Committee of Foreign Affairs, meekly swallowed +it.</p> + + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page060" name="page060"></a>(p. 060)</span> JULY, 1861.</h3> + +<p class="resume">The Evening Post — The message — The administration caught + napping — McDowell — Congress slowly feels its way — Seward's great + facility of labor — Not a Know-Nothing — Prophesies a speedy + end — Carried away by his imagination — Says "secession is + over" — Hopeful views — Politeness of the State department — Scott + carries on the campaign from his sleeping room — Bull + Run — Rout — Panic — "Malediction! Malediction!" — Not a manly word + in Congress! — Abuse of the soldiers — McClellan sent for — Young + blood — Gen. Wadsworth — Poor McDowell! — Scott responsible — Plan of + reorganization — Let McClellan beware of routine.</p> + + +<p>It seems to me that the destinies of this admirable people are in +strange hands. Mr. Lincoln, honest man of nature, perhaps an empiric, +doctoring with innocent juices from herbs; but some others around him +seem to be quacks of the first order. I wish I may be mistaken.</p> + +<p>The press, the thus called good one, is vacillating. Best of all, and +almost not vacillating, is the New York Evening Post. I do not speak +of principles; but the papers vacillate, speaking of the measures and +the slowness of the administration.</p> + +<p>The President's message; plenty of good, honest intentions; simple, +unaffected wording, but a confession that by the attack on Sumpter, +and the uprising of Virginia, the administration was, so to speak, +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page061" name="page061"></a>(p. 061)</span> caught napping. Further, up to that day the administration +did not take any, the slightest, measure of any kind for any +emergency; in a word, that it expected no attacks, no war, saw no +fire, and did not prepare to meet and quench one.</p> + +<p>It were, perhaps, better for Lincoln if he could muster courage and +act by himself according to his nature, rather than follow so many, or +even any single adviser. Less and less I understand Mr. Lincoln, but +as his private secretary assures me that Lincoln has great judgment +and great energy, I suggested to the secretary to say to Lincoln he +should be more himself.</p> + +<p>Being <i>tęte-ŕ-tęte</i> with McDowell, I saw him do things of details +which in any, even half-way organized army, belong to the speciality +of a chief of the staff. I, of course, wondered at it. McDowell, who +commands what in Europe would be called a large corps, told me that +General Scott allowed him not to form a complete staff, such a one as +he, McDowell, wished.</p> + +<p>And all this, so to speak, on the eve of a battle, when the army faces +the enemy. It seems that genuine staff duties are something altogether +unknown to the military senility of the army. McDowell received this +corps in the most chaotic state. Almost with his own hands he +organized, or rather put together, the artillery. Brigades are +scarcely formed; the commanders of brigades do not know their +commands, and the soldiers do not know their generals—and <span class="pagenum"><a id="page062" name="page062"></a>(p. 062)</span> +still they consider Scott to be a great general!</p> + +<p>The Congress, well-intentioned, but entangled in formulas, slowly +feels its way. The Congress is composed of better elements than is the +administration, and it is ludicrous to see how the administration +takes airs of hauteur with the Congress. This Congress is in an +abnormal condition <i>for the task of directing a revolution</i>; <i>a +formula can be thrown in its face</i> almost at every bold step. The +administration is virtually irresponsible, more so than the government +of any constitutional nation whatever. What great things this +administration could carry out! Congress will consecrate, legalize, +sanction everything. Perhaps no harm would have resulted if the Senate +and the House had contained some new, fresher elements directly from +the boiling, popular cauldron. Such men would take a <i>position</i> at +once. Many of the leaders in both Houses were accustomed for many +years to make only opposition. But a long opposition influences and +disorganizes the judgment, forms not those genuine statesmen able to +grasp great events. For such emergencies as are now here, terrible +energy is needed, and only a very perfect mind resists the enervating +influence of a protracted opposition.</p> + +<p>Suggested to Mr. Seward that the best diplomacy was to take possession +of Virginia. Doing this, we will find all the cabinets smooth and +friendly.</p> + +<p>I seldom saw a man with greater facility of labor than Seward. When +once he is at work, it runs <span class="pagenum"><a id="page063" name="page063"></a>(p. 063)</span> torrent-like from his pen. His +mind is elastic. His principal forte is argument on <i>any</i> given case. +But the question is how far he masters the variegated information so +necessary in a statesman, and the more now, when the country earnestly +has such dangerous questions with European cabinets. He is still +cheerful, hopeful, and prophesies a speedy end.</p> + +<p>Seward has no Know-Nothingism about him. He is easy, and may have many +genuine generous traits in his character, were they not compressed by +the habits of the, not lofty, politician. At present, Seward is a +moral dictator; he has Lincoln in his hand, and is all in all. Very +likely he flatters him and imposes upon his simple mind by his +over-bold, dogmatic, but not over-correct and logical, +generalizations. Seward's finger is in all the other departments, but +above all in the army.</p> + +<p>The opposition made to Seward is not courageous, not open, not +dignified. Such an opposition betrays the weakness of the opposers, +and does not inspire respect. It is darkly surreptitious. These +opponents call Seward hard names, but do this in a corner, although +most of them have their parliamentary chair wherefrom they can speak. +If he is bad and mischievous, then unite your forces and overthrow +him; if he is not bad, or if you are not strong enough against him, do +not cover yourself with ridicule, making a show of impotent malice. +When the Senate confirmed him, every one throughout the land knew his +vacillating policy; knew him to be for compromise, for concessions; +knew that <span class="pagenum"><a id="page064" name="page064"></a>(p. 064)</span> he disbelieved in the terrible earnestness of the +struggle, and always prophesied its very speedy end. The Senate +confirmed Seward with open eyes. Perhaps at the start his imagination +and his patriotism made him doubt and disbelieve in the enormity of +treason—he could not realize that the traitors would go to the bitter +end. Seemingly, Seward still hopes that one day or another they may +return as forlorn sheep. Under the like impressions, he always +believed, and perhaps still believes, he shall be able to patch up the +quarrel, and be the savior of the Union. Very probably his +imagination, his ardent wishes, carry him away, and confuse that clear +insight into events which alone constitutes the statesman.</p> + +<p>Suggested to Sumner to demand the reduction of the tariff on certain +merchandises, on the plea of fraternity of the working American people +with their brethren the operatives all over Europe; by it principally +I wished to alleviate the condition of French industry, as I have full +confidence in Louis Napoleon, and in the unsophisticated judgment of +the genuine French people. The suggestion did not take with the +Senate.</p> + +<p>When the July telegraph brought the news of the victory at Romney +(Western Virginia), it was about midnight. Mr. Seward warmly +congratulated the President that "<i>the secession was over</i>." What a +far-reaching policy!</p> + +<p>When the struggle will be over, England, at least her Tories, +aristocrats, and politicians, will find themselves baffled in their +ardent wishes for the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page065" name="page065"></a>(p. 065)</span> breaking of the Union. The free States +will look tidy and nice, as in the past. But more than one generation +will pass before ceases to bleed the wound inflicted by the lies, the +taunts, the vituperations, poured in England upon this noble, +generous, and high-minded people; upon the sacred cause defended by +the freemen.</p> + +<p>These freemen of America, up to the present time, incarnate the +loftiest principle in the successive, progressive, and historical +development of man. Nations, communities, societies, institutions, +stand and fall with that principle, whatever it be, whereof they are +the incarnation; so teaches us history. Woe to these freemen if they +will recede from the principle; if they abandon human rights; if they +do not crush human bondage, this sum of all infamies. Certainly the +question paramount to all is, to save and preserve pure +self-government in principle and in its direct application. But +although the question of slavery seems to be incidental and +subordinate to the former, virtually the question of slavery is twin +to the former. Slavery serves as a basis, as a nurse, for the most +infamous and abject aristocracy or oligarchy that was ever built up in +history, and any, even the best, the mildest, and the most honest +oligarchy or aristocracy kills and destroys man and self-government.</p> + +<p>From the purely administrative point of view, the principle whose +incarnation is the American people, the principle begins to be +perverted. The embodiment of self-government fills dungeons, +suppresses <span class="pagenum"><a id="page066" name="page066"></a>(p. 066)</span> personal liberty, opens letters, and in the +reckless saturnalias of despotism it rivals many from among the +European despots. Europe, which does not see well the causes, shudders +at this <i>delirium tremens</i> of despotism in America.</p> + +<p>Certainly, treason being in ebullition, the holders of power could not +stand by and look. But instead of an energetic action, instead of +exercising in full the existing laws, they hesitated, and treason, +emboldened, grew over their heads.</p> + +<p>The law inflicted the severest capital punishment on the chiefs of the +revolt in Baltimore, but all went off unharmed. The administration one +day willingly allows the law to slide from its lap, and the next +moment grasps at an unnecessary arbitrary power. Had the traitors of +Baltimore been tried by court-martial, as the law allowed, and +punished, few, if any, traitors would then have raised their heads in +the North.</p> + +<p>Englishmen forget that even after a secession, the North, to-day +twenty millions, as large as the whole Union eight years ago, will in +ten years be thirty millions; a population rich, industrious, and +hating England with fury.</p> + +<p>Seward, having complete hold of the President, weakens Lincoln's mind +by using it up in hunting after comparatively paltry expedients. +Seward-Scott's influence neutralizes the energetic cry of the country, +of the congressmen, and in the Cabinet that of Blair, who is still a +trump.</p> + +<p>The emancipation of slaves is spoken of as an <span class="pagenum"><a id="page067" name="page067"></a>(p. 067)</span> expedient, but +not as a sacred duty, even for the maintenance of the Union. To +emancipate through the war power is an offence to reason, logic, and +humanity; but better even so than not at all. War power is in its +nature violent, transient, established for a day; emancipation is the +highest social and economical solution to be given by law and reason, +and ought to result from a thorough and mature deliberation. When the +Constitution was framed, slavery was ashamed of itself, stood in the +corner, had no paws. Now-a-days, slavery has become a traitor, is +arrogant, blood-thirsty, worse than a jackal and a hyena; deliberately +slavery is a matricide. And they still talk of slavery as sheltered by +the Constitution; and many once anti-slavery men like Seward, etc., +are ready to preserve it, to compromise with the crime.</p> + +<p>The existence of nations oscillates between epochs when the substance +and when the form prevails. The formation of America was the epoch +when substance prevailed. Afterward, for more than half a century, the +form was paramount; the term of substance again begins. The +Constitution is substance and form. The substance in it is perennial; +but every form is transient, and must be expanded, changed, re-cast.</p> + +<p>Few, if any, Americans are aware of the identity of laws ruling the +universe with laws ruling and prevailing in the historical development +of man. Rarely has an American patience enough to ascend the long +chain from effect to cause, until he reaches <span class="pagenum"><a id="page068" name="page068"></a>(p. 068)</span> the first +cause, the womb wherein was first generated the subsequent distant +effect. So, likewise, they cannot realize that at the start the +imperceptible deviation from the aim by and by widens to a bottomless +gap until the aim is missed. Then the greatest and the most devoted +sacrifices are useless. The legal conductors of the nation, since +March 6th, ignore this law.</p> + +<p>The foreign ministers here in Washington were astonished at the +<i>politeness</i>, when some time ago the Department sent to the foreign +ministers a circular announcing to them that armed vessels of the +neutrals will be allowed to enter at pleasure the rebel blockaded +ports. This favor was not asked, not hoped for, and was not necessary. +It was too late when I called the attention of the Department to the +fact that such favors were very seldom granted; that they are +dangerous, and can occasion complications. I observed that during the +war between Mexico and France, in 1838, Count Mole, Minister of +Foreign Affairs, and the Premier of Louis Philippe, instructed the +admiral commanding the French navy in the Mexican waters, to oppose, +even by force, any attempt made by a neutral man-of-war to enter a +blockaded port. And it was not so dangerous then as it may be in this +civil war. But the chief clerk adviser of the Department found out +that President Polk's administration during the Mexican war granted a +similar permission, and, glad to have a precedent, his powerful brains +could not find out the difference between <i>then</i> and <i>now</i>.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page069" name="page069"></a>(p. 069)</span> The internal routine of the ministry, and the manner in which +our ministers are treated abroad by the Chief at home, is very +strange, humiliating to our agents in the eyes of foreign Cabinets. +Cassius Clay was instructed to propose to Russia our accession to the +convention of Paris, but was not informed from Washington that our +ministers at Paris, London, etc., were to make the same propositions. +When Prince Gortschakoff asked Cassius Clay if similar propositions +were made to the other cosigners of the Paris convention, our minister +was obliged to confess his utter ignorance about the whole proceeding. +Prince Gortschakoff good-naturedly inquired about it from his +ministers at Paris and London, and enlightened Cassius Clay.</p> + +<p>No ministry of foreign affairs in Europe would treat its agents in +such a trifling manner, and, if done, a minister would resent it.</p> + +<p>This mistake, or recklessness, is to be credited principally to the +internal chief, or director of the department, and not to the minister +himself. By and by, the chief clerks, these routinists in the former +coarse traditions of the Democratic administrations, will learn and +acquire better diplomatic and bureaucratic habits.</p> + +<p>If one calls the attention of influential Americans to the +mismanagement in the organization of the army; to the extraordinary +way in which everything, as organization of brigades, and the inner +service, the quartermaster's duty, is done, the general and inevitable +answer is, "We are not military; we are <span class="pagenum"><a id="page070" name="page070"></a>(p. 070)</span> young people; we +have to learn." Granted; but instead of learning from the best, the +latest, and most correct authorities, why stick to an obsolete, +senile, musty, rotten, mean, and now-a-days impracticable routine, +which is all-powerful in all relating to the army and to the war? The +Americans may pay dear for thus reversing the rules of common sense.</p> + +<p>General Scott directs from his sleeping room the movements of the two +armies on the Potomac and in the Shenandoah valley. General Scott has +given the order to advance. At least a strange way, to have the +command of battle at a distance of thirty and one hundred miles, and +stretched on his fauteuil. Marshal de Saxe, although deadly sick, was +on the field at Fontenoy. What will be the result of this +experimentalization, so contrary to sound reason?</p> + +<p>Fighting at Bull Run. One o'clock, <span class="smcap">P. M.</span> Good news. Gen. Scott says +that although we were 40-100 in disadvantage, nevertheless his plans +are successful—all goes as he arranged it—all as he foresaw it. +Bravo! old man! If so, I make <i>amende honorable</i> of all that I said up +to this minute. Two o'clock, <span class="smcap">P. M.</span> General Scott, satisfied with the +justness and success of his strategy and tactics—takes a nap.</p> + +<p><i>Evening.</i>—Battle lost; rout, panic. The army almost disbanded, in +full run. So say the forerunners of the accursed news. Malediction! +Malediction!</p> + +<p>What a horrible night and day! rain and cold; <span class="pagenum"><a id="page071" name="page071"></a>(p. 071)</span> stragglers and +disbanded soldiers in every direction, and no order, nobody to gather +the soldiers, or to take care of them.</p> + +<p>As if there existed not any military or administrative authority in +Washington! Under the eyes of the two commanders-in-chief! Oh, +senility, imbecility, ignominy! In Europe, a commander of a city, or +any other military authority whatever, who should behave in such a +way, would be dismissed, nay, expelled, from military service. What I +can gather is, that the enemy was in full retreat in the centre and on +one flank, when he was reinforced by fresh troops, who outflanked and +turned ours. If so, the panic can be explained. Even old veteran +troops generally run when they are outflanked.</p> + +<p>Johnston, whom Patterson permitted to slip, came to the rescue of +Beauregard. So they say. It is <i>en petit</i> Waterloo, with +Blucher-Johnston, and Grouchy-Patterson. But had Napoleon's power +survived after Waterloo, Grouchy, his chief of the staff, and even +Ney,<a id="footnotetag1" name="footnotetag1"></a><a href="#footnote1" title="Go to footnote 1"><span class="smaller">[1]</span></a> for the fault at Quatre-bras, would have been court-martialed +and shot. Here these blind Americans will thank Scott and Patterson.</p> + +<p>Others say that a bold charge of cavalry arrived on our rear, and +threw in disorder the wagons and the baggage gang. That is nothing +new; at the battle of Borodino some Cossacks, pouncing upon the French +baggage, created a panic, which for a <span class="pagenum"><a id="page072" name="page072"></a>(p. 072)</span> moment staggered +Napoleon, and prevented him in time from reinforcing Ney and Davoust. +But McDowell committed a fault in putting his baggage train, the +ambulances excepted, on a road between the army and its reserves, +which, in such a manner, came not in action. By and by I shall learn +more about it.</p> + +<p>The Congress has made a worse Bull Run than the soldiers. Not a single +manly, heroic word to the nation and the army. As if unsuccess always +was dishonor. This body groped its way, and was morally stunned by the +blow; the would-be leaders more than the mass.</p> + +<p>Suggested to Sumner to make, as the Romans did, a few stirring words +on account of the defeat.</p> + +<p>Some mean fellows in Congress, who never smelt powder, abused the +soldiers. Those fellows would have been the first to run. Others, +still worse, to show their abject flunkeyism to Scott, and to humbug +the public at large about their intimacy with this fetish, make +speeches in his defence. Scott broadly prepared the defeat, and now, +through the mouths of flunkeys and spit-lickers,<a id="footnotetag2" name="footnotetag2"></a><a href="#footnote2" title="Go to footnote 2"><span class="smaller">[2]</span></a> he attempts to +throw the fault on the thus called politicians.</p> + +<p>The President telegraphed for McClellan, who in <span class="pagenum"><a id="page073" name="page073"></a>(p. 073)</span> the West, +showed <i>rapidity of movement</i>, the first and most necessary capacity +for a commander. Young blood will be infused, and perhaps senility +will be thrown overboard, or sent to the Museum of the Smithsonian +Institute.</p> + +<p>At Bull Run the foreign regiments ran not, but covered the retreat. +And Scott, and worse than he, Thomas, this black spot in the War +Department, both are averse to, and when they can they humiliate, the +foreigners. A member of Congress, in search of a friend, went for +several miles up the stream of the fugitive army; great was his +astonishment to hear spoken by the fugitives only the unmixed, pure +Anglo-Saxon.</p> + +<p>My friend, J. Wadsworth, behaved cool, brave, on the field, and was +devoted to the wounded. Now, as always, he is the splendid type of a +true man of the people.</p> + +<p>Poor, unhappy McDowell! During the days when he prepared the army, he +was well aware that an eventual success would be altogether attributed +to Scott; but that he, McDowell, would be the scapegoat for the +defeat. Already, when on Sunday morning the news of the first +successes was known, Scott swallowed incense, and took the whole +credit of it to himself. Now he accuses the politicians.</p> + +<p>Once more. Scott himself prepared the defeat. Subsequent elucidation +will justify this assertion. One thing is already certain: one of the +reasons of the lost battle is the exhaustion of troops which +fought—and the number here in Washington is <span class="pagenum"><a id="page074" name="page074"></a>(p. 074)</span> more than +50,000 men. Only an imbecile would divide the forces in such a way as +to throw half of it to attack a superior and entrenched enemy. But +Scott wished to shape the great events of the country in accordance +with his narrow, ossified brains, and with his peculiar patriotism; +and he did the same in the conduct of the war.</p> + +<p>I am sure some day or other it will come out that this immense +fortification of Manassas is a similar humbug to the masked batteries; +and Scott was the first to aggrandize these terrible national +nightmares. Already many soldiers say that they did not see any +fortifications. Very likely only small earthworks; if so, Scott ought +to have known what was the position and the works of an enemy encamped +about thirty miles from him. If he, Scott, was ignorant, then it shows +his utter imbecility; if he knew that the fortifications were +insignificant, and did not tell it to the troops, then he is worse +than an incapable chief. Up to the present day, all the military +leaders of ancient and modern times told their troops before a battle +that the enemy is not much after all, and that the difficulties to +overcome are rather insignificant. After the battle was won, +everything became aggrandized. Here everybody, beginning with Scott, +ardently rivalled how to scare and frighten the volunteers, by stories +of the masked batteries of Manassas, with its several tiers of +fortifications, the terrible superiority of the Southerners, etc., +etc. In Europe such behavior would be called treason.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page075" name="page075"></a>(p. 075)</span> The administration and the influential men cannot realize +that they must give up their old, stupid, musty routine. McClellan +ought to be altogether independent of Scott; be untrammelled in his +activity; have large powers; have direct action; and not refer to +Scott. What is this wheel within a wheel? Instead of it, Scott, as by +concession, cuts for McClellan a military department of six square +miles. Oh, human stupidity, how difficult thou art to lift!</p> + +<p>Scott will paralyze McClellan as he did Lyon and Butler. Scott always +pushed on his spit-lickers, or favorites, rotten by old age. But Scott +has pushed aside such men as Wool and Col. Smith; refused the services +of many brave as Hooker and others, because they never belonged to his +flunkeys.</p> + +<p>Send to McClellan a plan for the reorganization of the army.</p> + +<p>1st. True mastership consists in creating an army with extant +elements, and not in clamoring for what is altogether impossible to +obtain.</p> + +<p>2d. The idea is preposterous to try to have a large thus-called +regular army. A small number, fifteen to twenty thousand men, divided +among several hundreds of thousands of volunteers, would be as a drop +of water in a lake. Besides, this war is to be decided by the great +masses of the volunteers, and it is uncivic and unpatriotic to in any +way nourish the wickedly-assumed discrimination between regulars and +volunteers.</p> + +<p>3d. Good non-commissioned officers and corporals <span class="pagenum"><a id="page076" name="page076"></a>(p. 076)</span> constitute +the sole, sound, and easy articulations of a regiment. Any one who +ever was in action is aware of this truth. With good non-commissioned +officers, even ignorant lieutenants do very little harm. The volunteer +regiments ought to have as many good sergeants and corporals as +possible.</p> + +<p>4th. To provide for this want, and for reasons mentioned above, the +relics of the regular army ought to be dissolved. Let us have one +army, as the enemy has.</p> + +<p>5th. All the rank and file of the army ought to be made at once +corporals and sergeants, and be distributed as much as possible among +the volunteers.</p> + +<p>6th. The non-commissioned regulars ought to be made commissioned +officers, and with officers of all grades be distributed and merged in +the one great army.</p> + +<p>For the first time since the armaments, I enjoyed a genuine military +view. McClellan, surrounded as a general ought to be, went to see the +army. It looks martial. The city, likewise, has a more martial look +than it had all the time under Scott. It seems that a young, strong +hand holds the ribbons. God grant that McClellan may preserve his +western vigor and activity, and may not become softened and dissolved +by these Washington evaporations. If he does, if he follows the +routine, he will become as impotent as others before him. Young man, +beware of Washington's corrupt but flattering influences. To the camp! +to the camp! A tent is better for you than a handsome house. The tent, +the fumes of <span class="pagenum"><a id="page077" name="page077"></a>(p. 077)</span> bivouacs, inspired the Fredericks, the +Napoleons, and Washingtons.</p> + +<p>Up to this day they make more history in Secessia than here. Jeff. +Davis overshadows Lincoln. Jeff. Davis and his gang of malefactors are +pushed into the whirlpool of action by the nature of their crime; +here, our leaders dread action, and grope. The rebels have a clear, +decisive, almost palpable aim; but here * *</p> + + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page078" name="page078"></a>(p. 078)</span> AUGUST, 1861.</h3> + +<p class="resume">The truth about Bull Run — The press staggers — The Blairs alone + firm — Scott's military character — Seward — Mr. Lincoln reads the + Herald — The ubiquitous lobbyist — Intervention — Congress + adjourns — The administration waits for something to turn + up — Wade — Lyon is killed — Russell and his shadow — The Yankees + take the loan — Bravo, Yankees! — McClellan works hard — Prince + Napoleon — Manassas fortifications a humbug — Mr. Seward + Improves — Old Whigism — McClellan's powers enlarged — Jeff. Davis + makes history — Fremont emancipates in Missouri — The Cabinet.</p> + + +<p>The truth about Bull Run will, perhaps, only reach the people when it +becomes reduced to an historical use. I gather what I am sure is true.</p> + +<p>About three weeks ago General McDowell took upon himself the +responsibility to attack the enemy concentrated at Manassas. Deciding +upon this step, McDowell showed the determination of a true soldier, +and a cool, intelligent courage. According to rumors permeating the +whole North; rumors originated by secessionists in and around +Washington, and in various parts of the free States; rumors gulped by +a part of the press, and never contradicted, but rather nursed, at +headquarters, Manassas was a terrible, unknown, mysterious something; +a bugbear, between a fortress made by art and a natural fastness, +whose approaches were defended for miles by numberless masked +batteries, and which <span class="pagenum"><a id="page079" name="page079"></a>(p. 079)</span> was filled by countless thousands of +the most ferocious warriors. Such was Manassas in public opinion when +McDowell undertook to attack this formidable American Torres Vedras, +and this with the scanty and almost unorganized means in men and +artillery allotted to him by the senile wisdom of General Scott. +General McDowell obtained the promise that Beauregard alone was to be +before him. To fulfil this promise, General Scott was to order +Patterson to keep Johnston, and a movement was to be made on the James +River, so as to prevent troops coming from Richmond to Manassas. As it +was already said, Patterson, a special favorite of General Scott, +kindly allowed Johnston to save Beauregard, and Jeff. Davis with +troops from Richmond likewise was on the spot. McDowell planned his +plan very skilfully; no European general would have done better, and I +am sure that such will be the verdict hereafter. Some second-rate +mistakes in the execution did not virtually endanger its success; but, +to say the truth, McDowell and his army were defeated by the +imbecility of the supreme military authority. Imbecility stabbed them +in the back.</p> + +<p>One part of the press, stultified and stupefied, staggered under the +blow; the other part showed its utter degradation by fawning on Scott +and attacking the Congress, or its best part. The Evening Post +staggered not; its editors are genuine, laborious students, and, above +all, students of history. The editors of the other papers are +politicians; <span class="pagenum"><a id="page080" name="page080"></a>(p. 080)</span> some of them are little, others are big +villains. All, intellectually, belong to the class called in America +more or less well-read men; information acquired by reading, but which +in itself is not much.</p> + +<p>The brothers Blair, almost alone, receded not, and put the defeat +where it belonged—at the feet of General Scott.</p> + +<p>The <i>rudis indigestaque moles</i>, torn away from Scott's hands, already +begins to acquire the shape of an army. Thanks to the youth, the +vigor, and the activity of McClellan.</p> + +<p>General Scott throws the whole disaster on politicians, and abuses +them. How ungrateful. His too lofty pedestal is almost exclusively the +work of politicians. I heard very, very few military men in America +consider Scott a man of transcendent military capacity. Years ago, +during the Crimean campaign, I spent some time at West Point in the +society of Cols. Robert Lee, Walker, Hardee, then in the service of +the United States, and now traitors; not one of them classed Scott +much higher above what would be called a respectable capacity; and of +which, as they said, there are many, many in every European army.</p> + +<p>If one analyzes the Mexican campaign, it will be found that General +Scott had, comparatively, more officers than soldiers; the officers +young men, full of vigor, and in the first gush of youth, who +therefore mightily facilitated the task of the commander. Their names +resound to-day in both the camps.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page081" name="page081"></a>(p. 081)</span> Further, generals from the campaign in Mexico assert that +three of the won battles were fought against orders, which signifies +that in Mexico youth had the best of cautious senility. It was +according to the law of nature, and for it it was crowned with +success.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward has a very active intellect, an excellent man for current +business, easy and clear-headed for solving any second-rate +complications; but as for his initiative, that is another question. +Hitherto his initiative does not tell, but rather confuses. Then he +sustains Scott, some say, for future political capital. If so it is +bad; worse still if Mr. Seward sustains Scott on the ground of high +military fitness, as it is impossible to admit that Mr. Seward knows +anything about military affairs, or that he ever <i>studied</i> the +description <i>of any battle</i>. At least, I so judge from his +conversation.</p> + +<p>Mr. Lincoln has already the fumes of greatness, and looks down on the +press, reads no paper, that dirty traitor the New York Herald +excepted. So, at least, it is generally stated.</p> + +<p>The enemies of Seward maintain that he, Seward, drilled Lincoln into +it, to make himself more necessary.</p> + +<p>Early, even before the inauguration, McDowell suggested to General +Scott to concentrate in Washington the small army, the depots +scattered in Texas and New Mexico. Scott refused, and this is called a +general! God preserve any cause, any people <span class="pagenum"><a id="page082" name="page082"></a>(p. 082)</span> who have for a +savior a Scott, together with his civil and military partisans.</p> + +<p>If it is not direct, naked treason which prevails among the nurses, +and the various advisers of the people, imbecility, narrow-mindedness, +do the same work. Further, the way in which many leech, phlebotomize, +cheat and steal the people's treasury, is even worse than rampant +treason. I heard a Boston shipbuilder complain to Sumner that the +ubiquitous lobbyist, Thurlow Weed, was in his, the builder's, way +concerning some contracts to be made in the Navy Department, etc., +etc. Will it turn out that the same men who are to-day at the head of +affairs will be the men who shall bring to an end this revolt or +revolution? It ought not to be, as it is contrary to logic, and to +human events.</p> + +<p>Lincoln alone must forcibly remain, he being one of the incarnated +formulas of the Constitution, endowed with a specific, four years' +lasting existence.</p> + +<p>The Americans are nervous about foreign intervention. It is difficult +to make them understand that no intervention is to be, and none can be +made. Therein the press is as silly as the public at large. Certainly +France does not intend any meddling or intervention; of this I am +sure. Neither does England seriously.</p> + +<p>Next, if these two powers should even thirst for such an injustice, +they have no means to do it. If they break our blockades, we make war, +and exclude them from the Northern ports, whose commerce is more +valuable to them than that of the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page083" name="page083"></a>(p. 083)</span> South. I do not believe +the foreign powers to be forgetful of their interest; they know better +their interests than the Americans.</p> + +<p>The Congress adjourned, abandoning, with a confidence unparalleled in +history, the affairs of the country in the hands of the not over +far-sighted administration. The majority of the Congress are good, and +fully and nobly represent the pure, clear and sure aspirations, +instincts, nay, the clear-sightedness of the people. In the Senate, as +in the House, are many, very many true men, and men of pure devotion, +and of clear insight into the events; men superior to the +administration; such are, above all, those senators and +representatives who do not attempt or aim to sit on a pedestal before +the public, before the people, but wish the thing to be done for the +thing itself. But for <i>the formula</i> which chains their hands, feet, +and intellect, the Congress contained several men who, if they could +act, would finish the secession in a double-quick time. But the whole +people move in the treadmill of formulas. It is a pity that they are +not inspired by the axiom of the Roman legist, <i>scire leges non est +hoc verba earum tenere, sed vim ac potestatem</i>. Congress had positive +notions of what ought to be done; the administration, Micawber-like, +looks for that something which may turn up, and by expedients patches +all from day to day.</p> + +<p>What may turn up nobody can foresee; matter alone without mind cannot +carry the day. The people have the mind, but the official legal +leaders <span class="pagenum"><a id="page084" name="page084"></a>(p. 084)</span> a very small portion of it. Come what will, I shall +not break down; I shall not give up the holy principle. If crime, +rebellion, <i>sauvagerie</i>, triumph, it will be, not because the people +failed, but it will be because mediocrities were at the helm. +Concessions, compromises, any patched-up peace, will for a century +degrade the name of America. Of course, I cannot prevent it; but +events have often broken but not bent me. I may be burned, but I +cannot be melted; so if secesh succeeds, I throw in a cesspool my +document of naturalization, and shall return to Europe, even if +working my passage.</p> + +<p>It is maddening to read all this ignoble clap-trap, written by +European wiseacres concerning this country. Not one knows the people, +not one knows the accidental agencies which neutralize what is grand +and devoted in the people.</p> + +<p>Some are praised here as statesmen and leaders. A statesman, a leader +of such a people as are the Americans, and in such emergencies, must +be a <i>man</i> in the fullest and loftiest comprehension. All the noblest +criteria of moral and intellectual manhood ought to be vigorously and +harmoniously developed in him. He ought to have a deep and lively +moral sense, and the moral perception of events and of men around him. +He ought to have large brains and a big heart,—an almost +all-embracing comprehension of the inside and outside of events,—and +when he has those qualities, then only the genius of foresight will +dwell on his brow. He ought to forget himself wholly and +unconditionally; his reason, his heart, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page085" name="page085"></a>(p. 085)</span> his soul ought to +merge in the principles which lifted him to the elevated station. Who +around me approaches this ideal? So far as I know, perhaps Senator +Wade.</p> + +<p>I wait and wait for the eagle which may break out from the White +House. Even the burning fire of the national disaster at Bull Run left +the egg unhatched. <i>Utinam sim falsus</i>, but it looks as if the slowest +brains were to deal with the greatest events of our epoch. Mr. Lincoln +is a pure-souled, well-intentioned patriot, and this nobody doubts or +contests. But is that all which is needed in these terrible +emergencies?</p> + +<p>Lyon is killed,—the only man of initiative hitherto generated by +events. We have bad luck. I shall put on mourning for at least six +weeks. They ought to weep all over the land for the loss of such a +man; and he would not have been lost if the administration had put him +long ago in command of the West. O General Scott! Lyon's death can be +credited to you. Lyon was obnoxious to General Scott, but the +General's influence maintains in the service all the doubtful +capacities and characters. The War Department, as says Potter, +bristles with secessionists, and with them the old, rotten, +respectable relics, preserved by General Scott, depress and nip in the +bud all the young, patriotic, and genuine capacities.</p> + +<p>As the sea corrodes the rocks against which it impinges, so egotism, +narrow-mindedness, and immorality <span class="pagenum"><a id="page086" name="page086"></a>(p. 086)</span> corrode the best human +institutions. For humanity's sake, Americans, beware!</p> + +<p>Always the clouds of harpies around the White House and the +Departments,—such a generous ferment in the people, and such +impurities coming to the surface!</p> + +<p>Patronage is the stumbling stone here to true political action. By +patronage the Cabinet keeps in check Congressmen, Senators, etc.</p> + +<p>I learn from very good authority that when Russell, with his shadow, +Sam. Ward, went South, Mr. Seward told Ward that he, Seward, intends +not to force the Union on the Southern people, if it should be +positively ascertained that that people does not wish to live in the +Union! I am sorry for Seward. Such is not the feeling of the Northern +people, and such notions must necessarily confuse and make vacillating +Mr. Seward's—that is, Mr. Lincoln's—policy. Seward's patriotism and +patriotic wishes and expectations prevent him from seeing things as +they are.</p> + +<p>The money men of Boston decided the conclusion of the first national +loan. Bravo, my beloved Yankees! In finances as in war, as in all, not +the financiering capacity of this or that individual, not any special +masterly measures, etc., but the stern will of the people to succeed, +provides funds and means, prevents bankruptcy, etc. The men who give +money send an agent here to ascertain how many traitors are still kept +in offices, and what are <span class="pagenum"><a id="page087" name="page087"></a>(p. 087)</span> the prospects of energetic action +by the administration.</p> + +<p>McClellan is organizing, working hard. It is a pleasure to see him, so +devoted and so young. After all, youth is promise. But already +adulation begins, and may spoil him. It would be very, very saddening.</p> + +<p>Prince Napoleon's visit stirs up all the stupidity of politicians in +Europe and here. What a mass of absurdities are written on it in +Europe, and even by Americans residing there. All this is more than +equalled by the <i>solemn</i> and <i>wise</i> speculations of the Americans at +home. Bar-room and coffee-house politicians are the same all over the +world, the same, I am sure, in China and Japan. To suppose Prince +Napoleon has any appetite whatever for any kind of American crown! +Bah! He is brilliant and intelligent, and to suppose him to have such +absurd plans is to offend him. But human and American gullibility are +bottomless.</p> + +<p>The Prince is a noble friend of the American cause, and freely speaks +out his predilection. His sentiments are those of a true Frenchman, +and not the sickly free-trade pro-slaveryism of Baroche with which he +poisoned here the diplomatic atmosphere. Prince Napoleon's example +will purify it.</p> + +<p>As I was sure of it, the great Manassas fortifications are a humbug. +It is scarcely a half-way fortified camp. So say the companions of the +Prince, who, with him, visited Beauregard's army. So <span class="pagenum"><a id="page088" name="page088"></a>(p. 088)</span> much +for the great Gen. Scott, whom the companions of the Prince call a +<i>magnificent ruin</i>.</p> + +<p>The Prince spoke with Beauregard, and the Prince's and his companions' +opinion is, that McDowell planned well his attack, but failed in the +execution; and Beauregard thought the same. The Prince saw McClellan, +and does not prize him so high as we do. These foreign officers say +that most probably, on both sides, the officers will make most correct +plans, as do pupils in military schools, but the execution will depend +upon accident.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward shows every day more and more capacity in dispatching the +regular, current, diplomatical business affairs. In all such matters +he is now at home, as if he had done it for years and years. He is no +more spread-eagle in his diplomatic relations; is easy and prompt in +all secondary questions relating to secondary interests, and daily +emerging from international complications.</p> + +<p>Hitherto the war policy of the administration, as inspired and +directed by Scott, was rather to receive blows, and then to try to +ward them off. I expect young McClellan to deal blows, and thus to +upturn the Micawber policy. Perhaps Gen. Scott believed that his name +and example would awe the rebels, and that they would come back after +having made a little fuss and done some little mischief. But Scott's +greatness was principally built up by the Whigs, and his hold on +Democrats was not very great. Witness the events of Polk's and +Pierce's administrations. His Mississippi-Atlantic strategy is +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page089" name="page089"></a>(p. 089)</span> a delirium of a softening brain. Seward's enemies say that +he puts up and sustains Scott, because in the case of success Scott +will not be in Seward's way for the future Presidency. Mr. Lincoln, an +old Whig, has the Whig-worship for Scott; and as Mr. Lincoln, in 1851, +stumped for Scott, the candidate for the Presidency, the many eulogies +showered by Lincoln upon Scott still more strengthened the worship +which, of course, Seward lively entertains in Lincoln's bosom. Thus +the relics of Whigism direct now the destinies of the North. Mr. +Lincoln, Gen. Scott, Mr. Seward, form a triad, with satellites like +Bates and Smith in the Cabinet. But the Whigs have not the reputation +of governmental vigor, decision, and promptitude.</p> + +<p>The vitiated impulse and direction given by Gen. Scott at the start, +still prevails, and it will be very difficult to bring it on the right +track—to change the general as well as the war policy from the +defensive, as it is now, to the offensive, as it ought to have been +from the beginning. The North is five to one in men, and one hundred +to one in material resources. Any one with brains and energy could +suppress the rebellion in eight weeks from to-day.</p> + +<p>Mr. Lincoln in some way has a slender historical resemblance to Louis +XVI.—similar goodness, honesty, good intentions; but the size of +events seems to be too much for him.</p> + +<p>And so now Mr. Lincoln is wholly overshadowed by Seward. If by miracle +the revolt may end in a short time, Mr. Seward will have most of the +credit <span class="pagenum"><a id="page090" name="page090"></a>(p. 090)</span> for it. In the long run the blame for eventual +disasters will be put at Mr. Lincoln's door.</p> + +<p>Thank heaven! the area for action and the powers of McClellan are +extended and increased. The administration seems to understand the +exigencies of the day.</p> + +<p>I am told that the patriotic and brave Senator Wade, disgusted with +the slowness and inanity of the administration, exclaimed, "I do not +wonder that people desert to Jeff. Davis, as he shows brains; I may +desert myself." And truly, Jeff. Davis and his gang make history.</p> + +<p>Young McClellan seems to falter before the Medusa-<i>ruin</i> Scott, who is +again at his tricks, and refuses officers to volunteers. To carry +through in Washington any sensible scheme, more boldness is needed +than on the bloodiest battle-field.</p> + +<p>If Gen. Scott could have disappeared from the stage of events on the +sixth of March, his name would have remained surrounded with that halo +to which the people was accustomed; but now, when the smoke will blow +over, it may turn differently. I am afraid that at some future time +will be applied to Scott * * * <i>quia turpe ducunt parere minoribus, et +quć imberbi didicere, senes perdenda fateri</i>.</p> + +<p>Not self-government is on trial, and not the genuine principle of +democracy. It is not the genuine, virtual democracy which conspired +against the republic, and which rebels, but an unprincipled, infamous +oligarchy, risen in arms to destroy democracy. From Athens down to +to-day, true democracies <span class="pagenum"><a id="page091" name="page091"></a>(p. 091)</span> never betrayed any country, never +leagued themselves with enemies. From the time of Hellas down to +to-day, all over the world, and in all epochs, royalties, oligarchies, +aristocracies, conspired against, betrayed, and sold their respective +father-lands. (I said this years ago in America and Europe.)</p> + +<p>Fremont as initiator; he emancipates the slaves of the disloyal +Missourians. Takes the advance, but is justified in it by the +slowness, nay, by the stagnancy of the administration.</p> + +<p>Gen. Scott opposed to the expedition to Hatteras!</p> + +<p>If it be true that Seward and Chase already lay the tracks for the +Presidential succession, then I can only admire their +short-sightedness, nay, utter and darkest blindness. The terrible +events will be a schooling for the people; the future President will +not be a schemer already shuffling the cards; most probably it will be +a man who serves the country, forgetting himself.</p> + +<p>Only two members in the Cabinet drive together, Blair and Welles, and +both on the right side, both true men, impatient for action, action. +Every day shows on what false principle this Cabinet was constructed, +not for the emergency, not in view to suppress the rebellion, but to +satisfy various party wranglings. Now the people's cause sticks in the +mud.</p> + + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page092" name="page092"></a>(p. 092)</span> SEPTEMBER, 1861.</h3> + +<p class="resume">What will McClellan do? — Fremont disavowed — The Blairs not in + fault — Fremont ignorant and a bungler — Conspiracy to destroy + him — Seward rather on his side — McClellan's staff — A Marcy will + not do! — McClellan publishes a slave-catching order — The people + move onward — Mr. Seward again — West Point — The Washington + defences — What a Russian officer thought of them — Oh, for + battles! — Fremont wishes to attack Memphis; a bold + move! — Seward's influence over Lincoln — The people for + Fremont — Col. Romanoff's opinion of the generals — McClellan + refuses to move — Manœuvrings — The people uneasy — The + staff — The Orleans — Brave boys! — The Potomac closed — Oh, poor + nation! — Mexico — McClellan and Scott.</p> + + +<p>Will McClellan display unity in conception, and vigor in execution? +That is the question. He seems very energetic and active in organizing +the army; but he ought to take the field very soon. He ought to leave +Washington, and have his headquarters in the camp among the soldiers. +The life in the tent will inspire him. It alone inspired Frederick II. +and Napoleon. Too much organization may become as mischievous as the +no organization under Scott. Time, time is everything. The levies will +fight well; may only McClellan not be carried away by the notion and +the attempt to create what is called a perfect army on European +pattern. Such an attempt would be ruinous to the cause. It is +altogether impossible to create such an army on the European model, +and no necessity exists for it. The <span class="pagenum"><a id="page093" name="page093"></a>(p. 093)</span> rebel army is no +European one. Civil wars have altogether different military +exigencies, and the great tactics for a civil war are wholly different +from the tactics, etc., needed in a regular war. Napoleon differently +fought the Vendeans, and differently the Austrians, and the other +coalesced armies. May only McClellan not become intoxicated before he +puts the cup to his lips.</p> + +<p>Fremont disavowed by Lincoln and the administration. This looks bad. I +have no considerable confidence in Fremont's high capacities, and +believe that his head is turned a little; but in this question he was +right in principle, and right in legality. A commander of an army +operating separately has the exercise of full powers of war.</p> + +<p>The Blairs are not to be accused; I read the letter from F. Blair to +his brother. It is the letter of a patriot, but not of an intriguer. +Fremont establishes an absurd rule concerning the breach of military +discipline, and shows by it his ignorance and narrow-mindedness. So +Fremont, and other bungling martinets, assert that nobody has the +right to criticise the actions of his commander.</p> + +<p>Fremont is ignorant of history, and those around him who put in his +head such absurd notions are a pack of mean and servile spit-lickers. +An officer ought to obey orders without hesitation, and if he does not +he is to be court-martialed and shot. But it is perfectly allowable to +criticise them; it is in human nature—it was, is, and will be done in +all armies; see in Curtius and other historians of Alexander <span class="pagenum"><a id="page094" name="page094"></a>(p. 094)</span> +of Macedon. It was continually done under Napoleon. In Russia, in +1812, the criticism made by almost all the officers forced Alexander +I. to leave the army, and to put Kutousoff over Barclay. In the last +Italian campaign Austrian officers criticised loudly Giulay, their +commander, etc., etc.</p> + +<p>Conspiracy to destroy Fremont on account of his slave proclamation. +The conspirators are the Missouri slaveholders: Senator Brodhead, old +Bates, Scott, McClellan, and their staffs. Some jealousy against him +in the Cabinet, but Seward rather on Fremont's side.</p> + +<p>McClellan makes his father-in-law, a man of <i>very</i> secondary capacity, +the chief of the staff of the army. It seems that McClellan ignores +what a highly responsible position it is, and what a special and +transcendent capacity must be that of a chief of the staff—the more +so when of an army of several hundreds of thousands. I do not look for +a Berthier, a Gneisenau, a Diebitsch, or Gortschakoff, but a Marcy +will not do.</p> + +<p>Colonel Lebedeef, from the staff of the Emperor Alexander II., and +professor in the School of the Staff at St. Petersburg, saw here +everything, spoke with our generals, and his conclusion is that in +military capacity McDowell is by far superior to McClellan. Strange, +if true, and foreboding no good.</p> + +<p>Mr. Lincoln begins to call a demagogue any one who does not admire all +the doings of his administration. Are we already so far?</p> + +<p>McClellan under fatal influences of the rampant <span class="pagenum"><a id="page095" name="page095"></a>(p. 095)</span> pro-slavery +men, and of partisans of the South, as is a Barlow. All the former +associations of McClellan have been of the worst +kind—Breckinridgians. But perhaps he will throw them off. He is +young, and the elevation of his position, his standing before the +civilized world, will inspire and purify him, I hope. Nay, I ardently +wish he may go to the camp, to the camp.</p> + +<p>McClellan published a slave-catching order. Oh that he may discard +those bad men around him!</p> + +<p>Struggles with evils, above all with domestic, internal evils, absorb +a great part of every nation's life. Such struggles constitute its +development, are the landmarks of its progress and decline.</p> + +<p>The like struggles deserve more the attention of the observer, the +philosopher, than all kinds of external wars. And, besides, most of +such external wars result from the internal condition of a nation. At +any rate, their success or unsuccess almost wholly depends upon its +capacity to overcome internal evils. A nation even under a despotic +rule may overcome and repel an invasion, as long as the struggle +against the internal evils has not broken the harmony between the +ruler and the nation. Here the internal evil has torn a part of the +constitutional structure; may only the necessary harmony between this +high-minded people and the representative of the transient +constitutional formula not be destroyed. The people move onward, the +formula vacillates, and seems to fear to make any bold step.</p> + +<p>If the cause of the freemen of the North succumbs, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page096" name="page096"></a>(p. 096)</span> then +humanity is humiliated. This high-spirited exclamation belongs to +Tassara, the Minister from Spain. Not the diplomat, but the nobly +inspired <i>man</i> uttered it.</p> + +<p>But for the authoritative influence of General Scott, and the absence +of any foresight and energy on the part of the administration, the +rebels would be almost wholly without military leaders, without naval +officers. The Johnsons, Magruders, Tatnalls, Buchanans, ought to have +been arrested for treason the moment they announced their intention to +resign.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward has many excellent personal qualities, besides his +unquestionable eminent capacity for business and argument; but why is +he neutralizing so much good in him by the passion to be all in all, +to meddle with everything, to play the knowing one in military +affairs, he being in all such matters as innocent as a lamb? It is not +a field on which Seward's hazarded generalizations can be of any +earthly use; but they must confuse all.</p> + +<p>Seward is free from that coarse, semi-barbarous know-nothingism which +rules paramount, not the genuine people, but the would-be something, +the half-civilized <i>gentlemen</i>. Above all, know-nothingism pervades +all around Scott, who is himself its grand master, and it nestles +there <i>par excellence</i> in more than one way. It is, however, to be +seen how far this pure American-Scott military wisdom is something +real, transcendent. Up to this day, the pure Americanism, West Point +schoolboy's conceit, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page097" name="page097"></a>(p. 097)</span> have not produced much. The defences of +Washington, so much clarioned as being the product of a high +conception and of engineering skill,—these defences are very +questionable when appreciated by a genuine military eye. A Russian +officer of the military engineers, one who was in the Crimea and at +Sebastopol, after having surveyed these defences here, told me that +the Russian soldiers who defended Sebastopol, and who learned what +ought to be defences, would prefer to fight outside than inside of the +Washington forts, bastions, defences, etc., etc., etc.</p> + +<p>Doubtless many foreigners coming to this country are not much, but the +greatest number are soldiers who saw service and fire, and could be of +some use at the side of Scott's West Point greenness and presumption.</p> + +<p>If we are worsted, then the fate of the men of faith in principles +will be that of Sisyphus, and the coming generation for half a century +will have uphill work.</p> + +<p>If not McClellan himself, some intriguers around him already dream, +nay, even attempt to form a pure military, that is, a reckless, +unprincipled, unpatriotic party. These men foment the irritation +between the arrogance of the thus-called regular army, and the pure +abnegation of the volunteers. Oh, for battles! Oh, for battles!</p> + +<p>Fremont wished at once to attack Fort Pillow and the city of Memphis. +It was a bold move, but the concerted civil and military wisdom +grouped around <span class="pagenum"><a id="page098" name="page098"></a>(p. 098)</span> the President opposed this truly great +military conception.</p> + +<p>Mr. Lincoln is pulled in all directions. His intentions are excellent, +and he would have made an excellent President for quiet times. But +this civil war imperatively demands a man of foresight, of prompt +decision, of Jacksonian will and energy. These qualities may be latent +in Lincoln, but do not yet come to daylight. Mr. Lincoln has no +experience of men and events, and no knowledge of the past. Seward's +influence over Lincoln may be explained by the fact that Lincoln +considers Seward as the alpha and omega of every kind of knowledge and +information.</p> + +<p>I still hope, perhaps against hope, that if Lincoln is what the masses +believe him to be, a strong mind, then all may come out well. Strong +minds, lifted by events into elevated regions, expand more and more; +their "mind's eye" pierces through clouds, and even through rocks; +they become inspired, and inspiration compensates the deficiency or +want of information acquired by studies. Weak minds, when transported +into higher regions, become confused and dizzy. Which of the two will +be Mr. Lincoln's fate?</p> + +<p>The administration hesitates to give to the struggle a character of +emancipation; but the people hesitate not, and take Fremont to their +heart.</p> + +<p>As the concrete humanity, so single nations have epochs of gestation, +and epochs of normal activity, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page099" name="page099"></a>(p. 099)</span> of growth, of full life, of +manhood. Americans are now in the stage of manhood.</p> + +<p>Col. Romanoff, of the Russian military engineer corps, who was in the +Crimean war, saw here the men and the army, saw and conversed with the +generals. Col. R. is of opinion that McDowell is by far superior to +McClellan, and would make a better commander.</p> + +<p>It is said that McClellan refuses to move until he has an army of +300,000 men and 600 guns. Has he not studied Napoleon's wars? Napoleon +scarcely ever had half such a number in hand; and when at Wagram, +where he had about 180,000 men, himself in the centre, Davoust and +Massena on the flanks, nevertheless the handling of such a mass was +too heavy even for his, Napoleon's, genius.</p> + +<p>The country is—to use an Americanism—in a pretty fix, if this +McClellan turns out to be a mistake. I hope for the best. 600 guns! +But 100 guns in a line cover a mile. What will he do with 600? Lose +them in forests, marshes, and bad roads; whence it is unhappily a fact +that McClellan read only a little of military history, misunderstood +what he read, and now attempts to realize hallucinations, as a boy +attempts to imitate the exploits of an Orlando. It is dreadful to +think of it. I prefer to trust his assertion that, once organized, he +soon, very soon, will deal heavy and quick blows to the rebels.</p> + +<p>I saw some manœuvrings, and am astonished that no artillery is +distributed among the regiments of infantry. When the rank and file +see the guns on <span class="pagenum"><a id="page100" name="page100"></a>(p. 100)</span> their side, the soldiers consider them as a +part of themselves and of the regiment; they fight better in the +company of guns; they stand by them and defend them as they defend +their colors. Such a distribution of guns would strengthen the body of +the volunteers. But it seems that McClellan has no confidence in the +volunteers. Were this true, it would denote a small, very small mind. +Let us hope it is not so. One of his generals—a martinet of the first +class—told me that McClellan waits for the organization of <i>the +regulars</i>, to have them for the defence of the guns. If so, it is +sheer nonsense. These narrow-minded West Point martinets will become +the ruin of McClellan.</p> + +<p>McClellan could now take the field. Oh, why has he established his +headquarters in the city, among flunkeys, wiseacres, and spit-lickers? +Were he among the troops, he would be already in Manassas. The people +are uneasy and fretting about this inaction, and the people see what +is right and necessary.</p> + +<p>Gen. Banks, a true and devoted patriot, is sacrificed by the stupidity +of what they call here the staff of the great army, but which +collectively, with its chief, is only a mass of conceit and +ignorance—few, as General Williams, excepted. Banks is in the face of +the enemy, and has no cavalry and no artillery; and here are immense +reviews to amuse women and fools.</p> + +<p>Mr. Mercier, the French Minister, visited a considerable part of the +free States, and his opinions are <span class="pagenum"><a id="page101" name="page101"></a>(p. 101)</span> now more clear and firm; +above all, he is very friendly to our side. He is sagacious and good.</p> + +<p>Missouri is in great confusion—three parts of it lost. Fremont is not +to be accused of all the mischief, but, from effect to cause, the +accusation ascends to General Scott.</p> + +<p>Gen. Scott insisted to have Gen. Harney appointed to the command of +Missouri, and hated Lyon. If, even after Harney's recall, Lyon had +been appointed, Lyon would be alive and Missouri safe. But hatred, +anxiety of rank, and stupidity, united their efforts, and prevailed. +Oh American people! to depend upon such inveterate blunderers!</p> + +<p>Were McClellan in the camp, he would have no flatterers, no +antechambers filled with flunkeys; but the rebels would not so easily +get news of his plans as they did in the affair on Munson's Hill.</p> + +<p>The Orleans are here. I warned the government against admitting the +Count de Paris, saying that it would be a <i>deliberate</i> breach of good +comity towards Louis Napoleon, and towards the Bonapartes, who prove +to be our friends; I told that no European government would commit +itself in such a manner, not even if connected by ties of blood with +the Orleans. At the start, Mr. Seward heeded a little my advice, but +finally he could not resist the vanity to display untimely +spread-eagleism, and the Orleans are in our service. Brave boys! It is +a noble, generous, high-minded, if not an altogether wise, action.</p> + +<p>If a mind is not nobly inspired and strong, then <span class="pagenum"><a id="page102" name="page102"></a>(p. 102)</span> the +exercise of power makes it crotchety and dissimulative in contact with +men. To my disgust, I witness this all around me.</p> + +<p>The American people, its institutions, the Union—all have lost their +virginity, their political innocence. A revolution in the +institutions, in the mode of life, in notions begun—it is going on, +will grow and mature, either for good or evil. Civil war, this most +terrible but most maturing passion, has put an end to the boyhood and +to the youth of the American people. Whatever may be the end, one +thing is sure—that the substance and the form will be modified; nay, +perhaps, both wholly changed. A new generation of citizens will grow +and come out from this smoke of the civil war.</p> + +<p>The Potomac closed by the rebels! Mischief and shame! Natural fruits +of the dilatory war policy—Scott's fault. Months ago the navy wished +to prevent it, to shell out the rebels, to keep our troops in the +principal positions. Scott opposed; and still he has almost paramount +influence. McClellan complains against Scott, and Lincoln and Seward +flatter McClellan, but look up to Scott as to a supernatural military +wisdom. Oh, poor nation!</p> + +<p>In Europe clouds gather over Mexico. Whatever it eventually may come +to, I suggested to Mr. Seward to lay aside the Monroe doctrine, not to +meddle for or against Mexico, but to earnestly protest against any +eventual European interference in the internal condition of the +political institutions of Mexico.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page103" name="page103"></a>(p. 103)</span> Continual secondary, international complications, naturally +growing out from the maritime question; so with the Dutch +cheesemongers, with Spain, with England—all easily to be settled; +they generate fuss and trouble, but will make no fire.</p> + +<p>Gen. Scott's partisans complain that McClellan is very disrespectful +in his dealings with Gen. Scott. I wonder not. McClellan is probably +hampered by the narrow routine notions of Scott. McClellan feels that +Scott prevents energetic and prompt action; that he, McClellan, in +every step is obliged to fight Gen. Scott's inertia; and McClellan +grows impatient, and shows it to Scott.</p> + + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page104" name="page104"></a>(p. 104)</span> OCTOBER, 1861.</h3> + +<p class="resume">Experiments on the people's life-blood — McClellan's uniform — The + army fit to move — The rebels treat us like children — We lose + time — Everything is defensive — The starvation theory — The + anaconda — First interview with McClellan — Impressions of him — His + distrust of the volunteers — Not a Napoleon nor a Garibaldi — Mason + and Slidell — Seward admonishes Adams — Fremont goes overboard — The + pro-slavery party triumph — The collateral missions to + Europe — Peace impossible — Every Southern gentleman is a + pirate — When will we deal blows? — Inertia! inertia!</p> + + +<p>As in the medićval epoch, and some time thereafter, anatomists and +physiologists experimented on the living villeins, that is, on +peasantry, serfs, and called this process <i>experientia in anima vili</i>, +so this naďve administration experiments in civil and in military +matters on the people's life-blood.</p> + +<p>McClellan, stirred up by the fools and peacocks around him, has sent +to the War Department a project of a showy uniform for himself and his +staff. It would be to laugh at, if it were not insane. McClellan very +likely read not what he signed.</p> + +<p>The army is in sufficient rig and organization to take the field; but +nevertheless McClellan has not yet made a single movement imperatively +prescribed by the simplest tactics, and by the simplest common sense, +when the enemy is in front. Not a single serious reconnoissance to +ascertain the real force <span class="pagenum"><a id="page105" name="page105"></a>(p. 105)</span> of the enemy, to pierce through the +curtain behind which the rebels hide their real forces. It must be +conceded to the rebel generals that they show great skill in +humbugging us. Whenever we try to make a step we are met by a +seemingly strong force (tenfold increased by rumors spread by the +secessionists among us, and gulped by our stupidity), which makes us +suppose a deep front, and a still deeper body behind. And there is the +humbug, I am sure. If, on such an extensive line as the rebels occupy, +the main body should correspond to what they show in front, then the +rebel force must muster several hundreds of thousands. Such large +numbers they have not, and I am sure that four-fifths of their whole +force constitutes their vanguard, and behind it the main body is +chaff. The rebels treat us as if we were children.</p> + +<p>McClellan fortifies Washington; Fremont, St. Louis; Anderson asks for +engineers to fortify some spots in Kentucky. This is all a defensive +warfare, and not so will the rebel region be conquered. We lose time, +and time serves the rebels, as it increases their moral force. Every +day of their existence shows their intrinsic vitality.</p> + +<p>The theory of starving the rebels out is got up by imbeciles, wholly +ignorant of such matters; wholly ignorant of human nature; wholly +ignorant of the degree of energy, and of abnegation, which criminals +can display when firmly decided upon their purpose. This absurdity +comes from the celebrated anaconda Mississippi-Atlantic strategy.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page106" name="page106"></a>(p. 106)</span> Oh! When in Poland, in 1831, the military chiefs concentrated +all the forces in the fortifications of Warsaw, all was gone. Oh for a +dashing general, for a dashing purpose, in the councils of the White +House! The constitutional advisers are deaf to the voice of the +people, who know more about it than do all the departments and the +military wiseacres. The people look up to find as big brains and +hearts as are theirs, and hitherto the people have looked up in vain. +The radical senators, as a King, a Trumbull, a Wade, Wilson, Chandler, +Hale, etc., the true Republicans in the last session of +Congress—further, men as Wadsworth and the like, are the true +exponents of the character, of the clear insight, of the soundness of +the people.</p> + +<p>McClellan, and even the administration, seem not to realize that pure +military considerations cannot fulfil the imperative demands of the +political situation.</p> + +<p><i>October 6th.</i>—I met McClellan; had with him a protracted +conversation, and could look well into him. I do not attach any value +to physiognomies, and consider phrenology, craniology, and their +kindred, to be rather humbugs; but, nevertheless, I was struck with +the soft, insignificant inexpressiveness of his eyes and features. My +enthusiasm for him, my faith, is wholly extinct. All that he said to +me and to others present was altogether unmilitary and inexperienced. +It made me sick at heart to hear him, and to think that he is to +decide over the destinies and the blood of the people. And he +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page107" name="page107"></a>(p. 107)</span> already an idol, incensed, worshipped, before he did +anything whatever. McClellan may have individual courage, so has +almost every animal; but he has not the decision and the courage of a +military leader and captain. He has no real confidence in the troops; +has scarcely any idea how battles are fought; has no confidence in and +no notion of the use of the bayonet. I told him that, notwithstanding +his opinion, I would take his worst brigade of infantry, and after a +fortnight's drill challenge and whip any of the best rebel brigades.</p> + +<p>Some time ago it was reported that McClellan considered this war had +become a duel of artillery. Fools wondered and applauded. I then +protested against putting such an absurdity in McClellan's mouth; now +I must believe it. To be sure, every battle is in part a duel of +artillery, but ends or is decided by charges of infantry or cavalry. +Cannonading alone never constituted and decided a battle. No position +can be taken by cannonading alone, and shells alone do not always +force an enemy to abandon a position. Napoleon, an artillerist <i>par +excellence</i>, considered campaigns and battles to be something more +than duels of artillery. The great battle of Borodino, and all others, +were decided when batteries were stormed and taken. Eylau was a battle +of charges by cavalry and by infantry, besides a terrible cannonading, +etc., etc. McClellan spoke with pride of the fortifications of +Washington, and pointed to one of the forts as having a greater +profile than had the world-renowned <span class="pagenum"><a id="page108" name="page108"></a>(p. 108)</span> Malakoff. What a +confusion of notions, what a misappreciation of relative conditions!</p> + +<p>I cannot express my sad, mournful feelings, during this conversation +with McClellan. We spoke about the necessity of dividing his large +army into corps. McClellan took from the table an Army Almanac, and +pointed to the names of generals to whom he intended to give the +command of corps. He feels the urgency of the case, and said that Gen. +Scott prevented him from doing it; but as soon as he, McClellan, shall +be free to act, the division will be made. So General Scott is +everywhere to defend senile routine against progress, and the +experience of modern times.</p> + +<p>The rebels deserve, to the end of time, many curses from outraged +humanity. By their treason they forced upon the free institutions of +the North the necessity of curtailing personal liberty and other +rights; to make use of despotism for the sake of self-defence.</p> + +<p>The enemy concentrates and shortens his lines, and McClellan dares not +even tread on the enemy's heels. Instead of forcing the enemy to do +what we want, and upturn his schemes, McClellan seemingly does the +bidding of Beauregard. We advance as much as Beauregard allows us to +do. New tactics, to be sure, but at any rate not Napoleonic.</p> + +<p>The fighting in the West and some small successes here are obtained by +rough levies; and those imbecile, regular martinets surrounding +McClellan still nurse his distrust in the volunteers. All the +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page109" name="page109"></a>(p. 109)</span> wealth, energy, intellect of the country, is concentrated in +the hands of McClellan, and he uses it to throw up entrenchments. The +partisans of McClellan point to his highly scientific +preparations—his science. He may have some little of it, but +half-science is worse than thorough ignorance. Oh! for one dare-devil +in the Lyon, or in the old-fashioned Yankee style. McClellan is +neither a Napoleon, nor a Cabrera, nor a Garibaldi.</p> + +<p>Mason and Slidell escaped to Havana on their way to Europe, as +commissioners of the rebels. According to all international +definitions, we have the full right to seize them in any neutral +vessel, they being political contrabands of war going on a publicly +avowed errand hostile to their true government. Mason and Slidell are +not common passengers, nor are they political refugees invoking the +protection of any neutral flag. They are travelling commissioners of +war, of bloodshed and rebellion; and it is all the same in whatever +seaport they embark. And if the vessel conveying them goes from +America to Europe, or <i>vice versa</i>, Mr. Seward can let them be seized +when they have left Havana, provided he finds it expedient.</p> + +<p>We lose time, and time is all in favor of the rebels. Every day +consolidates their existence—so to speak, crystallizes them. +Further—many so-called Union men in the South, who, at the start, +opposed secession, by and by will get accustomed to it. Secession +daily takes deeper root, and will so by degrees become <i>un fait +accompli</i>.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page110" name="page110"></a>(p. 110)</span> Mr. Adams, in his official relations with the English +government, speaks of the rebel pirates as of lawful privateers. Mr. +Seward admonished him for it. Bravo!</p> + +<p>It is so difficult, not to say impossible, to meet an American who +concatenates a long series of effects and causes, or who understands +that to explain an isolated fact or phenomenon the chain must be +ascended and a general law invoked. Could they do it, various +bunglings would be avoided, and much of the people's sacrifices +husbanded, instead of being squandered, as it is done now.</p> + +<p>Fremont going overboard! His fall will be the triumph of the +pro-slavery party, headed by the New York Herald, and supported by +military old fogies, by martinets, and by double and triple political +and intellectual know-nothings. Pity that Fremont had no brilliant +military capacity. Then his fall could not have taken place.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward is too much ruled by his imagination, and too hastily +discounts the future. But imagination ruins a statesman. Mr. Seward +must lose credit at home and abroad for having prophesied, and having +his prophecies end in smoke. When Hatteras was taken (Gen. Scott +protested against the expedition), Mr. S. assured me that it was the +beginning of the end. A diplomat here made the observation that no +minister of a European parliamentary government could remain in power +after having been continually contradicted by facts.</p> + +<p>Now, Mr. Seward devised these collateral missions <span class="pagenum"><a id="page111" name="page111"></a>(p. 111)</span> to Europe. +He very little knows the habit and temper of European cabinets if he +believes that such collateral confidential agents can do any good. The +European cabinets distrust such irresponsible agents, who, in their +turn, weaken the influence and the standing of the genuine diplomatic +agents. Mr. S., early in the year, boasted to abolish, even in Europe, +the system of passports, and soon afterwards introduced it at home. So +his imagination carries him to overhaul the world. He proposes to +European powers a united expedition to Japan, and we cannot prevent at +home the running of the blockade, and are ourselves blockaded on the +Potomac. All such schemes are offsprings of an ambitious imagination. +But the worst is, that every such outburst of his imagination Mr. +Seward at once transforms into a dogma, and spreads it with all his +might. I pity him when I look towards the end of his political career. +He writes well, and has put down the insolent English dispatch +concerning the <i>habeas corpus</i> and the arrests of dubious, if not +treacherous, Englishmen. Perhaps Seward imagines himself to be a +Cardinal Richelieu, with Lincoln for Louis XIII. (provided he knows as +much history), or may be he has the ambition to be considered a +Talleyrand or Metternich of diplomacy. But if any, he has some very, +very faint similarity with Alberoni. He easily outwits here men around +him; most are politicians as he; but he never can outwit the statesmen +of Europe. Besides, diplomacy, above all that of great <span class="pagenum"><a id="page112" name="page112"></a>(p. 112)</span> +powers, is conceived largely and carried on a grand scale; the present +diplomacy has outgrown what is commonly called (but fallaciously) +Talleyrandism and Metternichism.</p> + +<p>McClellan and the party which fears to make a bold advance on the +enemy make so much fuss about the country being cut up and wooded; it +proves only that they have no brains and no fertility of expedients. +This country is not more cut up than is the Caucasus, and the woods +are no great, endless, primitive forests. They are rather groves. In +the Caucasus the Russians continually attack great and dense forests; +they fire in them several round shots, then grape, and then storm them +with the bayonet; and the Circassians are no worse soldiers than are +the Southrons.</p> + +<p>European papers talk much of mediation, of a peaceful arrangement, of +compromise. By intuition of the future the Northern people know very +well the utter impossibility of such an arrangement. A peace could not +stand; any such peace will establish the military superiority of the +arrogant, reckless, piratical South. The South would teem with +hundreds of thousands of men ready for any piratical, fillibustering +raid, enterprise, or excursion, of which the free States north and +west would become the principal theatres. Such a marauding community +as the South would become, in case of success, will be unexampled in +history. The Cylician pirates, the Barbary robbers, nay, the Tartars +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page113" name="page113"></a>(p. 113)</span> of the 12th, 13th, and 14th centuries, were virtuous and +civilized in comparison with what would be an independent, +man-stealing, and man-whipping Southern agglomeration of lawless men. +The free States could have no security, even if <i>all</i> the thus +<i>called</i> gentlemen and men of honor were to sign a treaty or a +compromise. The Southern pestilential influence would poison not only +the North, but this whole hemisphere. The history of the past has +nothing to be compared with organized, legal piracy, as would become +the thus-called Southern chivalry on land and on sea; and soon +European maritime powers would be obliged to make costly expeditions +for the sake of extirpating, crushing, uprooting the nest of pirates, +which then will embrace about twelve millions,—<i>every</i> Southern +gentleman being a pirate at heart.</p> + +<p>This is what the Northern people know by experience and by intuition, +and what makes the people so uneasy about the inertia of the +administration.</p> + +<p>Mr. Lincoln, Mr. Seward, Gen. Scott, and other great men, are soured +against the people and public opinion for distrusting, or rather for +criticising their little display of statesmanlike activity. How +unjust! As a general rule, of all human sentiments, confidence is the +most scrutinizing one. If <i>confidence</i> is bestowed, it wants to +perfectly know the <i>why</i>. But from the outset of this war the American +people gave and give to everybody full, unsuspecting confidence, +without asking the why, without <span class="pagenum"><a id="page114" name="page114"></a>(p. 114)</span> even scrutinizing the +actions which were to justify the claim.</p> + +<p>Up to this day Secesh is the positive pole; the Union is the +negative,—it is the blow recipient. When, oh, when will come the +opposite? When will we deal blows? Not under McClellan, I suspect.</p> + + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page115" name="page115"></a>(p. 115)</span> NOVEMBER, 1861.</h3> + + +<p class="resume">Ball's Bluff — Whitewashing — "Victoria! Old Scott gone + overboard!" — His fatal influence — His + conceit — Cameron — Intervention — More reviews — Weed, Everett, + Hughes — Gov. Andrew — Boutwell — Mason and Slidell caught — Lincoln + frightened by the South Carolina success — Waits unnoticed in + McClellan's library — Gen. Thomas — Traitors and pedants — The + Virginia campaign — West Point — McClellan's speciality — When will + they begin to see through him?</p> + + +<p>The season is excellent for military operations, such as any Napoleon +could wish it. And we, lying not on our oars or arms, but in our beds, +as our <i>spes patrić</i> is warmly and cosily established in a large +house, receiving there the incense and salutations of all flunkeys. +Even cabinet ministers crowd McClellan's antechambers!</p> + +<p>The massacre at Ball's Bluff is the work either of treason, or of +stupidity, or of cowardice, or most probably of all three united.</p> + +<p>No European government and no European nation would thus coolly bear +it. Any commander culpable of such stupidity would be forever +disgraced, and dismissed from the army. Here the administration, the +Cabinet, and all the Scotts, the McClellans, the Thomases, etc., +strain their brains and muscles to whitewash themselves or the +culprit—to represent this massacre as something very innocent.</p> + +<p>Victoria! Victoria! Old Scott, Old Mischief, gone <span class="pagenum"><a id="page116" name="page116"></a>(p. 116)</span> overboard! +So vanished one of the two evil genii keeping guard over Mr. Lincoln's +brains. But it will not be so easy to redress the evil done by Scott. +He nailed the country's cause to such a turnpike that any of his +successors will perhaps be unable to undo what Old Mischief has done. +Scott might have had certain, even eminent, military capacity; but, +all things considered, he had it only on a small scale. Scott never +had in his hand large numbers, and hundreds of European generals of +divisions would do the same that Scott did, even in Mexico. Any one in +Europe, who in some way or other participated in the events of the +last forty years, has had occasion to see or participate in one single +day in more and better fighting, to hear more firing, and smell more +powder, than has General Scott in his whole life.</p> + +<p>Scott's fatal influence palsied, stiffened, and poisoned every noble +or higher impulse, and every aspiration of the people. Scott +diligently sowed the first seeds of antagonism between volunteers and +regulars, and diligently nursed them. Around his person in the War +Department, and in the army, General Scott kept and maintained +officers, who, already before the inauguration, declared, and daily +asserted, that if it comes to a war, few officers of the army will +unite with the North and remain loyal to the Union.</p> + +<p>He never forgot to be a Virginian, and was filled with all a +Virginian's conceit. To the last hour he warded off blows aimed at +Virginia. To this hour <span class="pagenum"><a id="page117" name="page117"></a>(p. 117)</span> he never believed in a serious war, +and now <i>requiescat in pace</i> until the curse of coming generations.</p> + +<p>McClellan is invested with all the powers of Scott. McClellan has more +on his shoulders than any man—a Napoleon not excepted—can stand; and +with his very limited capacity McClellan must necessarily break under +it. Now McClellan will be still more idolized. He is already a kind of +dictator, as Lincoln, Seward, etc., turn around him.</p> + +<p>In a conversation with Cameron, I warned him against bestowing such +powers on McClellan. "What shall we do?" was Cameron's answer; +"neither the President nor I know anything about military affairs." +Well, it is true; but McClellan is scarcely an apprentice.</p> + +<p>Again the intermittent fear, or fever, of foreign intervention. How +absurd! Americans belittle themselves talking and thinking about it. +The European powers will not, and cannot. That is my creed and my +answer; but some of our agents, diplomats, and statesmen, try to made +capital for themselves from this fever which they evoke to establish +before the public that their skill preserves the country from foreign +intervention. Bosh!</p> + +<p>All the good and useful produced in the life and in the economy of +nations, all the just and the right in their institutions, all the ups +and downs, misfortunes and disasters befalling them, all this was, is, +and forever will be the result of logical deductions <span class="pagenum"><a id="page118" name="page118"></a>(p. 118)</span> from +pre-existing dates and facts. And here almost everybody forgets the +yesterday.</p> + +<p>A revolution imposes obligations. A revolution makes imperative the +development and the practical application of those social principles +which are its basis.</p> + +<p>The American Revolution of 1776 proclaimed self-government, equality +before all, happiness of all, etc.; it is therefore the peremptory +duty of the American people to uproot domestic oligarchy, based upon +living on the labor of an enslaved man; it has to put a stop to the +moral, intellectual, and physical servitude of both, of whites and of +colored.</p> + +<p>Eminent men in America are taunted with the ambition to reach the +White House. In itself it is not condemnable; it is a noble or an +ignoble ambition, according to the ways and means used to reach that +aim. It is great and stirring to see one's name recorded in the list +of Presidents of the United States; but there is still a record far +shorter, but by far more to be envied—a record venerated by our +race—it is the record of truly <i>great men</i>. The actually inscribed +runners for the White House do not think of this.</p> + +<p>No one around me here seems to understand (and no one is familiar +enough with general history) that protracted wars consolidate a +nationality. Every day of Southern existence shapes it out more and +more into a <i>nation</i>, with all the necessary moral and material +conditions of existence.</p> + +<p>Seeing these repeated reviews, I cannot get rid of <span class="pagenum"><a id="page119" name="page119"></a>(p. 119)</span> the idea +that by such shows and displays McClellan tries to frighten the rebels +in the Chinaman fashion.</p> + +<p>The collateral missions to England, France, and Spain, are to add +force to our cause before the public opinion as well as before the +rulers. But what a curious choice of men! It would be called even an +unhappy one. Thurlow Weed, with his offhand, apparently sincere, if +not polished ways, may not be too repulsive to English refinement, +provided he does not buttonhole his interlocutionists, or does not pat +them on the shoulder. So Thurlow Weed will be dined, wined, etc. But +doubtless the London press will show him up, or some "Secesh" in +London will do it. I am sure that Lord Lyons, as it is his paramount +duty, has sent to Earl Russell a full and detailed biography of this +Seward's <i>alter ego</i>, sent <i>ad latus</i> to Mr. Adams. Thurlow Weed will +be considered an agreeable fellow; but he never can acquire much +weight and consideration, neither with the statesmen, nor with the +members of the government, nor in saloons, nor with the public at +large.</p> + +<p>Edward Everett begged to be excused from such a false position offered +to him in London. Not fish, not flesh. It was rather an offence to +proffer it to Everett. The old patriot better knows Europe, its +cabinets, and exigencies, than those who attempted to intricate him in +this ludicrous position. He is right, and he will do more good here +than he could do in London—there on a level with Thurlow Weed!</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page120" name="page120"></a>(p. 120)</span> Archbishop Hughes is to influence Paris and France,—but +whom? The public opinion, which is on our side, is anti-Roman, and +Hughes is an Ultra Montane—an opinion not over friendly to Louis +Napoleon. The French clergy in every way, in culture, wisdom, +instruction, theology, manners, deportment, etc., is superior to +Hughes in incalculable proportions, and the French clergy are already +generally anti-slavery. Hughes to act on Louis Napoleon! Why! the +French Emperor can outwit a legion of Hugheses, and do this without +the slightest effort. Besides, for more than a century European +sovereigns, governments, and cabinets, have generally given up the use +of bishops, etc., for political, public, or confidential missions. Mr. +Seward stirs up old dust. All the liberal party in Europe or France +will look astonished, if not worse, at this absurdity.</p> + +<p>All things considered, it looks like one of Seward's personal tricks, +and Seward outwitted Chase, took him in by proffering a similar +mission to Chase's friend, Bishop McIlvaine. But I pity Dayton. He is +a high-toned man, and the mission of Hughes is a humiliation to +Dayton.</p> + +<p>Whatever may be the objects of these missions, they look like petty +expedients, unworthy a minister of a great government.</p> + +<p>Mason and Slidell caught. England will roar, but here the people are +satisfied. Some of the diplomats make curious faces. Lord Lyons +behaves <span class="pagenum"><a id="page121" name="page121"></a>(p. 121)</span> with dignity. The small Bremen flatter right and +left, and do it like little lap-dogs.</p> + +<p>Governor Andrew of Massachusetts, ex-Governor Boutwell, are tip-top +men—men of the people. The Blairs are too heinous, too violent, in +their persecution of Fremont. Warned M. Blair not to protect one whom +Fremont deservedly expelled. But M. Blair, in his spite against +Fremont, took a mean adventurer by the hand, and entangled therein the +President.</p> + +<p>The vessel and the crew are excellent, and would easily obey the hand +of a helmsman, but there is the rub, where to find him? Lincoln is a +simple man of the prairie, and his eyes penetrate not the fog, the +tempest. They do not perceive the signs of the times—cannot embrace +the horizon of the nation. And thus his small intellectual insight is +dimmed by those around him. Lincoln begins now already to believe that +he is infallible; that he is ahead of the people, and frets that the +people may remain behind. Oh simplicity or conceit!</p> + +<p>Again, Lincoln is frightened with the success in South Carolina, as in +his opinion this success will complicate the question of slavery. He +is frightened as to what he shall do with Charleston and Augusta, +provided these cities are taken.</p> + +<p>It is disgusting to hear with what superciliousness the different +members of the Cabinet speak of the approaching Congress—and not one +of them is in any way the superior of many congressmen.</p> + +<p>When Congress meets, the true national balance <span class="pagenum"><a id="page122" name="page122"></a>(p. 122)</span> account will +be struck. The commercial and piratical flag of the secesh is +virtually in all waters and ports. (The little cheese-eater, the +Hollander, was the first to raise a fuss against the United States +concerning the piratical flag. This is not to be forgotten.) 2d. +Prestige, to a great extent, lost. 3d. Millions upon millions wasted. +Washington besieged and blockaded, and more than 200,000 men kept in +check by an enemy not by half as strong. 4th. Every initiative which +our diplomacy tried abroad was wholly unsuccessful, and we are obliged +to submit to new international principles inaugurated at our cost; +and, summing up, instead of a broad, decided, general policy, we have +vacillation, inaction, tricks, and expedients. The people fret, and so +will the Congress. Nations are as individuals; any partial disturbance +in a part of the body occasions a general chill. Nature makes efforts +to check the beginning of disease, and so do nations. In the human +organism nature does not submit willingly to the loss of health, or of +a limb, or of life. Nature struggles against death. So the people of +the Union will not submit to an amputation, and is uneasy to see how +unskilfully its own family doctors treat the national disease.</p> + +<p>Port Royal, South Carolina, taken. Great and general rejoicing. It is +a brilliant feat of arms, but a questionable military and war policy. +Those attacks on the circumference, or on extremities, never can +become a death-blow to secesh. The rebels must be crushed in the +focus; they ought to <span class="pagenum"><a id="page123" name="page123"></a>(p. 123)</span> receive a blow at the heart. This new +strategy seems to indicate that McClellan has not heart enough to +attack the fastnesses of rebeldom, but expects that something may turn +up from these small expeditions. He expects to weaken the rebels in +their focus. I wish McClellan may be right in his expectations, but I +doubt it.</p> + +<p>Officers of McClellan's staff tell that Mr. Lincoln almost daily comes +into McClellan's library, and sits there rather unnoticed. On several +occasions McClellan let the President wait in the room, together with +other common mortals.</p> + +<p>The English statesmen and the English press have the notion deeply +rooted in their brains that the American people fight for empire. The +rebels do it, but not the free men.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward's emphatical prohibition to Mr. Adams to mention the +question of slavery may have contributed to strengthen in England the +above-mentioned fallacy. This is a blunder, which before long or short +Seward will repent. It looks like astuteness—<i>ruse</i>; but if so, it is +the resource of a rather limited mind. In great and minor affairs, +straightforwardness is the best policy. Loyalty always gets the better +of astuteness, and the more so when the opponent is unprepared to meet +it. Tricks can be well met by tricks, but tricks are impotent against +truth and sincerity. But Mr. Seward, unhappily, has spent his life in +various political tricks, and was surrounded by men whose intimacy +must have necessarily lowered and unhealthily affected him. All +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page124" name="page124"></a>(p. 124)</span> his most intimates are unintellectual mediocrities or +tricksters.</p> + +<p>Seward is free from that infamous know-nothingism of which this Gen. +Thomas is the great master (a man every few weeks accused of treason +by the public opinion, and undoubtedly vibrating between loyalty here +and sympathy with rebels).</p> + +<p>All this must have unavoidably vitiated Mr. Seward's better nature. In +such way only can I see plainly why so many excellent qualities are +marred in him. He at times can broadly comprehend things around him; +he is good-natured when not stung, and he is devoted to his men.</p> + +<p>As a patriot, he is American to the core—were only his domestic +policy straightforward and decided, and would he only stop meddling +with the plans of the campaign, and let the War Department alone.</p> + +<p>Since every part of his initiative with European cabinets failed, +Seward very skilfully dispatches all the minor affairs with +Europe—affairs generated by various maritime and international +complications. Were his domestic policy as correct as is now his +foreign policy, Seward would be the right man.</p> + +<p>Statesmanship emerges from the collision of great principles with +important interests. In the great Revolution, the thus called fathers +of the nation were the offsprings of the exigencies of the time, and +they were fully up to their task. They were vigorous and fresh; their +intellect was not obstructed by any political routine, or by tricky +political praxis. Such men are now needed at the helm to <span class="pagenum"><a id="page125" name="page125"></a>(p. 125)</span> +carry this noble people throughout the most terrible tempest. So in +these days one hears so much about constitutional formulas as +safeguards of liberty. True liberty is not to be virtually secured by +any framework of rules and limitations, devisable only by statecraft. +The perennial existence of liberty depends not on the action of any +definite and ascertainable machinery, but on continual accessions of +fresh and vital influences. But perhaps such influences are among the +noblest, and therefore among the rarest, attributes of man.</p> + +<p>Abroad and here, traitors and some pedants on formulas make a noise +concerning the violation of formulas. Of course it were better if such +violations had been left undone. But all this is transient, and evoked +by the direst necessity. The Constitution was made for a healthy, +normal condition of the nation; the present condition is abnormal. +Regular functions are suspended. When the human body is ruined or +devoured by a violent disease, often very tonic remedies are +used—remedies which would destroy the organism if administered when +in a healthy, normal condition. A strong organism recovers from +disease, and from its treatment. Human societies and institutions pass +through a similar ordeal, and when they are unhinged, extraordinary +and abnormal ways are required to maintain the endangered society and +restore its equipoise.</p> + +<p>Examining day after day the map of Virginia, it strikes one that a +movement with half of the army could be made down from Mount Vernon by +the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page126" name="page126"></a>(p. 126)</span> two turnpike roads, and by water to Occoquan, and from +there to Brentsville. The country there seems to be flat, and not much +wooded. Manassas would be taken in the rear, and surrounded, provided +the other half of the army would push on by the direct way from here +to Manassas, and seriously attack the enemy, who thus would be broken, +could not escape. This, or any plan, the map of Virginia ought to +suggest to the staff of McClellan, were it a staff in the true +meaning. Dybitsch and Toll, young colonels in the staff of Alexander +I., 1813-'14, originated the march on Paris, so destructive to +Napoleon. History bristles with evidences how with staffs originated +many plans of battles and of campaigns; history explains the paramount +influence of staffs on the conduct of a war. Of course Napoleon wanted +not a suggestive, but only an executive staff; but McClellan is not a +Napoleon, and has neither a suggestive nor an executive staff around +him. A Marcy to suggest a plan of a campaign or of a battle, to watch +over its execution!</p> + +<p>I spoke to McDowell about the positions of Occoquan and Brentsville. +He answered that perhaps something similar will be under +consideration, and that McClellan must show his mettle and capacity. I +pity McDowell's confidence.</p> + +<p>Besides, the American army as it was and is educated, nursed, brought +up by Gen. Scott,—the army has no idea what are the various and +complicated duties of a staff. No school of staff at West Point; +therefore the difficulty to find now genuine officers <span class="pagenum"><a id="page127" name="page127"></a>(p. 127)</span> of the +staff. If McClellan ever moves this army, then the defectiveness of +his staff may occasion losses and even disasters. It will be worse +with his staff than it was at Jena with the Prussian staff, who were +as conceited as the small West Point clique here in Washington.</p> + +<p>West Point instructs well in special branches, but does not +necessarily form generals and captains. The great American Revolution +was fought and made victorious by men not from any military schools, +and to whom were opposed commanders with as much military science as +there was possessed and current in Europe. Jackson, Taylor, and even +Scott, are not from the school.</p> + +<p>I do not wish to judge or disparage the pupils from West Point, but I +am disgusted with the supercilious and ridiculous behavior of the +clique here, ready to form prćtorians or anything else, and poisoning +around them the public opinion. Western generals are West Point +pupils, but I do not hear them make so much fuss, and so +contemptuously look down on the volunteers. These Western generals +pine not after regulars, but make use of such elements as they have +under hand. The best and most patriotic generals and officers here, +educated at West Point, are numerous. Unhappily a clique, composed of +a few fools and fops, overshadows the others.</p> + +<p>McClellan's speciality is engineering. It is a speciality which does +not form captains and generals for the field,—at least such instances +are very rare. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page128" name="page128"></a>(p. 128)</span> Of all Napoleon's marshals and eminent +commanders, Berthier alone was educated as engineer, and his +speciality and high capacity was that of a chief of the staff. +Marescott or Todleben would never claim to be captains. The +intellectual powers of an engineer are modeled, drilled, turned +towards the defensive,—the engineer's brains concentrate upon +selecting defensive positions, and combine how to strengthen them by +art. So an engineer is rather disabled from embracing a whole +battle-field, with its endless casualties and space. Engineers are the +incarnation of a defensive warfare; all others, as artillerists, +infantry, and cavalry, are for dashing into the unknown—into the +space; and thus these specialities virtually represent the offensive +warfare.</p> + +<p>When will they begin to see through McClellan, and find out that he is +not the man? Perhaps too late, and then the nation will sorely feel +it.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward almost idolizes McClellan. Poor homage that; but it does +mischief by reason of its influence on the public opinion.</p> + + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page129" name="page129"></a>(p. 129)</span> DECEMBER, 1861.</h3> + +<p class="resume">The message — Emancipation — State papers published — Curtis + Noyes — Greeley not fit for Senator — Generalship all on the rebel + side — The South and the North — The sensationists — The new idol + will cost the people their life-blood! — The Blairs — Poor + Lincoln! — The Trent affair — Scott home again — The war + investigation committee — Mr. Mercier.</p> + + +<p>McClellan is now all-powerful, and refuses to divide the army into +corps. Thus much for his brains and for his consistency.</p> + +<p>The message—a disquisition upon labor and capital; hesitancy about +slavery. The President wishes to be pushed on by public opinion. But +public opinion is safe, and expects from the official leader a decided +step onwards. The message gives no solution, suggests none, accounts +not for the lost time—foreshadows not a vigorous, energetic effort to +crush the rebellion; foreshadows not a vigorous, offensive war. The +message is an honest paper, but says not much.</p> + +<p>The question of emancipation is not clear even in the heads of the +leading emancipationists; not one thinks to give freeholds to the +emancipated. It is the only way to make them useful to themselves and +to the community. Freedom without land is humbug, and the fools speak +of exportation of the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page130" name="page130"></a>(p. 130)</span> four millions of slaves, depriving +thus the country of laborers, which a century of emigration cannot +fill again. All these fools ought to be sent to a lunatic asylum.</p> + +<p>To export the emancipated would be equivalent to devastation of the +South, to its transformation into a wilderness. Small freeholds for +the emancipated can be cut out of the plantations of rebels, or out of +the public lands of each State—lands forfeited by the rebellion.</p> + +<p>State papers published. The instructions to the various diplomatic +agents betray a beginner in the diplomatic career. By writing special +instructions for each minister, Mr. Seward unnecessarily increased his +task. The cause, reasons, etc., of the rebellion are one and the same +for France or Russia, and a single explanatory circular for all the +ministers would have done as well and spared a great deal of labor. +Cavour wrote one circular to all cabinets, and so do all European +statesmen. So, as they are, the State papers are a curious +agglomeration of good patriotism and confusion. So the Minister to +England is to avoid slavery; the Minister to France has the contrary. +All this is not smartness or diplomacy, but rather confusion, +insincerity, and double-dealing. One must conclude that Lincoln and +Seward have themselves no firm opinion. The instructions to Mexico +would sound nobly-worded but for the confusion and the veil ordered to +be thrown upon the cause of secession. That to Italy, above all to +Austria, has a smack of a schoolmaster <span class="pagenum"><a id="page131" name="page131"></a>(p. 131)</span> displaying his +information before a gaping boy. It is offensive to the Minister going +to Vienna. It may be suspected that some of these instructions were +written to make capital at home, to astonish Mr. Lincoln with the +knowledge of Europe and the familiarity with European affairs. All +this display will prove to Europeans rather an ignorance of Europe. +The correspondence on the Paris convention is splendid, although the +initiative taken by Seward on this question was a mistake. But he +argued well the case against the English and French reservations.</p> + +<p>Never any government whatever treated so tenderly its worst and most +dangerous enemies as does this government the Washington +secessionists, spies for the enemy, and spreading false news here to +frighten McClellan.</p> + +<p>The old regular, but partly worn-out Republican leaders throttle and +neutralize the new, fresh, vigorous accessions. So Curtis Noyes, one +of the most eminent and devoted men, could not come into the Senate +because Greeley wished to be elected.</p> + +<p>No living man has rendered greater services to the people during the +last twenty years than Greeley; but he ought to remain in his +speciality. Greeley is no more fit for a Senator than to take the +command of a regiment. Besides, the events already run over his head; +Greeley is slowly breaking down.</p> + +<p>McClellan is beset with all kinds of inventors, contractors, etc. He +mostly endorses their suggestions, and on this authority the most +extravagant <span class="pagenum"><a id="page132" name="page132"></a>(p. 132)</span> orders are given by the War Department. All this +ought to be investigated. Somebody back of McClellan may be found as +being the real patron of these leeches.</p> + +<p>If the genius or capacity of a commander consists not only in closely +observing the movements of the enemy, but likewise in penetrating the +enemy's plans and in modifying his own in proportion as they are +deranged by an unexpected movement or a rapid march, then the +generalship is altogether on the other side, and on ours not a sign, +not a breath of it.</p> + +<p>A civil war is mostly the purifying fire in a nation's existence. It +is to be hoped that this great convulsion will purify the free States +by sounding the death-knell of these small intriguing politicians. The +American people at large will acquire earnestness, knowledge of men, +and clear insight into its own affairs. Tricky politicians will be +discarded, and true men backed by majorities.</p> + +<p>The South has for its leaders the chiefs who for years organized the +secession, who waged everything on its success, as life, honor, +fortune, and who incite and carry with them the ignorant masses.</p> + +<p>The reverse is in the North. Mr. Lincoln was not elected for +suppressing the rebellion, nor did he make his Cabinet in view of a +terrible national struggle for death or life. Neither Lincoln nor his +Cabinet are the inciters or the inspiring leaders of the people, but +only expressions—not <i>ad hoc</i>—of the national will. This is one +reason why the administration <span class="pagenum"><a id="page133" name="page133"></a>(p. 133)</span> is slower than the people, and +why the rebel administration is quicker than ours.</p> + +<p>The second reason, and generated by the first, is, that every rebel +devotes his whole soul and energy to the success of the rebellion, +forcibly forgetting his individuality. Our thus called leaders think +first of their little selves, whose aggrandizement the public events +are to secure, and the public cause is to square itself with their +individual schemes.</p> + +<p>Such is the policy of almost all those at the helm here. Not one among +them is to be found deserving the name of a statesman, endowed with a +great devotion, and with a great power, for the service of a great and +noble aim. From the solemn hour that the fatherland honorably chains +him to its service, the genuine statesman exists no more for himself, +but for his country alone. If necessary, he ought to consider himself +a victim to the public good, even were the public unjust towards him. +He is to treat as enemies all the dirty, tricky, and mean passions and +men. His enemies will hate, but the country, his enemies included, +will esteem him. Such a man will be the genuine man of the American +people, but he exists not in the official spheres.</p> + +<p>It is for the first time in history that a young, insignificant man, +without a past, without any reason, is put in such a lofty position as +has been McClellan; he is to be literally kicked into greatness, and +into showing eventually courage. All this is a psychological problem!</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page134" name="page134"></a>(p. 134)</span> Kent's Commentary upon the qualifications of a President is +the best criticism upon Lincoln.</p> + +<p>These mosquitoes of public opinion, the sensation-seekers, the +sentimental preachers, the lecturers, the amateurs of the thus called +representative men, these oratorical falsifiers of history, but +considered here as luminaries, are already at their pernicious, nay, +accursed work.</p> + +<p>They poison the judgment of the people. These hero-seekers for their +sermons, lectures, and sensation productions, have already found all +the criteria of a hero in McClellan, even in his chin, in the back of +his horse, etc., etc., and now herald it all over the country. Curses +be upon them.</p> + +<p>No nation has ever raised idols with such facility as do the +Americans. Nay, I do not suppose that there ever existed in history a +nation with such a thirst for idols as this people. I may be a false +prophet; but this new idol, McClellan, will cost them their +life-blood.</p> + +<p>The Blairs are now staunch supporters of McClellan. It is +unpardonable. They ought to know, and they do know better. But Mr. +Blair wishes to be Secretary of War in Cameron's place, and wishes to +get it through McClellan.</p> + +<p>And poor Lincoln! I pity him; but his advisers may make out of him +something worse even than was Judas, in the curses of ages.</p> + +<p>Polybius asserts that when the Greeks wrote about Rome they erred and +lied, and when the Romans wrote of themselves they lied or boasted. +The same <span class="pagenum"><a id="page135" name="page135"></a>(p. 135)</span> the English do in relation to themselves, and to +Americans. Above all, in this Trent affair, or excitement, all +European writers for the press, professors, doctors, etc., pervert +facts, reason, and international laws, forget the past, and lie or +flatter, with a slight exception, as is Gasparin.</p> + +<p>The Trent affair finished. We are a little humbled, but it was +expedient to terminate it so. With another military leader than +McClellan, we could march at the same time to Richmond, and invest +Canada before any considerable English force could arrive there. But +with such a hero at our head, better that it ends so. Europe will +applaud us, and the relation with England will become clarified. +Perhaps England would not have been so stiff in this Trent affair but +for the fixed idea in Russell's, Newcastle's, Palmerston's, etc., +heads that Seward wishes to pick a quarrel with England.</p> + +<p>The first weeks of Seward's premiership pointed that way. Mr. Seward +has the honors of the Trent affair. It is well as it is; the argument +is smart, but a little too long, and not in a genuine diplomatic +style. But Lincoln ought to have a little credit for it, as from the +start he was for giving the traitors up.</p> + +<p>The worst feature of the whole Trent affair is, that it brought back +home from France this old mischief, General Scott. He will again +resume his position as the first military authority in the country, +confuse the judgment of Lincoln, of the press, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page136" name="page136"></a>(p. 136)</span> and of the +people, and again push the country into mire.</p> + +<p>The Congress appointed a War Investigating Committee, Senator Wade at +the head. There is hope that the committee will quickly find out what +a terrible mistake this McClellan is, and warn the nation of him. But +Lincoln, Seward, and the Blairs, will not give up their idol.</p> + +<p>Louis Napoleon said his word about the Trent affair. All things +considered, the conduct of the Emperor cannot be complained of. The +Thouvenel paper is serious, severe, but intrinsically not unfriendly. +Quite the contrary. Up to this time I am right in my reliance on Louis +Napoleon, on his sound, cool, but broad comprehension.</p> + +<p>Mr. Mercier behaves well, and he is to be relied on, provided we show +mettle and fight the traitors. Now, as the European imbroglio is +clarified, <i>at them</i>, <i>at them</i>! But nothing to hope or expect from +McClellan. I daily preach, but in the wilderness. Prince de Joinville +made a very ridiculous fuss about the Trent affair.</p> + +<p>Americans believe that a statesman must be an orator. Schoolboy-like, +they judge on English precedents. In England, the Parliament is +omnipotent; it makes and unmakes administrations, therefore oratory is +a necessary corollary in a statesman; but here the Cabinet acts +without parliamentary wranglings, and a Jackson is the true type of an +American statesman. Washington was not an orator, nor was Alexander +Hamilton.</p> + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page137" name="page137"></a>(p. 137)</span> JANUARY, 1862.</h3> + +<p class="resume">The year 1861 ends badly — European defenders of + slavery — Secession lies — Jeremy + Diddlers — Sensation-seekers — Despotic tendencies — Atomistic + Torquemadas — Congress chained by formulas — Burnside's expedition + a sign of life — Will this McClellan ever advance? — Mr. Adams + unhorsed — He packs his trunks — Bad blankets — Austria, Prussia, + and Russia — The West Point nursery — McClellan a greater mistake + than Scott — Tracks to the White House — European stories about Mr. + Lincoln — The English ignorami — The slaveholder a scarcely + varnished savage — Jeff. Davis — "Beauregard frightens + us — McClellan rocks his baby" — Fancy army equipment — McClellan + and his chief of staff sick in bed — "No satirist could invent + such things" — Stanton in the Cabinet — "This Stanton is the + people" — Fremont — Weed — The English will not be humbugged — Dayton + in a fret — Beaufort — The investigating committee condemn + McClellan — Lincoln in the clutches of Seward and Blair — Banks + begs for guns and cavalry in vain — The people will awake! — The + question of race — Agassiz.</p> + + +<p>An ugly year ended in backing before England, having, at least, +relative right on our side. Further, the ending year has revealed a +certain incapacity in the Republican party's leaders, at least its +official leaders, to administer the country and to grasp the events. +If the new year shall be only the continuation of the faults, the +mistakes, and the incapacities prevailing during 1861, then the worst +is to be expected.</p> + +<p>The lowest in moral degradation is an European defending slavery here +or in Europe. Such Europeans <span class="pagenum"><a id="page138" name="page138"></a>(p. 138)</span> are far below the condemned +criminals. Still lower are such Europeans who become defenders of +slavery after having visited plantations, where, in the shape of wines +and delicacies, they tasted human blood, and then, hyenas-like, +smacked their lips And thirsted for more.</p> + +<p>Always the same stories, lies, and humbugs concerning the hundreds of +thousands of rebels in Manassas. These lies are spread here in +Washington by the numerous secessionists—at large, by such ignoble +sheets as the New York Herald and Times; and McClellan seems to +willingly swallow these lies, as they justify his inaction and c——.</p> + +<p>The city is more and more crowded with Jeremy Diddlers, with +lecturers, with sensation-seekers, all of them in advance discounting +their hero, and showing in broad light their gigantic stupidity. One +of this motley finds in McClellan a Norman chin, the other muscle, the +third a brow for laurels (of thistle I hope), another a square, +military, heroic frame, another firmness in lips, another an +unfathomed depth in the eye, etc., etc. Never I heard in Europe such +balderdash. And the ladies—not the women and gentlewomen—are worse +than the men in thus stupefying themselves and those around them.</p> + +<p>The thus called arbitrary acts of the government prove how easily, on +the plea of patriotic necessity, a people, nay, the public opinion, +submits to arbitrary rule. All this, servility included, explains the +facility with which, in former times, concentrated and concrete +despotisms have been established. Here <span class="pagenum"><a id="page139" name="page139"></a>(p. 139)</span> every such arbitrary +action is submitted to, because it is so new, and because the people +has the childish, naďve, but, to it, honorable confidence, that the +power entrusted by the people is used in the interest and for the +welfare of the people. But all the despots of all times and of all +nations said the same. However, in justice to Mr. Lincoln, he is pure, +and has no despotical longings, but he has around him some atomistic +Torquemadas.</p> + +<p>It will be very difficult to the coming generations to believe that a +people, a generation, who for half a century was outrunning the time, +who applied the steam and the electro-magnetic telegraph, that the +same people, when overrun by a terrible crisis, moved slowly, waited +patiently, and suffered from the mismanagement of its leaders. This is +to be exclusively explained by the youthful self-consciousness of an +internal, inexhaustible vital force, and by the child-like +inexperience.</p> + +<p>The Congress, that is, the majority, shows that it is aware of the +urgency of the case, and of the dangerous position of the country. But +still the best in Congress are chained, hampered by the formulas.</p> + +<p>The good men in both the houses seem to be firmly decided not to +quietly stand by and assist in the murder of the nation by the +administrative and military incapacity. This was to be expected from +such men as Wade, Grimes, Chandler, Hale, Wilson, Sumner (too +classical), and other Republicans in the Senate, and from the numerous +pure, radical Republicans in the House.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page140" name="page140"></a>(p. 140)</span> Burnside's expedition is a sign of life. But all these +expeditions on the circumference, even if successful, will be +fruitless if no bold, decided movement is at once made at the centre, +at the heart of the rebellion. But McClellan, as his supporters say, +matures his <i>strategical</i> plans. O God! General Scott lost <i>by +strategy</i> three-fourths of the country's cause, and very probably by +strategy McClellan will jeopardize what remains of it.</p> + +<p>Will this McClellan ever advance? If he lingers, he may find only rats +in Manassas. McClellan is ignorant of the great, unique rule for all +affairs and undertakings,—it is to throw the whole man in one thing +at one time. It is the same in the camp as in the study, for a captain +as for a lawyer, the savant, and the scholar.</p> + +<p>It is to be regretted that some of the men truly and thoroughly +devoted to the cause of freedom and of humanity, mix with it such an +enormous quantity of personal, almost childish vanity, as to puzzle +many minds concerning the genuine nobleness of their devotion. It is +to be regretted that those otherwise so self-sacrificing patriots +discount even their martyrdom and persecutions, and credit them to +their frivolous self-satisfaction.</p> + +<p>Most of the thus-called well-informed Americans rather skim over than +thoroughly study history. Above all, it applies to the general history +of the Christian era, and of our great epoch (from the second half of +the 18th century). Most of the Americans are only very superficially +familiar with the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page141" name="page141"></a>(p. 141)</span> history of continental Europe, or know it +only by its contact with the history of England. Many of them are more +familiar with the classical wars of Alexander, Hannibal, Cćsar, etc., +than with those of Gustavus, Frederick II., and even of Napoleon. Were +it otherwise, <i>strategy</i> would not to such an extent have taken hold +of their brains.</p> + +<p>Mr. Adams was terribly unhorsed during the Trent excitement in +England; he literally began to pack up his trunks, and asked a +personal advice from Lord John Russell.</p> + +<p>What a devoted patriot this Sandford in Belgium is; he has continual +<i>itchings in his hand</i> to pay a <i>higher price</i> for bad blankets that +they may not fall into the hands of secesh agents; so with cloth, so +perhaps with arms. <i>Oh, disinterested patriot!</i></p> + +<p>Austria and Prussia whipped in by England and France, and at the same +time glad to have an occasion to take the airs of maritime powers. +Austria and Prussia sent their advice concerning the Trent affair. The +kick of asses at what they suppose to be the dying lion.</p> + +<p>Austria and Prussia! Great heavens! Ask the prisons of both those +champions of violated rights how many better men than Slidell and +Mason groaned in them; and the conduct of those powers against the +Poles in 1831! Was it neutral or honest?</p> + +<p>I am sure that Russia will behave well, and abstain from coming +forward with uncalled-for and humiliating advice. Russia is a true +great power,—a <span class="pagenum"><a id="page142" name="page142"></a>(p. 142)</span> true friend,—and such noble behavior will +be in harmony with the character of Alexander II., and with the +friendliness and clear perception of events held by the Russian +minister here. I hope that when the war is over the West Point nursery +will be reformed, and a general military organization introduced, such +a one as exists in Switzerland.</p> + +<p>McClellan is a greater mistake than was even Scott. McClellan knows +not the A B C of military history of any nation or war, or he would +not keep this army so in camp. He would know that after recruits have +been roughly instructed in the rudiments of a drill, the next best +instructor is fighting. So it was in the thirty years' war; so in the +American Revolution; so in the first French revolutionary wars. +Strategians, martinets, lost the battles, or rather the campaigns, of +Austerlitz, of Jena, etc. In 1813 German rough levies fought almost +before they were drilled, and at Bautzen French recruits were +victorious over Prussians, Russians, and Austrians. The secesh fight +with fresh levies, etc.</p> + +<p>Numerous political intriguers surrounding McClellan are busily laying +tracks for him to the White House. What will Seward and Chase say to +it, and even old Abe, who himself dreams of re-election, or at least +his friends do it for him? All these candidates forget that the surest +manner to reach the White House is not to think of it—to forget +oneself and to act.</p> + +<p>It is amusing to find in European papers all the various stories about +Mr. Lincoln. There he is <span class="pagenum"><a id="page143" name="page143"></a>(p. 143)</span> represented as a violent, +blood-thirsty revolutionaire, dragging the people after him. In this +manner, those European imbeciles are acquainted with American events, +character, etc. They cannot find out that in decision, in +clear-sightedness and soundness of judgment, the people are far ahead +of Mr. Lincoln and of his spiritual or constitutional +conscience-keepers. And the same imbeciles, if not <i>canailles</i>, speak +of a mob-rule over the President, etc. Some one ought to enlighten +those French and English supercilious ignorami that something like a +mob only prevails in such cities as New York, Philadelphia, and +Baltimore; and nine-tenths of such a mob are mostly yet unwashed, +unrepublicanized Europeans. The ninety-nine one-hundredths of the +freemen of the North are more orderly, more enlightened, more +law-abiding, and more moral than are the English lordlings, +somebodies, nobodies, and would-be somebodies. In the West, lynch-law, +to be sure, is at times used against brothels, bar-rooms, +gambling-houses, and thieves. It would be well to do the same in +London, were it not that most of the lynch-lawed may not belong to the +people. If the European scribblers were not past any honest impulse, +they would know that the South is the generator and the congenial +region for the mob, the filibusters, the revolver and the bowie-knife +rule. In the South the proportion of mobs to decency is the reverse of +that prevailing in the free States. The <i>slavery gentleman</i> is a +scarcely varnished savage, for whom the highest law is his reckless +passion and will.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page144" name="page144"></a>(p. 144)</span> If Jeff. Davis succeeds, he will be the founder of a new and +great slaveholding empire. His name will resound in after times; but +history will record his name as that of a curse to humanity.</p> + +<p>And so Davis is making history and Lincoln is telling stories. +Beauregard gets inspired by the fumes of bivouacs; McClellan by the +fumes of flatterers. Beauregard frightens us, McClellan rocks his +baby. Beauregard shares the camp-fires of his soldiers; he sees them +daily, knows them, as it is said, one by one; McClellan lives +comfortably in the city, and appears only to the soldiers as the great +Lama on special occasions. Camp-fellowship inspired all the great +captains and established the magnetic current between the leader and +the soldier.</p> + +<p>McClellan organized a board of generals, arriving daily from the +camps, to discuss some new fancy army equipment. And Lincoln, Seward, +Blair, and all the tail of intriguers and imbeciles, still admire him. +In no other country would such a futile man be kept in command of +troops opposed to a deadly and skilful enemy.</p> + +<p>For several weeks, McClellan and his chief of the staff (such as he +is) are sick in bed, and no one is <i>ad interim</i> appointed to attend to +the current affairs of our army of 600,000, having the enemy before +their nose. Oh human imbecility! No satirist could invent such things; +and if told, it would not be believed in Europe.</p> + +<p>The McClellan-worship by the people at large is to be explained by the +firm, ardent will of the people <span class="pagenum"><a id="page145" name="page145"></a>(p. 145)</span> to crush the rebels, and by +the general feeling of the necessity of a man for that purpose. Such +is the case with the true, confiding people in the country; but here, +contractors, martinets, and intriguers are the blowers of that +worship. Lincoln is as is the people at large; but a Seward, a Blair, +a Herald, a Times, and their respective and numerous tails,—as for +their motives, they are the reverse of Lincoln and of the people.</p> + +<p>Victories in Kentucky, beyond the circumference or the direct action +from here; they are obtained without strategy and by rough levies. But +this voice of events is not understood by the McClellan tross.</p> + +<p>Change in the Cabinet: Stanton, a new man, not from the parlor, and +not from the hacks. His bulletin on the victory in Kentucky +inaugurated a new era. It is a voice that nobody hitherto uttered in +America. It is the awakening voice of the good genius of the people, +almost as that which awoke Lazarus. This Stanton is the people; I +never saw him, but I hope he is the man for the events; perhaps he may +turn out to be <i>my</i> statesman.</p> + +<p>I wish I could get convinced of the real superiority of Fremont. It is +true that he was treated badly and had natural and artificial +difficulties to over come; it is true that to him belongs the credit +of having started the construction of the mortar fleet; but likewise +it is true that he was, at the mildest, unsurpassingly reckless in +contracts and expenditures, and I shall never believe him a general. +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page146" name="page146"></a>(p. 146)</span> With all this, Fremont started a great initiative at a time +when McClellan and three-fourths of the generals of his creation +considered it a greater crime to strike at a <i>gentleman</i> slaveholder +than to strike at the Union.</p> + +<p>The courtesies and hospitalities paid to Thurlow Weed by English +society are clamored here in various ways. These courtesies prove the +high breeding and the good-will of a part, at least, of the English +aristocracy and of English statesmen. I do not suppose that Thurlow +Weed could ever have been admitted in such society if he were +travelling on his own merits as the great lobbyist and politician. At +the utmost, he would have been shown up as a <i>rara avis</i>. But +introduced to English society as the master spirit of Mr. Seward, and +as Seward's semi-official confidential agent, Thurlow Weed was +admitted, and even petted. But it is another question if this palming +of a Thurlow Weed upon the English high-toned statesmen increased +their consideration for Mr. Seward. The Duke of Newcastle and others +are not yet softened, and refuse to be humbugged.</p> + +<p>Whoever has the slightest knowledge of how affairs are transacted, is +well aware that the times of a personal diplomacy are almost gone. The +exceptions are very rare, very few, and the persons must be of other +might and intellectual mettle than a Sandford, Weed, or Hughes. Great +affairs are not conducted or decided by conversations, but by great +interests. Diplomatic agents, at the utmost, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page147" name="page147"></a>(p. 147)</span> serve to keep +their respective governments informed about the run of events. Mr. +Mercier does it for Louis Napoleon; but Mr. Mercier's reports, however +friendly they may be, cannot much influence a man of such depth as +Louis Napoleon, and to imagine that a Hughes will be able to do it! I +am ashamed of Mr. Seward; he proves by this would-be-crotchety policy +how little he knows of events and of men, and how he undervalues Louis +Napoleon. Such humbug missions are good to throw dirt in the eyes of a +Lincoln, a Chase, etc., but in Europe such things are sent to +Coventry. And Hughes to influence Spain! Oh! oh!</p> + +<p>Dayton frets on account of the mission of Hughes. Dayton is right. +Generally Dayton shows a great deal of good sense, of good +comprehension, and a noble and independent character. He is not a +flatterer, not servile, and subservient to Mr. Seward, as are +others—Mr. Adams, Mr. Sandford, and some few other diplomatic agents.</p> + +<p>The active and acting abolitionists ought to concentrate all their +efforts to organize thoroughly and efficiently the district of +Beaufort. The success of a productive colony there would serve as a +womb for the emancipation at large.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward declares that he has given up meddling with military +affairs. For his own sake, and for the sake of the country, I ardently +wish it were so; but—I shall never believe it.</p> + +<p>The Investigating Committee has made the most thorough disclosures of +the thorough incapacity of <span class="pagenum"><a id="page148" name="page148"></a>(p. 148)</span> McClellan; but the McClellan men, +Seward, Blair, etc., neutralize, stifle all the good which could +accrue to the country from these disclosures. And Lincoln is in their +clutches. The administration by its influence prevents the publication +of the results of this investigation, prevents the truth from coming +to the people. Any hard name will be too soft for such a moral +prevarication.</p> + +<p>McClellan is either as feeble as a reed, or a bad man. The disorder +around here is nameless. Banks compares it to the time of the French +Directory. Banks has no guns, no cavalry, and is in the vanguard. He +begs almost on his knees, and cannot get anything. And the country +pays a chief of the staff, and head of the staffers.</p> + +<p>The time must come, although it be now seemingly distant, that the +people will awake from this lethargy; that it will perceive how much +of the noblest blood of the people, how much time and money, have been +worse than recklessly squandered. The people will find it out, and +then they will ask those Cains at the wheel an account of the innocent +blood of Abel, the country's son, the country's cause.</p> + +<p>The defenders of, and the thus called moderate men on the question of +slavery, utter about it the old rubbish composed of the most thorough +ignorance and of disgusting fallacies, in relation to this pseudo +science, or rather lie, about races. More of it will come out in the +course of the Congressional discussions. Not one of them is aware that +independent science, that comparative anatomy, physiology, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page149" name="page149"></a>(p. 149)</span> +psychology, anthropology, that philosophy of history altogether and +thoroughly repudiate all these superficially asserted, or +tried-to-be-established, intrinsic diversities and peculiarities of +races. All these would-be axioms, theories, are based on sand. In true +science the question of race as represented by the Southern school +partisans of slavery, with Agassiz, the so-called professor of +Charleston by European savans, at their head,—that question is at the +best an illusive element, and endangers the accuracy of induction. As +it presents itself to the unprejudiced investigator, race is nothing +more than the single manifestation of anterior stages of existence, +the aggregate expression of the pre-historic vicissitudes of a people.</p> + +<p>If those would-be knowing arguers on slavery, race, etc., were only +aware of the fact that such people as the primitive Greeks, or the +ancestors of classical Greeks, that the ancestors of the Latins, that +even the roving, robbing ancestors of the Anglo Saxons, in some way or +other, have been anthropophagi, and worshipped fetishes; and even as +thus called already civilized, they sacrificed men to gods,—could our +great pro-slavers know all this, they would be more decent in their +ignorant assertions, and not, so self-satisfied, strut about in their +dark ignorance.</p> + +<p>Those who are afraid that the freed negroes of the South will run to +the Northern free States, display an ignorance still greater than the +former. When the enslaved colored Americans in the South shall +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page150" name="page150"></a>(p. 150)</span> be <i>all</i> thoroughly emancipated in that now cursed region, +then they will remain in the, to them, congenial climate, and in the +favorable economical conditions of labor and of existence. Not only +those emancipated will not run North, but the colored population from +the free States, incited and stirred up by natural attractions, will +leave the North for the South, as small streamlets and rivulets run +into a large current or river.</p> + +<p>The rebels extend on an immense bow, nearly one hundred miles, from +the lower to the upper Potomac. Our army, two to one, is on the span +of the arc, and we do nothing. A French sergeant would be better +inspired than is McClellan.</p> + + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page151" name="page151"></a>(p. 151)</span> FEBRUARY, 1862.</h3> + +<p class="resume">Drifting — The English blue book — Lord John could not act + differently — Palmerston the great European fuss-maker — Mr. + Seward's "two pickled rods" for England — Lord Lyons — His pathway + strewn with broken glass — Gen. Stone arrested — Sumner's + resolutions infuse a new spirit in the Constitution — Mr. Seward + beyond salvation — He works to save slavery — Weed has ruined + him — The New York press — "Poor Tribune" — The Evening Post — The + Blairs — Illusions dispelled — "All quiet on the Potomac" — The + London papers — Quill-heroes can be bought for a dinner — French + opinion — Superhuman efforts to save slavery — It is doomed! — "All + you worshippers of darkness cannot save it!" — The + Hutchinsons — Corporal Adams — Victories in the West — Stanton the + man! — Strategy (hear! hear!)</p> + + +<p>We are obliged, one by one, to eat our official high-toned assertions +and words, and day after day we drift towards putting the rebels on an +equal footing with ourselves. We declared the privateers to be pirates +(which they are), and now we proffer their exchange against our +colonels and other honorable prisoners. So one radical evil generates +numberless others. And from the beginning of the struggle this radical +evil was and is the want of earnestness, of a firm purpose, and of a +straight, vigorous policy by the administration. <i>Paullatim summa +petuntur</i> may turn out true—but for the rebels.</p> + +<p>The publication of the English blue book, or of official +correspondence between Lord Lyons and Lord John Russell, throws a new +light on the conduct <span class="pagenum"><a id="page152" name="page152"></a>(p. 152)</span> of the English Cabinet; and, anglophobe +as I am, I must confess that, all things considered, above all the +unhappily-justified distrust of England in Mr. Seward's policy,—from +the first day of our troubles Lord John Russell could not act +differently from what he did. Lord John Russell had to reconcile the +various and immense interests of England, jeopardized by the war, with +his sincere love of human liberty. Therein Lord John Russell differs +wholly from Lord Palmerston, this great European fuss-maker, who hates +America. As far as it was possible, Lord J. Russell remained faithful +to the noble (not hereditary, but philosophical) traditions of his +blood. Lord John Russell's letter to Lord Lyons (No. 17), February 20, +1861, although full of distrust in the future policy of Mr. Lincoln's +Cabinet towards England, is nevertheless an honorable document for his +name.</p> + +<p>Lord J. Russell was well aware that the original plan of Mr. Seward +was to annoy and worry England. Everything is known in this world, and +especially the incautious words and conversations of public men. +Months before the inauguration, Mr. Seward talked to senators of both +parties that he had in store "two pickled rods" for England. The one +was to be Green (always drunken), the Senator from Missouri, on +account of the colored man Anderson; the other Mr. Nesmith, the +Senator from Oregon, and the San Juan boundaries. Undoubtedly the +Southern senators did not keep secret the like inimical forebodings +concerning Mr. Seward's intentions <span class="pagenum"><a id="page153" name="page153"></a>(p. 153)</span> towards England. +Undoubtedly all this must have been known to Lord J. Russell when he +wrote the above-mentioned letter, No. 17.</p> + +<p>More even than Lord John Russell's, Lord Lyons's official +correspondence since November, 1860, inspires the highest possible +respect for his noble sentiments and character. Above all, one who +witnessed the difficulties of Lord Lyons's position here, and how his +pathway was strewn with broken glass, and this by all kinds of hands, +must feel for him the highest and most sincere consideration. From the +official correspondence, Lord Lyons comes out a friend of humanity and +of human liberty,—just the reverse of what he generally was supposed +to be. And during the whole Trent affair, Lord Lyons's conduct was +discreet, delicate, and generous. Events may transform Lord Lyons into +an official enemy of the Union; but a mind soured by human meanness is +soothingly impressioned by such true nobleness in a diplomat and an +Englishman.</p> + +<p>Gen. Stone, of Ball's Bluff infamous massacre, arrested. Bravo! At the +best, Stone was one of those conceited regulars who admired slavery, +and who would have wished to save the Union in their own peculiar way. +I wish he may speak, as in all probability he was not alone.</p> + +<p>Sumner's resolutions infuse a new spirit in the Constitution, and +elevate it from the low ground of a dead formula. The resolutions +close the epoch of the Stories, of the Kents, of the Curtises, and +inaugurate a higher comprehension of American constitutionalism. +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page154" name="page154"></a>(p. 154)</span> During this session Charles Sumner triumphantly and nobly +annihilated the aspersions of his enemies, representing him as a man +of one hobby, but lacking any practical ideas. His speech on currency +was among the best. Not so with his speech about the Trent affair. It +is superficial, and contains misconceptions concerning treaties, and +other blunders very strange in a would-be statesman.</p> + +<p>Ardently devoted to the cause of justice and of human rights, Sumner +weakens the influence which he ought to exercise, because he impresses +many with the notion that he looks more to the outside effect produced +by him than to the intrinsic value of the subject; he makes others +suppose that he is too fond of such effect, and, above all, of the +effect produced in Europe among the circle of his English and European +acquaintances.</p> + +<p>It is positively asserted that Lincoln agreed to take Mr. Seward in +the Cabinet, because Weed and others urgently represented that Mr. +Seward is the only man in the Republican party who is familiar with +Europe, with her statesmen, and their policy. O Lord! O Lord! And +where has Seward acquired all this information? Mr. Seward had not +even the first A B C of it, or of anything else connected with it. +And, besides, such a kind of special information is, at the utmost, of +secondary necessity for an American statesman. Marcy had it not, and +was a true, a genuine statesman. Undoubtedly, nature has endowed +Seward with eminent <span class="pagenum"><a id="page155" name="page155"></a>(p. 155)</span> intellectual qualities, and with germs +for an eminent statesman. But the intellectual qualities became +blunted by the long use of crotchets and tricks of a politician, by +the associations and influence of such as Weed, etc.; thereby the +better germs became nipped, so to speak, in the bud. Mr. Seward's +acquired information by study, by instruction, and by reading, is +quite the reverse of what in Europe is regarded as necessary for a +statesman. Often, very often, I sorrowfully analyze and observe Mr. +Seward, with feelings like those evoked in us by the sight of a noble +ruin, or of a once rich, natural panorama, but now marred by large +black spots of burned and dead vegetation, or by the ashes of a +volcano.</p> + +<p>Now, Mr. Seward is beyond salvation—a "disappointed man," as he +called himself in a conversation with Judge Potter, M. C.; he changed +aims, and perhaps convictions. For Mr. Seward, slavery is no more the +most hideous social disease; he abandoned that creed which elevated +him in the confidence of the people. Now he works to preserve as much +as possible of the curse of slavery; he does it on the plea of Union +and conservatism; but in truth he wishes to disorganize the pure +Republican party, which he hates since the Chicago Convention and +since the days of the formation of the Cabinet. Under the advice of +Weed, Mr. Seward attempts to form a (thus called) Union and +conservative party, which at the next turn may carry him into the +White House.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page156" name="page156"></a>(p. 156)</span> Seward considers Weed his good genius; but in reality Weed +has ruined Seward. Now Mr. Seward supports <i>strategy</i>, imbecility, and +McClellan. The only explanation for me is, that Seward, participating +in all military counsels and strategic plans, and not understanding +any of them, finds it safer to back McClellan, and thus to deceive +others about his own ignorance of military matters.</p> + +<p>The press—the New York one—worse and worse; the majority wholly +degraded to the standard of the Herald and of the Times. The <i>poor</i> +Tribune, daily fading away, altogether losing that bold, lofty spirit +of initiative to which for so many years the Tribune owed its +all-powerful and unparalleled influence over the free masses. Now, at +times, the Tribune is similar to an old, honest sexagenarian, +attempting to draw a night-cap over his ears and eyes. The flames of +the holy fire, so common once in the Tribune, flash now only at +distant, very distant epochs. The Evening Post towers over all of +them. If the Evening Post never at a jump went as far as once did the +Tribune, the Evening Post never made or makes a retrograde step; but +perhaps slowly, but steadily and boldly, moves on. The Evening Post is +not a paper of politicians or of jobbers, but of enlightened, +well-informed, and strong-hearted patriots and citizens.</p> + +<p>Mr. Blair, after all, is only an ambitious politician. My illusion +about both the brothers is wholly dispelled and gone. I regret it, but +both sustain McClellan, both look askant on Stanton, and belong +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page157" name="page157"></a>(p. 157)</span> to the conditional emancipationists, colonizationists, and +other <span class="smcap">RADICAL</span> preservers of slavery. All such form a class of +superficial politicians, of compromisers with their creed, and are +corrupters of others.</p> + +<p>How ardently I would prefer not to so often accuse others; but more +than forty years of revolutionary and public life and experience have +taught me to discriminate between deep convictions and assumed +ones—to highly venerate the first, and to keep aloof from the second. +Gold is gold, and pinchbeck is pinchbeck, in character as in metal.</p> + +<p>McClellan acts as if he had taken the oath to some hidden and veiled +deity or combination, by all means not to ascertain anything about the +condition of the enemy. Any European if not American old woman in +pants long ago would have pierced the veil by a strong reconnoissance +on Centreville. Here "all quiet on the Potomac." And I hear generals, +West Pointers, justifying this colossal offence against common sense, +and against the rudiments of military tactics, and even science. Oh, +noble, but awfully dealt with, American people!</p> + +<p>At times Mr. Seward talks and acts as if he lacked altogether the +perception of the terrible earnestness of the struggle, of the dangers +and responsibilities of his political position, as well now before the +people as hereafter before history. Often I can scarcely resist +answering him, Beware, beware!</p> + +<p>Lincoln belittles himself more and more. Whatever he does is done +under the pressure of events, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page158" name="page158"></a>(p. 158)</span> under the pressure of the +public opinion. These agencies push Lincoln and slowly move him, +notwithstanding his reluctant heaviness and his resistance. And he a +standard-bearer of this noble people!</p> + +<p>Those mercenary, ignorant, despicable scribblers of the London Times, +of the Tory Herald, of the Saturday Review, and of the police papers +in Paris, as the Constitutionnel, the Pays, the Patrie, all of them +lie with unparalleled facility. Any one knows that those hungry +quill-heroes can be got for a good dinner and a <i>douceur</i>.</p> + +<p>I am sorry that the Americans ascribe to Louis Napoleon and to the +French people the hostility to human rights as shown by those +<i>échappés des bagnes de la littérature</i>. Louis Napoleon and the French +people have nothing in common with those literary blacklegs.</p> + +<p>The <i>Journal des Débats</i>, the <i>Opinion Nationale</i>, the <i>Presse</i>, the +<i>Sičcle</i>, etc., constitute the true and honest organs of opinion in +France. In the same way A. de Gasparin speaks for the French people +with more authority than does Michel Chevalier, who knows much more +about free trade, about canals and railroads, but is as ignorant of +the character, of the spirit, and of the institutions of the American +people, as he is ignorant concerning the man in the moon. So the +lawyer Hautefeuille must have received a fee to show so much ill-will +to the cause of humanity, and such gigantic ignorance.</p> + +<p><i>Who began the civil war?</i> is repeatedly discussed <span class="pagenum"><a id="page159" name="page159"></a>(p. 159)</span> by those +quill cut-throats and allies on the Thames and on the Seine.</p> + +<p>Here some smaller diplomats (not Sweden, who is true to the core to +the cause of liberty), and, above all, the would-be fashionable +<i>galopins des légations</i>, are the cesspools of secession news, picked +up by them in secesh society. Happily, the like <i>galopins</i> are the +reverse of the opinions of their respective chiefs.</p> + +<p>What superhuman efforts are made in Congress, and out of it, in the +Cabinet, in the White House, by Union men,—Seward imagines he leads +them,—by the weak-brained, and by traitors, to save slavery, if not +all, at least a part of it. Every concession made by the President to +the enemies of slavery has only one aim; it is to mollify their urgent +demands by throwing to them small crumbs, as one tries to mollify a +boisterous and hungry dog. By such a trick Lincoln and Seward try to +save what can be saved of the peculiar institution, to gratify, and +eventually to conciliate, the South. This is the policy of Lincoln, of +Seward, and very likely of Mr. Blair. Such political <i>gobe-mouche</i> as +Doolittle and many others, are, or will be, taken in by this +manœuvre.</p> + +<p>Scheme what you like, you schemers, wiseacres, politicians, and +would-be statesmen, nevertheless slavery is doomed. Humanity will have +the best against such pettifoggers as you. I know better. I have the +honor to belong to that European generation who, during this half of +our century, from <span class="pagenum"><a id="page160" name="page160"></a>(p. 160)</span> Tagus and Cadiz to the Wolga, has gored +with its blood battle-fields and scaffolds; whose songs and +aspirations were re-echoed by all the horrible dungeons; by dungeons +of the blood-thirsty Spanish inquisition, then across Europe and Asia, +to the mines of Nertschinsk, in the ever-frozen Altai. We lost all we +had on earth; seemingly we were always beaten; but Portugal and Spain +enjoy to-day a constitutional regime that is an improvement on +absolutism. France has expelled forever the Bourbons, and universal +suffrage, spelt now by the French people, is a progress, is a promise +of a great democratic future. Germany has in part conquered free +speech and free press. Italy is united, Romanism is falling to pieces, +Austria is undermined and shaky, and broken are the chains on the body +of the Russian serf. All this is the work of the spirit of the age, +and our generation was the spirit's apostle and confessor. And so it +will be with slavery, and all you worshippers of darkness cannot save +it.</p> + +<p>Not the one who strikes the first blow begins a civil war, but he who +makes the striking of the blow imperative. The Southern robbers cannot +claim exemption; they stole the arsenals, and struck the first blow at +Sumpter. So much for the infamous quill-heroes of the London Times, +the Herald, and <i>tutti quanti</i>.</p> + +<p>The highest crime is treason in arms, and this crime is praised and +defended by the English would-be high-toned press. But sooner or later +it will come out how much apiece was paid to the London <span class="pagenum"><a id="page161" name="page161"></a>(p. 161)</span> +Times, the Herald, and the Saturday Review for their venomous articles +against the Union.</p> + +<p>McClellan expelled from the army the Hutchinson family. It is mean and +petty. Songs are the soul and life of the camp, and McClellan's +<i>heroic deeds</i> have not yet found their minstrel.</p> + +<p>After all, McClellan has organized—nothing! McDowell has, so to +speak, formed the first skeletons of brigades, divisions, of parks of +artillery, etc. The people uninterruptedly poured in men and +treasures, and McClellan only continued what was commenced before him.</p> + +<p>I positively know that already in December Mr. Lincoln began to be +doubtful of McClellan's generalship. This doubtfulness is daily +increasing, and nevertheless Mr. Lincoln keeps that incapacity in +command because he does not wish <i>to hurt McClellan's feelings</i>. +Better to ruin the noble people, the country! I begin to draw the +conclusion that Mr. Lincoln's good qualities are rather negative than +positive.</p> + +<p>Mr. Adams complains that he is kept in the dark about the policy of +the administration, and cannot answer questions made to him in London. +But the administration, that is, Lincoln and Seward, are a little <i>a +la</i> Micawber, expecting what may turn up. And, besides this, the great +orator <i>de lana caprina</i> (Mr. Adams) deliberately degraded himself to +the condition of a corporal under Mr. Seward's orders.</p> + +<p>Victories in the West, results of the new spirit in the War +Department. Stanton will be the man.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page162" name="page162"></a>(p. 162)</span> It is a curious fact that such commanders as Halleck, etc., +sit in cities and fight through those under them; and there are +ignoble flatterers trying to attribute these victories to McClellan, +and to his <i>strategy</i>. As if battles could be commanded by telegraph +at one thousand miles' distance. It is worse than imbecility, it is +idiotism and <i>strategy</i>.</p> + +<p>Stanton calls himself a man of one idea. How he overtops in the +Cabinet those myrmidons with their many petty notions! One idea, but a +great and noble one, makes the great men, or the men for great events. +Would God that the people may understand Stanton, and that +pettifoggers, imbeciles, and traitors may not push themselves between +the people and Stanton, and neutralize the only man who has <i>the one +idea</i> to break, to crush the rebellion.</p> + +<p>Every day Mr. Lincoln shows his want of knowledge of men and of +things; the total absence of <i>intuition</i> to spell, to see through, and +to disentangle events.</p> + +<p>If, since March, 1861, instead of being in the hands of pettifoggers, +Mr. Lincoln had been in the hands of <i>a man of one idea</i> as is +Stanton, nine-tenths of the work would have been accomplished.</p> + +<p>McClellan's flunkeys claim for him the victories in the West. It is +impossible to settle which is more to be scorned in them, their +flunkeyism or their stupidity.</p> + +<p><i>Lock-jaw</i> expedition. For any other government whatever, in one even +of the most abject favoritism, such a humbug and silly conduct of the +commander <span class="pagenum"><a id="page163" name="page163"></a>(p. 163)</span> and of his chief of the staff would open the eyes +even of a Pompadour or of a Dubarry. Here, <i>our great rulers and +ministers</i> shut the more closely their mind's (?) eyes * * * * *</p> + +<p>For the first time in one of his dispatches Mr. Corporal Adams <i>dares</i> +to act against orders, and mentions—but very slightly—slavery. Mr. +Adams observes to his chief that in England public opinion is very +sensitive; at last the old freesoiler found it out.</p> + +<p>How this public opinion in America is unable to see the things as they +naturally are. Now the public fights to whom to ascribe the victories +in the West. Common sense says, Ascribe them, 1st, to the person who +ordered the fight (Stanton); 2d, exclusively to the generals who +personally commanded the battles and the assaults of forts. Even +Napoleon did not claim for himself the glory for battles won by his +generals when in his, Napoleon's, absence.</p> + +<p>For weeks McClellan and his thus called staff diligently study +international law, strategy (hear, hear!), tactics, etc. His aids +translate for his use French and German writers. One cannot even apply +in this case the proverb, "Better late than never," as the like +hastily scraped and undigested sham-knowledge unavoidably must +obfuscate and wholly confuse McClellan's—not Napoleonic—brains.</p> + +<p>The intriguers and imbeciles claim the Western victories as the +illustration of McClellan's great <span class="pagenum"><a id="page164" name="page164"></a>(p. 164)</span> <i>strategy</i>. Why shows he +not a little <i>strategy</i> under his nose here? Any old woman would +surround and take the rebels in Manassas.</p> + +<p>Now they dispute to Grant his deserved laurels. If he had failed at +Donelson, the <i>strategians</i> would have washed their hands, and thrown +on Grant the disaster. So did Scott after Bull Run.</p> + +<p>Mr. Lincoln, McClellan, Seward, Blair, etc., forget the terrible +responsibility for thus recklessly squandering the best blood, the +best men, the best generation of the people, and its treasures. But +sooner or later they will be taken to a terrible account even by the +Congress, and at any rate by history.</p> + +<p>It is by their policy, by their support of McClellan, that the war is +so slow, and the longer it lasts the more human sacrifices it will +devour, and the greater the costs of the devastation. Stanton alone +feels and acts differently, and it seems that the rats in the Cabinet +already begin their nightly work against him. These rats are so +ignorant and conceited!</p> + +<p>The celebrated Souvoroff was accused of cruelty because he always at +once stormed fortresses instead of investing them and starving out the +inhabitants and the garrisons. The old hero showed by arithmetical +calculations that his bloodiest assaults never occasioned so much loss +of human life as did on both sides any long siege, digging, and +approaches, and the starving out of those shut up in a fortress. This +for McClellan and for the intriguing and ignorant <span class="smcap">RATS</span>.</p> + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page165" name="page165"></a>(p. 165)</span> MARCH, 1862.</h3> + +<p class="resume">The Africo-Americans — Fremont — The + Orleans — Confiscation — American nepotism — The Merrimac — Wooden + guns — Oh shame! — Gen. Wadsworth — The rats have the best of + Stanton — McClellan goes to Fortress Monroe — Utter imbecility — The + embarkation — McClellan a turtle — He will stick in the + marshes — Louis Napoleon behaves nobly — So does Mr. Mercier — Queen + Victoria for freedom — The great strategian — Senator Sumner and + the French minister — Archbishop Hughes — His diplomatic activity + not worth the postage on his + correspondence — Alberoni-Seward — Love's labor lost.</p> + + +<p>Men like this Davis, Wickliffe, and all the like <i>pecus</i>, roar against +the African race. The more I see of this doomed people, the more I am +convinced of their intrinsic superiority over all their white +revilers, above all, over this slaveholding generation, rotten, as it +is, to the core. When emancipated, the Africo-Americans in immense +majority will at once make quiet, orderly, laborious, intelligent, and +free cultivators, or, to use European language, an excellent +peasantry; when ninety-nine one-hundredths of slaveholders, either +rebels or thus called loyal, altogether considered, as human beings +are shams, are shams as citizens, and constitute caricatures and +monsters of civilization.</p> + +<p>Civilization! It is the highest and noblest aim in human destinies +when it makes the man moral and <span class="pagenum"><a id="page166" name="page166"></a>(p. 166)</span> true; but civilization +invoked by, and in which strut traitors, slaveholders, and abettors of +slavery, reminds one of De Maistre's assertion, that the devil created +the red man of America as a counterfeit to man, God's creation in the +Old World. This so-called civilization of the slaveholders is the +devil's counterfeit of the genuine civilization.</p> + +<p>The Africo-Americans are the true producers of the Southern +wealth—cotton, rice, tobacco, etc. When emancipated and transformed +into small farmers, these laborious men will increase and ameliorate +the culture of the land; and they will produce by far more when the +white shams and drones shall be taken out of their way. In the South, +bristling with Africo-American villages, will almost disappear +fillibusterism, murder, and the bowie knife, and other supreme +manifestations of Southern <i>chivalrous high-breeding</i>.</p> + +<p>Fremont's reports and defence show what a disorder and insanity +prevailed under the rule of Scott. Fremont's military capacity perhaps +is equal to zero; his vanity put him in the hands of wily flatterers; +but the disasters in the West cannot be credited to him. Fremont +initiated the construction of the mortar flotilla on the Mississippi +(I positively know such is the fact), and he suggested the capture of +various forts, but was not sustained at this sham, the headquarters.</p> + +<p>These Orleans have wholly espoused and share in the fallacious and +mischievous notions of the McClellanites concerning the volunteers. +Most <span class="pagenum"><a id="page167" name="page167"></a>(p. 167)</span> probably with the authority of their name, they confirm +McClellan's fallacious notions about the necessity of a great regular +army. The Orleans are good, generous boys, but their judgment is not +yet matured; they had better stayed at home.</p> + +<p>Confiscation is the great word in Congress or out of it. The property +of the rebels is confiscable by the ever observed rule of war, as +consecrated by international laws. When two sovereigns make war, the +victor confiscates the other's property, as represented by whole +provinces, by public domains, by public taxes and revenues. In the +present case the rebels are the sovereigns, and their property is +therefore confiscable. But for the sake of equity, and to compensate +the wastes of war, Congress ought to decree the confiscation of +property of all those who, being at the helm, by their political +incapacity or tricks contribute to protract the war and increase its +expense.</p> + +<p>Mr. Lincoln yields to the pressure of public opinion. A proof: his +message to Congress about emancipation in the Border States. Crumb No. +1 thrown—reluctantly I am sure—to the noble appetite of freemen. I +hope history will not credit Mr. Lincoln with being the initiator.</p> + +<p>American nepotism puts to shame the one practised in Europe. All +around here they keep offices in pairs, father and son. So McClellan +has a father in-law as chief of the staff, a brother as aid, and then +various relations, clerks, etc., etc., and the same in some other +branches of the administration.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page168" name="page168"></a>(p. 168)</span> The Merrimac affair. Terrible evidence how active and daring +are the rebels, and we sleepy, slow, and self-satisfied. By applying +the formula of induction from effect to cause, the disaster occasioned +by the Merrimac, and any further havoc to be made by this iron +vessel,—all this is to be credited to McClellan.</p> + +<p>If Norfolk had been taken months ago, then the rebels could not have +constructed the Merrimac. Norfolk could have been easily taken any day +during the last six months, <i>but for strategy</i> and the <i>maturing of +great plans</i>! These are the sacramental words more current now than +ever. Oh good-natured American people! how little is necessary to +humbug thee!</p> + +<p>Oh shame! oh malediction! The rebels left Centreville,—which turns +out to be scarcely a breastwork, with wooden guns,—and they slipped +off from Manassas.</p> + +<p>When McClellan got the news of the evacuation, he gravely considered +where to lean his right or left flanks, and after the consideration, +two days after the enemy <i>wholly</i> completed the evacuation, McClellan +moves at the head of 80,000 men—to storm the wooden guns of +Centreville. Two hours after the news of the evacuation reached the +headquarters, Gen. Wadsworth asked permission to follow with his +brigade, during the night, the retreating enemy. But it was not +<i>strategy, not a matured plan</i>. If Gen. Wadsworth had been in command +of the army, not one of the rats from Manassas <span class="pagenum"><a id="page169" name="page169"></a>(p. 169)</span> would have +escaped. The reasons are, that Gen. Wadsworth has a quick, clear, and +wide-encompassing conception of events and things, a clear insight, +and many other inborn qualities of mind and intellect.</p> + +<p>The Congress has a large number of very respectable capacities, and +altogether sufficient for the emergencies, and the Congress would do +more good but for the impediments thrown in its way by the +double-dealing policy prevailing in Mr. Lincoln's Cabinet and +administration. The majority in Congress represent well the spirit of +self-government. It is a pity that Congress cannot crush or purify the +administration.</p> + +<p>All that passes here is maddening, and I am very grateful to my father +and mother for having endowed me with a frame which resists the blows.</p> + +<p>The pursuit of the enemy abandoned, the basis of operations changed. +The rats had the best of Stanton. <i>Utinam sim falsus propheta</i>, but if +Stanton's influence is no more all-powerful, then there is an end to +the short period of successes. Mr. Lincoln's council wanted to be +animated by a pure and powerful spirit. Stanton was the man, but he is +not a match for impure intriguers. Also McClellan goes to Fortress +Monroe, to Yorktown, to the rivers. This plan reveals an utter +military imbecility, and its plausibility can only catch ——.</p> + +<p>1st. Common sense shows that the rebels ought to be cut off from their +resources, that is, from railroads, and from communication with the +revolted <span class="pagenum"><a id="page170" name="page170"></a>(p. 170)</span> States in the interior, and to be precipitated into +the ocean. To accomplish it our troops ought to have marched by land +to Richmond, and pushed the enemy towards the ocean. Now McClellan +pushes the rebels from the extremity towards the centre, towards the +focus of their basis,—exactly what they want.</p> + +<p>I am sure that McClellan is allured to this strategy by the success of +the gunboats on the Mississippi. He wishes that the gunboats may take +Richmond, and he have the credit of it.</p> + +<p>The Merrimac is still menacing in Hampton Roads, and may, some day or +other, play havoc with the transports. The communications by land are +always more preferable than those by water—above all for such a great +army. A storm, etc., may do great mischief.</p> + +<p>McClellan assures the President, and the other intriguers and fools +constituting his supporters, that in a few days he will throw 55,000 +men on Yorktown. He and his staff to do such a thing, which would be a +masterpiece even for the French military leaders and their staffs! He, +McClellan, never knew what it was to embark an army. Those who believe +him are even greater imbeciles than I supposed them to be. Poor +Stanton, to be hampered by imbecility and intrigue! I went to +Alexandria to see the embarkation; it will last weeks, not days.</p> + +<p>From Yorktown to Richmond, the country is marshy, very marshy; +McClellan, a turtle, a <i>dasippus</i>, will not understand to move quick +and to overcome <span class="pagenum"><a id="page171" name="page171"></a>(p. 171)</span> the impediments. Faulty as it is to drive +the rebels from the sea towards their centre, this false move would be +corrected by rash and decisive movements. But McClellan will stick in +the marshes, and may never reach Richmond by that road.</p> + +<p>Any man with common sense would go directly by land; if the army moves +only three miles a day it will reach Richmond sooner than by the other +way. Such an army in a spell will construct turnpike roads and +bridges, and if the rebels tear up the railroads, they likewise could +be easily repaired. Progressing in the slowest, in the most genuine +McClellan manner, the army will reach Richmond with less danger than +by the Peninsula.</p> + +<p>The future American historian ought to record in gold and diamonds the +names of those who in the councils opposed McClellan's new strategy. +Oh! Mr. Seward, Mr. Seward, why is your name to be recorded among the +most ardent supporters of this <i>strategy</i>?</p> + +<p>Jeff. Davis sneers at the immense amount of money, etc., spent by Mr. +Lincoln. As he, Jeff. Davis, is still quietly in Richmond, and his +army undestroyed, of course he is right to sneer at Mr. Lincoln and +McClellan, whom he, Jeff. Davis, kept at bay with wooden guns.</p> + +<p>Senator Sumner takes airs to defend or explain McClellan. The Senator +is probably influenced by Blair. The Senator cannot be classed among +traitors and intriguers supporting the <i>great strategian</i>. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page172" name="page172"></a>(p. 172)</span> +Perhaps likewise the Senator believes it to be <i>distingué</i> to side +with <i>strategy</i>.</p> + +<p>If the party and the people could have foreseen that civil war was +inevitable, undoubtedly Mr. Lincoln would not have been elected. But +as the cause of the North would have been totally ruined by the +election of Lincoln's Chicago competitor, Mr. Lincoln is the lesser of +the two evils.</p> + +<p>A great nuisance is this competition for all kinds of news by the +reporters hanging about the city, the government, and the army. Some +of these reporters are men of sense, discernment, and character; but +for the sake of competition and priority they fish up and pick up what +they can, what comes in their way, even if such news is altogether +beyond common sense, or beyond probability.</p> + +<p>In this way the best among the newspapers have confused and misled the +sound judgment of the people; so it is in relation to the overwhelming +numbers of the rebels, and by spreading absurdities concerning +relations with Europe. The reporters of the Herald and of the Times +are peremptorily instructed to see the events through the perverted +spectacles of their respective bosses.</p> + +<p>Mr. Adams gets either frightened or warm. Mr. A. insists on the +slavery question, speaks of the project of Mason and Slidell in London +to offer certain moral concessions to English anti-slavery +feeling,—such as the regulations of marriage, the repeal of laws +against manumission, etc. Mr. Adams warns <span class="pagenum"><a id="page173" name="page173"></a>(p. 173)</span> that these offers +may make an impression in England.</p> + +<p>When all around me I witness this revolting want of energy,—Stanton +excepted,—this vacillation, these tricks and double-dealings in the +governmental spheres, then I wish myself far off in Europe; but when I +consider this great people outside of the governmental spheres, then I +am proud to be one of the people, and shall stay and fall with them.</p> + +<p>How meekly the people accept the disgrace of the wooden guns and of +the evacuation of Manassas! It is true that the partisans of +McClellan, the traitors, the intriguers, and the imbeciles are +devotedly at work to confuse the judgment of the people at large.</p> + +<p>Mr. Dayton's semi-official conversation with Louis Napoleon shows how +well disposed the Emperor was and is. The Emperor, almost as a favor, +asks for a decided military operation. And in face of such news from +Europe, Lincoln, Seward, and Blair sustain the <i>do-nothing +strategian</i>!</p> + +<p>Until now Louis Napoleon behaves nobly, and not an atom of reproach +can be made by the American people against his policy; and our policy +many times justly could have soured him, as the acceptation of the +Orleans, etc. No French vessels ran anywhere the blockade; secesh +agents found very little if any credit among French speculators. Very +little if any arms, munitions, etc., were bought in France. And in +face of all these positive facts, the American wiseacres here and in +Europe, all the bar-room <span class="pagenum"><a id="page174" name="page174"></a>(p. 174)</span> and street politicians here and +there, all the would-be statesmen, all the sham wise, are incessant in +their speculations concerning certain invisible, deep, treacherous +schemes of Louis Napoleon against the Union. This herd is full of +stories concerning his deep hatred of the North; they are incessant in +their warnings against this dangerous and scheming enemy. Some +Englishmen in high position stir up this distrust. On the authority of +letters repeatedly received from England, Senator Sumner is always in +fits of distrust towards the policy of France. The last discovery made +by all these deep statesmen here and in France is, that Louis Napoleon +intends to take Mexico, to have then a basis for cooperation with the +rebels, and to destroy us. But Mexico is not yet taken, and already +the allies look askance at each other. Those great Anglo-American +Talleyrands, Metternichs, etc., bring down the clear and large +intellect of Louis Napoleon to the atomistic proportions of their own +sham brains. I do not mean to foretell Louis Napoleon's policy in +future. Unforeseen emergencies and complications may change it. I +speak of what was done up to this day, and repeat, <i>not the slightest +complaint can be made against Louis Napoleon</i>. And in justice to Mr. +Mercier, the French minister here, it must be recorded that he +sincerely seconds the open policy of his sovereign. Besides, Mr. +Mercier now openly declares that he never believed the Americans to be +such a great and energetic people as the events have shown them to be. +I am grateful to him for <span class="pagenum"><a id="page175" name="page175"></a>(p. 175)</span> this sense of justice, shared only +by few of his diplomatic colleagues.</p> + +<p>In one word, official and unofficial Europe, in its immense majority, +is on our side. The exceptions, therefore, are few, and if they are +noisy, they are not intrinsically influential and dangerous. The +truest woman, Queen Victoria, is on the side of freedom, of right, and +of justice. This ennobles even her, and likewise ennobles our cause. +Not the bad wishes of certain Europeans are in our way, but our +slowness, the McClellanism and its supporters.</p> + +<p><i>Quidquid delirant reges, plectuntur achivi!</i> The <i>achivi</i> is the +people, and the McClellanists are the <i>reges</i>.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward, elated by victories, insinuates to foreign powers that +they may stop the "recognition of belligerents." Oh imagination! Such +things ought not even to be insinuated, as logic and common sense +clearly show that the foreign cabinets cannot do it, and thus stultify +themselves. Seward believes that his rhetoric is irresistible, and +will move the cabinets of France and of England. * * * Not the +"recognition of belligerents;" let the rebels slip off from Manassas, +etc. Mr. Seward would do better for himself and for the country to +give up meddling with the operations of the war, and backing the +bloodless campaigns of the <i>strategian</i>. But Mr. Seward, carried away +by his imagination, believes that the cabinets will yield to his +persuasive voice, and then, oh! what a feather in his diplomatic +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page176" name="page176"></a>(p. 176)</span> cap before the befogged Mr. Lincoln, and before the people. +But <i>pia desideria</i>.</p> + +<p>In all the wars, as well as in all the single campaigns and battles, +every <i>captain</i> deserving this name aimed at breaking his enemy in the +centre or at seizing his basis of operations, wherefrom the enemy +draws its resources and forces. The great <i>strategian</i> changed all +this; he goes directly to the circumference instead of aiming at the +heart.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward, answering Mr. Dayton's dispatch concerning his, Dayton's, +conversation with Louis Napoleon, points to Europe being likewise +menaced by revolutionists. Unnecessary spread-eagleism, and an awful +want of any, even diplomatic, tact. I hope that Mr. Dayton, who has so +much sound sense and discernment, will keep to himself this freak of +Mr. Seward's untamable imagination.</p> + +<p>Under the influence of insinuations received from his English friends, +Senator Sumner said to Mr. Mercier (I was present) that with every +steamer he expects a joint letter of admonition directed by the French +and English to our government. Mr. Mercier retorted, "How can you, +sir, have such notions? you are too great a nation to be treated in +this way. Such letters would do for Greece, etc., but not for you." I +was sorry and glad for the lesson thus given.</p> + +<p>Archbishop Hughes was not over-successful in France, and went off +rather second-best in the opinion of the press, of the public, and of +the Catholic, even ultra-Montane clergy of France. All this on +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page177" name="page177"></a>(p. 177)</span> account of his conditional anti-slaverism and unconditional +pro-slaverism. All this was easily to be foreseen. His Eminence is in +Rome, and from Rome is to influence Spain in our favor.</p> + +<p>Oh diplomacy! oh times of Capucine and Jesuit fathers and of Abbes! +We, the children of the eighteenth century, we recall you to life. I +do not suppose that the whole diplomatic activity of his Eminence is +worth the postage of his correspondence. But Uncle Sam is generous, +and pays him well. So it is with Thurlow Weed, who tries to be +economical, is unsuccessful, and cries for more monish. A schoolboy on +a spree!</p> + +<p>It seems that Weed loses not his time, and tries with Sandford to turn +<i>a penny</i> in Belgium. Oh disinterested saviors of the country, and +patriots!</p> + +<p>But for this violent development of our domestic affairs, Mr. Seward +would have appeared before the world as the mediator between the Pope +and the insubordinate European nations, sovereigns, and cabinets.</p> + +<p>Oh, Alberoni! oh, imaginary! It beats any of the wildest poets. In +justice it must be recorded, that this great scheme of mediation was +dancing before Mr. Seward's imagination at the epoch when he was sure +that, once Secretary of State, his speeches would be current and read +all over the South; and they, the speeches, would crush and extinguish +secession. This Mr. Seward assured one of the patriotic members of +Buchanan's expiring Cabinet.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward is now busy building up a conservative <span class="pagenum"><a id="page178" name="page178"></a>(p. 178)</span> Union +party North and South to preserve slavery, and to crush the rampant +Sumnerism, as Thurlow Weed calls it, and advises Seward to do so.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward's unofficial agents, Thurlow Weed, his Eminence, and +others, are untiring in the incense of their benefactor. Occasionally, +Mr. Lincoln gets a small share of it.</p> + +<p>Sandford in Paris and Brussels, Mr. Adams and Thurlow Weed in London, +work hard to assuage and soften the harsh odor in which Mr. Seward is +held, above all, among certain Englishmen of mark. It seems, however, +that <i>love's labor is lost</i>, and Mr. Adams, scholar-like, explains the +unsuccess of their efforts by the following philosophy: That in great +convulsions and events it is always the most eminent men who become +selected for violent and vituperative attacks. This is Mr. Seward's +fate, but time will dispel the falsehoods, and render him justice. +Well, be it so.</p> + +<p>Weed tried hard to bring the Duke of Newcastle over to Mr. Seward; but +the Duke seems perfectly unmoved by the blandishments, etc. To think +that the strict and upright Duke, who knows Weed, could be shaken by +the ubiquitous lobbyist! Rather the other way.</p> + +<p>One not acquainted with Mr. Seward's ardent republicanism may suspect +him of some dictatorial projects, to judge from the zeal with which +some of the diplomatic agents in Europe, together with the unofficial +ones there, extol to all the world Mr. Seward's transcendent +superiority over all other <span class="pagenum"><a id="page179" name="page179"></a>(p. 179)</span> eminent men in America. Are the +European statesmen to be prepared beforehand, or are they to be +befogged and prevented from judging for themselves? If so, again is +<i>love's labor lost</i>. European statesmen can perfectly take Mr. +Seward's measure from his uninterrupted and never-fulfilled +prophecies, and from other diplomatic stumblings; and one look +suffices European men of mark to measure a Hughes, a Weed, a Sandford, +and <i>tutti quanti</i>.</p> + +<p>In Mr. Lincoln's councils, Mr. Stanton alone has the vigor, the +purity, and the simplicity of a man of deep convictions. Stanton alone +unites the clear, broad comprehension of the exigencies of the +national question with unyielding action. He is the <i>statesman</i> so +long searched for by me. He, once a friend of McClellan, was not +deterred thereby from condemning that do-nothing <i>strategy</i>, so +ruinous and so dishonorable. Stanton is a Democrat, and therefore not +intrinsically, perhaps not even relatively, an anti-slavery man, but +he hesitates not now to destroy slavery for the preservation of the +Union. I am sure that every day will make Stanton more clear-sighted, +and more radical in the question of Union and rebellion. And Seward +and Blair, who owe their position to their anti-slavery principles, +<i>arcades ambo</i>, try now to save something of slavery, and turn against +Stanton.</p> + + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page180" name="page180"></a>(p. 180)</span> APRIL, 1862.</h3> + +<p class="resume">Immense power of the President — Mr. Seward's Egeria — Programme of + peace — The belligerent question — Roebucks and Gregories + scums — Running the blockade — Weed and Seward take clouds for + camels — Uncle Sam's pockets — Manhood, not money, the sinews of + war — Colonization schemes — Senator Doolittle — Coal mine + speculation — Washington too near the seat of war — Blair demands + the return of a fugitive slave woman — Slavery is Mr. Lincoln's + "<i>mammy</i>" — He will not destroy her — Victories in the West — The + brave navy — McClellan subsides in mud before Yorktown — Telegraphs + for more men — God will be tired out! — Great strength of the + people — Emancipation in the District — Wade's speech — He is a + monolith — Chase and Seward — N. Y. Times — The Rothschilds — Army + movements and plans.</p> + + +<p>If the military conduct of McClellan, from the first of January to the +day of the embarkation of the troops for Yorktown—if this conduct +were tried by French marshals, or by the French chief staff, or by the +military authorities and chief staffs of Prussia, Russia, and even of +Austria, McClellan would be condemned as unfit to have any military +command whatever. I would stake my right hand on such a verdict; and +here the would-be strategians, the traitors, the intriguers, and the +imbeciles prize him sky-high.</p> + +<p>Only by personal and close observation of the inner working of the +administrative machinery is it possible to appreciate and to +understand what an <span class="pagenum"><a id="page181" name="page181"></a>(p. 181)</span> immense power the Constitution locates in +the hands of a President. Far more power has he than any +constitutional sovereign—more than is the power of the English +sovereign and of her Cabinet put together. In the present emergencies, +such a power in the hands of a Wade or of a Stanton would have long +ago saved the country.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward looks to all sides of the compass for a Union party in the +South, which may rise politically against the rebels. That is the +advice of Weed, Mr. Seward's Egeria. I doubt that he will find many, +or even any. First kill the secesh, destroy the rebel power, that is, +the army, and then look for the Union men in the South. Mr. Seward, in +his generalizations, in his ardent expectations, etc., etc., forgets +to consider—at least a little—human nature, and, not to speak of +history, this <i>terra incognita</i>. Blood shed for the nationality makes +it grow and prosper; a protracted struggle deepens its roots, carries +away the indifferent, and even those who at the start opposed the +move. All such, perhaps, may again fall off from the current of +rebellion, but that current must first be reduced to an imperceptible +rivulet; and Mr. Seward, sustaining the do-nothing strategian, acts +against himself.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward's last programme is, after the capture of Richmond and of +New Orleans, to issue a proclamation—to offer terms to the rebels, to +restore the old Union in full, to protect slavery and all. For this +reason he supports McClellan, as both have the same plan. Of such a +character are the assurances <span class="pagenum"><a id="page182" name="page182"></a>(p. 182)</span> given by Mr. Seward to foreign +diplomats and governments. He tries to make them sure that a large +Union party will soon be forthcoming in the South, and again sounds +his vaticinations of the sacramental ninety days. I am sorry for this +his incurable passion to play the Pythoness. It is impossible that +such repeated prophecies shall raise him high in the estimation of the +European statesmen. Impossible! Impossible! whatever may be the +contrary assertions of his adulators, such as an Adams, a Sandford, a +Weed, a Bigelow, a Hughes, and others. When Mr. Seward proudly +unveiled this his programme, a foreign diplomat suggested that the +Congress may not accept it. Mr. Seward retorted that he cares not for +Congress; that he will appeal to the people, who are totally +indifferent to the abolition of slavery.</p> + +<p>Why does Mr. Seward deliberately slander the American people, and this +before foreign diplomats, whose duty it is to report all Mr. Seward's +words to their respective governments? Such words uttered by Mr. +Seward justify the assertions of Lord John Russell, of Gladstone, +those true and high-minded friends of human liberty, that the North +fights for empire and not for a principle. The people who will answer +to Mr. Seward's appeal will be those whose creed is that of the New +York Herald, the Boston Courier, the people of the Fernando and Ben +Woods, of the Vallandighams, etc.</p> + +<p>What is the use of urging on the foreign Cabinets—above all, England +and France—to rescind <span class="pagenum"><a id="page183" name="page183"></a>(p. 183)</span> the recognition of belligerents? They +cannot do it. It does not much—nay, not any—harm, as the English +speculators will risk to run the blockade if the rebels are +belligerent or not. And besides, the English and French Cabinets may +throw in Mr. Seward's face the decisions of our own prize courts, who, +on the authority of Mr. Seward's blockade, in their judicial +decisions, treat the rebels as belligerents. The European statesmen +are more cautious and more consequential in their acts than is our +Secretary.</p> + +<p>As it stands now, the conduct of the English government is very +correct, and not to be complained of. I do not speak of the infamous +articles in the Times, Herald, etc., or of the Gregories and such +scums as the Roebucks; but I am satisfied that Lord John Russell +wishes us no harm, and that it is our own policy which confuses and +makes suspicious such men as Russell, Gladstone, and others of the +better stamp.</p> + +<p>As for the armaments of secesh vessels in Liverpool and the Bahamas, +it is so perfectly in harmony with the English mercantile character +that it is impossible for the government to stop it.</p> + +<p>The English merchant generally considers it as a lawful enterprise to +run blockades; in the present case the premium is immense; it is so in +a twofold manner. 1st, the immediate profits on the various cargoes +exchanged against each other by a successful running of the blockade; +such profits must equal several hundred per cent. 2d, the prospective +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page184" name="page184"></a>(p. 184)</span> profits from an eventual success of the rebellion for such +friends as are now supporting the rebels. These prospects must be very +alluring, and are partly justified by our slow war, slow policy. I am +sure that the like armaments for the secessionists are made by shares +owned by various individuals; the individual risk of each shareholder +being comparatively insignificant when compared with the prospective +gains.</p> + +<p>If Seward, McClellan, and Blair had not meddled with Stanton, not +weakened his decisions, nor befogged Mr. Lincoln, Richmond would be in +our hands, together with Charleston and Savannah; and all the +iron-clad vessels built in England for secesh would be harmless.</p> + +<p>Mr. Weed and Mr. Seward expect Jeff. Davis to be overthrown by their +imaginary Southern Union party. O, wiseacres! if both of you had only +a little knowledge of human nature—not of that one embodied in +lobbyists—and of history, then you would be aware that if Jeff. Davis +is to be deposed it will be by one more violent than he, and you would +not speculate and take clouds for camels. During the weeks of +embarkation for Yorktown, the thorough incapacity of McClellan's chief +of the staff was as brilliant as the cloudless sun. It makes one +shudder to think what it will be when the campaign will be decidedly +and seriously going on.</p> + +<p>It is astonishing, and psychologically altogether incomprehensible, to +see persons, justly deserving to be considered as intelligent, deny +the evidence of <span class="pagenum"><a id="page185" name="page185"></a>(p. 185)</span> their own senses; forbid, so to speak, their +sound judgment to act; to be befogged by thorough imbeciles; to +consider incapacity as strategy, and to take imbecility for deep, +mysterious, great combinations and plans. Even the Turks could not +long be humbugged in such a way.</p> + +<p>No sovereign in the world, not even Napoleon in his palmiest days, +could thus easily satisfy his military whims concerning the most +costly and variegated material for an army, as does McClellan. He +changes his plans; every such change is gorgeously satisfied and +millions thrown away. Guns, mortars, transports, spades, etc., appear +at his order as if by charm; and all this to veil his utter +incapacity. This Yorktown expedition uncovers Washington and the +North, and such a deep plan could have been imagined only by a +<i>strategian</i>.</p> + +<p>What are doing in Europe all these various agents of Mr. Seward, and +paid by Uncle Sam? all these Weeds, Sandfords, Hughes, Bigelows, and +whoever else may be there? They cannot find means in their brains to +better direct, inform, or influence the European press. Almost all the +articles in our favor are only defensive and explanatory; the +offensive is altogether carried by the secesh press in England and in +France. But to deal offensive blows, our agents would be obliged to +stand firm on human principles, and show up all the dastardly +corruption of slavery, of slaveholders, and of rebels. Such a warfare +is forbidden by Mr. Seward's policy; and perhaps if such a Weed should +speak of corruption, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page186" name="page186"></a>(p. 186)</span> some English secesh may reprint +Wilkeson's letter. In one word, our cause in Europe is very tamely +represented and carried on. Members of the Chamber of Deputies in +Paris complain that they can nowhere find necessary information +concerning certain facts. There Seward's agents have not even been +able to correct the fallacies about the epoch of the Morrill +tariff,—fallacies so often invoked by the secesh press,—and many +other similar statements. I shall not wonder if the public opinion in +Europe by and by may fall off from our cause. Our defensive condition +there justifies the assumptions of the secesh. As we dare not expose +their crimes, the public in Europe must come to this conclusion, that +secesh may be right, and may begin to consider the North as having no +principle.</p> + +<p>And to think that all these agents heavily phlebotomize Uncle Sam's +pockets to obtain such contemptible results!</p> + +<p>Many persons, some among them of influence and judgment, still speak +and speculate upon what they call the starving of the rebellion. They +calculate upon the comparative poverty of the rebels, repeating the +fallacious adage, that money is the sinews of war. Money is so, but +only in a limited degree, and more limited than is generally supposed; +more limited even now when war is a very expensive pastime.</p> + +<p>This fallacy, first uttered by the aristocrat Thucydides, was repeated +over and over again until it became a statesmanlike creed. But even +Thucydides <span class="pagenum"><a id="page187" name="page187"></a>(p. 187)</span> gave not to that <i>dictum</i> such a general sense, +and Macchiavelli scorned the fallacy and exposed it. When poor, the +Spartans have been the bravest. The historical halo surrounding the +name of Sparta originated at that epoch when the use of money and of +gold had been almost forbidden. The wealth of Athens began after the +victories over the Persians; but those victories were won when the +Athenians were comparatively poor. So it was with the Romans until the +subjugation of Carthage, and in modern Europe the Swiss, etc., etc., +etc.</p> + +<p>Manhood in a people, and self-sacrifice, are the genuine sinews of +war; wealth alone saved no nation from disgrace and from death, nay, +often accelerated the catastrophe.</p> + +<p>The colonization of Africo-Americans is still discussed; very likely +inspired by Seward and by his Yucatan schemes. Senator Doolittle runs +himself down at a fearful rate. I regret Doolittle's mistake. Those +colonizers forget that if they should export even 100,000 persons a +year, an equal number will be yearly born at home, not to speak of +other impossibilities. If carried on on a small scale, this scheme +amounts to nothing; and on a grand scale it is altogether impossible, +besides being as stupid as it is recklessly cruel. Only those persons +insist on colonization who hate or dread general emancipation.</p> + +<p>When the slaves shall be emancipated, then the owners of plantations +will be forced to offer very acceptable terms to the newly made free +laborers to <span class="pagenum"><a id="page188" name="page188"></a>(p. 188)</span> have their plantations cultivated, which +otherwise must become waste and useless lands, and the planters +themselves poor starving wretches. With very little of governmental +interference, the mutual relation between planter and laborer can be +regulated, and the planter will be the first to oppose colonization.</p> + +<p>Look from whatever side you like, a colonization schemer is a cruel +deceiver, he is an enemy of emancipation, and if he claims to be an +emancipator then he is an enemy of the planter and of the prosperity +of the southern region.</p> + +<p>Besides, the present scheme of colonization to Chiriqui is an infamous +speculation to help some Ambrosio Thompson to work coal mines in that +part of Central America. That individual has a grant for some lands in +Chiriqui, and there these poor victims are to be exported. The grant +itself is contested by the New Grenadian government. Those poor +coolies will be the prey of speculators; there will arise claims +against the Grenadian government—a rich mine for lobbyists and +claimants. Infamy! and these fathers of the country are as blind as +moles. Central America is always in convulsions, and of course the +colonists will be robbed by every party of those semi-savages. The +colonists being Methodists, etc., will be pointed out by the stupid +Catholic clergy as being heretics and miscreants.</p> + +<p>Washington's proximity to the theatre of war in <span class="pagenum"><a id="page189" name="page189"></a>(p. 189)</span> Virginia is +the greatest impediment for rapid movements; it is the ruin of +generals and of armies.</p> + +<p>Being within reach of the seat of government and of the material +means, the generals are never ready, but always have something to +complete, something to ask for, and so days after days elapse. In all +other countries and governments of the world the commanders move on, +and the objects of secondary necessity are sent after them.</p> + +<p>In all other countries and wars the principal aim of commanders is to +become conspicuous by rapidity of movements. The paramount glory is to +have achieved and obtained important results with comparatively +limited means. Here, the greater the slowness with which they move, +the greater captains they are; and the more expensive their +operations, the surer they are of the applause of the administration, +and of a great many f——.</p> + +<p>After all, the above is the result of pre-existing causes. Slowness, +indecision, and waste of money, are the prominent features of this +administration.</p> + +<p>Stanton excepted, I again think of the dictum of Professor Steffens, +and every day believe it more.</p> + +<p>Mr. Blair worse and worse; is more hot in support of McClellan, more +determined to upset Stanton, and I heard him demand the return of a +poor fugitive slave woman to some of Blair's Maryland friends.</p> + +<p>Every day I am confirmed in my creed that whoever had slavery for +<i>mammy</i> is never serious in the effort to destroy it. Whatever such +men as Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Blair will do against slavery, will +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page190" name="page190"></a>(p. 190)</span> never be radical by their own choice or conviction, but will +be done reluctantly, and when under the unavoidable pressure of +events.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward restive and bitter against all who criticise. Mr. Seward +assumes that everybody does his best, and ought therefore to be +applauded. But Mr. Seward forgets the proverb about hell being paved +with good intentions. In this terrible emergency the people want men +who <i>really</i> do the best, and not those who only try and intend to do +it.</p> + +<p>McClellan had the full sway so long—appointed so many, perhaps more +than sixty, brigadier generals—that it is not astonishing when those +appointees prefer rather not to see for themselves, but blindly +"hurrah" for their creator.</p> + +<p>Victories in the West, triumphantly establishing the superiority of +our soldiers in open battle-fields, and the superiority of all +generals who are distant from any contact with Washington, as Pope, +Grant, Curtis, Mitchell, Sigel, and others. The brave navy,—this pure +democratic element which assures the greatest results, and makes the +less laudatory noise. The navy is admirable; the navy is the purest +and most glorious child of the people.</p> + +<p>The destruction of the rebellion saves the future generations of the +Southern whites. Secession would for centuries have bred and raised +only formidable social hyenas.</p> + +<p>McClellan subsided in mud before Yorktown. Any other, only even +half-way, military capacity commanding such forces would have made a +lunch <span class="pagenum"><a id="page191" name="page191"></a>(p. 191)</span> of Yorktown. But our troops are to dig, perhaps their +graves, to the full satisfaction of Mr. Lincoln, Mr. Seward, and Mr. +Blair.</p> + +<p>McClellan telegraphs for more men, and he has more already than he can +put in action, and more than he has room for. He subsides in digging. +The rebels will again fool him as they fooled him in Manassas. If +McClellan could know anything, then he would know this—that nothing +is so destructive to an army as sieges, as diggings, and camps, and +nothing more disciplines and re-invigorates men, makes them true +soldiers, than does marching and fighting. Poor Stanton! how he must +suffer to be overruled by imbeciles and intriguers. McClellan +telegraphing for reinforcements plainly shows how unmilitary are his +brains. He and a great many here believe that the greater the mass of +troops, the surer the victory. History mostly teaches the contrary; +but speak to American wiseacres about history! He, McClellan, and +others on his side, ignore the difficulty of handling or swinging an +army of 100,000 men.</p> + +<p>A good general, confident in his troops, will not hesitate to fight +two to three. But McClellan feels at ease when he can, at the least, +have two to one. In Manassas he had three to one, and +conquered—wooden guns! We will see what he will conquer before +Yorktown.</p> + +<p>Louis Napoleon always well disposed, but of course he cannot swallow +Mr. Seward's demand about belligerents. I am so glad and so proud that +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page192" name="page192"></a>(p. 192)</span> up to this day events justify my confidence in the French +policy, although our policy may tire not only Louis Napoleon, but tire +the God whom we worship and invoke. I should not wonder if God, tired +by such McClellans, Lincolns, Sewards, Blairs, etc., finally gives us +the cold shoulder. This demand concerning belligerents is a diplomatic +and initiative step made by Mr. Seward; it is unsuccessful, as are all +his initiatives, and no wonder.</p> + +<p>Mr. Lincoln, incited by Mr. Seward and by Mr. Blair, overrules the +opinion of the purest, the ablest, and the most patriotic men in +Congress—that of Stanton, and of the few good generals unbefogged by +McClellanism. Such a power as the Constitution gives to a President is +the salvation of the people when in the hands of a Jackson, but when +in the hands of a Lincoln, ——!</p> + +<p>The muscular strength of the American people, and the strength of its +backbone, beat all the Herculeses and Atlases supporting the globe. +Any other people would have long ago broke down under the policy and +the combined weight of Lincoln, Seward, and McClellan.</p> + +<p>Mr. Lincoln is forced out again from one of his pro-slavery +entrenchments; he was obliged to yield, and to sign the hard-fought +bill for emancipation in the District of Columbia; but how +reluctantly, with what bad grace he signed it! Good boy; he wishes not +to strike his <i>mammy</i>; and to think that the friends of humanity in +Europe will credit this emancipation not where it is due, not to the +noble <span class="pagenum"><a id="page193" name="page193"></a>(p. 193)</span> pressure exercised by the high-minded Northern masses, +but to this Kentucky ——.</p> + +<p>Senator Wade made a powerful speech in relation to the arrest of +General Stone. It was powerful, patriotic, and rises to the skies over +the Lilliputian oratory of the thus-called scholars, etc. Wade is a +monolith,—he is cut out full in a rock.</p> + +<p>It seems that the new law increasing the number of judges for the +Supreme Court weakened many backbones. Congress ought to have added +the clause that a senator can be nominated only after six years from +the day of the promulgation.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward again chalked before the dazzled eyes of foreign powers +certain future military operations; but again events have been so +impolite as to upturn Mr. Seward's prophecies.</p> + +<p>The report of the Senate committee on the destruction of Norfolk +speaks of the "insane delusion" of the administration. I am proud to +have considered it in the same light about a year ago.</p> + +<p>Mr. Thouvenel politely but logically refuses to acquiesce in Mr. +Seward's demand concerning the belligerents. Thouvenel's reasons are +plausible. The support given to strategy by Mr. Seward,—that support +does more mischief to us than do all the pirates and all the +violations of blockade. Let us take Richmond,—a thing impossible with +McClellan,—and take by land Charleston, Savannah, etc.; then the +pirates and belligerents are strangulated. And—as says Gen. +Sherman—Savannah and Charleston could have been taken several months +ago. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page194" name="page194"></a>(p. 194)</span> Orders from Washington forbade to do it; and it would +be curious to ascertain how far Mr. Seward is innocent in the +perpetration of these orders.</p> + +<p>Chase and Seward dear-dearing each other! Amusing! Kilkenny cats! At +this game Seward will have the best of Chase, who is not a match for +tricks.</p> + +<p>The New York Times attacks Capt. Dahlgren, of the Navy Yard. It is in +the nature of the "little villain" to bespatter men of such devotion, +patriotism, and eminent capacity as is Captain Dahlgren.</p> + +<p>Thurlow Weed calls the Tribune "infernal," because it wishes a serious +war, and thus prevents the raising of a Union party in the South, so +flippantly looked for by him and Mr. Seward, his pupil. I see the time +coming when all these <i>gentlemen</i> of the concessions, of the +not-hurting policy,—when all these conservative seekers for the Union +party will try, Pilatus-like, to wash their hands of the innocent +blood; but you shall try, and not succeed, to whitewash your stained +hands; you have less excuses on your side than had the Roman proconsul +on his side.</p> + +<p>When Mr. Mercier was in Richmond, some of the rebel leaders and +generals told him that they believed not their senses on learning that +McClellan was going to Yorktown; that he never could have selected a +better place for them, and that they were sure of his destruction on +the Peninsula.</p> + +<p>Perhaps McClellan wished to try his hand and rehearse the siege of +Sebastopol.</p> + +<p>If McClellan's ignorance of military history were <span class="pagenum"><a id="page195" name="page195"></a>(p. 195)</span> not so +well established, he would know that since Archimedes, down to +Todleben, more genius was displayed in the defence than in the attack +of any place. The making of approaches, parallels, etc., is an affair +of engineering school routine. Napoleon took Toulon rather as an +artillerist, who, having, calculated the reach of projectiles, put his +battery on a spot wherefrom he shelled Toulon. Napoleon took Mantua by +destroying the Austrian army which hastened to the relief of the +fortress. But the great American strategian knows better, and +satisfies (as said above) the rebels.</p> + +<p>The New York Herald, the New York Times, and other staunch supporters +of McClellan, again and again trumpet that the rebels fear McClellan, +that they consider him to be the ablest general opposed to them. The +rebels are smart, and so is their ally, the New York Herald. As for +the Times, it is only a flunkeying "little villain."</p> + +<p>McDowell, Banks, Fremont have about 70,000 men; the last two are +nearly at the head of the Shenandoah valley; they could unite with +McDowell, and march and take Richmond. They beg to be ordered to do +it, and so wishes Stanton; but, fatally befogged by McClellan, by +McClellan's clique in the councils, or by strategians, Lincoln +emphatically forbids any junction, any movement; the President forbids +McDowell to take Fredericksburg, or to throw a bridge across the +river. And thus McClellan prevents any glorious military operation; is +losing in the mud a hundred men daily by disease, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page196" name="page196"></a>(p. 196)</span> and Mr. +Lincoln—still infatuated. But infatuation is the disease of small and +weak brains.</p> + +<p>Rothschild in Paris, and very likely the Rothschilds in London, are +for the North. But if the Rothschilds show that they well understand +and respect the Old Testament, whose spirit is anti-slavery, they show +they understand better the true Christian spirit than do the +Christians. The Rothschilds show themselves more thoroughly of our +century than are such Michel Chevaliers, or such impure Roebucks, and +all the supporters of free trade in human flesh.</p> + +<p>McClellan's supporters, and such strategians as Blair and Seward, +assert that McClellan's plan was ruined by not sending McDowell to +Gloucester; that then the whole rebel army would have been caught in a +trap. That silly plan to go to the Peninsula is defended in a still +more silly way.</p> + +<p>By McDowell's going to Gloucester, Washington would have been wholly +at the mercy of an army of thirty to forty thousand men; the +celebrated defences of Washington, this result of the united wisdom of +Scott and McClellan, facilitating to the rebel army a raid on +Washington.</p> + +<p>Further; McClellan, in concocting and <i>maturing</i> his thus called +plans, probably believes that the rebels will do just the thing which, +in his calculations, he wishes them to do; and such erroneous +suppositions are the sole basis of his <i>plans</i>. But the rebels +repeatedly showed themselves by far too smart for his <i>Napoleonic</i> +brains; and besides, not <span class="pagenum"><a id="page197" name="page197"></a>(p. 197)</span> much wit to the rebel generals was +necessary to see through and through what the great Napoleon was +about, by ordering McDowell to Gloucester. Of course, the rebel +generals would not have had the politeness towards McClellan to +sheepishly accede to his wishes, and go into the trap. The whole plan +was worse than childish, and I am glad to learn that several generals +showed brains to condemn it. The whole plan was up to the +comprehension of McClellanites, of consummate strategians in +McClellan's official tross, for those in the Cabinet and out of it.</p> + +<p>Would God that all this ends not in disasters. If it ends well it will +be the first time success has crowned such transcendent incapacity.</p> + + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page198" name="page198"></a>(p. 198)</span> MAY, 1862.</h3> + +<p class="resume">Capture of New Orleans — The second siege of Troy — Mr. Seward + lights his lantern to search for the Union-saving + party — Subserviency to power — Vitality of the people — Yorktown + evacuated — Battle of Williamsburg — Great bayonet + charge! — Heintzelman and Hooker — McClellan telegraphs that the + enemy outnumber him — The terrible enemy evacuate + Williamsburg — The track of truth begins to be lost — Oh + Napoleon! — Oh spirit of Berthier! — Dayton not in favor — Events + are too rapid for Lincoln — His integrity — Too tender of men's + feelings — Halleck — Ten thousand men disabled by disease — The + Bishop of Orleans — The rebels retreat without the knowledge of + McNapoleon — Hunter's proclamation — Too noble for Mr. + Lincoln — McClellan again subsides in mud — Jackson defeats Banks, + who makes a masterly retreat — Bravo, Banks! — The aulic council + frightened — Gov. Andrew's letter — Sigel — English opinion — Mr. + Mill — Young Europa — Young Germany — Corinth evacuated — Oh, + generalship! — McDowell grimly persecuted by bad luck.</p> + + +<p>The capture of New Orleans. The undaunted bravery of the Navy—this +most beautiful leaf in the American history. The Navy fights without +talk and <i>strategy</i>, because it does not look to win the track to the +White House. The capture of New Orleans may lead the rebels to +evacuate Yorktown and to fool the great strategian.</p> + +<p>It is a very threatening symptom, that no genuine harmony—nay, no +sympathy—exists between the best, the purest, the most intelligent, +the most energetic members of both the Houses of Congress and +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page199" name="page199"></a>(p. 199)</span> the President, including the leading spirit of his Cabinet. +The New York Herald is the principal supporter of Mr. Lincoln and Mr. +Seward; in the Congress their supporters are the Democrats, and all +those who wish to make concessions to the South, who ardently wish to +preserve slavery, and in any way to patch up the quarrel.</p> + +<p>In times as trying as are the present ones, such a shameful and +dangerous anomaly must, in the long run, destroy either the government +or the nation. If it turns out differently here, the exclusive reason +thereof will be the great vitality of the people. All the deep and +dangerous wounds inflicted by the policy of the administration will be +healed by the vigorous, vital energy of the people.</p> + +<p>"For Heaven's sake finish quick your war!" Such are the +exclamations—nay, the prayers—coming from the French statesmen, as +Fould and others, from our devoted friends, as Prince Napoleon, and +from all the famishing, but nevertheless nobly-behaving, operatives in +England. And here McClellan inaugurates before Yorktown a second siege +of Troy or of Sebastopol; Lincoln forbids the junction of McDowell +with Banks and Fremont, by which Richmond could be easily taken from +the west side, where it ought to be attacked; and Mr. Seward reads the +like dispatches and backs McClellan; Mr. S. lights his lantern in +search North and South of the Union-saving party!</p> + +<p>Speak to me of subserviency to power by European aristocrats, +courtiers, etc.! What almost <span class="pagenum"><a id="page200" name="page200"></a>(p. 200)</span> every day I witness here of +subserviency of influential men to the favored and office-distributing +power, all things compared and considered, beats whatever I saw in +Europe, even in Russia at the Nicolean epoch.</p> + +<p>General Cameron, in his farewell speech, said that at the beginning of +the civil war General Scott told him, Cameron, that he, Scott, never +in his life was more pained than when a Virginian reminded him of his +paramount duties to his State. I take note of this declaration, as it +corroborates what a year ago I said in this diary concerning the +disastrous hesitations of General Scott.</p> + +<p>It is said that Turtschininoff is all in all in General Mitchell's +command. Turtschininoff is a genuine and distinguished officer of the +staff, and educated in that speciality so wholly unknown to +West-Pointers. Several among the foreigners in the army are thoroughly +educated officers of the staff, and would be of great use if employed +in the proper place. But envy and know-nothingism are doubly in their +way. Besides, the foreign officers have no tenderness for the Southern +cause and Southern chivalry, and would be in the cause with their +whole heart.</p> + +<p>By the insinuations of an anonymous correspondent in the Tribune, Mr. +Seward tries to re-establish his anti-slavery reputation. But how is +it that foreign diplomats, that the purest of his former political +friends, consider him to be now the savior of what he once persecuted +in his speeches?</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page201" name="page201"></a>(p. 201)</span> At every step this noble people vindicates and asserts the +vitality of self-government, continually jeopardized by the +inexhaustible errors of the policy followed by the master-spirits in +the administration. European doctors, prophets, vindictive enemies +like the London Times, the Saturday Review, etc., and the French +journals of the police, all of them are daily—nay, hourly—baffled in +their expectations—paper money and no bankruptcy, no inflation, bonds +equal to gold, etc., etc. And all this, not because there is any great +or even small statesman or financier at the head of the +administration, but because the people at large have confidence in +themselves, in their own energies; because they have the determination +to succeed, and not to be bankrupt; not to discredit their own +decisions. All these phenomena, so new in the history of nations, are +incomprehensible to European wiseacres; they are too much for the +hatred and dulness of the Europeans in France, England, and for that +of the many Europeans here.</p> + +<p>Yorktown evacuated!—under the nose of an army of 160,000 men, and +within the distance of a rifle shot!—evacuated quietly, of course, +during several days. One cannot abstain from saying Bravo! to the +rebel generals. Their high capacity forces the mind to an involuntary +applause. Traitors, intriguers, and imbeciles applaud, extol the +results of the bloodless strategy. McClellan is used by the rebels +only to be fooled by them. It must be so. It is one proof more of the +transcendent capacity <span class="pagenum"><a id="page202" name="page202"></a>(p. 202)</span> of the strategian, and, above all, of +the capacity and efficiency of the chief of the staff of the great +army. Such an operation as that of Yorktown, anywhere else, would be +considered as the highest disgrace; here, glorifications of strategy. +McClellan's bulletins from Yorktown describe the rebel fortifications +as being almost impregnable. Of course impregnable! but only to him.</p> + +<p>Battle at Williamsburg; and McClellan and his so perfect staff +altogether ignorant of the whole bloody but honorable affair as fought +against terrible odds by Heintzelman and Hooker; but the great +Napoleon's bulletin mentions a <i>real</i>—Oh hear! hear the great +Mars!—<i>charge with the bayonet</i>, made at the other extremity of +Williamsburg, and in which from twenty to forty men were killed!</p> + +<p>Heintzelman's and Hooker's personal conduct, and that of their troops, +was heroic beyond name. McClellan ignored the battle; ignored what was +going on, and, as it is said, gave orders to Sumner not to support +Heintzelman.</p> + +<p>McClellan telegraphs that the enemy far outnumbers him (fears count +doubly), but that he will do his utmost and his best. This Napoleon of +the New York Herald's manufacture in everything is the reverse of all +the leaders and captains known in history: all of them, when before +the battle they addressed their soldiers, represented the enemy as +inferior and contemptible; after the battle was won, the enemy was +extolled.</p> + +<p>From the first of his addresses to this his last dispatch <span class="pagenum"><a id="page203" name="page203"></a>(p. 203)</span> +from Williamsburg, McClellan always speaks of the terrible enemy whom +he is to encounter; and in this last dispatch he tries to frighten not +only his army, but the whole country. During the night <i>the terrible +enemy</i> evacuated Williamsburg; McClellan breathes more free, takes +fresh courage, and his bulletin estimates the enemy's forces at +50,000.</p> + +<p>The track of truth begins to be lost. By comparing dates, bulletins, +and notes, it results that at the precise minute when McClellan +telegraphed his wail concerning the large numbers of the enemy and the +formidable fortifications of Williamsburg, the rebels were evacuating +them, pressed and expelled therefrom by Hooker, Kearney, and +Heintzelman. Oh Napoleon! Oh spirits not only of Berthier and of +Gneisenau, but of the most insignificant chiefs of staffs, admire your +caricature at the head of the army commanded by this freshly-backed +Napoleon!</p> + +<p>A foreign diplomat was in McClellan's tent before Yorktown, on the eve +of the day when the rebels wholly evacuated it. One of McClellan's +aids suggested to the general that the comparative silence of the +rebel artillery might forebode evacuation. "Impossible!" answered the +New York Herald's Napoleon. "I know everything that passes in their +camp, and I have them fast." (I have these details from the +above-mentioned diplomat.) In the same minute, when the strategian +spoke in this way, at least half of the rebel army had already +withdrawn from Yorktown. Comments thereupon are superfluous.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page204" name="page204"></a>(p. 204)</span> Dayton, from Paris, very sensibly objects to the policy of +insisting that England and France shall annul their decision +concerning the belligerents. Dayton considers such a demand to be, for +various reasons, out of season. I am sure that Dayton is respected by +Louis Napoleon and by Thouvenel on account of his sound sense and +rectitude, although he <i>parleys not</i> French. Dayton must impress +everybody differently from that French parleying claims' prosecutor +and itinerant agent of a sewing machine, who breakfasts in Brussels +with Leopold, and the same day dines in Paris with Thouvenel, and may +take his supper in h—l, so far as the interest of the cause is +concerned. But Dayton seems not to be in favor with the department.</p> + +<p>The admirers of McClellan assert that one parallel digged by him was +sufficient to frighten the rebels and force them to evacuate. Good for +what it is worth for such mighty ignorant brains. The mortars, the +hundred-pounders, frightened the rebels; they break down not before +parallels, strategy, or Napoleon, but before the intellectual +superiority of the North, in the present case embodied in mortars and +other armaments.</p> + +<p>Following the retreating enemy, McClellan loses more prisoners than he +makes from the enemy. A new and perfectly original, perfectly <i>sui +generis</i> mode of warfare, but altogether in harmony with all the other +martial performances of the pet of the New York Herald, of Messrs. +Seward and Blair, and of the whole herd of intriguers and imbeciles.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page205" name="page205"></a>(p. 205)</span> People who approach him say that Mr. Lincoln's conceit +groweth every day. I guess that Seward carefully nurses the weed as +the easiest way to dominate over and to handle a feeble mind.</p> + +<p>Since Mr. Mercier judges by his own eyes, and not by those of former +various Washington associations, his inborn soundness and perspicacity +have the upper hand. He is impartial and just to both parties; he is +not bound to have against the rebels feelings akin to mine, but he is +well disposed, and wishes for the success of the Union.</p> + +<p>The events are too grand and too rapid for Lincoln. It is impossible +for him to grasp and to comprehend them. I do not know any past +historical personality fully adequate to such a task. Happily in this +occurrency, the many, the people at large, by its grasp and +forwardness, supplies and neutralizes the inefficiency or the +tergiversations, intrigues and double-dealings of the few, of the +official leaders, advisers, etc.</p> + +<p>I willingly concede to Mr. Lincoln all the best and most variegated +mental and intellectual qualities, all the virtues as claimed for him +by his eulogists and friends. I would wish to believe, as they do, Mr. +Lincoln to be infallible and impeccable. But all those qualities and +virtues represented to form the residue of his character, all shining +when in private life, some way or other are transformed from positives +into negatives, since Mr. Lincoln's contact with the pulsations and +the hurricane of public life. Thus Mr. Lincoln's friends assert that +all his efforts <span class="pagenum"><a id="page206" name="page206"></a>(p. 206)</span> tend to conciliate parties and even +individuals. This candor was beneficial and efficient in the court or +bar-rooms, or around a supper table in Springfield. It was even more +so, perhaps, when seasoned with stories more or less * * * But one who +tries to conciliate between two antipodic principles, or between pure +and impure characters, unavoidably must dodge the principal points at +issue. Such is the stern law of logic. Who dodges, who biasses, +unavoidably deviates from that straight and direct way at the end of +which dwells truth. Further: feeble, expectative and vacillating +minds, deprived of the faculty to embrace in all its depth and +extension the task before them,—such minds cannot have a clear +purpose, nor the firm perception of ways and means leading to the aim, +and still less have they the sternness of conviction so necessary for +men dealing with such mighty events, on which depend the life and +death of a society. Such men hesitate, postpone, bias and deviate from +the straight way. Such men believe themselves in the way to truth, +when they are aside of it. It results therefrom, that when certain +amiable qualities, such as conciliation, a little dodging, hesitation, +etc., are practised in private life and in a very restrained area, +their deviations from truth are altogether imperceptible, and they are +then positive good qualities, nay, virtues. But such qualities, +transported and put into daily friction with the tempestuous +atmosphere of human events, lose their ingenuousness, their innocence, +their good-naturedness; <span class="pagenum"><a id="page207" name="page207"></a>(p. 207)</span> the imperceptibility of their +intrinsic deviation becomes transparent and of gigantic dimensions.</p> + +<p>Mr. Lincoln's crystal-pure integrity prevented not the most frightful +dilapidation, nay, robbing of the treasury by contractors, etc., etc. +Nor has it kept pure his official household. His friend Lamon and the +to-be-formed regiments; the splendid equipages and <i>coupes</i> of his +youthful secretaries, to be sure, came not from Springfield, etc., +etc., nor sees he through the rascally scheme of the Chiriqui +colonization.</p> + +<p>Mr. Lincoln, his friends assert, does not wish to hurt the feelings of +any one with whom he has to deal. Exceedingly amiable quality in a +private individual, but at times turning almost to be a vice in a man +entrusted with the destinies of a nation. So he never could decide to +hurt the feelings of McClellan, and this after all the numerous proofs +of his incapacity. But Mr. Lincoln hurts thereby, and in the most +sensible manner, the interests, nay, the lives, of the twenty millions +of people. I am sure that McClellan may lose the whole army, and why +not if he continues as he began? and Mr. Lincoln will support and keep +him, as to act otherwise would hurt McClellan's, Marcy's, Seward's, +and perhaps Blair's feelings.</p> + +<p>Finally, Mr. Lincoln, advised, they say, by Mr. Seward, holds in +contempt public opinion as manifested by the press, with the exception +of the incense burnt to him by the New York Herald. If <span class="pagenum"><a id="page208" name="page208"></a>(p. 208)</span> this +is true, Mr. Lincoln's mind is cunningly befogged.</p> + +<p>It is very soothing for the quiet of private life to ignore +newspapers; but all over Europe men in power, sovereigns and +ministers, carefully and daily study and watch the opinions of the +newspapers, and principally of those which oppose and criticise them.</p> + +<p>Such, Mr. Lincoln, is the wisdom of the truly experienced statesman. +Better ask Louis Napoleon than Seward.</p> + +<p>I am astonished that concerning Mexico Louis Napoleon was taken in by +Almonte. Experience ought to have fully made him familiar with the +general policy of political refugees. This policy was, is, and will be +always based on imaginary facts.</p> + +<p>Political refugees befog themselves and befog others. And this Mr. de +Saligny must be a d——; Louis Napoleon ought to expel him from the +service.</p> + +<p>Halleck likewise seems to lay the track to the White House. Nothing +has been done since he took the command in person. Halleck, as does +also McClellan, tries to make all his measures so sure, so perfect, +that he misses his aim, and becomes fooled by the enemy. In war, as in +anything else, after having quickly prepared and taken measures, a man +ought to act, and rely as much as possible on fortune—that is, on his +own acuteness—how to cut the knot when he meets it in his path.</p> + +<p>Halleck before Corinth, and McClellan before Manassas and Yorktown, +both spend by far more <span class="pagenum"><a id="page209" name="page209"></a>(p. 209)</span> time than it took Napoleon from +Boulogne and Bretagne to march into the heart of Germany, surround and +capture Mack at Ulm, and come in view of Vienna.</p> + +<p>The French and English naval officers in the Mississippi assured our +commanders that it was impossible to overcome the various defences +erected by the rebels. Our men gave the lie to those envious +forebodings. McClellan, in a dispatch, assures the Secretary of War +that he, McClellan, will take care of the gunboats. <i>Risum teneatis.</i></p> + +<p>The most contemptible flunkeys on the face of the earth are the +wiseacres, and the thus-called framers of public opinion. Until yet +McClellan, literally, has not stood by when a cartridge was burned, +and they sing hosanna for him.</p> + +<p>Ten thousand men have been disabled by diseases before Yorktown; add +to it the several thousands in a similar way disabled in the camp +before Manassas, and it makes more than would have cost two battles, +fought between the Rappahannock and Richmond,—battles which must have +settled the question.</p> + +<p>Although ultra-Montane, the Bishop of Orleans nobly condemns slavery. +The Bishop's pastoral is an answer to H. E., Archbishop of New York. +The French bishop therein is true to the spirit of the Catholic +church. The Irish archbishop, compared to him, appears a dabbler in +Romanism.</p> + +<p>During the administration of Pierce and of Buchanan, the Democratic +senators ruled over the President <span class="pagenum"><a id="page210" name="page210"></a>(p. 210)</span> and the Cabinet. Perhaps +it is not as it ought to be; but for the salvation of the country it +were desirable that a curb be put on Mr. Lincoln, Mr. Seward, Mr. +Blair, by the Republican senators, by men like Wade, Wilson, Chandler, +Grimes, Fessenden, Hale, and others.</p> + +<p>The retreat of the rebels was masterly conducted, and their pursuit by +McClellan has no name. Nowhere has this Napoleon got at them. The +affair at Williamsburg was bravely done by Heintzelman and Hooker; but +it was done without the knowledge of McNapoleon, and contrary to his +expectations and strategy. This he confesses in one of his <i>masterly</i> +bulletins. Perhaps McNapoleon ignored Heintzelman's corps' heroic +actions, because neither Heintzelman, nor Hooker, nor Kearney worship +<i>strategy, and the deep, well-matured plans of Mc</i>.</p> + +<p>General Hunter's proclamation in South Carolina is the greatest social +act in the course of this war. How pale and insignificant are Mr. +Lincoln's disquisitions aside of that proclamation, which is greeted +in heaven by angels and cherubim—provided they are a reality.</p> + +<p>Of course Mr. Lincoln overrules General Hunter's proclamation. It is +too human, too noble, too great, for the tall Kentuckian. Many say +that Seward, Blair, Seaton from the Intelligencer, and other Border +State patriots, pressed upon Lincoln. I am sure that it gave them very +little trouble to put Mr. Lincoln straight —— with slaveocracy. +Henceforth <span class="pagenum"><a id="page211" name="page211"></a>(p. 211)</span> every Northern man dying in the South is to be +credited to Mr. Lincoln!</p> + +<p>Mr. Lincoln again publishes a disquisition, and points to the signs of +the times. But does Mr. Lincoln perceive other, more awful, signs of +the times? Does he see the bloody handwriting on the wall, condemning +his unnatural, vacillating, dodging policy?</p> + +<p>All things considered, it will not be astonishing in Europe if they +lose patience and sneer at the North, when they learn that McClellan +is continually doing strategy; when they will read his bulletins; when +they will find out that from West Point to Richmond he pursued the +enemy at the <i>enormous</i> speed of two miles a day,—and that of course +nobody was hurt,—and finally, that, surrounded by a brilliant and +costly staff, he was ignorant of the condition of the roads, and of +the existence of marshes and swamps into which he plunged the army.</p> + +<p>The President repeatedly speaks of his strong will to restore the +Union. Very well; but why not use for it the best, the most decided, +and the most thorough means and measures?</p> + +<p>Continually I meet numbers and numbers of soldiers who are discharged +because disabled in the camps during winter. Thus McClellan's +bloodless strategy deprived several thousands of their health, without +in the least hurting the enemy. And daily I meet numbers of +able-bodied Africo-Americans, who would make excellent soldiers. I +decided to <span class="pagenum"><a id="page212" name="page212"></a>(p. 212)</span> try to form a regiment of the Africo-Americans, +and, after whipping the F. F. V.'s, establish, beyond doubt, the +perfect equality of the thus called races.</p> + +<p>McClellan subsides in mud,—digs,—and the sick list of the army +increases hourly at a fearful ratio. And McClellan refuses to slaves +admittance within his lines. If, at least, McClellan was a fighting +general; but a mud-mole as he —-—-. Any other general in any other +country, in Asia, in Africa, etc., would use any elements whatever +within his grasp, by using which he could strengthen his own and +weaken the enemy's resources. McNapoleon knows better!</p> + +<p>One of the best diplomatic documents by Mr. Seward is that on Mexico; +and so is also the policy pursued by him. Why does Mr. Seward dabble +in war and strategy at home?</p> + +<p>McClellan digs, and by his wailings has disorganized the corps of +McDowell, and of Banks, who retreats and is pressed by Jackson. The +men who advised, or the McClellan worshippers who prevented the union +of McDowell with Banks and Fremont, are as criminal as any one can be +in Mr. Lincoln's councils.</p> + +<p>Now Jackson is reorganized; he penetrated between Fremont and Banks, +who were sorely weakened by transferring continually divisions from +one to another army, and this between the Chickahominy and the lower +Shenandoah.</p> + +<p>New diplomatic initiative by Mr. Seward. France and England are +requested to declare to the rebels <span class="pagenum"><a id="page213" name="page213"></a>(p. 213)</span> that they have no support +to expect from the above-mentioned powers.</p> + +<p>This initiative would be splendid if it could succeed; but it cannot, +and for the same logical reasons as failed the recent initiative about +belligerents. Such unsuccessful initiatives are lowering the +consideration of that statesman who makes them. Such failures show a +want of diplomatic and statesmanlike perspicacity.</p> + +<p>The nation is assured by Mr. Lincoln and by Mr. Seward that a perfect +harmony prevails in the Cabinet. Beautiful if true.</p> + +<p>General Banks attacked by Jackson and defeated; but, although +surrounded, makes a masterly retreat, without even being considerably +worsted. Bravo, Banks! Such retreats do as much honor to a general as +a won battle.</p> + +<p>This bold raid of Jackson—a genuine general—wholly disorganized that +army which, if united weeks ago, could have taken Richmond, and +rendered Jackson's brilliant dash impossible. The military aulic +council of the President is frightened out of its senses, and asks the +people for 100,000 defenders. General Wadsworth advised not to thus, +without any necessity, frighten the country.</p> + +<p>On this occasion Governor Andrew, of Massachusetts, wrote a scorching +letter to the administration on account of General Hunter's +proclamation. Governor Andrew always acts, speaks, and writes to the +point.</p> + +<p>This alarming appeal, so promptly responded to, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page214" name="page214"></a>(p. 214)</span> has its +good, as it will show to Europe the untired determination of the free +States.</p> + +<p>The President took it into his head to direct himself, by telegraph, +the military operations from Fredericksburg to Shenandoah. The country +sees with what results. The military advisers of the President seem no +better than are his civil advisers—Seward, Blair, etc. If the +President earnestly wishes to use his right as Commander-in-Chief, +then he had better take in person the command of the army of the +Potomac.</p> + +<p>There McClellan's diggings and strategy neutralize the gallantry of +the generals and of the troops. There action, not digging, is needed. +I wrote to the President; suggesting to make Sigel his chief of the +staff (Sigel has been educated for it), and then to let our generals +fight under his, the President's, eyes.</p> + +<p>Great injustice was and is done to Mr. Seward by the lying and very +extensively spread rumor that he is often intoxicated. I am sure that +it is not so, and I contradict it with all my might. At last I +discovered the reason of the rumor. It is Mr. Seward's unhappy passion +for generalizations. He goes off like a rocket. Most people hearing +him become confused, understand nothing, are unable to follow him in +his soarings, and believe him to be intoxicated. His devotees alone +get in ecstacies when these rockets fly.</p> + +<p>Every time after any success of our troops, that perfidious sheet, the +London Times, puts on innocent <span class="pagenum"><a id="page215" name="page215"></a>(p. 215)</span> airs, and asks, "Why are the +Americans so bitter against England?" Why? At every disaster the Times +pours upon the North the most malicious, poisonous, and lacerating +derisions; derisions to pierce the skin of a rhinoceros. When in that +strain no feeling is respected by this lying paper.</p> + +<p>Derision of the North was the Times's order of the day even before the +civil war really began. People, who probably have it from the fountain +itself, assert that in one of his hours of whiskey expansion the great +Russell let the cat out, and confessed that the Times's firm purpose +was, and is, to definitely break the Union.</p> + +<p>Until this hour that reptile's efforts have been unsuccessful; it +could not even bring the Cabinet over to its heinous purposes. A +counterpoise and a counter poison exist in England's higher spheres, +and I credit it to that noblest woman the queen, to Earl Russell, and +to some few others.</p> + +<p>The would-be English <i>noblesse</i>, the Tories, and all the like genuine +nobodies, or <i>would-be</i> somebodies, affect to side with the South. +They are welcome to such an alliance, and even parentage. <i>Similis +simili gaudet.</i> Nobody with his senses considers the like +<i>gentlemen</i> as representing the progressive, humane, and enlightened +part of the English nation; the American people may look down upon +their snobbish hostility. J. S. Mill—not to speak of his +followers—has declared for the cause of the North. His intellectual +support more than gorgeously compensates the cause of right and of +freedom, even <span class="pagenum"><a id="page216" name="page216"></a>(p. 216)</span> for the loss or for the sneers of the whole +aristocracy, and of snobdom, of somebodies and of would-be gentlemen +of the whole Britannia Empire, including the Canadian beggarly +manikins.</p> + +<p>By their arrogance the Englishmen are offensive to all the nations of +the world; but they are still more so by their ingrained snobbyism. +(See about it Hugo Grotius.) Further: During the last thirty years the +London Times and the Lord Fussmaker Palmerston have done more to make +us hate England than even did the certain inborn and not over-amiable +traits in the English character.</p> + +<p>A part of the young foreign diplomacy here have a very strong secesh +bend; they consider the slaveholders to be aristocrats, and thus like +to acquire an aristocratic perfume. But, aristocratically speaking, +most of this promiscuous young Europa are parvenus, and the few titled +among them have heraldically no noble blood in their veins. No wonder +that here they mistake monstrosities for real noblesse. Enthusiastic +is young Germany—that is, young Bremen.</p> + +<p>Young European Spain here is remarkably discreet, as in the times of a +Philip II., of an Alba.</p> + +<p>Corinth evacuated under the nose of Halleck, as Manassas and Yorktown +have been evacuated under the nose of McClellan. Nay, Halleck, equally +strong as was the enemy, the first day of the evacuation ignores what +became of Beauregard with between sixty and eighty thousand men. Oh +generalship! Gen. Halleck is a gift from Gen. Scott. If Halleck +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page217" name="page217"></a>(p. 217)</span> makes not something better, it will turn out to be a very +poor gift. <i>Timeo Danaos</i>, etc., concerning the North and the gifts +from "<i>the highest military authority in the land</i>."</p> + +<p>McDowell is grimly persecuted by bad luck. Since March, twice he +organized an excellent and strong corps, with which he could have +marched on Richmond, and both times his corps was wholly +disorganized—first by McClellan's wails for more, the second time by +the President and his aulic council. And now all the ignorance and +stupidity, together with all the McClellanites, accuse McDowell. Pity +that he was so near Washington; otherwise his misfortune could not +have so thoroughly occurred.</p> + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page218" name="page218"></a>(p. 218)</span> JUNE, 1862.</h3> + +<p class="resume">Diplomatic circulars seasoned by stories — Battle before + Richmond — Casey's division disgraced — McClellan afterwards + confesses he was misinformed — Fair Oaks — "Nobody is hurt, only + the bleeding people" — Fremont disobeys orders — N. Y. Times, + World, and Herald, opinion-poisoning sheets — Napoleon never + visible before nine o'clock in the morning — Hooker and the other + fighters soldered to the mud — Senator Sumner shows the practical + side of his intellect — "Slavery a big job!" — McClellan sends for + mortars — Defenders of slavery in Congress worse than the + rebels — Wooden guns and cotton sentries at Corinth — The navy is + glorious — Brave old Gideon Welles! — July 4th to be celebrated in + Richmond! — Colonization again — Justice to France — New + regiments — The people sublime! — Congress — Lincoln visits + Scott — McDowell — Pope — Disloyalty in the departments.</p> + + +<p>Mr. Seward takes off from Mr. Adams the gag on the question of +slavery. Perhaps even Mr. Adams might have been a little fretting. A +long speculative dispatch, wherein, among some good things, one finds +some generalizations and misstatements concerning the distress in +Ireland, generated by want of potatoes (vide Parl. De.), and not from +want of cotton, as says Mr. Seward—a confession that the government +"covers the weakness of the insurgents" and "takes care of the welfare +of the insurgents." What a tenderness, and what an ingratitude of the +rebels to acknowledge it by blows! <span class="pagenum"><a id="page219" name="page219"></a>(p. 219)</span> Another confession, more +precious, that the poor slaves are the best and the only bravely +devoted Union men in the South, although occasionally shot for their +devotion by our generals, expelled from the lines (vide Halleck's +order No. 3), and delivered to the tender mercies of their masters. +Finally, <i>immediate</i> emancipation is held before the eyes of the +English statesmen rather as a Medusa head; then a kind of +story—perhaps to please Mr. Lincoln—or quotation from <i>some</i> writer, +etc. So far as I recollect, it is for the first time that diplomatic +circulars are seasoned by stories. But, <i>dit moi qui tu hante je te +dirai qui tu es</i>.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward repeatedly asserts, in writing and in words, that he has no +eventual views towards the White House. Well, it may be so or not. But +if his friends may succeed in carrying his nomination, then, of +course, reluctantly, he will bend his head to the people's will, +and—accept. When in past centuries abbots and bishops were elected, +they <i>reluctantly</i> accepted fat abbeys and bishoprics; the investiture +was given in the sacramental words, <i>accipe onus pro peccatis</i>.</p> + +<p>A battle by Richmond. McClellan telegraphs a victory, and it comes out +that we lost men, positions, camps, and artillery. The President +patiently bears such humbugging, and the country—submits.</p> + +<p>McClellan disgraces a part of the brave General Casey's division. +Whatever might have been the conduct of the soldiers in detail, one +thing is certain, that the division was composed of rough levies; +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page220" name="page220"></a>(p. 220)</span> that they fought three hours, being almost surrounded by +overwhelming forces; that they kept ground until reinforcements came; +that the breaking of the division cannot be true, or was only partial, +and that McClellan was not at all on the ground.</p> + +<p>This battle of Fair Oaks is another evidence of the transcendent +incapacity of the chief of the staff of the army of the Potomac, and +of Gen. McClellan's veracity. In a subsequent bulletin the general +confesses that he was misinformed concerning the conduct of Gen. +Casey's division.</p> + +<p>In any other army in the world, a chief of the staff who would assign +to a division a post so advanced, so isolated, so cut off from the +rest of the army, as was Gen. Casey's position,—such a chief of the +staff would be at once dismissed. Here, oh here, nobody is hurt, +nobody is to be hurt—only the bleeding people.</p> + +<p>As to the conduct of the soldiers, they fought well; thorough veterans +scarcely could have behaved better. McClellan turns out worse even +than I expected.</p> + +<p>The President's campaign against Jackson—very unsuccessful. Fremont +came not up to the mark; disobeyed orders. No excuse whatever for such +disobedience.</p> + +<p>One is at a loss which is to be more admired, the ignorance or the +impudence of such opinion-confusing and opinion-poisoning sheets as +the New York Times, the World, the Herald, etc. They sing <i>hosanna</i> +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page221" name="page221"></a>(p. 221)</span> for McClellan's victories. In advance they praise the +to-be-fought battles on selected fields of battle, and after the plans +have been matured for weeks, nay for months.</p> + +<p>A plan of a whole campaign, a general survey of it, may be prepared +and matured long before the campaign begins. But to mature for weeks a +plan of a battle! All the genuine great captains seldom had the +selection of a field of battle, as they rapidly moved in search of or +to meet their enemies, and fought them where they found them. For the +same reason, they scarcely had more than forty-eight hours to mature +their plans. Such is the history and the character of nine-tenths of +the great battles fought in the world.</p> + +<p>When Napoleon overthrew Prussia and Austria, he beforehand prepared +those campaigns; but neither Jena, Eylau, Friedland, Austerlitz or +Wagram were the fields of battle of his special choice. But Napoleon +moved his armies as did all the great captains before him, and as must +do all great captains after him. Only American great captains sit down +in the mud and dig.</p> + +<p>At times in the West, Pope, Mitchell, Nelson, Grant moved their +forces, and beat the enemy. I am sure that these brave generals and +the braves of the army of the Potomac most certainly are early risers. +A certain Napoleon never is visible before nine o'clock in the +morning. So I hear from a French officer who is not in the service, +but follows the movements of the Potomac army.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page222" name="page222"></a>(p. 222)</span> In McClellan's army Heintzelman, Hooker, Kearney, Sumner, and +many others, would move quick, would fight and beat; but a leaden +weight presses, and solders them to the mud. I must write an article +to the press concerning the rapidity of movements,—this golden rule +for any conduct of a war.</p> + +<p>Since he was in the field, McNapoleon neither planned nor assisted in +person in any encounter. When are his great plans to burst out?</p> + +<p>In one of his recently published dispatches, Mr. Seward makes an awful +mistake in trying to establish the difference between a revolution and +a civil war, as to their respective relations to foreign interference +and support. A little knowledge of history, and a less presumption, +would have spared to him such an exposure. A revolution in a nation +can be effected, and generally is effected, without a foreign +intervention, and without even an appeal to it. Most of the civil wars +look to foreign help. So teaches history, whatever may be Mr. Seward's +contrary generalizations.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward is unrelenting in his efforts to build up the Union-saving +slavery party, and is sure, as he says, to be able to manage the +Republicans, in and out of Congress. We shall see.</p> + +<p>Senator Sumner very well discusses the tax-bill, and again shows the +practical side of his intellect. Sumner proves that a laborious +intellect can grasp and master the most complicated matters. If Sumner +could only have more experience of men and things, he would not be so +Germanly—<i>naďve</i>.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page223" name="page223"></a>(p. 223)</span> Mr. Seward triumphantly publishes the Turkish hatti, by which +pirates are excluded from the Ottoman ports. Oh, Jemine! to be +patronized by the Turks! Misfortune brings one with strange +bedfellows.</p> + +<p>On the occasion of the organization of slaves at Beaufort, Mr. Lincoln +exclaimed, "Slavery is a big job, and will smother us!" It will, if +dealt with in your way, Mr. President.</p> + +<p>McClellan sends for mortars and hundred-pounders; these monsters are +to fight, but not he. Well, even so, if possible.</p> + +<p>The Southern leaders send to Europe officers of artillery to buy arms +and ammunition, and are well served. Our good administration sends +speculators, railroad engineers, agents of sewing machines, and the +arms bought by them kill our own soldiers, and not the enemies.</p> + +<p>English papers taunt the Americans that in one hundred years the +country must become a monarchy. The Americans have now a foretaste of +some among the features of monarchy, among others of favoritism. The +Pompadours and the Dubarrys could not have sustained a McClellan at +the cost of so many lives and so many millions. Then the dabbling in +war, and other etc.'s, performed in the most approved Louis XIV.'s or +Nicolean style.</p> + +<p>Worse than the rebels, and by far more abject and degraded, are the +defenders of slavery, of treason, and of rebellion in the Congress, in +the press, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page224" name="page224"></a>(p. 224)</span> and in the public opinion. No gallows high enough +for them.</p> + +<p>McClellan crowds the marshes with heavy artillery, and may easily lose +them at the smallest disaster. His army is overburdened with artillery +in a country where the moving of guns must be exceedingly difficult, +nay, often impossible. And then the difficulty of having such a large +number of men drilled for the service of guns. Scarcely any army in +Europe possesses artillerists in such numbers as are now required +here. Few guns well served make more execution than large numbers of +them fired at random.</p> + +<p>Instead of concentrating his army and attacking at once the rebels in +Richmond, McClellan extends his army over nearly sixty miles! To keep +such an extensive line more than 300,000 would be required. Oh, +heavens! this man is more ignorant of warfare than his worst enemies +have suspected him.</p> + +<p>It is reported that at Corinth the rebels had not only wooden guns, +but cotton manikins as sentries. God grant it may not be true, as it +would make the slow, pedantic Halleck even below McClellan.</p> + +<p>The future historian will be amazed, bewildered, nay, he may lose his +senses, discovering the heaps of confusion and of ignorance which +caused the disasters of Banks, the escape of Jackson, etc., etc.</p> + +<p>It is impossible to resist the admiration inspired by the skill, the +daring, the fertility of intellectual resources displayed by the +rebels; all this is so thoroughly <span class="pagenum"><a id="page225" name="page225"></a>(p. 225)</span> contrasted by what is done +by our legal chiefs.</p> + +<p>Pity that such manhood is shown in the defence of the most infamous +cause ever known in the history of the world. To conquer an +independence with the sole object to procreate, to breed, to traffic +in, and to whip slaves!</p> + +<p>The navy is glorious everywhere, and not fussy. The people can never +sufficiently remunerate the navy, if patriotic services are to be +remunerated. The same would be with the army but for the Napoleons!</p> + +<p>The published correspondence between the rebels Rust and Hunter fully +justifies my confidence in Louis Napoleon's sound judgment. That +publication clearly establishes how the press here is wholly unable to +conceive or to comprehend the policy of the great European nations. +The press heaps outrages and nurses suspicions against Napoleon. The +Sandfords and others knowingly stir up suspicions to make believe that +their smartness averts the evil. Poor chaps! When great interests are +at stake, neither their fuss, nor any dispatch, however elaborate, can +exercise a shadow of influence.</p> + +<p>It seems that a Babylonian confusion prevails in the movements, in the +distribution, and in the combination of the various parts of the army +under McClellan. I should wonder if it were otherwise, with such a +general and supported by such a chief of the staff.</p> + +<p>Brave old Gideon Welles (Neptune) instructing <span class="pagenum"><a id="page226" name="page226"></a>(p. 226)</span> his sailors to +fight, and not to calculate, and "not to deliver anybody against his +personal wish."</p> + +<p>These imbecile reporters and letter-writers for the press, and other +sensationists, make me enraged with their sneers at the poverty of the +rebels. If so, the more heroism. They forget the "beggars" of the +Dutch insurrection against Philip II.</p> + +<p>The cat is out, and I am sorry for it. The world is informed that the +revolution is finished, and now the civil war begins. Oh generalizer! +oh philosopher of history! oh prophet as to the speedy end of the +civil <i>war</i>! Oh stop, oh stop! Not by digging will your pet McClellan +bring the war to a speedy close.</p> + +<p>I am often enraged against myself not to be able to admire Mr. Seward, +and to be obliged to judge his whole policy in such, perhaps too +severe, a manner. What can I do, what can I do? No one, not even Gen. +Scott and Mr. Lincoln, since January, 1861, has exercised an influence +equal to Mr. Seward's on the affairs of the country, and <i>amicus +Plato, etc., sed magis amica veritas</i>.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward believes that July 4th will be celebrated by us in +Richmond. He and McClellan spread this hope; Doolittle believes it. We +could be in Richmond any day under any other general, not a Napoleon; +we may never be there if led on by McClellan, inspired by Mr. Seward's +policy.</p> + +<p>The French amateur in McClellan's army is disgusted with McNapoleon, +and speaks with contempt of the reckless waste of men, of material, +etc. He <span class="pagenum"><a id="page227" name="page227"></a>(p. 227)</span> calls it cruel, brainless, and uses a great many +other exclamations.</p> + +<p>The healthful activity of Stanton, his broad and clear perception of +almost all exigencies of these critical times, are continually baffled +and neutralized by the allied McClellan, Blair, Seward, New York Times +and New York Herald. Such an alliance can easily confuse even the +strongest brains.</p> + +<p>The colonization again on the <i>tapis</i>, and all the wonted display of +ignorance, stupidity, ill-will, and phariseeism towards genuine +liberty.</p> + +<p>Seward gave up his Yucatan scheme. Chiriqui has the lead. And finally, +some foreign diplomats try to make conspicuous their little royalties. +So Denmark tries to cultivate the barren rocks of St. Thomas with the +poor captives. It will be a new kind of apprenticeship under cruel +masters. I hear that Mr. Lincoln is caught in the trap, and that a +convention <i>ad hoc</i> is soon to be concluded. This time, at least, Mr. +Seward's name will remain outside.</p> + +<p>I am uneasy, fearing we may commit some spread-eagleism towards France +during this present Mexican imbroglio. I will do my utmost to explain +to influential senators the truth concerning Louis Napoleon's +political conduct towards the North, the absurdity of any hostile +demonstration against France, and the dirt constituting the substratum +of the new Mexican treaty.</p> + +<p>"French policy may change towards us," say the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page228" name="page228"></a>(p. 228)</span> +anti-Napoleons; "Louis Napoleon will unmask his diplomatic batteries," +etc., etc.</p> + +<p>Well, Louis Napoleon may change when he finds that we are incorrigible +imbeciles, and that the great interests, which to defend is his duty, +are jeopardized; but not before. As for masked batteries, I considered +worse than fools all those who believed in masked batteries at +Manassas; and in the same light I consider all the believers in +diplomatic masked batteries. I was not afraid of the one, and am not +of the other.</p> + +<p>Not one single French vessel has run, or attempted to run, the +blockade; not one has left the ports of France, or of the French West +Indies, loaded with arms or ammunition for the insurgents. As for the +barking of French papers, or of some second or third rate saloons, +barkings thus magnified by American letter-writers, I know too much of +Paris and of society to take notice of it. I am sure that the whole +rebel tross in Paris, male and female, have not yet been admitted into +any single saloon of the <i>real</i> good or high society in Paris, and +never will be. A thus called <i>highly accomplished and fashionable +lady</i> from New Orleans, or from Washington, may easily be taken for a +country dress-maker, or for a chamber-maid, not fit for first families +of the genuine good and high society in Paris, and all over Europe.</p> + +<p>Stanton, the true patriot, frets in despair at McClellan's keeping the +army in the unhealthiest place of Virginia. Stanton's opponents, the +rats, find all <span class="pagenum"><a id="page229" name="page229"></a>(p. 229)</span> right, even the deaths by disease. In the end +McClellan is to be all the better for it. Is there no penitentiary for +all this mob?</p> + +<p>New regiments pour in, the people are sublime in their devotion; only +may these regiments not become sacrificed to the Jaggernaut of +imbecility.</p> + +<p>Whatever may say its revilers, this Congress will have a noble and +pure page in American history. I speak of the majority.</p> + +<p>The Congress showed energy, clear and broad comprehension and +appreciation of the events and of men. The Congress was ready for +every sacrifice, and would have accelerated the crushing of the +rebellion but for the formulas, and for the inadequacy of the majority +in the administration. If the Congress had no great leaders, the +better for it; it had honest and energetic men, and their leader was +their purpose, their pure belief in the justice of their cause and in +the people. Such leaders elevate higher any political body than could +ever a Clay, a Webster, etc., etc.</p> + +<p>The Congress is palsied by the inefficiency of the administration, and +but for this, the Congress would have done far more for the salvation +of the country. All the best men in Congress support Stanton, and this +alone speaks volumes. It is a curse that the administration is so +independent of the Congress. Oh, why this Congress possesses not the +omnipotence of an English Parliament? Then the Congress would have +prevented all the evils hitherto brought upon the country by the +vacillating <span class="pagenum"><a id="page230" name="page230"></a>(p. 230)</span> military and general policy. Step by step this +policy brings the country to the verge of an abyss, and it will tax +all the energy of the people not to be precipitated in it.</p> + +<p>Mr. Lincoln has gone to get inspiration and information from Gen. +Scott. Good God! Can this man never go out from this rotten treadmill? +One more advice from the "great ruin," and the country will also be a +ruin.</p> + +<p>Flatterers, sensation writers, and all this <i>magna clientum caterva</i> +extol to the skies Mr. Lincoln's firmness and straightforwardness. The +firmness is located, and is to be discovered in various places—in the +lips, in the chin, in the jaw, and God knows where else. I cannot +detect any firmness in his actions beyond that of sticking to +McClellan,—of whom he has the worst opinion,—and of resisting the +emancipation and the arming of Africo-Americans. He has firmness in +letting the country be ruined.</p> + +<p>McClellan's bulletins constitute the most original and strange +collection of style in general, and of military style in particular. +Capt. Morin says that the first thing is to teach McClellan how to +write military bulletins.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward's crew of politicians is busily at work among congressmen, +etc., to prepare a strong party in support of the administration's +eventual concessions to slavery, in case Richmond is taken. Ultra +Democratic, half secession Senators are sounded.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page231" name="page231"></a>(p. 231)</span> The more the events complicate, the more they require a +powerful, all-embracing mind, but in the same proportion subside Mr. +Lincoln, Mr. Seward, Mr. Weed, and all the rest of the great men. +Alone the people and their true men subside not.</p> + +<p>Poor McDowell suffers for the sins of others—above all, for those of +Mr. Lincoln and of his aulic council. He is internally broken down, +but behaves nobly; not as does this poor Fremont, whose disappearance +from the military scene cannot and must not be regretted. He is not a +military capacity; he was again badly surrounded, and his last battle +was fought at random, without any unity. I spoke about it with various +foreign officers serving under him, and all agree in the incapacity of +Fremont and of his staff.</p> + +<p>Gen. Pope, a man for the circumstances, acted well in the West; at +last a new man.</p> + +<p>McClellan inaugurated new tactics. It is to approach the enemy's army +by parallels and by trenches. He will not take or scare the enemy, but +he will immortalize his name far above the immortality of all not +great generals.</p> + +<p>Night and day ambulances are conveying the sick and wounded here, and +large numbers, thousands upon thousands, going north. One must cry +tears of blood to witness such destruction, such a sacrifice of the +noblest people on the shrine of utter military incapacity. And the +traitors, the imbeciles, and the intriguers sing <i>hallelujah</i> to +McClellan, and daily throw their slime at Stanton.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page232" name="page232"></a>(p. 232)</span> From time to time rumors and complaints are made concerning +the ill-will or disloyalty of some of the <i>employés</i> in the +Departments. The explanation thereof may be that some of the thus +called old fogies, above all in the War Department, may be unfriendly +to the war without being disloyal. Such venerables took root in +comfortable situations; they slowly trod in the easy path of rusty and +musty routine, and at once the war shook them to the bone, exposing +the incapacity and the inefficiency of many; it forced upon them the +horror of <i>cogitandi</i> about new matters, and an amount of daily duties +to be performed in offices which formerly equalled sinecures. Further, +these relics dread to be superseded by more active and intelligent +men; and <i>inde irć</i>.</p> + + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page233" name="page233"></a>(p. 233)</span> JULY, 1862.</h3> + +<p class="resume">Intervention — The cursed fields of the Chickahominy — Titanic + fightings, but no generalship — McClellan the first to reach James + river — The Orleans leave — July 4th, the gloomiest since the birth + of the republic — Not reinforcements, but brains, wanted; and + brains not transferable! — The people run to the rescue — Rebel + tactics — Lincoln does not sacrifice Stanton — McClellan not the + greatest culprit — Stanton a true statesman — The President goes to + James river — The Union as it was, a throttling nightmare! — A man + needed! — Confiscation bill signed — Congress adjourned — Mr. + Dicey — Halleck, the American Carnot — Lincoln tries to neutralize + the confiscation bill — Guerillas spread like locusts.</p> + + +<p>When at epochs of great social convulsions events and circumstances +put certain individuals into an eminent or elevated position, their +names become intertwined with the great epoch. In the eyes of the +masses and of the vulgar observers, such names acquire a high +importance on account of the commonly made confusion between +circumstances and personal merit, and, moonlight-like, such names +reverberate not their own, but a borrowed splendor. Thus much for the +official pilots of this great people.</p> + +<p>The usual paroxysm of the foreign intervention fever. It ought to be +so easy to understand, that out of self-respect foreign powers will +not risk any intervention on paper; and to make an effective +intervention a hundred thousand men will be necessary, as the first +course. For such a service no <span class="pagenum"><a id="page234" name="page234"></a>(p. 234)</span> foreign power is prepared. +Intervention is silly talk. McClellan and all kinds of his supporters +do more for the South than could England and France united.</p> + +<p>It was a poor trick to gather by telegraph the signatures of the +governors for an offer of troops to the President. It was done for +effect in Europe; but events seem to have a grudge against Mr. Seward; +the same steamer carried over the Atlantic the news of our defeats in +the Chickahominy swamps.</p> + +<p>To attempt a change of such an extensive basis as was occupied by our +army under the eyes of a daring, able, skilful enemy, in a country +wooded and marshy, and without roads! This movement was perhaps +necessary, and could not be avoided; but why at the start had such a +basis been selected? Such a selection made disasters inevitable, and +they followed.</p> + +<p>All kinds of accounts pour in from these cursed fields of the +Chickahominy. Foreign officers—whose veracity I can believe—speak +enthusiastically of the undaunted bravery of the volunteers and of +their generals; <i>but a general generalship</i> was not to be found during +those titanic fightings. What I gathered from the <i>suite</i> of the +Orleans is, that Gen. McClellan was totally confused, was totally +ignorant of the condition of the corps, was never within distance to +give or to be asked for orders, and was the first to reach the banks +of the James and to sleep on board the gunboat Galena. At Winchester, +Banks in person covered the retreat.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page235" name="page235"></a>(p. 235)</span> The Orleans left. I pity them; they will be hooted in Europe. +They shared some of McClellan's fallacious and petty notions, and very +likely they have been gulled by the McClellan-Seward expectations of +taking Richmond before July 4th.</p> + +<p>Gen. Hunter's letter about fugitive slaves, and rebels fugitive from +the flag of the Union, is the noblest contra distinction. No rhetor +could have invented it. Hang yourselves, oh rhetors!</p> + +<p><i>July 4th.</i>—The gloomiest since the birth of this republic. Never was +the country so low, and after such sacrifices of blood, of time, and +of money; and all this slaughtered to that Juggernaut of strategy, and +to the ignoble motley of his supporters.</p> + +<p>Oh you widows, bereaved mothers, sisters, and sweethearts, cry for +vengeance! Cry for vengeance, you shadows of the dead of the malaria, +or fallen in the defence of your country's honor. Stupidity has +stabbed in the back more deadly wounds than did the enemy in front. +This is the 4th of July. Oh! my old heart and my, not weak, mind are +bursting with grief.</p> + +<p>The people, the masses, sacrifice their blood, their time, their +fortune. What sacrifice the official leaders and pilots? All is net +gain for them. Thousands and thousands of families will be +impoverished for life, nay, for generations. It is those nameless +heroes on the fields of battle who alone uphold the honor of the +American name, as it is the people at large who have the true +statesmanship, and not the appointed guardsmen.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page236" name="page236"></a>(p. 236)</span> Rats, hounds, all the vermin, all the impure beasts, are +after Stanton, for his not having sent reinforcements to McClellan; +but none existed, and McClellan has exhausted and devoured all the +reserves. Not reinforcements, but brains, were wanted, and brains are +not transferable.</p> + +<p>The people, sublime, runs again to the rescue, and Mr. Seward is so +sacrilegious, so impious, as to say that the people is generally slow. +He is fast on the road of confusion.</p> + +<p>I am sure that the whole movement and attack of the rebels was made, +as it could be made, at the utmost with 60,000 to 70,000 men, if even +with such a number. The rebels never attacked our whole line, but +always threw superior forces on some weak and isolated point. This the +rebels did during the last battles. The rebels showed great +generalship. Jackson is already the legendary hero, and deserves to +be.</p> + +<p>McClellan never attacked, but <i>always</i> was surprised and forced to +fight, so the rebels were sure that he would not dare anything to +counteract and counter-manœuvre their daring; so the rebel generals +had perfect ease for the execution of their bold but skilful plans.</p> + +<p>Lincoln sacrifices not Stanton, not even to Seward, to Blair, and to +the slaveocrats in Congress. That is something.</p> + +<p>McClellan publishes a pompous order of the day for the 4th of July, +and apes the phraseology of <span class="pagenum"><a id="page237" name="page237"></a>(p. 237)</span> Napoleon's bulletins from times +when by a blow Napoleon overthrew empires.</p> + +<p>What I can gather from the accounts of the seven days' fighting is, +that during the battle at Gaines' Mills (to speak technically), +positively the whole army was without any basis. But traitors, +imbeciles and intriguers rend the air and the skies with their praises +of the great strategy and of the brilliant generalship.</p> + +<p>I am aware how difficult it will be to convince the heroic army—that +is, its rank and file—that their disasters result from want of +generalship, and not from any inferiority in numbers. All over the +world incapable commanders raise the outcry of deficiency in numbers +to cover therewith their personal deficiency of brains. Similar events +to McClellan's wails, and the confusion they create in the armies and +in the people, are nothing new in the history of wars.</p> + +<p>A fleet of gunboats covers the army on the James river. Once McClellan +condescendingly boasted that he would take care of the gunboats. The +worst is, that these gunboats could have done service against +Charleston, Mobile, Savannah, etc.</p> + +<p>After all, McClellan is not the greatest culprit. It is not his fault +that he is without military brains and without military capacity. He +tried to do the best, according to his poor intellect. The great, +eternally-to-be-damned malefactors are those who kept him in command +after having had repeated proofs of his incapacity; and still greater +are those constitutional <span class="pagenum"><a id="page238" name="page238"></a>(p. 238)</span> advisers who supported McClellan +against the outcry of the best in the Cabinet and in the nation. A +time may come when the children of those malefactors will be ashamed +of their fathers' names, and—curse them.</p> + +<p>I have not scorn enough against the revilers and accusers of Stanton. +If Stanton could have had his free will, far different would be the +condition of affairs. Stanton's first appearance put an end to the +prevailing lethargy, and marked a new and glorious era. But, ah! how +short! The rats and the vermin were afraid of him, and took shelter +behind the incarnated strategy. Stanton embraced and embraces the +<i>ensemble</i> of the task and of the field before him. And this +politician, Blair, to be his critic! If Stanton had been left +undisturbed in the execution of his duties as the Secretary of War, +McClellan would have been obliged to march directly to Richmond, and +the brainless strategy in the Peninsula would have been crushed in the +bud. If Stanton had not been undermined, not only the people would +have been saved from terrible disasters, but McClellan, Lincoln, +Seward, and Blair would have been saved from reproaches and from +malediction.</p> + +<p>Stanton likewise shows himself to be a true statesman. A Democrat in +politics, he very likely never was such a violent and decided opponent +of slavery as the Sewards and Blairs professed to be throughout their +whole lives. But now Stanton pierces the fog, perceives the +unavoidable exigencies, and is an <span class="pagenum"><a id="page239" name="page239"></a>(p. 239)</span> emancipationist, when the +Sewards and the Blairs try to compromise, nay, virtually to preserve +slavery.</p> + +<p><i>July 10th.</i>—The rebels won time to increase and gather their forces +from the south. McClellan's army may not prevent their turning against +Pope, who has too small a body to resist or to cover the whole line +from Fredericksburg to the Shenandoah. If the rebels attack Pope he +must retreat and concentrate before Washington; and then again begins +the uphill work. The people generally pour in blood, time and money; +but brains, brains are needed, and, without violating the formulas, +the people cannot inaugurate brains. Whatever the people may do, the +same quacks and bunglers will over again commit the same blunders. +Nothing can teach a little foresight to the helmsman and to some of +his seconds. Rocked by his imagination, Mr. Seward never sees clearly +the events before him and what they generate.</p> + +<p>The call for three hundred thousand men will be responded to. The men +will come; but will statesmanship and generalship come with them? I am +afraid that the rebels, operating with promptness and energy, may give +no time to the levies to be fully organized; the rebels will press on +Washington.</p> + +<p>McClellan reports to the President that he has only 50,000 men left. +The President goes to James river, and finds 83,000 ready for action. +Was it ignorance in McClellan, or his inborn disrespect of truth, or +disrespect of the country, or something worse, that made him make such +a report? And <span class="pagenum"><a id="page240" name="page240"></a>(p. 240)</span> all this passes, and Mr. Lincoln cannot hurt +McClellan, although a gory shroud extends over the whole country.</p> + +<p>A secretary of the French consul is here, and confirms my speculations +concerning the numbers of the rebels in the last battles on the +Chickahominy. The current and authoritative opinion in Richmond is, +that from the Potomac to the Rio Grande the rebel force never exceeded +300,000 men. If so, the more glory; and it must be so, according to +the rational analysis of statistics.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward writes a skilful dispatch to explain the battles on the +Chickahominy. But no skill can succeed to bamboozle the cold, +clear-sighted European statesmen.</p> + +<p>No doubt Mr. Seward sincerely wished to save the Union in his own way +and according to his peculiar conception, and, after having +accomplished it, disappear from the political arena, surrounded by the +halo of national gratitude.</p> + +<p>But even for this aim of reconstruction of the Union as it was, Mr. +Seward, at the start, took the wrong track, and took it because he is +ignorant of history and of the logic in human affairs. To save the +Union as it was, it was imperatively necessary to strike quick and +crushing blows, and to do this in May, June, etc., 1861. Mr. Seward +could have realized then what now is only a throttling nightmare—<i>the +Union as it was</i>. But Mr. Seward sustained a policy of delays and not +of blows; the struggle protracts, and, for reasons repeatedly +mentioned, the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page241" name="page241"></a>(p. 241)</span> suppression of rebellion becomes more and +more difficult, and the reconstruction of the old Union as it was a +<i>mirage</i> of his imagination.</p> + +<p>But it is not Thurlow Weed, and others of that stamp, who could +enlighten Mr. Seward on such subjects—far, far above their vulgar and +mean politicianism. It is now useless to accuse and condemn Congress +for its so-called violence, as does Mr. Seward, and to assert that but +for Congress he, Mr. Seward, would have long ago patched up the +quarrel. The Congress may be as tame as a lamb, and as subject as a +foot-sole. Mr. Seward may on his knees proffer to the rebels a +compromise and the most stringent safeguards for slavery; to-day the +rebels will spurn all as they would have spurned it during the whole +year. The rebels will act as Mason did when in the Senate hall Mr. +Seward asked the traitor to be introduced to Mr. Lincoln.</p> + +<p>The country is in more need of a man than of the many hundreds of +thousands of new levies.</p> + +<p>Some time ago Mr. Seward gathered around him his devotees in Congress +(few in number), and unveiled to them that nobody can imagine what +superhuman efforts it cost him to avert foreign intervention. Very +unnecessary demonstration, as he knows it well himself, and, if it +gets into the papers, may turn out to be offensive to the two +cabinets, as they give to Mr. Seward no reason for making such +statements. Should England and France ever decide upon any such step, +then Mr. Seward may write as <span class="pagenum"><a id="page242" name="page242"></a>(p. 242)</span> a Cicero, have all the learning +of a Hugo Grotius, of a Vattel, and of all other publicists combined; +he may send legions of Weeds and Sandfords to Europe, and all this +will not weigh a feather with the cabinets of London and of Paris.</p> + +<p>Further, no foreign powers occasioned our defeats <i>in the +Chickahominy</i>, but those who were enraptured with the Peninsula +strategy.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward's letter to the great meeting in New York shows that not +his patriotism, but his confidence in success, is slightly notched.</p> + +<p>Nobody doubts his patriotism; but Mr. Seward tried to shape mighty +events into a mould after his not-over-gigantic mind, and now he frets +because these events tear his sacrilegious hand.</p> + +<p>After much opposition, vacillation, hesitation, and aversion, the +President signed the confiscation and emancipation bill. A new +evidence of how devotedly he wishes to avert any deadly blows from +slavery,—this national shame.</p> + +<p>The Congress adjourned after having done everything good, and what was +in its power. It separated, leaving the country's cause in a worse +condition than it was a year ago, after the Bull Run day. Many, nay, +almost all the best members of both houses are fully aware in what +hands they left the destinies of the nation. Many went away with +despair in their hearts; but the constitutional formula makes it +impossible for them to act, and to save what so badly needs a savior.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page243" name="page243"></a>(p. 243)</span> Intervention fever again. The worst intervention is +perpetrated at home by imbeciles, by intriguers, by traitors, and by +the—spades.</p> + +<p>Mr. Dicey, an Englishman who travelled or travels in this +country,—Mr. D. is the first among his countrymen who understands the +events here, and who is just toward the true American people;—Mr. D. +truly says that the people fight without a general, and without a +statesman, and are the more to be admired for it.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward tries to appear grand before the foreign diplomats, and +talks about Cromwell, Louis Napoleon, <i>coup d'États</i> against the +Congress, and about his regrets to be in the impossibility to imitate +them. Only think, Cromwell, Napoleon I., Napoleon III., Seward! Such +dictatorial dreams may explain Mr. Seward's partiality for General +McClellan, whom Seward may perhaps wish to use as Louis Napoleon used +Gen. St. Arnoud.</p> + +<p>Halleck is to be the American Carnot. But any change is an +improvement. If Halleck extricates the army on the James river, and +saves it from malaria,—this enemy more deadly than Jackson and +McClellan combined,—then for this single action Halleck deserves well +of the country, and his Corinth affair will, at least in part, be +atoned for.</p> + +<p>Mr. Lincoln makes a new effort to save his <i>mammy</i>, and tries to +neutralize the confiscation bill. Mr. Lincoln will not make a step +beyond what is called the Border-States' policy; and it may prove too +late when he will decide to honestly execute the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page244" name="page244"></a>(p. 244)</span> law of +Congress. Mr. Seward gets into hysterics at the hateful name of +Congress. Similar spite he showed to a delegation from the city of New +York, upbraiding some of its members, and assuring them that +delegations are not needed,—that the administration is fully up to +the task. Yes, Stanton is, but how about some others?</p> + +<p>Poor Mr. Lincoln! he must stand all the mutual puffs of Seward and +Sandford, and some more in store for him when the Weeds and Hughes +will come and give an account of their doings in Europe.</p> + +<p>The report of the battle against Casey, as published by the rebel +General Johnston, is a masterpiece of military style, and shows how +skilfully the attack was combined. The Southern leaders have +exclusively in view the triumph of their cause. With many of our +leaders, the people's cause is made to square with their little +selfishness.</p> + +<p>Guerillas spread like locusts. Perhaps they are the results of our +Union-searching, slavery-saving policy.</p> + + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page245" name="page245"></a>(p. 245)</span> AUGUST, 1862.</h3> + +<p class="resume">Emancipation — The President's hand falls back — Weed sent + for — Gen. Wadsworth — The new levies — The Africo-Americans not + called for — Let every Northern man be shot rather! — End of the + Peninsula campaign — Fifty or sixty thousand dead — Who is + responsible? — The army saved — Lincoln and McClellan — The + President and the Africo-Americans — An Eden in + Chiriqui — Greeley — The old lion begins to awake — Mr. Lincoln + tells stories — The rebels take the offensive — European + opinion — McClellan's army landed — Roebuck — Halleck — Butler's + mistakes — Hunter recalled — Terrible fighting at Manassas — Pope + cuts his way through — Reinforcements slow in coming — McClellan + reduced in command.</p> + + +<p><i>Vulgatior fama est</i>, that Mr. Lincoln was already raising his hand to +sign a stirring proclamation on the question of emancipation; that +Stanton was upholding the President's arm that it might not grow weak +in the performance of a sacred duty; that Chase, Bates, and Welles +joined Stanton; but that Messrs. Seward and Blair so firmly objected +that the President's outstretched hand slowly began to fall back; that +to precipitate the mortification, Thurlow Weed was telegraphed; that +Thurlow Weed presented to Mr. Lincoln the Medusa-head of Irish riots +in the North against the emancipation of slaves in the South; that Mr. +Lincoln's mind faltered (oh, Steffens) before such a Chinese shadow, +and that thus once more slavery was saved. <i>Relata refero.</i></p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page246" name="page246"></a>(p. 246)</span> General Wadsworth is the good genius of the poor and +oppressed race. But for Wadsworth's noble soul and heart the Lamons +and many other blood-hounds in Washington would have given about +three-fourths of the fugitives over to the whip of the slavers.</p> + +<p>Within the last four weeks 600,000 new levies are called to arms. With +the 600,000 men levied previously, it is the heaviest draft ever made +from a population. No emperor or despot ever did it in a similar lapse +of time. The appreciation current here is, that the twenty millions of +inhabitants can easily furnish such a quota; but the truth is that the +draft, or the levy, or the volunteering, is made from about three +millions of men between the ages of twenty and forty years. One +million two hundred thousand in one year is equal to nearly 36-100, +and this from the most vital, the most generative, and most productive +part of the population.</p> + +<p>The same analysis and percentage applied to the statistics of the +population in the rebel States gives a little above 300,000 men under +arms; however, the percentage of the drafts from the full-aged +population in the South can be increased by some 15-100 over the +percentage in the North. This increase is almost exclusively +facilitated by the substratum of slavery, and our administration +devotedly takes care <i>ne detrimentum capiat</i> that peculiar +institution.</p> + +<p>The last draft could be averted from the North if the four millions of +loyal Africo-Americans were called to arms. But Mr. Lincoln, with the +Sewards, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page247" name="page247"></a>(p. 247)</span> the Blairs, and others, will rather see every +Northern man shot than to touch the palladium of the rebels.</p> + +<p>These new enormous masses will crush the rebellion, provided they are +not marshalled by strategy; but nevertheless the painful confession +must be made, that our putting in the field of three to one rebel may +confuse a future historian, and contribute to root more firmly that +stupid fallacy already asserted by the rebels, and by some among their +European upholders, of the superiority of the Southern over the +Northern thus called race. Such a stigma is inflicted upon the brave +and heroic North by the strategy, and by the vacillating, slave-saving +policy of the administration.</p> + +<p>This is the more painful for me to record, as most of the foreign +officers in our service, and who are experienced and good judges, most +positively assert the superior fighting qualities of the Union +volunteers over the rebels. Our troops are better fed, clad and armed, +but over our army hovers the thick mist of strategy and indecision; +the rebels are led not by anaconda strategians, but by fighting +generals, desperate, and thus externally heroic; energy inspires their +councils, their administration, and their military leaders.</p> + +<p>If Stanton and Halleck succeed in extricating the army on the James +river, then they will deserve the gratitude of the people. The malaria +there must be more destructive than would be many battles.</p> + +<p>Events triumphantly justify Stanton's opposition <span class="pagenum"><a id="page248" name="page248"></a>(p. 248)</span> to the +Peninsula strategy and campaign. So ends this horrible sacrifice; +between fifty and sixty thousand killed or dead by diseases. The +victims of this holocaust have fallen for their country's cause, but +the responsibility for the slaughter is to be equally divided between +McClellan, Lincoln, Seward and Blair. Even Sylla had not on his soul +so much blood as has the above quatuor. When, after the victory over +the allied Samnites and others, at the Colline gate of Rome, Sylla +ordered the massacre of more than four thousand prisoners who laid +down their arms; when his lists of proscription filled with blood Rome +and other cities of Italy, Sylla so firmly consolidated the supremacy +of the <i>Urbs</i> over Italy and over the world, that after twenty +centuries of the most manifold vicissitudes, transformations and +tempests, this supremacy cannot yet be upturned. But the holocaust to +strategy resulted in humiliating the North and in heaping glory on the +Southern leaders.</p> + +<p>If the newly called 600,000 men finish the rebellion before Congress +meets, then slavery is saved. To save slavery and to avoid +emancipation was perhaps the secret aim of Mr. Lincoln, Seward, and +Blair; who knows but that of Halleck, when the administration called +for the additional 300,000 men?</p> + +<p>Persons who approach Halleck say that he is a thorough pro-slavery +partisan. His order No. 3, the opinion of some officers of his staff, +and his associations, make me believe in the truth of that report.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page249" name="page249"></a>(p. 249)</span> Mr. Seward says <i>sub rosa</i> to various persons, that slavery +is an obsolete question, and he assures others that emancipation is a +fixed fact, and is no more to be held back; that he is no more a +conservative. How are we to understand this man? If Mr. Seward is +sincere, then his last transformation may prove that he has given up +the idea of finding a Union party in the South, or that he wishes to +reconquer—what he has lost—the confidence of the party. But this +return on his part may prove <i>troppo tardi</i>.</p> + +<p>The army of the Potomac is saved; the heroes, martyrs, and sufferers +are extricated from the grasp of death. This epopee in the history of +the civil war will immortalize the army, but the strategian's +immortality will differ from that of the army.</p> + +<p>England and France firm in their neutrality. Lord John Russell's +speeches in Parliament are all that can be desired.</p> + +<p>Will it ever be thoroughly investigated and elucidated why, after the +evacuation of Corinth, the onward march of our everywhere-victorious +Western armies came at once to a stand-still? The guerillas, the +increase of forces in Richmond, and some eventual disasters, may be +directly traced to this inconceivable conduct on the part of the +Western commanders or of the Commander-in-chief. Was not some +Union-searching at the bottom of that stoppage? When, months ago, a +false rumor was spread about the evacuation of Memphis and Corinth, +Mr. Seward was ready to start for the above-mentioned places, of +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page250" name="page250"></a>(p. 250)</span> course in search of the Union feeling. Perhaps others were +drawn into this Union-searching, Union and slavery-restoring +conspiracy.</p> + +<p>I have most positive reasons to believe that Gen. Halleck wished to +remove Gen. McClellan from the command of the army. The President +opposed to it. Men of honor, of word, and of truth, and who are on +intimate footing with Mr. Lincoln, repeatedly assured me that, in his +conversation, the President judges and appreciates Gen. McClellan as +he is judged and appreciated by those whom his crew call his enemies. +With all this, Mr. Lincoln, through thin and thick, supports McClellan +and maintains him in command. Such a double-dealing in the chief of a +noble people! Seemingly Mr. Seward and Mr. Blair always exercise the +most powerful influence. Both wished that the army remain in the +malarias of the James river. Whatever be their reasons, one shudders +in horror at the case with which all those culprits look on this +bloody affair. Oh you widowed wives, mothers, and sweethearts! oh you +orphaned children! oh you crippled and disabled, you impoverished and +ruined, by sacrificing to your country more than do all the Lincolns, +McClellans, Blairs, and Sewards! Some day you will ask a terrible +account, and if not the present day, posterity will avenge you.</p> + +<p>It is very discouraging to witness that the President shows little or +no energy in his dealings with incapacities, and what a mass of +intrigues is used to excuse and justify incapacity when the nation's +life-blood <span class="pagenum"><a id="page251" name="page251"></a>(p. 251)</span> runs in streams. Without the slightest hesitation +any European government would dismiss an incapable commander of an +army, and the French Convention, that type of revolutionary and +nation-saving energy, dealt even sharper with military and other +incapacities.</p> + +<p>Regiments after regiments begin to pour in, to make good the deadly +mistakes of our rulers. The people, as always, sublime, inexhaustible +in its sacrifices! God grant that administrative incompetency may +become soon exhausted!</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward told a diplomat that his (Seward's) salary was $8,000, and +he spends double the amount; thus sacrificing to the country $8,000. +When I hear such reports about him, I feel ashamed and sorrowful on +his account. Such talk will not increase esteem for him among +foreigners and strangers; and although I am sure that Mr. Seward +intended to make a joke, even as such it was worse than a poor one.</p> + +<p>In his interview with a deputation composed of Africo-Americans, Mr. +Lincoln rehearsed all the clap-trap concerning the races, the +incompatibility to live together, and other like <i>bosh</i>. Mr. Lincoln +promised to them an Eden—in Chiriqui. Mr. Lincoln promised them—what +he ought to know is utterly impossible and beyond his power—that they +will form an independent community in a country already governed by +orderly and legally organized States, as are New Grenada and Costa +Rica. Happily even for Mr. Lincoln's name, the logic of human events +will save from exposure his ignorance <span class="pagenum"><a id="page252" name="page252"></a>(p. 252)</span> of international laws, +and his too light and too quick assertions. I pity Mr. Lincoln; his +honesty and unfamiliarity with human affairs, with history, with laws, +and with other like etceteras, continually involve him in unnecessary +scrapes.</p> + +<p>The proclamation concerning the colonization is issued. It is a +display of ignorance or of humbug, or perhaps of both. Some of the +best among Americans do not utter their condemnation of this +colonization scheme, because the President is to be allowed <i>to carry +out his hobby</i>. The despots of the Old World will envy Mr. Lincoln. +Those despots can no more <i>carry out their hobbies</i>. The <i>Roi s'amuse</i> +had its time; but the <i>il bondo can</i> of some here, at times, beats +that of the <i>Italina in Algero</i>.</p> + +<p>The two letters of Greeley to the President show that the old, +indomitable lion begins to awake. As to Mr. Lincoln's answer, it reads +badly, and as for all the rest, it is the eternal dodging of a vital +question.</p> + +<p>Mr. Lincoln's equanimity, although not so stoical, is unequalled. In +the midst of the most stirring and exciting—nay, death-giving—news, +Mr. Lincoln has always a story to tell. This is known and experienced +by all who approach him. Months ago I was in Mr. Lincoln's presence +when he received a telegram announcing the crossing of the Mississippi +by Gen. Pope, at New Madrid. Scarcely had Mr. Lincoln finished the +reading of the dispatch, when he cracked (that is the sacramental +word) two not very washed stories.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page253" name="page253"></a>(p. 253)</span> When the history of this administration shall become well +known, contemporary and future generations will wonder and be puzzled +to know how the most intelligent and enlightened people in the world +could produce such fruits and results of self-government.</p> + +<p>The rebel chiefs take the offensive; they unfold a brilliancy in +conception and rapidity in execution of which the best generals in any +army might be proud. McClellan's army was to be prevented from uniting +with Pope. But it seems that Pope manœuvres successfully, and +approaches McClellan.</p> + +<p>If only our domestic policy were more to the point, England and France +could not be complained of. Mr. Mercier behaves here as loyally as can +be wished, and carefully avoids evoking any misunderstandings +whatever. So do Louis Napoleon, Mr. Thouvenel, Lord John Russell, +notwithstanding Mr. Seward's all-confusing policy. Mr. Mercier never, +never uttered in my presence anything whatever which in the slightest +manner could irritate even the <i>thinnest-skinned</i> American.</p> + +<p>As I expected, Louis Napoleon and Mr. Thouvenel highly esteem Mr. +Dayton; and it will be a great mistake to supersede Mr. Dayton in +Paris by the travelling agent of the sewing machine. It seems that +such a change is contemplated in certain quarters, because the agent +parleys poor French. Such a change will not be flattering, and will +not be agreeable to the French court, to the French cabinet, and to +the French good society.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page254" name="page254"></a>(p. 254)</span> On the continent of Europe sympathy begins to be unsettled, +unsteady. As independence is to-day the watchword in Europe, so the +cause of the rebels acquires a plausible justification. Various are +the reasons of this new counter current. Prominent among them is the +vacillating, and by Europeans considered to be <span class="smcap">INHUMAN</span>, policy of Mr. +Lincoln in regard to slavery, the opaqueness of our strategy, and the +brilliancy of the tactics of the rebel generals, and, finally, the +incapacity of our agents to enlighten European public opinion, and to +explain the true and horrible character of the rebellion. Repeatedly I +warned Mr. Seward, telling him that the tide of public opinion was +rising against us in Europe, and I explained to him the causes; but of +course it was useless, as his agents say the contrary, and say it for +reasons easily to be understood.</p> + +<p>McClellan's army landed, and he is to be in command of all the troops. +I congratulate all therein concerned about this new victory. Bleed, oh +bleed, American people! Mr. Lincoln and <i>consortes</i> insisted that +McClellan remain in command. <span class="smcap">Siste tandem carnifex!</span></p> + +<p>Mr. Roebuck, M. P., the gentleman! About thirty years ago, when +entering his public career as a member for Bath, Mr. Roebuck was +publicly slapped in the face during the going on of the election. A +few years ago Mr. Roebuck went to Vienna in the interests of some +lucrative railroad or Lloyd speculation, and returned to England a +fervent and devoted admirer of the Hapsburgs, and a reviler of all +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page255" name="page255"></a>(p. 255)</span> that once was sacred to the disciple of Jeremy Bentham.</p> + +<p>General Halleck may become the savior of the country. I hope and +ardently wish that it may be so, although his qualifications for it +are of a rather doubtful nature. Gen. Halleck wrote a book on military +science, as he wrote one on international laws, and both are laborious +compilations of other people's labors and ideas. But perhaps Halleck, +if not inspired, may become a regular, methodical captain. Such was +Moreau.</p> + +<p>Also, Gen. Halleck is not to take the field in person. I am told that +it was so decided by Mr. Lincoln, against Halleck's wish. What an +anomalous position of a commander of armies, who is not to see a field +of battle! Such a position is a genuine, new American invention, but +it ought not to be patented, at least not for the use of other +nations. It is impossible to understand it, and it will puzzle every +one having sound common sense.</p> + +<p>Gen. Butler commits a mistake in taunting and teasing the French +population and the French consul in New Orleans. When Butler was going +there, Mr. Seward ought to have instructed him concerning our friendly +relations with Louis Napoleon, and concerning the character of the +French consul in New Orleans, who was not partial to secesh. There may +be some secesh French, but the bulk, if well managed, would never take +a decided position against us as long as we were on friendly terms +with Louis Napoleon.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page256" name="page256"></a>(p. 256)</span> The President is indefatigable in his efforts to—save +slavery, and to uphold the policy of the New York Herald.</p> + +<p>It is said that General Hunter is recalled, and so was General Phelps +from New Orleans; General Phelps could not coolly witness the +sacrilegious massacre of the slaves. The inconceivable partiality of +the President for McClellan may, after all, be possibly explained by +the fact that Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Seward see in McClellan a—savior of +slavery.</p> + +<p>During two days' terrible fighting at Manassas, at Bull Run, and all +around, Pope cut his way through, but the reinforcements from +McClellan's army in Alexandria are <i>slow</i> in coming. McClellan and his +few pets among the generals may not object to see Pope worsted. Such +things happened in other armies, even almost under the eyes of +Napoleon, as in the campaign on the Elbe, in 1813. Any one worth the +name of a general, when he has no special position to guard, and hears +the roar of cannon, by forced marches runs to the field of battle. Not +any special orders, but the roar of cannon, attracted and directed +Desaix to Marengo, and Mac Mahon to Magenta. The roar of cannon shook +the air between Bull Run and Alexandria, and —— General McClellan and +others had positive orders to run to the rescue of Pope.</p> + +<p>I should not wonder if the President, enthusiasmed by this new exploit +of McClellan, were to nominate him for his, the President's, eventual +successor; Mr. Blair will back the nomination.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page257" name="page257"></a>(p. 257)</span> It is said that during these last weeks, Wallach, the editor +of the unwashed <i>Evening Star</i>, is in continual intercourse with the +President. <i>Arcades ambo.</i></p> + +<p>McClellan reduced in command; only when the life of the nation was +almost breathing its last. This concession was extorted from Mr. +Lincoln! What will Mr. Seward say to it?</p> + + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page258" name="page258"></a>(p. 258)</span> SEPTEMBER, 1862.</h3> + +<p class="resume"><i>Consummatum est!</i> — Will the outraged people avenge + itself? — McClellan satisfies the President — After a year! — The + truth will be throttled — Public opinion in Europe begins to + abandon us — The country marching to its tomb — Hooker, Kearney, + Heintzelman, Sigel, brave and true men — Supremacy of mind over + matter — Stanton the last Roman — Inauguration of the pretorian + regime — Pope accuses three generals — Investigation prevented by + McClellan — McDowell sacrificed — The country inundated with + lies — The demoralized army declares for McClellan — The pretorians + will soon finish with liberty — Wilkes sent to the West Indian + waters — Russia — Mediation — Invasion of Maryland — Strange story + about Stanton — Richmond never invested — McClellan in search of + the enemy — Thirty miles in six days — The + telegrams — Wadsworth — Capitulation of Harper's Ferry — Five days' + fighting — Brave Hooker wounded — No results — No reports from + McClellan — Tactics of the Maryland campaign — Nobody hurt in the + staff — Charmed lives — Wadsworth, Judge Conway, Wade, Boutwell, + Andrew — This most intelligent people become the laughing-stock of + the world! — The proclamation of emancipation — Seward to the + Paisley Association — Future complications — If Hooker had not been + wounded! — The military situation — Sigel persecuted by West + Point — Three cheers for the carriage and six! — How the great + captain was to catch the rebel army — Interview with the Chicago + deputation — Winter quarters — The conspiracy against + Sigel — Numbers of the rebel army — Letters of marque.</p> + + +<p>The intrigues, the insubordination of McClellan's pets, have almost +exclusively brought about the disasters at Manassas and at Bull Run, +and brought the country to the verge of the grave. But the people are +not to know the truth.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page259" name="page259"></a>(p. 259)</span> <span class="smcap">Consummatum est!</span> The people's honor is stained—the country's +cause on the verge of the grave. Will this outraged people avenge +itself on the four or five diggers?</p> + +<p>Old as I am, I feel a more rending pain now than I felt thirty years +ago when Poland was entombed. Here are at stake the highest interests +of humanity, of progress, of civilization. I find no words to utter my +feelings; my mind staggers. It is filled with darkness, pain, and +blood.</p> + +<p>Mr. Lincoln is the standard-bearer of the policy of the New York +Herald. So, before him, were Pierce and Buchanan.</p> + +<p>It is said that General McClellan fully satisfied the President of his +(the General's) complete innocence as to the delays which exclusively +generated the last disasters; also Gen. McClellan has justified +himself on military grounds. I wish the verdict of innocence may be +uttered by a court-martial of European generals. At any rate, the +country was thrown into an abyss.</p> + +<p><i>After a year!</i>—One hundred thousand of the best, bravest, the most +devoted men slaughtered; hundreds and hundreds of millions squandered; +the army again in the entrenchments of Washington; everywhere the +defensive and losses; the enemy on the Potomac, perhaps to invade the +free States; but McClellan is in command, his headquarters as +brilliant and as numerous as a year ago; the mean flunkeys at their +post; only the country's life-blood pours in streams; but—that is of +no account.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page260" name="page260"></a>(p. 260)</span> No acids are so dissolving and so corrosive as is the air of +Washington on patriotism. How few resist its action! Among the few are +Stanton, Chase (a passive patriot), Wadsworth, Dahlgren, and those +grouping around Stanton; so is Welles; likewise Fox; but they are +powerless. Washington is likewise the greatest garroter of truth; and +I am sure that the truth about the last battles will be throttled and +never elucidated.</p> + +<p><i>September 3.</i>—The Cabinets of France and of England will have a very +hard stand to resist the pressure of public opinion, carried away by +the skill and by the plausible heroism of the rebels. Public opinion +will be clamorous that something be done in favor of the rebels. +Happily, nothing else can be done but a war, and this saves us. But if +the rebels succeed without Europe, the more glory for their chiefs, +the more ignominy for ours. Public opinion begins to abandon us in +Europe. Already I have explained some of the reasons for it.</p> + +<p>The country is marching to its tomb, but the grave-diggers will not +confess their crime and their utter incapacity to save it. This their +stubbornness is even a greater crime. Will Halleck warn the country +against McClellan's incapacity?</p> + +<p>We have such generals as Hooker, Heintzelman, Kearney, etc., who +fought continually, and with odds against them, and who never were +worsted. Those three, among the best of the army, fought under Pope +and mutineered not. In any other country such men would receive large, +even the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page261" name="page261"></a>(p. 261)</span> superior command; here the palm belongs to the +incapable, the <i>slow</i>, and to the flatterer. The same with Sigel. His +corps is reduced to 6,000 men; common sense shows that he ought to +have at least 25,000 under him. Sigel begged the President to have +more men; the President sent him to Halleck and McClellan, who both +snubbed him off. By my prayer Sigel, although disheartened, went to +Stanton, who received him friendly and warmly, and promised to do his +utmost. Stanton will keep his word, if only the West Point envy will +not prevent him.</p> + +<p>Hooker, Kearney, and Heintzelman were not in favor at the headquarters +in the Peninsula, and their commands have been continually +disorganized in favor of the pets of the Commander-in-Chief. The +country knows what the three braves did since Yorktown down to the +last day—the country knows that at the last disasters at Bull Run +these heroic generals did their fullest duty. But not even their +advice is asked at the double headquarters. Stanton alone cannot do +everything. Rats may devour a Hercules.</p> + +<p>It seems certain that the rebel generals have various foreign officers +in their respective staffs. The rebels wish to assure the success of +their cause; here many have only in view their personal success. The +President, although not a Blucher, may make a Gneisenau out of Sigel, +who has in view only the success of the cause, and no prospects +towards the White House. Sigel would understand how to organize a +genuine staff.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page262" name="page262"></a>(p. 262)</span> Most of the foreigners who came to serve here came with the +intention to fight for the sacred principle of freedom, and without +any further views whatever of career and aggrandizement. In this +respect Americans are not just towards these foreigners, and the great +men at headquarters will prefer to see all go to pieces than to use +the capacity of foreigners, above all in the artillery and for the +staff duties.</p> + +<p>The mind—that is, Jeff. Davis, Jackson, Lee, etc.—has the best of +the matter—that is, Lincoln, McClellan, Blair, and Seward; however, +these positions are reversed when one considers the masses on both +sides. But on our side the matter commands and presses down the mind; +on the rebel side the mind of the chiefs vivifies, exalts, attracts, +and directs the matter. And the results thereof are, that not the +rebellion, but the North, is shaking.</p> + +<p>As <i>a</i>, not only as <i>the</i> President, Mr. Lincoln represents nothing +beyond the unavoidable constitutional formula. For all other purposes, +as an acting, directing, inspiring, or combining power or agency, Mr. +Lincoln becomes a myth. His reality is only manifested by preserving +slavery, by sticking to McClellan, by distributing offices, by +receiving inspirations from Mr. Seward, and by digging the country's +grave. So it is from March 4, 1861, up to this, September 5th, 1862. +What else Mr. Lincoln may eventually incarnate is not now perceptible.</p> + +<p>Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Seward piloted the country <span class="pagenum"><a id="page263" name="page263"></a>(p. 263)</span> among +breakers and rocks, from which to extricate the country requires a man +who is to be the burning focus of the whole people's soul.</p> + +<p>Other nations at times reached the bottom of an abyss, and they came +up again when from the tempest rending them emerged such a savior. But +here the formula may render impossible the appearance of such a +savior. The formula is the nation's hearse. The formula has +neutralized the best men in Congress, the best men in the Cabinet, as +is Stanton.</p> + +<p>The people have decided not, <i>propter vitam vivendi perdere causas</i>; +but the various formulas, the schemers, the grave-diggers, and the +aspirants for the White House, think differently.</p> + +<p>The almost daily changes made by Mr. Lincoln in the command of the +forces are the best evidences of his good-intentioned—debility.</p> + +<p>Harmony belongs to the primordial laws of nature; it is the same for +human societies. But here no harmony exists between the purest, the +noblest, and the most patriotic portion of the people, and the +official exponent of the people's will, and of its higher and purer +aspirations. So here all jars dissonantly; all is confusion, because +avenged must be every violation of nature's law.</p> + +<p>I cannot believe that at this deadly crisis the salvation can come +from Washington. The best man here has not his free action. And the +rest of them are the country's curse. Mr. Lincoln, with McClellan, +Seward, Blair, Halleck, and scores of such, are <span class="pagenum"><a id="page264" name="page264"></a>(p. 264)</span> as able to +cope with this crisis as to stop the revolution of our planet.</p> + +<p><i>Up to this day</i>, from among those foremost, the only man whose hands +remain unstained with the country's, his mother's, and his brethren's +blood, the last Roman, is Stanton.</p> + +<p><i>September 7.</i>—During last night troops marched to meet the enemy, +saluting with deafening shouts and cheers the residence of McClellan; +spit-lickers as a Kennedy, giving the sign by waving his hat. Such +shouts would cheer up the mind but for the fact that they were mostly +raised for the victory over those who demanded an investigation of the +causes of <i>slowness</i> and insubordination,—those exclusive causes of +the defeat of Pope's army. Those shouts were thrown out as defiance to +justice, to truth, and to law. Those shouts marked the inauguration of +the <i>pretorian regime</i>. General McClellan and other generals have +forced the President to <i>postpone</i> the investigation into the conduct +of the <i>slow</i> and of the insubordinate generals, all three special +favorites of McClellan. General McClellan appeared before the soldiers +surrounded by his <i>old identical staff</i>, by a tross of flatterers, +and, Oh heavens! in the cortege Senator Wilson! Oh, <i>sancta</i> not +<i>simplicitas</i>, but —— Oh, clear-sighted Republican!</p> + +<p>Subsequently, I learned that Senator Wilson was present for a moment, +and only by a pure accident, at that ovation.</p> + +<p><i>Laeszt Dich dem Teufel bey'm Haare packen, so hat Er Dich bey'm +Kopfe</i>, says Lessing, and so it <span class="pagenum"><a id="page265" name="page265"></a>(p. 265)</span> may become here with this +first success of the pretorians, or even worse than pretorians; these +here are Yanitschars of a Sultan.</p> + +<p>Pope and his army accuse three generals of insubordination and mutiny +on the field of battle. McClellan prevents investigation; the brutal +rule of Yanitschars is inaugurated, thanks to you, Messrs. Seward and +Blair.</p> + +<p>McDowell sacrificed to the Yanitschars; he is the scapegoat and the +victim to popular fallacy, to the imbecility of the press, and, above +all, to the intriguers and to the conspiracy of the mutinous pets of +McClellan. Weeks and weeks ago, I foretold to McDowell that such would +be his fate, and that only in after-times history will be just towards +him.</p> + +<p>The country begins to be inundated and opinion poisoned by all kinds +of the most glaring lies, invented and spread by the staffs, and the +imbecile, blind partisans of McClellan. Here are some from among the +lies.</p> + +<p>In January (oh hear, oh hear!) General McClellan with 50,000 men +intended to make a <i>flying</i> (oh hear, oh hear!) expedition to +Richmond, but Lincoln and Stanton opposed it. This lie divides itself +into two points. 1st lie. In January, nobody opposed General +McClellan's will, and, besides, he was sick. 2d lie. If he was so +pugnacious in January, why has he not made with the same number of men +a flying expedition only to Centreville, right under his nose?</p> + +<p>Emanating from the staff, such a lie is sufficient <span class="pagenum"><a id="page266" name="page266"></a>(p. 266)</span> to show +the military capacity of those who concocted it.</p> + +<p>Second lie. That the expedition to Yorktown and the Peninsula strategy +were forced upon McClellan. I hope that the Americans have enough +memory left, and enough self-respect to recollect the truth.</p> + +<p>Further, the above staff asserts that, when the truth will be known +about the campaign, and the fightings in the Chickahominy, then +justice will be done to McClellan.</p> + +<p>Always and everywhere lost battles, bad and ignorant generalship, +require explanations, justifications, and commentaries. Well-fought +battles are justified on the spot, the same day, and by results. No +one asks or makes comments upon the fighting of Jackson. Austerlitz, +Jena, were commented on, explained, some of the chiefs were justified, +but—by Austrian and Prussian commentators.</p> + +<p>Until to-day French writers discuss, analyze, and comment upon the +fatal battle of Waterloo. At Waterloo Napoleon was in the square of +his heroic guards; but during the seven days' fighting on the +Chickahominy, what regiment, not to say a square, saw in its midst the +American Napoleon?</p> + +<p>A thousand others, similar to the above-mentioned lies, will be or are +already circulated; the mass of the people will use its common sense, +and the lies must perish.</p> + +<p>On September 7th, Gen. McClellan gave his word to the President to +start to the army at 12 o'clock, but started at 4 <span class="smcap">P. M.</span> with a long +train of well-packed <span class="pagenum"><a id="page267" name="page267"></a>(p. 267)</span> wagons for himself and for his staff. +To be sure, Lee, Jackson, and all the other rebel chiefs together, +have not such a train; if they had, they would not be to-day on the +Potomac and in Maryland. Most certainly those quick-moving rebels +start at least an hour earlier than they are expected to do.</p> + +<p><i>September 9.</i>—Up to this day Mr. Lincoln ought to have discovered +whose advice transformed him into a standard-bearer of the policy of +the New York Herald, and made him push the country to the verge of the +grave; and, nevertheless, Mr. Lincoln is deaf to the voice of all true +and pure patriots who point out the malefactors.</p> + +<p>Secondary events; as a lost battle, etc., depend upon material causes; +but such primordial events as is the thorough miscarriage of Mr. +Lincoln's anti-rebellion policy,—such events are generated by moral +causes.</p> + +<p>Jefferson Davis, Lee, Jackson, and all the generals down to the last +Southern bush-whacker, incarnate the violent and hideous passion of +slavery, now all-powerful throughout the South. Here, Lincoln, Seward, +McClellan, Blair, Halleck, etc., incarnate the negation of the purest +and noblest aspirations of the North. Stanton alone is inspired by a +national patriotic idea. No unity, no harmony between the people and +the leaders; this discord must generate disasters.</p> + +<p>All over the country the lie is spread that the army demanded the +reappointment of McClellan. First, the three mutinous generals did it; +but not <span class="pagenum"><a id="page268" name="page268"></a>(p. 268)</span> a Kearney, the Bayard of America; very likely not +Hooker and Heintzelman—all of them soldiers, patriots, and men of +honor; nor very likely was it demanded by Keyes. I do not know +positively what was the conduct of Gen. Sumner. Gen. Burnside owes +what he is, glory and all, to McClellan. Burnside's honest gratitude +and honest want of judgment have contributed more than anything else +to inaugurate the regime of the pretorians, to justify mutiny. +Halleck's conduct in all this is veiled in mystery; it is so at least +for the present; and as truth will be kept out of sight, the country +may never know the truth about those shameful proceedings.</p> + +<p>I learn that Heintzelman, against his own judgment, agreed in the +McClellan movement. Well, if this is true, then, of course, the army, +for a long time misled by uninterrupted intrigues, misled by papers +such as the New York Herald and the Times,—the army or the soldiers +mightily contributed to bring about this fatal crisis. An army +composed of intelligent Americans, blinded, stultified by intriguers, +declares for a general who never, up to this day, covered with glory +his or the army's name. After this nothing more is to be expected, and +no disaster on the field of battle, no dissolution of a national +principle, can astonish my mind. Cursed be those who thus demoralized +the sound judgment of the soldiers! Cursed be my personal experience +of men and of things which makes me despair! But when an army or +soldiers become intellectually <span class="pagenum"><a id="page269" name="page269"></a>(p. 269)</span> brought down to such a +standard, then the holiest cause will always be lost. Oh for a man to +save the cause of humanity! But if even such a man should appear, +these pretorians will turn against him.</p> + +<p>The pretorians, with the New York Herald as their flag, will soon +finish with liberty at home. McClellan, Barlow, the brothers Wood, and +Bennett, may very soon be at the helm, with the 100,000 pretorians for +support. <i>Similia similibus</i>; and here disgrace is to cure disgrace.</p> + +<p>These helpless grave-diggers, above all, Seward, are on the way to +pick a quarrel with England, sending a flying gunboat fleet under +Wilkes into the West Indian waters. At this precise moment it were +better to be very cautious, and rather watch strongly our coasts with +the same gunboats.</p> + +<p><i>September 11.</i>—A military genius at once finds out the point where +blows are to be struck, and strikes them with lightning-like speed. +The rebels act in this manner; but what point was found out, what +blows were ever dealt by McClellan?</p> + +<p>Individuals similar to McClellan were idolized by the Roman +pretorians, and this idolatry marks the epoch of the utmost +demoralization and degradation of the Roman empire. Witnessing such a +phenomenon in an army of American volunteers, one must give up in +despair any confidence in manhood and in common sense.</p> + +<p>The Journal of St. Petersburg of August 6th semi-officially refutes +the insinuations that Russia intends to recognize the South, or to +unite with <span class="pagenum"><a id="page270" name="page270"></a>(p. 270)</span> France and England for any such purpose, or for +mediation. The language of the article is noble and friendly, as is +all which up to this day has been done by Alexander II. Mr. Stoeckl, +the Russian minister here, considerably contributes that such sound +and friendly views on the condition of our affairs are entertained by +the Russian Cabinet.</p> + +<p><i>September 11.</i>—Imbeciles agitate the question of mediation. European +cabinets will not offer it now, and nobody, not even the rebels, would +accept. No possible terms and basis exist for any mediation. A Solomon +could not find them out. If Jackson and Lee were to shell Washington, +then only the foreign ministers may be requested to step in and to +settle the terms of a capitulation or of an evacuation. The foreign +ministers here could act as mediators only if asked; not otherwise. I +am sure it will come out that the invasion of Maryland by the rebels +is made under the pressure exercised in Richmond by the Maryland +chivalry in the service of the rebellion. These runaways probably +promised an insurrection in Maryland, provided a rebel force crosses +the Potomac. (Wrote it to England.)</p> + +<p>All around helplessness and confusion. Conscientiously I make all +possible efforts to record what I believe to be true, and then truth +will take care of herself.</p> + +<p>After the study of the campaigns of Frederick II., above all, after +the study of those marvellous campaigns, combinations, manœuvres of +Napoleon, to witness every day the combinations of McClellan is +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page271" name="page271"></a>(p. 271)</span> more disgusting, more nauseous for the mind, than can be for +the stomach the strongest dose of emetic.</p> + +<p>The last catastrophe at Bull Run and at Manassas has a slight +resemblance with the catastrophe at Waterloo. The conduct of the +mutinous generals here is similar to the conduct of some of the French +generals during the battle of Ligny and Quatre-Bras. But here was +mutiny, and there demoralization produced by general and deeply rooted +and fatally unavoidable causes. The demoralization of the French +generals came at the end of a terrible epoch of struggles and +sacrifices, of material exhaustion, when the faith in the destinies of +Napoleon was extinct; here mutiny and demoralization seize upon the +newly-born era.</p> + +<p><i>September 13.</i>—What a good-natured people are the Americans! A +regiment of Pennsylvania infantry quartered for the night on the +sidewalk of the streets; officers, of course, absent; the poor +soldiers stretched on the stones, when so many empty large buildings, +when the empty (intellectually and materially empty) White House could +have given to the soldiers comfortable night quarters. It can give an +idea how they treat the soldiers in the field, if here in Washington +they care so little for them. But McClellan has forty wagons for his +staff, and forty ambulances—no danger for the latter to be used. In +European armies aristocratic officers would not dare to treat soldiers +in this way—to throw them on the pavement without any necessity.</p> + +<p>More than once in my life, after heavy fighting, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page272" name="page272"></a>(p. 272)</span> I laid down +the knapsack for a cushion, snow for a mattrass and for a blanket; but +by the side of the soldiers, the generals, the staffs, and the +officers shared similar bedsteads.</p> + +<p>I hear strange stories about Stanton, and about his having ruefully +fallen in McClellan's lap. If so, then one more <i>man</i>, one more +illusion, and one more creed in manhood gone overboard, drowned in +meanness, in moral cowardice, and subserviency.</p> + +<p>The worshippers of strategy and of Gen. McClellan try to make the +public swallow, that the investment of Richmond by him was a +magnificent display of science, and would have been a success but for +50,000 more men under his command.</p> + +<p>To invest any place whatever is to cut that place from the principal, +if not from all communications with the country around, and thus +prevent, or make dangerous or difficult, the arrival of provisions, of +support, etc.</p> + +<p>Our gunboats, etc., in the York and the James rivers have virtually +invested Richmond on the eastern side; but that part of the Peninsula +did not constitute the great source of life for the rebel army. The +principal life-arteries for Richmond ran through four-fifths of a +circle, beginning from the southern banks of the James river and +running to the southern banks of the Rapidan and of the Rappahannock. +Through that region men, material, provisions poured into Richmond +from the whole South, and that whole region around Richmond was left +perfectly open; but strategy concentrated its wisdom <span class="pagenum"><a id="page273" name="page273"></a>(p. 273)</span> on the +comparatively indifferent eastern side of the Chickahominy marshes, +and cut off the rebels from—nothing at all.</p> + +<p><i>September 13.</i>—General McClellan, in search of the enemy, during the +first six days makes thirty miles! Finds the enemy near Hagerstown. No +more time for strategy.</p> + +<p><i>September 14.</i>—General McClellan telegraphs to General Halleck +(<i>meliores ambo</i>) that he, McClellan, has "<i>the most reliable +information that the enemy is 190,000 strong in Maryland and in +Pennsylvania, besides 70,000 on the other side of the Potomac</i>." (The +same bosh about the numbers as in the Peninsula.)</p> + +<p>The Generals Burnside, Hooker, Sumner, Reno, fought the battle at +Hagerstown, and drove the enemy before them. General McClellan reports +a victory, <i>but expects the enemy to renew the fighting next day in a +considerable force</i>—(as at Williamsburg). McClellan telegraphs to +Halleck, "<i>Look for an attack on Washington.</i>" The enemy retreats to +recross the Potomac!</p> + +<p><i>September 15.</i>—General Wadsworth suggested to the President one of +those bold movements by which campaigns are terminated by one blow: +"To send Heintzelman and him, Wadsworth, with some 25,000 men, to +Gordonsville (here and in Baltimore about 90,000 men), and thus cut +off the enemy from Richmond, and prevent him from rallying his +forces." But General Halleck opposes such a Murat's dash, on account +of McClellan's "looked-for <span class="pagenum"><a id="page274" name="page274"></a>(p. 274)</span> attack on Washington"—by his, +McClellan's, imagination.</p> + +<p><i>September 17.</i>—When I wrote the above about Wadsworth and +Heintzelman, I was under the impression that the victory announced by +McClellan, Sept. 14, was more decisive; that as he had fresh the whole +corps of Fitz John Porter, and the greatest part of that of Franklin, +and other supports sent him from Washington, he would give no respite +to the enemy, and push him into the Potomac. It turned out +differently.</p> + +<p>The loss by capitulation of Harper's Ferry. It is a blow to us, and +very likely a disgraceful affair, not for the soldiers, but for the +commanders.</p> + +<p><i>September 19.</i>—Five days' fighting. Our brave Hooker wounded; +tremendous loss of life on both sides, and no decisive results. These +last battles, and those on the Chickahominy, that of Shiloh, in one +word all the fightings protracted throughout several consecutive days, +are almost unexampled in history. These horrible episodes establish +the bravery, the endurance of the soldiers, the bravery and the +ability of some among the commanders of the corps, of the divisions, +etc., and the absence of any <i>generalship in the commander</i>.</p> + +<p><i>September 20.</i>—Until this day Gen. McClellan has not published one +single detailed report about any of his operations since the +evacuation of Manassas in March. Thus much for the staff of the army +of the Potomac. We shall see what detailed report he will publish of +the campaign in <span class="pagenum"><a id="page275" name="page275"></a>(p. 275)</span> Maryland. McClellan's bulletins from +Maryland are twins to his bulletins from the Peninsula; and there may +be very little difference between the <i>gained</i> victories. To-day he is +ignorant of the movements of the enemy, and has more than 30,000 fresh +troops in hand.</p> + +<p>As in the Peninsula, so in Maryland. Although having nearly one-third +more men than the enemy, General McClellan never forced the enemy to +engage at once its whole force, never attacked the rebels on their +whole line, and never had any positive notion about the number and the +position of the opposing forces.</p> + +<p>The rebels had the Potomac in their rear; our army pressed them in +front, and—the rebels escaped.</p> + +<p>I appeal to such military heroes as Hooker; I appeal to thousands of +our brave soldiers, from generals down to the rank and file, and +further I appeal to all women with hearts and brains here and in +Europe.</p> + +<p><i>September 20.</i>—Gen. Mansfield killed at the head of his brigade. I +ask his forgiveness for all the criticism made upon him in this diary. +Last year, at the beginning of the war, Gen. Mansfield acted under the +orders of Gen. Scott. This explains all.</p> + +<p>As in the slaughters of the Chickahominy, so in the Maryland +slaughters, <i>nobody hurt</i> in McClellan's numerous staff. Thank Heaven! +Not only his life is charmed, but the charm extends over all who +surround him,—men and beasts.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page276" name="page276"></a>(p. 276)</span> A malediction sticks to our cause. Hooker badly, very badly +wounded. Hooker fought the greatest number of fights,—was never +worsted in the Peninsula, nor in the August disasters, and he alone +has the supreme honor of a nick-name, by the troopers' baptism: the +<i>Fighting Joe</i>. Hooker, not McClellan, ought to command the army. But +no pestilential Washington clique, none of the West-Pointers, back +him, and the pets, the pretorians, may have refused to obey his +orders.</p> + +<p>After the escape of the rebels from Manassas in March, and after the +evacuation of Yorktown, all the intriguers and traitors grouped around +the New York Herald, and the imbeciles around the New York Times, +prized high <i>the masterly strategy</i> and its bloodless victories. Now, +in dead, by powder and disease, in crippled, etc., McClellan destroyed +about 100,000 men, and the country's honor is bleeding, the country's +cause is on the verge of a precipice.</p> + +<p>How rare are men of civic heroism, of fearless civic courage; men of +the creed: <i>perisse mon nom mais que la patrie soit sauvée.</i></p> + +<p>General Wadsworth feels more deeply and more painfully the disasters, +nay, the disgrace, of the country, than do almost all with whom I meet +here. During the Congress, similar were the feelings of Senator Wade, +Judge Potter, and of many other Congressmen in both the Houses. So +feel Boutwell, Andrew, the Governor of Massachusetts, and I am sure +many, many over the country. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page277" name="page277"></a>(p. 277)</span> But the sensation-men and +preachers, lecturers, etc., all are to be * * * *</p> + +<p><i>September 22.</i>—By Mr. Seward's policy and by McClellan's strategy +and war-bulletins the bravest and the most intelligent people became +the laughing-stock of Europe and of the world. And thus is witnessed +the hitherto in history unexampled phenomenon of a devoted and brave +people of twenty millions, mastering all the wealth and the resources +of modern civilization, worsted and kept at bay by four to five +million rebels, likewise brave, but almost beggared, and cut off from +all external communications.</p> + +<p><i>Sept. 23.</i>—Proclamation <i>conditionally</i> abolishing slavery from +1863. The <i>conditional</i> is the last desperate effort made by Mr. +Lincoln and by Mr. Seward to save slavery. Poor Mr. Lincoln was +obliged to strike such a blow at his <i>mammy</i>! The two statesmen found +out that it was dangerous longer to resist the decided, authoritative +will of the masses. The words "resign," "depose," "impeach," were more +and more distinct in the popular murmur, and the proclamation was +issued.</p> + +<p>Very little, if any, credit is due to Mr. Lincoln or to Mr. Seward for +having thus late and reluctantly <i>legalized</i> the stern will of the +immense majority of the American people. For the sake of sacred truth +and justice I protest before civilization, humanity, and posterity, +that Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Seward intrinsically are wholly innocent of +this great satisfaction given to the right, and to national honor.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page278" name="page278"></a>(p. 278)</span> The absurdity of colonization is preserved in the +proclamation. How could it have been otherwise?</p> + +<p>But if the rebellion is crushed before January 1st, 1863, what then? +If the rebels turn loyal before that term? Then the people of the +North will be cheated. Happily for humanity and for national honor, +Mr. Lincoln's and Mr. Seward's benevolent expectations will be +baffled; the rebels will spurn the tenderly proffered leniency; these +rebels are so ungrateful towards those who "cover the weakness of the +insurgents," &c. (See the celebrated, and by the American press much +admired, despatch in May or June, 1862, Seward to Adams.)</p> + +<p>The proclamation is written in the meanest and the most dry routine +style; not a word to evoke a generous thrill, not a word reflecting +the warm and lofty comprehension and feelings of the immense majority +of the people on this question of emancipation. Nothing for humanity, +nothing to humanity. Whoever drew it, be he Mr. Lincoln or Mr. Seward, +it is clear that the writer was not in it either with his heart or +with his soul; it is clear that it was done under moral duress, under +the throttling pressure of events. How differently Stanton would have +spoken!</p> + +<p>General Wadsworth truly says, that never a noble subject was more +belittled by the form in which it was uttered.</p> + +<p>Brazilian m——s are much disturbed by the proclamation.</p> + +<p><i>Sept. 23.</i>—In his answer to the Paisley Parliamentary <span class="pagenum"><a id="page279" name="page279"></a>(p. 279)</span> +Reform Association, Mr. Seward complains that the sympathy of Europe +turns now for secession.</p> + +<p>O Mr. Seward, Mr. Seward, who is it that contributed to turn the +current against the cause of right and of humanity? Months ago I and +others warned you; the premonitory signs and the reasons of this +change have been pointed out to you. Now you slander Europe, of which +you know as little as of the inhabitants of the moon. The generous +populations of the whole of Europe expected and waited for a positive, +unhesitating, clear recognition of human rights; day after day the +generous European minds expected to see some positive, authoritative +fact confirm that lofty conception which, at the start of this +rebellion, they had of the cause of the North. But the pure, generous +tendencies of the American people became officially, authoritatively +misrepresented; the public opinion in Europe became stuffed with empty +generalizations, with official but unfulfilled prophecies, and with +cold declamations. Those official generalizations, prophecies, and +declamations, the supineness shown by the administration in the +recognition of human rights, all this began to be considered in Europe +as being sanctioned by the whole American people; and generous +European hearts and minds began to avert in disgust from the +<i>misrepresented</i> cause of the North.</p> + +<p>Two issues are before history, before the philosophy of history, and +before the social progress of our race. The first issue is the +struggle between the pure <span class="pagenum"><a id="page280" name="page280"></a>(p. 280)</span> democratic spirit embodied in the +Free States, and the fetid remains of the worst part of humanity +embodied in the South. The second issue is between the perennial +vitality of the principle of self-government in the people, and the +transient and accidental results of the self-government as manifested +in Mr. Lincoln, in Mr. Seward, and their followers. I hope that this +Diary will throw some light on the second issue, and vindicate the +perennial against the transient and the accidental.</p> + +<p><i>Sept. 24.</i>—If the events of this war should progress as they are +foreshadowed in the proclamation of September 22, then the application +of this proclamation may create inextricable complications. Not only +in one and the same State, but in one and the same district, nay, even +in the same township, after January 1st, 1863, may be found +Africo-Americans, portions of whom are emancipated, the others in +bondage. But the stern logic of events will save the illogical, +pusillanimous, confused half-measure, as it now is. (O Steffens!)</p> + +<p>General McClellan confesses that if Hooker had not been wounded, then +<i>the road</i>, by which the retreat of the rebels might have been cut +off, would have been taken. Such a declaration is the most emphatic +recognition of Hooker's superior military capacity. Seldom, however, +has the loss of a general commanding only <i>en second</i>, or a wing, as +did Hooker, decided the fortunes of the day. Why did not McClellan +take <i>the road</i> himself, after Hooker was obliged to leave the field? +When Desaix, Bessičres, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page281" name="page281"></a>(p. 281)</span> and Lannes fell, Napoleon +nevertheless won the respective battles.</p> + +<p><i>Sept. 25.</i>—The military position of the rebels in Winchester seems +to me one of the best they ever held in this war. Winchester is the +centre of which Washington, Harper's Ferry, Williamsport, nay, even +Wheeling, seem to be the circumference. Our army under McClellan is +almost beyond the circle, crosses not the Potomac, and is now only to +watch the enemy. So much for the great McClellan's victory. Truly, the +enemy may be taken in the rear, its communications with Richmond, &c., +cut off and destroyed; but <i>we are safe</i> on the Potomac, and this is +sufficient. McClellan is <i>the man of large conceptions and rapid +execution</i>. The best generals are <i>hors de combat</i>; as to Halleck, O, +it is not to think, not to speak. Well, I may be mistaken, but I +clearly see all this on the map of Virginia.</p> + +<p><i>Sept. 25.</i>—The West Point spirit persecutes Sigel with the utmost +rage. The West Point spirit seemingly wishes to have Sigel dishonored, +defeated, even if the country be thereby destroyed. The Hallecks, &c., +keep him in a subordinate position; <i>three days ago</i> his corps was a +little over seven thousand, almost no cavalry, and most of the +artillery without horses, and he in front.</p> + +<p>The more I scrutinize the President's thus called emancipation +proclamation, the more cunning and less good will and sincerity I find +therein. I hope I am mistaken. But the proclamation is only an act of +the military power,—is evoked by military <span class="pagenum"><a id="page282" name="page282"></a>(p. 282)</span> necessity,—and +not a civil, social, humane act of justice and equity.</p> + +<p>The only good to be derived from this proclamation is, that for the +first time the word <i>freedom</i>, and a general comprehension of +"emancipation," appear in an official act under the sanction of the +formula, and are inaugurated into the official, the constitutional +life of the nation. In itself it is therefore a great event for a +people so strictly attached to legality and to formulas.</p> + +<p>I do not recollect to have read in the history of any great, or even +of a small captain,—above all of such a one when between thirty-four +and thirty-six years old,—that he followed the army under his command +in a travelling carriage and six, when the field of operations +extended from fifty to seventy miles. Three cheers for McClellan, for +his carriage and six!</p> + +<p class="section">HOW THE GREAT CAPTAIN WAS TO CATCH THE WHOLE REBEL ARMY IN + MANASSAS, IN FEBRUARY AND MARCH, A. D. 1862.</p> + +<p>It was to have been done by a brilliant and unsurpassable stroke of +combined strategy, tactics, manœuvres, marches, and swimmings; also +on land and water. (O, hear! O, hear!)</p> + +<p>As every body knows, the rebels were encamped in the so <i>fearful</i> +strongholds of Centreville and Manassas, all the time fooling the +commander-in-chief of the federal army in relation to their <i>immense</i> +numbers. To attack the rebels in front, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page283" name="page283"></a>(p. 283)</span> or to surround them +by the Occoquan and Brentsville, would have been a too—simple +operation; by a special, an immense, space-embracing anaconda +strategy, the rebel army was to be cut off from the whole of rebeldom, +and forced to surrender <i>en masse</i> to the inventor of (the not yet +patented, I hope) bloodless victories. To accomplish such an immense +result, a fleet of transports was already ordered to be gathered at +Annapolis. On them in ten or fifteen days (O, hear!) an army of fifty +to sixty thousand, most completely equipped, was to be embarked, plus +forty thousand in Washington, all this to sail under the personal +command of the general-in-chief, and sail towards Richmond. Richmond +taken, the rebel army at Manassas would have been cut off, and obliged +to surrender on any terms.</p> + +<p>The above splendid conception was, and still is, peddled among the +army and among the nation by the admirers of, and the devotees of, +anaconda strategy.</p> + +<p>The expedition was to land at the mouth of the Tappahannock, a small +port, or rather a creek, used for shipping of a small quantity of +tobacco. As the port or creek has only some small attempts at wharves, +the landing of such an enormous army, with parks of artillery, with +cavalry, pontoons, and material for constructing bridges,—the landing +would not have been executed in weeks, if in months; but the projector +of the plan, perfectly losing the notion of time, calculated for ten +days. From that port the <i>flying</i> expedition was to march directly on +Richmond <span class="pagenum"><a id="page284" name="page284"></a>(p. 284)</span> through a country having only common field and dirt +roads, and this in a season when all roads generally are in an +impassable condition, through a country intersected by marshy streams, +principal among them the Matapony and the Pamunkey—to march towards +Richmond and the Chickahominy marshes. It seems that Chickahominy +exercised an attractive, Armida-like charm on the great strategian. An +army loaded with such immense trains would have sufficiently destroyed +all the roads, and rendered them impassable for itself; and the +<i>flying</i> expedition would at once have been transformed into an +expedition sticking in the mud, similar to that subsequent in the +peninsula. The enemy was in possession of Fredericksburg and of the +railroad to Hanover Court House on one flank, and of all the best +roads north of and through Chickahominy marshes on the other flank. +The <i>flying</i> expedition would have had for base Tappahannock and a +dirt road. O strategy! O stuff!</p> + +<p>The much-persecuted General McDowell exposed the worse than crudity of +the brilliant conception. By doing this, McDowell saved the country, +the administration, and the strategian from immense losses and from a +nameless shame. It is due to the people that the administration lay +before the public the scheme and the refutation. A look on the map of +Virginia must convince even the simplest mind of the brilliancy of +this conception.</p> + +<p>During all this time spent in such masterly operations, the rebel army +in Manassas was to quietly <span class="pagenum"><a id="page285" name="page285"></a>(p. 285)</span> look on, to wait, and not move, +not retreat on Richmond. Early in March, at once the rebel army, +always undisturbed, quietly disappeared from Manassas; and this is the +best evidence of the depth of that brilliant combination, peddled +under the name of the <i>flying expedition to Richmond</i>, projected for +January, February, or March. I appeal to the verdict of sound reason; +the parties are, common sense <i>versus</i> anaconda strategy and bloodless +victories.</p> + +<p><i>Sept. 27.</i>—The proclamation issued by the war power of the President +is not yet officially notified to those who alone are to execute +it—the armies and their respective commanders. Who is to be taken in? +The papers publish a detailed account of an interview between the +President and an anti-slavery deputation from Chicago. The deputation +asked for stringent measures in the spirit of the law of Congress, +which orders the emancipation of the slaves held by the rebels. The +President combated the reasons alleged by the deputation, and tried to +establish the danger and the inefficiency of the measure. A few days +after the above-mentioned debate, the President issued the +proclamation of September 22. Are his heart, his soul, and his +convictions to be looked for in the debate, or in the proclamation?</p> + +<p>The immense majority of the people, from the inmost of its heart, +greets the proclamation—a proof how deeply and ardently was felt its +necessity. The gratitude shown to Mr. Lincoln for having thus executed +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page286" name="page286"></a>(p. 286)</span> the will of his master,—this gratitude is the best evidence +how this whole people is better, has a loftier comprehension of right +and duty, than have its elected servants.</p> + +<p>McClellan already speaks that the campaign is finished, and the army +is to go into winter quarters. If the people, if the administration, +and if the army will stand this, then they will justly deserve the +scorn of the whole civilized and uncivilized world. But with such +civil and military chiefs all is possible, all may be expected to be +included in their programme of—vigorous operations.</p> + +<p><i>Sept. 28.</i>—For some weeks I watch a conspiracy of the West Pointers, +of the commanders-in-chief, of the staffs, and of the double +know-nothing cliques united against Sigel. The aim seems to be to put +Sigel and his purposely-reduced and disorganized forces in such a +condition and position that he may be worsted or destroyed by the +enemy. To avoid dishonoring the forces under him, to avoid exposing +them to slaughter, and to avoid being thus himself dishonored, Sigel +ought to resign, and make public the reasons of his resignation. A few +days ago, I wrote and warned the Evening Post; but—but—</p> + +<p>The Richmond papers confirm what I supposed concerning the motives +which pushed the rebel army across the Potomac. As the Marylanders +rose not in arms, and joined not the rebel army, the invaders had +nothing else to do but to retreat and to recross the Potomac. +McClellan ought to have thrown them into the river, which Hooker, if +not wounded, would have done, or if he had the command of our army.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page287" name="page287"></a>(p. 287)</span> The rebels would have retreated into Virginia, even without +being attacked by McClellan, even if he only followed them, say at one +day's distance. Not having destroyed the rebels, McClellan, in +reality, and from the military stand point, accomplished very +little—near to nothing. Hooker estimates the rebel force, at the +utmost, at eighty thousand men, and that is all that they could have. +McClellan had about one hundred and twenty thousand. And—and he is to +be considered the savior of Maryland and of Pennsylvania. O, good +American people! The genuine Napoleon won all his great battles +against armies which considerably outnumbered his.</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward menaces England with issuing <i>letters of marque</i> against +the Southern privateers. The menace is ridiculous, because it will not +be carried out, and, if carried out, it will become still more +ridiculous; it would be a very poor compliment to the navy to use the +whole power of private enterprise against a few rovers, and it would +be an official recognition of the rebels in the condition of +belligerents. <i>Quousque tandem</i>—<span class="smcap">O Seward</span>—<i>abutere patientiam +nostram?</i></p> + +<p><i>Sept. 30.</i>—Nearly three weeks after the battle of Antietam, General +McClellan publishes what he and they call a report of his operations +in Maryland; in all not twenty lines, and devoted principally to +establish—on probabilities—the numerical losses of the enemy. The +report is a fit <i>pendant</i> to his bulletins; is excellent for bunkum, +and to make other people justly laugh at us.</p> + + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page288" name="page288"></a>(p. 288)</span> OCTOBER, 1862.</h3> + +<p class="resume">Costly Infatuation — The do-nothing strategy — Cavalry on lame + horses — Bayonet charges — Antietam — Effect of the + proclamation — Disasters in the West — The abolitionists not + originally hostile to McClellan — Helplessness in the War + Department — Devotedness of the people — McClellan and the + proclamation — Wilkes — Colonel Key — Routine engineers — Rebel raid + into Pennsylvania — Stanton's sincerity — O, unfighting + strategians! — The administration a success — <i>De + gustibus</i> — Stuart's raid — West Point — St. Domingo — The + President's letter to McClellan — Broad church — The elections — The + Republican party gone — The remedy at the polls — McClellan wants + to be relieved — Mediation — Compromise — The rhetors. — The + optimists — The foreigners — Scott and Buchanan — Gladstone — Foreign + opinion and action — Both the extremes to be put + down — Spain — Fremont's campaign against Jackson — Seward's + circular — General Scott's gift — "O, could I go to a + camp!" — McClellan crosses the Potomac — Prays for rain — Fevers + decimate the regiments — Martindale and Fitz John Porter — The + political balance to be preserved — New regiments — O, poor + country!</p> + + +<p>With what a bloody sacrifice of men this people pays for its +infatuation in McClellan, for the moral cowardice of its official +leaders, and the intrigues and the imbecility of the regulars, of some +among the West Pointers, of traitors led by the New York Herald, by +the World, and by certain Unionists on the outside, and secessionists +at heart! All these combined nourish the infatuation. All things +compared, Napoleon cost not so much to the French people, and at least +Napoleon paid it in glory. Mind <span class="pagenum"><a id="page289" name="page289"></a>(p. 289)</span> and heart sicken to witness +all this here. The question to-day is, not to strengthen other +generals, as Heintzelman and Sigel, and to take the enemy in the rear, +but to give a <i>chance</i> to McClellan to win the ever-expected, and not +yet by him won, <i>great battle</i>. McClellan continually calls for more +men; all the vital forces of the people are absorbed by him; and when +he has large numbers, he is incapable of using and handling them; so +it was at the Chickahominy, so it was at Antietam. In the way that +McClellan acts now, he may use up all the available forces of the +people, if nobody has the courage to speak out; besides, any warning +voice is drowned in the treacherous intrigues of the clique, in +imbecility and infatuation.</p> + +<p>At the meeting of the governors, at the various public conventions, in +the thus called public resolutions—platforms, in one word—wherever, +in any way. North, West, and East, the public life of the people has +made its voice heard: <i>a vigorous prosecution of the war</i> was, and is, +earnestly recommended to the administration. All this will be of no +avail. By this time, by bloody and bitter experience, the American +people ought to have learned it. With his civil and military aids and +lieutenants, as the McClellans, the Hallecks, the Sewards, Mr. Lincoln +has been at work; and at the best, they have shown their utter +incapacity, if not ill-will, to carry the war on vigorously and upon +strictly military principles. Many persons in Washington know that Mr. +Seward last winter firmly backed the <i>do-nothing</i> <span class="pagenum"><a id="page290" name="page290"></a>(p. 290)</span> strategy, +in the firm belief that the rebels would be worried out, and submit +without fighting. To those statesmen and Napoleons, Carnots, &c., it +is as impossible to manœuvre with rapidity, to strike boldly and +decidedly, as to dance on their <i>well-furnished</i> heads. Only such a +good-natured people as the Americans can expect <i>something</i> from that +whole <i>caterva</i>. To expect from Mr. Lincoln's Napoleons, Carnots, &c., +vigorous and rapid military operations, is the same as to mount +cavalry on thoroughly lame horses, and order it to charge <i>ŕ fond de +train</i>.</p> + +<p>The worshippers of McClellan peddle that the Antietam victory became +neutralized because the enemy fell back on its second and third line. +Whatever may be in this falling back on lines, and accepting all as it +is represented, one thing is certain, that when commanders win +victories, generally they give no time to the enemy to fall back in +order on its second and third lines. But every thing gets a new stamp +under the new Napoleon. A few hours after the Antietam battle, General +McClellan telegraphed that he "<i>knew not</i> if the enemy retreated into +the interior or to the Potomac." O, O!</p> + +<p>Many from among the European officers here have some experience of the +manœuvring of large bodies—experience acquired on fields of +battle, and on reviews, and those camp manœuvres annually practised +all over Europe. In this way the European officers, more or less, have +the <i>coup d'œil</i> for space and for the <i>terrain</i>, so necessary when +an <span class="pagenum"><a id="page291" name="page291"></a>(p. 291)</span> army is to be put in positions on a field of battle, and +which <i>coup d'œil</i> few young American officers had the occasion to +acquire. If judiciously selected for the duties of the staffs, such +European officers would be of use and support to generals but for +jealousy and the West Point cliques.</p> + +<p>During this whole war I hear every body, but above all the West Point +wiseacres and strategians, assert that charges with the bayonet and +hand-to-hand fighting are exceedingly rare occurrences in the course +of any campaign. It is useless to speak to all those great judges of +experience and of history.</p> + +<p>In the account of the battles of Ligny and of Waterloo, Thiers +mentions four charges with the bayonet and hand-to-hand fighting at +Ligny, and nine at Waterloo, wherein one was made by the English, one +was made by Prussians and by French, and one by the French with +bayonet against English cavalry. In 1831 the Poles used the bayonet +more than it was used in any one campaign known in history. O, West +Point!</p> + +<p>It deserves to be noticed that the conspirators against Pope and +McDowell, and the pet pretorians of September 6 and 7, distinguished +themselves not very much in the battle of Antietam. Hooker commanded +McDowell's corps.</p> + +<p>To the number of evils inflicted upon this country by the McClellan +infatuation, must be added the fact that many young men, with +otherwise sound intellects, have been taken in, stultified, poisoned +beyond <span class="pagenum"><a id="page292" name="page292"></a>(p. 292)</span> cure, by high-sounding words, as strategy, +all-embracing scientific combinations, &c.—words identified with +incapacity, defeats, and intrigue.</p> + +<p>In all probability, Hooker alone, when he fought, had a fixed plan at +the Antietam battle. As for a general plan, aiming either to throw the +enemy into the river, or to cut him from the river, or to accomplish +something final and decisive, seemingly no such plan existed. It looks +as if they had ignored, at the headquarters, what kind of positions +were occupied by the enemy; and the only purpose seems to have been to +fight, but without having any preconceived plan. This, at least, is +the conclusion from the manner in which the battle was fought. If any +plan had existed, the brave army would have executed it; but the enemy +retreated in order, and rather unmolested. <i>As always, so this time, +the bravery of the army did every thing; and, as a matter of course, +the generalship did—nothing.</i></p> + +<p><i>Oct. 4.</i>—The proclamation of September 22 may not produce in Europe +the effect and the enthusiasm which it might have evoked if issued a +year ago, as an act of justice and of self-conscientious force, as an +utterance of the lofty, pure, and ardent aspirations and will of a +high-minded people. Europe may see now in the proclamation an action +of despair made in the duress of events; (and so it is in reality for +Mr. Lincoln, Seward, and their squad.) And in this way, a noble deed, +outpouring from the soul of the people, is reduced to pygmy and mean +proportions by ——. The name is on every body's lips.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page293" name="page293"></a>(p. 293)</span> But it was impossible to issue this proclamation last year; +at that time the master-spirit of Mr. Lincoln's administration +emphatically assured the diplomats that the Union will be preserved, +<i>were slavery—to rule in Boston</i>.</p> + +<p>The continued disasters in the West can easily be explained by the +fact, that those rotten skeletons, Crittenden, Davis, and Wickliffe +control the operations of the generals.</p> + +<p><i>Among the countless lies peddled by McClellan's worshippers, the most +enormous and the most impudent is that one by which they attempt to +explain, what in their lingo they call, the hostility of the +abolitionists towards McClellan. Concerning this matter, I can speak +with perfect knowledge of almost all the circumstances.</i></p> + +<p><i>Not one abolitionist of whatever hue, not one republican whatever, +was in any way troubled or thought about the political convictions of +General McClellan at the time when he was put at the head of the army. +All the abolitionists and republicans, who then earnestly wished, and +now wish, to have the rebellion crushed, expected General McClellan to +do it by quick, decisive, soldier-like, military operations, +manœuvres, and fights. Senators Wade, Chandler, Trumbull, &c., in +October, 1861, principally aided McClellan to become independent of +General Scott. When, however, weeks and months elapsed without any +soldier-like action, manifestation, or enterprise whatever, all those +who were in earnest began to feel uneasy, began to murmur, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page294" name="page294"></a>(p. 294)</span> +not in reference to any political opinions, whatever, held by General +McClellan, but solely and exclusively on account of his military +supineness. All those who ardently wished, and wish, that neither +slaveholders nor slavery be hurt in any way, such ones early grouped +themselves around General McClellan, believing to have found in him +the man after their own heart. That cesspool of all infamies, the New +York Herald, became the mouthpiece of all the like hypocrites. They +and the Herald were the first to pervert and to misrepresent the +indignation evoked by the do-nothing or nobody-hurt strategy, and to +call it the abolition outcry against their fetish.</i></p> + +<p>Scarcely will it be believed what disorder, what helplessness, and +what incapacity rule paramount in the expedition of any current +business in the strictly military part of the War Department. It is +worse than any imaginable red-tape and circumlocution. And all this, +being considered a speciality and a technicality, is in the exclusive +hands of the adjutant general, a master spirit among the West +Pointers. Generally, all relating to the thus celebrated organization +of the army is an exclusive work of the West Point wisdom—is handled +by West Pointers; and, nevertheless, the general comprehension of all +details in relation to an army, how it is to be handled, all the +military details of responsibility, of higher discipline, &c., all +this is confusion, and strikes with horror any one either familiar +with such matters or using freely his sound <span class="pagenum"><a id="page295" name="page295"></a>(p. 295)</span> sense. A narrow +routine which may have been innocuous with an army of sixteen thousand +with General Scott and in peace, became highly mischievous when the +army increased more than fifty times, and the war raged furiously. All +this confusion is specially produced by the wiseacres and doctors of +routine. Undoubtedly it reacts on the army, and shows of what use for +the country is, and was, that whole old nursery.</p> + +<p>Wherever one turns his eyes, every where a deep line separates the +patriotic activity of the people from the official activity. With the +people all is sacrifice, devotion, grandeur, and purity of purpose, by +great and small, by rich and poor, and with the poor, if possible, +even more than with the rich. With the highest and higher officials it +is either weakness, or egotism, or coolness, or intrigue, or +ignorance, or helplessness. The exceptions are few, and have been +repeatedly pointed out.</p> + +<p><i>Oct. 8.</i>—General McClellan's order to the army concerning the +President's proclamation shows up the man. Not a word about the object +in the proclamation, but rather unveiled insinuations that the army is +dissatisfied with emancipation, and that it may mutiny. The army ought +to feel highly honored by such insinuations in that lengthy +disquisition about his (McClellan's) position and the duties of the +army. For the honor of the brave, armed citizen-patriots it can be +emphatically asserted that the patriotic volunteers better know their +duties than do those who preach to them. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page296" name="page296"></a>(p. 296)</span> Some suspect that +Mr. Seward drew the paper for McClellan, but I am sure this cannot be. +It may have been done by Bennett or some other of the Herald, or by +Barlow. If this order is the result of Mr. Lincoln's visit to the +camp, and of a transaction with Mac-Napoleon, then the President has +not thereby increased the dignity of his presidential character.</p> + +<p>Wilkes's Spirit of the Times incommensurably towers above the New York +Press by its dauntless patriotism; by its clear, broad, and deep +comprehension of the condition of the country.</p> + +<p>Colonel Key's disclosures concerning the McClellan-Halleck programme, +not to destroy the rebels and the rebellion until the next +presidential election, are throttled by the dismissal of the colonel. +But what he said, if put by the side of the words of the order to the +army, that "the remedy for political errors, if any are committed, is +to be found only in the action of the people at the polls,"—all this +ought to open even the most obtuse intellects.</p> + +<p>Poor (Carlyle fashion) old Greeley hurrahs for McClellan and for the +order No. 163 to the army. O for new and young men to swim among new +and young events!</p> + +<p><i>Oct. 11.</i>—Will any body in this country have the patriotic courage +to reform the army? that is, to dismiss from the service the West +Point clique in Washington and in the army of the Potomac. Such a +proof of strong will cannot be expected from the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page297" name="page297"></a>(p. 297)</span> President; +but perhaps Congress may show it. Those first and second scholars or +graduates from West Point are all routine engineers; and who ever +heard of whole armies commanded, moved, and manœuvred by engineers? +American invention; but not to be patented for Europe.</p> + +<p><i>Oct. 11.</i>—The rebel raid into Pennsylvania, under the nose of +McClellan. Is there any thing in the world capable of opening this +people's eyes?</p> + +<p>I doubt if at any time, and in the life of any great or small people, +there existed such a galaxy of civil and military rulers, chiefs, and +leaders, stripped of nobler manhood, as are the <i>great men</i> here. The +blush of honor never burned their cheeks! O, the low politicians! Some +persons doubt Stanton's sincerity in his dealings with individuals. I +am not a judge thereof; but were it so, it can easily be forgiven if +he only remains sincere and true to the cause.</p> + +<p>One is amazed and even aghast at the impudence of the McClellan and +West Point cliques. In their lingo, heroes like Kearney, like Hooker +and Heintzelman, all such are superciliously mentioned as <i>only +fighting generals</i>. O, unfighting strategians!</p> + +<p>Stuart's brilliant raid was executed the day of McClellan's bombastic +proclamation about his having cleared Pennsylvania and Maryland of the +enemy. On the same day McClellan and other generals straggled about +the country, visiting cities hundreds of miles distant from the camp. +And such generals complain of straggling! Make <span class="pagenum"><a id="page298" name="page298"></a>(p. 298)</span> the army +fight! inspire with confidence the soldier—then he will not straggle.</p> + +<p>The Evening Post, October 13, demonstrates that up to this day Mr. +Lincoln's administration is "a grand and brilliant success." Well, <i>de +gustibus non est disputandum</i>. Others may rightly think that the +achievements enumerated by the Evening Post are exclusively due to the +people; that by the people they were forced upon the administration, +(Stanton and the navy excepted;) and that the numerous failures, the +waste of human life, of money, and of time, are to be logically and +directly traced to the administration. O, subserviency!</p> + +<p>The McClellanites are indignant against the Pennsylvanians for not +having caught Stuart and his three thousand horses. Bravo! And what is +the army for? and, above all, what are the so expensive commander and +his staff for?</p> + +<p>It is perhaps natural that many from among the republican leaders +attempt to prop up the reputation of Mr. Lincoln's administrative +capacity, to kindle a halo around his name, and to sponge the waste of +blood, of means, and of time, from the tracks of his +Seward-Scott-Blair administration; but stern historical justice shall +not, and cannot, do it.</p> + +<p>Whatever be the high <i>military and scientific prowess</i> shown by the +first West Point graduates and scholars, all this in no way +compensates for the <i>summum</i> of perverted notions which are reared +there, and for the mock, sham, and clownish aristocracy <span class="pagenum"><a id="page299" name="page299"></a>(p. 299)</span> by +which a high-toned West Pointer is easily recognized. Of course many +and many are the exceptions; many West Point pupils are animated by +the noblest and purest American spirit; but the genuine West Point +spirit consists in sneering and looking down with contempt at the +mother and nurse; that is, at the purely republican, purely democratic +political institutions, at the broad political and intellectual +freedom to which those clown-aristocrats owe their rearing, their +little bit of information, and those shoulder-stripes by which they +are so mightily inflated.</p> + +<p>What silly talk, to compare the St. Domingo insurrection with the +eventual results of emancipation in the South! In St. Domingo the +slaves were obliged to tear their liberty from the slaveholding +planter, and from a government siding with the oppressor. Here the +lawful government gives liberty to a peaceful laborer, and the planter +is an outlawed traitor. But the genuine pro-slavery democrat is +stupidly obtuse.</p> + +<p><i>Oct. 18.</i>—A few days ago the President wrote a letter to McClellan, +with ability and lucidity, exposing to view the military urgency of a +movement on the enemy with an army of one hundred and forty thousand +men, as has now McClellan at Harper's Ferry. But the letter ends by +saying that all that it contains is <i>not</i> to be considered by +McNapoleon as being an order. Of course Mac obeys—the last injunction +of the letter. Mr. Lincoln wishes not to hurt the great Napoleon's +feelings; <span class="pagenum"><a id="page300" name="page300"></a>(p. 300)</span> as for hurting the country, the people, the cause, +this is of—no consequence! Ah! to witness all this is to be chained, +and to die of thirst within the reach of the purest water.</p> + +<p>Reverend Dr. Unitarian Sensation's broad church, admirer of the +Southern gentleman, and a Jeremy Diddler.</p> + +<p><i>Oct. 18.</i>—The elections in several of the States evidence the deep +imprint upon the country of Lincoln-Seward disorganizing, because from +the first day vacillating, undecided, both-ways policy. The elections +reverberate the moral, the political, and the belligerent condition in +which the country is dragged and thrown by those two <i>master spirits</i>. +No decided principle inspires them and their administration, and no +principle leads and has a decided majority in the elections; neither +the democrats nor the republicans prevail; neither freedom nor +submission is the watchword; and finally, neither the North nor the +South is decidedly the master on the fields of battle. All is +confusion!</p> + +<p>Scarcely one genuine republican was, or is, in the cabinet; the +republican party is completely on the wane—and perhaps beyond +redemption; all this is a logical result, and was easily to be +foreseen by any body,—only not by the wiseacres of the party, not by +the republican papers in New York, as the Times, the Tribune, and the +Evening Post, only not by the Sumners, Doolittles, and many of the +like leaders, all of whom, when, about a year ago, warned against such +a cataclysm, self-confidently smiled; but who <span class="pagenum"><a id="page301" name="page301"></a>(p. 301)</span> soon will cry +more bitter tears than did the daughters of Judah over the ruins of +Jerusalem.</p> + +<p>And now likewise the phrase in McClellan's order No. 163, about "the +remedy at the polls," the disclosures made by Colonel Key, receive +their fullest, but ominous and cursed, signification; and now the +blind can see that it is policy, and not altogether incapacity, in +McClellan to have made a war to preserve slavery and the rebels. And +thus McClellan outwitted Mr. Lincoln.</p> + +<p>In general, human nature is passionately attracted, nay, is subdued, +by energy, above all by civic intrepidity. It would have been so easy +for Mr. Lincoln to carry the masses, and to avoid those disasters at +the polls! But stubbornness is not energy.</p> + +<p>From a very reliable source I learn that a few days after the battle +of Antietam, General McClellan, or at least General or Colonel Marcy, +of McClellan's staff, insinuated to the President that General +McClellan would wish to be relieved from the command of the army, and +be assigned to quiet duties in Washington—very likely to supersede +Halleck. And the President seized not by the hairs the occasion to get +rid of the nation's nightmare, together with the pets of the commander +of the army of the Potomac. McClellan acted honestly in making the +above insinuation; he is now, in part at least, irresponsible for any +future disaster and blood.</p> + +<p><i>Oct. 20.</i>—I have strong indications that European powers, as England +and France, are very sanguine to mediate, but would do it only if, and +when, <i>asked</i> by <span class="pagenum"><a id="page302" name="page302"></a>(p. 302)</span> our government. Those two governments, or +some other half-friendly, may, semi-officially, insinuate to Mr. +Seward to make such a demand. A few months ago, already Mr. Dayton +wrote from Paris something about such a step. Mr. Seward is desperate, +downcast, and may believe he can serve his country by committing the +cabinet to some such combination. I must warn Stanton and others.</p> + +<p>In the Express and in the World the New York Herald found its masters +in ignominy.</p> + +<p>More or less mean, contemptible ambition among the helmsmen, but +patriotism, patriotic ambition are below zero—here in Washington. For +the sake and honor of human nature, I pray to destiny Stanton may not +fail, and still count among the Wadsworths, the Wades, and the like +pure patriots.</p> + +<p>The democratic elections and majorities united to Mr. Seward may +enforce a compromise, and God knows if Mr. Lincoln will oppose it to +the last. Then the only seeming salvation of the north will be the +indomitable decision of the rebels not to accept any terms except a +full recognition.</p> + +<p><i>Oct. 22.</i>—The incapacity of the military wiseacres borders on +idiotism, if not on something worse. To do nothing McClellan absorbs +every man, and keeps one hundred and forty thousand men on the +Maryland side of the Potomac. Sigel has only a small command of twelve +thousand men, in a position where, with one quarter of what is useless +under McClellan, with his skill, his activity, and the <i>truly</i> +patriotic devotion of his troops, of his officers, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page303" name="page303"></a>(p. 303)</span> and of +the commanders under him, Sigel would force the rebels to retreat from +Winchester, and otherwise damage them far more than <i>will</i> or can do +such McClellans, Hallecks, and all this c——e.</p> + +<p>One of the greatest misfortunes for the American people is to have +considered as statesmen the rhetors, the petty politicians, and the +speech-makers. Now, those rhetors, petty politicians, and +speech-makers are at the helm, are in the Senate, and—ruin the +country.</p> + +<p>The optimists and the subservients still console themselves and +confuse the people by asserting that Mr. Lincoln will yet <i>come out</i> +as a man and a statesman. Previous to such a happy change the +country's honor and the country's political and material vitality will +<i>run out</i>.</p> + +<p>More than a year ago Mr. Seward said to the Prince Salm and to me, +that this war ought to be fought out by foreigners; that the Americans +fought the revolutionary war, but now they are devoted to peaceful +pursuits; and that it is the duty of Europeans to save this refuge +from the thraldoms in the old world.</p> + +<p>Now, I see that Mr. Seward was right, although in a sense different +from that in which he uttered the above sentence.</p> + +<p>The Irish excepted, all the other foreign-born Americans, but +preëminently the Germans, are more in communion with the lofty, pure, +and humane element in the thus called American principle, are +therefore more in communion with the creed of the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page304" name="page304"></a>(p. 304)</span> immense +majority of Americans, than are they, the present dabblers in +politics, the would-be leaders, (civil and military,) the would-be +statesmen, all of whom are eaten up by the admixture into what is +vital and perennial in the signification of America, of all that in +itself is local, muddy, petty, accidental, and transient.</p> + +<p><i>Oct. 23.</i>—The recent publication of General Scott's letter, and of a +writing to President Buchanan, confirms my opinion that "the highest +military authority in the land" faltered after March 4, 1861, and +inaugurated that defensive warfare wherein we <i>stick</i> on the Potomac +until this day.</p> + +<p>Pseudo-liberal right-honorable Gladstone asserts that Jeff. Davis "has +made the South a nation;" then Abraham Lincoln, with W. H. Seward and +G. B. McClellan, have destroyed a noble and generous nation.</p> + +<p>England may now recognize the South, France may join in it, but other +great European powers, as Russia, Spain, Prussia, Austria, will not +follow in such a wake. The recognition will not materially improve the +condition of the rebels, nor raise the blockade. But as soon as +recognized, Jeff. D. may ask for a mediation, which the people—if not +Mr. Seward—will spurn. An armed mediation remains to be applied, +wherein, likewise, the other European powers will not concur. An armed +mediation between the two principles will be the <i>summum</i> of infamy to +which English aristocracy and English mercantilism can degrade itself; +if Louis Napoleon <span class="pagenum"><a id="page305" name="page305"></a>(p. 305)</span> joins therein, then his crown is not worth +two years lease, provided the Orleans have ——</p> + +<p>If we should succumb under the united efforts of imbecility, of +pro-slavery treason, of Anglo-Franco-European and of American perjury, +then</p> + +<p class="quote"> + Ultima cœlestis terram Astrća reliquit.</p> + +<p><i>Oct. 25.</i>—Only two or three days ago, in a conversation with a +diplomat, Mr. Seward asserted that both the extreme parties will be +mastered—that is, the secessionists and the abolitionists. So Mr. +Seward confesses the <i>credo</i> and the gospel of the New York Herald, +the World, the Journal of Commerce, the National Intelligencer, and +other similar organs of secession.</p> + +<p>Notwithstanding the numerous complications naturally generated by the +vicinity of Cuba to Secessia, the Spanish government, Count Serrano, +the captain-general of Cuba, and Tassara, the Spanish minister here, +all have maintained the most loyal relations towards the Federal +government. It were to be very much regretted if a drunkard or a +brute, as in the affair of the Montgomery, should disturb such +relations.</p> + +<p><i>Oct. 26.</i>—McClellan-Blair-Seward tactics are crowned with splendid +success. By his <i>simplicity</i> Mr. Lincoln aided therein as much as he +could. The bad season is in; any successful campaign impossible. The +rebels will be safe, and Gladstone justified.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page306" name="page306"></a>(p. 306)</span> It is so difficult to find out the truth concerning Fremont's +campaign against Jackson, that some generalship may, after all, be +credited to him. At any rate Fremont is a better general than +McClellan and the pets in command under him, and Fremont is with his +heart and soul in the cause, of which the McClellanites cannot be +accused, all of them, their fetish included, having no heart and no +soul.</p> + +<p>Old Europe, and, above all, official Europe, and even the Gladstones, +must be vindicated. Official Europe generally appreciates nations by +their leaders. Europe demands from such leaders actions and proofs of +statesmanship, of high capacity, if not of heroism. The attempt to +astonish Europe by speeches, by oratory, and, still worse, by +second-rate legal arguments, by what is called papers here, and in +Europe diplomatic circulars and despatches, is the same as the attempt +to eclipse bright sunlight with a burning candle. But our orators, +and, above all, Mr. Seward, flooded the European and the English +statesmen with their, at the best, indifferent productions. Official +Europe was favored with a shower of three various editions of <i>papers +relating to foreign relations</i> in 1862, issued by the <i>State +Department</i>, together with the Sanfords, the Weeds, the Hugheses, <i>et +hoc genus omne</i>. Undoubtedly, the traitor Mason shows in England more +of fire than does the cold, stiff, prickly, and dignified son and +grandson of Presidents; and then the average of our press! O, Jemima!</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page307" name="page307"></a>(p. 307)</span> In his circular, September 22, to our agents in Europe, Mr. +Seward belies not himself. The emancipation is rather coldly +announced, and it is visible that neither Mr. Seward's heart nor soul +is in it.</p> + +<p>The President has now the most reliable information that when Corinth +was invested by Halleck, the rebel troops were wholly demoralized, and +the enemy was astonished not to be attacked, as very little resistance +would have been made. So much for General Scott's gift in Halleck.</p> + +<p>The almost daily occurrences here long ago would have exasperated the +hot-headed and warm-hearted nations in Europe, and treason would have +become their watchword. O American people! thou art warm-hearted, but +of <i>unparallelled endurance</i>!</p> + +<p>No European nation, not even the Turks, would patiently bear such a +condition of affairs. Every where the sovereign would have been forced +to change, or to modify, the <i>personnel</i> of his ministers and +advisers; and Mr. Lincoln is in the hands of Messrs. Seward and Blair, +both worse even than McClellan, and—cannot shake them off.</p> + +<p>Now, for the first time in my life, I realize why, during the last +stages of the dissolution of the Roman empire, honest men escaped into +monasteries, or why, at certain epochs of the great French revolution, +the best men went to the army.</p> + +<p>Ah! to witness here the meanest egotism, imbecility, and intrigue, +coolly, one by one, destroy the honor and the future of this noble +people. Curse <span class="pagenum"><a id="page308" name="page308"></a>(p. 308)</span> upon my old age! above all, curse upon my +obesity! Curse upon my poverty! What a cesspool! what a mire! Only +legal slaughterers all around! O, could I go to a camp! but, of +course, not to one under McClellan. Sigel's camp. Sigel's men are not +soulless; they fight for an idea, without an eye to the White House.</p> + +<p>The rhetors, the stump-speakers, the politicians, and the intriguers +hold the power, and—humanity and history shudder at the results.</p> + +<p><i>Oct. 29.</i>—McClellan, with his wonted intrepidity and rapidity, +crossed the Potomac from all directions, pushes on Winchester, +and—will find there wherefrom every animal willingly discharges +itself.</p> + +<p>A foreign diplomat, one of the most eminent in the whole <i>corps</i>, said +yesterday, "No living being so ardently prays for rain as does +McClellan; rain will prevent fighting, marching, &c." Such is the +estimation of our hero.</p> + +<p>Fevers decimated many regiments at Harper's Ferry. If McClellan would +have marched only five miles a day, fighting even such battles without +any generalship, as he did at Antietam, the army would be healthier, +and by this time would be in Richmond.</p> + +<p>The decision of the court of inquiry between a patriot and the +incarnation of West Point McClellanism, between Martindale and that +Fitz-John Porter, ought to open the eyes of any one, but—not those of +Mr. Lincoln.</p> + +<p>Only two days ago Mr. Lincoln declared, that the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page309" name="page309"></a>(p. 309)</span> reason why +McClellan and his pets are not removed is, not any confidence in +McClellan's capacity, but to preserve the political balance between +the republican and the democratic parties.</p> + +<p>If there exist such spiritual creations as providence, genii, or +angels watching over the destinies of nations, then, at the sight of +Lincoln-Seward-Blair doings, providence, angels, genii avert their +faces in despair.</p> + +<p><i>Oct. 30.</i>—New regiments coming in. It cuts into the deepest of the +heart to see such noble and devoted fellows going to be again wantonly +slaughtered by the combined military and civic inefficiency of +McClellan-Lincoln-Seward, and, above all, by their utter +heartlessness.</p> + +<p>When the rebels invaded Maryland, the <i>fighting</i> generals, as +Heintzelman, advised to mass the troops between the rebels and the +Potomac, cut them from their bases and communications, push them +towards the North without a possibility of escape, instead of throwing +them back on the Potomac. Harper's Ferry would have been saved. Every +progress made by the rebels in a Northern direction would have assured +their ruin; soon their ammunition would have been exhausted, and +surrender was inevitable. But this bold plan of a <i>fighting</i> general +could not be comprehended by pets and pretorians. Since, daily and +daily occasions occur to destroy the rebels; but that is not the game. +Instead of cutting the rebels from Gordonsville and Richmond, which +could have been <span class="pagenum"><a id="page310" name="page310"></a>(p. 310)</span> done any time during the last five weeks if +Heintzelman and Sigel were not so thoroughly weakened by an ignorant, +or worse, distribution of troops, McClellan with all his might pushes +the rebels back to Richmond, back on their bases and their resources. +O, poor country!</p> + +<p>Even I feel humiliated to continually ascertain, by various direct and +indirect sources from Europe, in what little estimation—if not +worse—is held our administration by the principal statesmen and +governments of the old world.</p> + + + + + +<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page311" name="page311"></a>(p. 311)</span> NOVEMBER, 1862.</h3> + +<p class="resume">Empty rhetoric — The future dark and terrible — Wadsworth + defeated — The official bunglers blast every thing they + touch — Great and holy day! McClellan gone overboard! — The + planters — Burnside — McClellan nominated for President — Awful + events approaching — Dictatorship dawns on the horizon — The + catastrophe.</p> + + +<p>O God, O God! to witness how, by the hands of +Lincoln-Seward-McClellan, this noblest human structure is +crumbled—and, perhaps, soon</p> + +<p class="quote">Pulvere vix tactć poterunt monstrare ruinć.</p> + +<p>May God preserve this people—those noble patriots, of which +Wadsworth, Wade, Potter of Wisconsin, Stanton, Governor Andrew, and +many others are the types, when the country will be ruined and rended +by the firm, Lincoln-Seward-McClellan, to realize the pang,—</p> + +<p class="quote"> + Nessun maggior' dolor' che ricordarsi dell tempo felice<br> + Nella miseria.</p> + +<p>O, I know what it is!</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward's letter, October 28, to Messrs. Connover and Palmer, is a +display of that empty rhetoric whose dust he is wont to throw into the +eyes of the good-natured masses. His plea for united action—of course +with him—is the most bitter irony on himself. Mr. Seward's policy and +action <span class="pagenum"><a id="page312" name="page312"></a>(p. 312)</span> are at the helm, and he piloted "our noble ship of +state" on worse breakers than those "of eighteen months ago."</p> + +<p>Mr. Seward's letter is dumb on the object of the Cooper meeting. Of +course, Mr. Seward would rather swallow a viper than applaud the +abolition of slavery.</p> + +<p><i>Nov. 5.</i>—Lincoln-Seward politically slaughtered the republican +party, and with it the country's honor. The future looks dark and +terrible. I shudder. Dishonor on all sides. Lincoln will not +understand to use the lease of power left to him—or to fall as a man. +But to be candid, most of the thus called leaders prepared this +defeat, and most of them at the last moment may lack decision and +dignity. How repeatedly I warned the Sumners, Wilsons, and other +wiseacres, that such will be the end, that the people at large will +become exasperated by Lincoln's administration!</p> + +<p>The issue brought before the people was all but dignified. It would +have been better to make a straightforward issue against the +incapacity and the democratic ill-will of McClellan, than to dodge the +question, and force honest and noble men to speak against their +convictions. The issue, as made, was concocted by journalists, by +politicians; but not by statesmen, not by genuine great leaders.</p> + +<p>Seward triumphs. His insincerity preëminently contributed to defeat +Wadsworth. Mephisto-like, he rejoices in thus having humbled the pure +and radical patriots.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page313" name="page313"></a>(p. 313)</span> At any rate, I shall try to expose Seward. <i>Arrive que +pourra.</i> But for him the sacred cause would have been victorious, and +now—horror! horror!</p> + +<p>The pro-Romanist clergy is more furiously and savagely pro-slavery +than are the Rhetts, the Yanceys, in the South; the poor +Africo-Americans are, if not the truest Christians in this country, at +any rate their Christianity is sublime when compared with the +pro-Romanism.</p> + +<p>O, for civic intrepidity, or all is lost! High-minded, intrepid, +self-forgetful civism and abnegation alone can avert the catastrophe. +Such is the mass of the people—but its leaders!</p> + +<p><i>Nov. 8.</i>—Hooker has the military instinct in him which lights the +fire, and the inspiration of the god of battles; as Halleck has +nothing of the one and of the other, and as Mr. Lincoln is—Mr. +Lincoln, so Hooker is not to be put in command of the army. Lincoln +and Halleck will find out their man. <i>Similis simili gaudet</i>, or, +<i>przywitala sie dupa z wiechciem</i>.</p> + +<p><i>Nov. 9.</i>—The official bunglers have blasted every thing they +touched: the people's virgin enthusiasm and unparalleled devotion; +they have endangered the country's safety. It is to hope for a miracle +to expect any thing for the better at the hands of the bunglers. Will +the shallow rhetors, will the would-be leaders in the Congress, be as +subservient to the bunglers as they have been up to this hour?</p> + +<p><i>Nov. 9.</i>—Great and holy day! McClellan gone overboard! Better late +than never. But this belated act of justice to the country cannot +atone for <span class="pagenum"><a id="page314" name="page314"></a>(p. 314)</span> all the deadly disasters, will not remove the +fearful responsibility from Lincoln-Seward-Blair, for having so long +sustained this horrible vampire. Now is Seward's turn to jump.</p> + +<p>It must be acknowledged, in justice to the average of the better class +of planters, that the superficial, sociable intercourse with them is +more easy, and what is commonly considered more European, than is +similar intercourse with any corresponding class in the North. Therein +consists the whole attraction exercised by the Southerners on +Europeans visiting America—the diplomats included. I, for one, am +always uneasy, anxious, as if touching hot iron, when in intercourse +here with men with whom I am very intimate, (on the outside,) and who +now are in power. I never felt so out of the track when—once—in +intercourse with sovereigns, and with eminent men in Europe.</p> + +<p><i>Nov. 11.</i>—General Burnside succeeds to McClellan—gives a military +ovation to his predecessor. In his order of the day, Burnside pays +homage to McClellan, and thus implicitly condemns the government. +Burnside permits McClellan to issue such a parting word as must shake +the army and the country.</p> + +<p><i>Nov. 12.</i>—The democrats nominate McClellan for the next presidency. +Thus Mr. Lincoln's helplessness, Seward's hatred of the republican +creed, the treason, the imbecility, the intrigues of various others, +the lack of civic energy in the New York republican press and in the +republican politicians, except <span class="pagenum"><a id="page315" name="page315"></a>(p. 315)</span> some repeatedly mentioned in +this Diary,—all this combined has built up a pedestal for such a +McClellan!</p> + +<p>Strange and awful events may occur even before the end of Mr. +Lincoln's administration. The democratic leaders are perverse, +unprincipled, reckless, daring beyond conception; success is their +creed, and no conscience, no honor restrain them; and in the +management of the public opinion and of their party the democrats have +evidenced a skill far above that of the republican leaders; further, +the democrats evoke the vilest, the most brutish passions dormant in +the masses; the democrats are supported by all that is brutal, savage, +ignorant, and sordid; and, to crown and strengthen all, the democrats, +united to Romanist priesthood, rule over the Irishry.</p> + +<p>And thus the relentless hatred with which the democrats persecute any +elevated, noble, humane aspiration; the helplessness, the incapacity +of the official and unofficial leaders of the republican party: both +these agencies combined may deal such a blow to the pure and humane +republican creed that it may not recover therefrom during the next +twenty-five years.</p> + +<p>To sum up,—</p> + +<p><i>Dictatorship with McClellan</i> seems to dawn upon the horizon; the +smallest disaster—Burnside, ah!—will precipitate the catastrophe. I +pray to God (and for the first time) that I may be mistaken.</p> + +<p class="p4"><a id="footnote1" name="footnote1"></a> +<b>Footnote 1:</b> That such would have been the presumed fate of Ney at the +hands of Napoleon, I was afterwards assured by the old Duke of +Bassano, and by the Duchess Abrantes.<a href="#footnotetag1"><span class="small">[Back to Main Text]</span></a></p> + +<p><a id="footnote2" name="footnote2"></a> +<b>Footnote 2:</b> Foremost among them was the editor of the New York Times, +publishing a long article wherein he proved that he had been admitted +to General Scott's table, and that the General unfolded to him, the +editor, the great anaconda strategy. Exactly the thing to be admired +and gulped by a man of such <i>variegated</i> information as that +individual.</p> + +<p>That little villianish "article" had a second object: it was to filch +subscribers from the Tribune, which broke down, not over +courageously.<a href="#footnotetag2"><span class="small">[Back to Main Text]</span></a></p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" noshade> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DIARY FROM MARCH 4, 1861, TO NOVEMBER 12, 1862***</p> +<p>******* This file should be named 28926-h.txt or 28926-h.zip *******</p> +<p>This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:<br> +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/8/9/2/28926">http://www.gutenberg.org/2/8/9/2/28926</a></p> +<p>Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed.</p> + +<p>Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Diary from March 4, 1861, to November 12, 1862 + + +Author: Adam Gurowski + + + +Release Date: May 22, 2009 [eBook #28926] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DIARY FROM MARCH 4, 1861, TO +NOVEMBER 12, 1862*** + + +E-text prepared by David Edwards, Christine P. Travers, and the Project +Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from +digital material generously made available by Internet Archive +(http://www.archive.org) + + + +Note: Images of the original pages are available through + Internet Archive. See + http://www.archive.org/details/diarycivilwar01gurouoft + + +Transcriber's note: + + Obvious printer's errors have been corrected. Hyphenation and + accentuation have been standardised. All other inconsistencies + are as in the original. The author's spelling has been retained. + + + + + +DIARY, FROM MARCH 4, 1861, TO NOVEMBER 12, 1862. + +by + +ADAM GUROWSKI. + + + + + + + +Boston: +Lee and Shepard, +Successors to Phillips, Sampson & Co. +1862. + +Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1862, by +Lee and Shepard, +In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of +Massachusetts. + + + + +Dedicated + +TO + +THE WIDOWED WIVES, THE BEREAVED MOTHERS, SISTERS, + +SWEETHEARTS, AND ORPHANS + +IN + +THE LOYAL STATES. + + + + +_On doit a son pays sa fortune, sa vie, mais avant tout la Verite._ + + +In this Diary I recorded what I heard and saw myself, and what I heard +from others, on whose veracity I can implicitly rely. + +I recorded impressions as immediately as I felt them. A life almost +wholly spent in the tempests and among the breakers of our times has +taught me that the first impressions are the purest and the best. + +If they ever peruse these pages, my friends and acquaintances will +find therein what, during these horrible national trials, was a +subject of our confidential conversations and discussions, what in +letters and by mouth was a subject of repeated forebodings and +warnings. Perhaps these pages may in some way explain a phenomenon +almost unexampled in history,--that twenty millions of people, brave, +highly intelligent, and mastering all the wealth of modern +civilization, were, if not virtually overpowered, at least so long +kept at bay by about five millions of rebels. + + GUROWSKI. + +WASHINGTON, NOVEMBER, 1862. + + + + +CONTENTS. + + + MARCH, 1861. 13 + +Inauguration day -- The message -- Scott watching at the door of the +Union -- The Cabinet born -- The Seward and Chase struggle -- The New +York radicals triumph -- The treason spreads -- The Cabinet pays old +party debts -- The diplomats confounded -- Poor Senators! -- Sumner is +like a hare tracked by hounds -- Chase in favor of recognizing the +revolted States -- Blunted axes -- Blair demands action, brave fellow! +-- The slave-drivers -- The month of March closes -- No foresight! no +foresight! + + + APRIL, 1861. 22 + +Seward parleying with the rebel commissioners -- Corcoran's dinner -- +The crime in full blast! -- 75,000 men called for -- Massachusetts +takes the lead -- Baltimore -- Defence of Washington -- Blockade +discussed -- France our friend, not England -- Warning to the +President -- Virginia secedes -- Lincoln warned again -- Seward says +it will all blow over in sixty to ninety days -- Charles F. Adams -- +The administration undecided; the people alone inspired -- Slavery +must perish! -- The Fabian policy -- The Blairs -- Strange conduct of +Scott -- Lord Lyons -- Secret agent to Canada. + + + MAY, 1861. 37 + +The administration tossed by expedients -- Seward to Dayton -- +Spread-eagleism -- One phasis of the American Union finished -- The +fuss about Russell -- Pressure on the administration increases -- +Seward, Wickoff, and the Herald -- Lord Lyons menaced with passports +-- The splendid Northern army -- The administration not up to the +occasion -- The new men -- Andrew, Wadsworth, Boutwell, Noyes, Wade, +Trumbull, Walcott, King, Chandler, Wilson -- Lyon jumps over formulas +-- Governor Banks needed -- Butler takes Baltimore with two regiments +-- News from England -- The "belligerent" question -- Butler and Scott +-- Seward and the diplomats -- "What a Merlin!" -- "France not bigger +than New York!" -- Virginia invaded -- Murder of Ellsworth -- Harpies +at the White House. + + + JUNE, 1861. 50 + +Butler emancipates slaves -- The army not organized -- Promenades -- +The blockade -- Louis Napoleon -- Scott all in all -- Strategy! -- Gun +contracts -- The diplomats -- Masked batteries -- Seward writes for +"bunkum" -- Big Bethel -- The Dayton letter -- Instructions to Mr. +Adams. + + + JULY, 1861. 60 + +The Evening Post -- The message -- The administration caught napping +-- McDowell -- Congress slowly feels its way -- Seward's great +facility of labor -- Not a Know-Nothing -- Prophesies a speedy end -- +Carried away by his imagination -- Says "secession is over" -- Hopeful +views -- Politeness of the State department -- Scott carries on the +campaign from his sleeping room -- Bull Run -- Rout -- Panic -- +"Malediction! Malediction!" -- Not a manly word in Congress! -- Abuse +of the soldiers -- McClellan sent for -- Young-blood -- Gen. Wadsworth +-- Poor McDowell! -- Scott responsible -- Plan of reorganization -- +Let McClellan beware of routine. + + + AUGUST, 1861. 78 + +The truth about Bull Run -- The press staggers -- The Blairs alone +firm -- Scott's military character -- Seward -- Mr. Lincoln reads the +Herald -- The ubiquitous lobbyist -- Intervention -- Congress adjourns +-- The administration waits for something to turn up -- Wade -- Lyon +is killed -- Russell and his shadow -- The Yankees take the loan -- +Bravo, Yankees! -- McClellan works hard -- Prince Napoleon -- Manassas +fortifications a humbug -- Mr. Seward improves -- Old Whigism -- +McClellan's powers enlarged -- Jeff. Davis makes history -- Fremont +emancipates in Missouri -- The Cabinet. + + + SEPTEMBER, 1861. 92 + +What will McClellan do? -- Fremont disavowed -- The Blairs not in +fault -- Fremont ignorant and a bungler -- Conspiracy to destroy him +-- Seward rather on his side -- McClellan's staff -- A Marcy will not +do! -- McClellan publishes a slave-catching order -- The people move +onward -- Mr. Seward again -- West Point -- The Washington defences -- +What a Russian officer thought of them -- Oh, for battles! -- Fremont +wishes to attack Memphis; a bold move! -- Seward's influence over +Lincoln -- The people for Fremont -- Col. Romanoff's opinion of the +generals -- McClellan refuses to move -- Manoeuvrings -- The people +uneasy -- The staff -- The Orleans -- Brave boys! -- The Potomac +closed -- Oh, poor nation! -- Mexico -- McClellan and Scott. + + + OCTOBER, 1861. 104 + +Experiments on the people's life-blood -- McClellan's uniform -- The +army fit to move -- The rebels treat us like children -- We lose time +-- Everything is defensive -- The starvation theory -- The anaconda -- +First interview with McClellan -- Impressions of him -- His distrust +of the volunteers -- Not a Napoleon nor a Garibaldi -- Mason and +Slidell -- Seward admonishes Adams -- Fremont goes overboard -- The +pro-slavery party triumph -- The collateral missions to Europe -- +Peace impossible -- Every Southern gentleman is a pirate -- When will +we deal blows? -- Inertia! inertia! + + + NOVEMBER, 1861. 115 + +Ball's Bluff -- Whitewashing -- "Victoria! Old Scott gone overboard!" +-- His fatal influence -- His conceit -- Cameron -- Intervention -- +More reviews -- Weed, Everett, Hughes -- Gov. Andrew -- Boutwell -- +Mason and Slidell caught -- Lincoln frightened by the South Carolina +success -- Waits unnoticed in McClellan's library -- Gen. Thomas -- +Traitors and pedants -- The Virginia campaign -- West Point -- +McClellan's speciality -- When will they begin to see through him? + + + DECEMBER, 1861. 129 + +The message -- Emancipation -- State papers published -- Curtis Noyes +-- Greeley not fit for Senator -- Generalship all on the rebel side -- +The South and the North -- The sensationists -- The new idol will cost +the people their life-blood! -- The Blairs -- Poor Lincoln! -- The +Trent affair -- Scott home again -- The war investigation committee -- +Mr. Mercier. + + + JANUARY, 1862. 137 + +The year 1861 ends badly -- European defenders of slavery -- Secession +lies -- Jeremy Diddlers -- Sensation-seekers -- Despotic tendencies -- +Atomistic Torquemadas -- Congress chained by formulas -- Burnside's +expedition a sign of life -- Will this McClellan ever advance? -- Mr. +Adams unhorsed -- He packs his trunks -- Bad blankets -- Austria, +Prussia, and Russia -- The West Point nursery -- McClellan a greater +mistake than Scott -- Tracks to the White House -- European stories +about Mr. Lincoln -- The English ignorami -- The slaveholder a +scarcely varnished savage -- Jeff. Davis -- "Beauregard frightens us +-- McClellan rocks his baby" -- Fancy army equipment -- McClellan and +his chief of staff sick in bed -- "No satirist could invent such +things" -- Stanton in the Cabinet -- "This Stanton is the people" -- +Fremont -- Weed -- The English will not be humbugged -- Dayton in a +fret -- Beaufort -- The investigating committee condemn McClellan -- +Lincoln in the clutches of Seward and Blair -- Banks begs for guns and +cavalry in vain -- The people will awake! -- The question of race -- +Agassiz. + + + FEBRUARY, 1862. 151 + +Drifting -- The English blue book -- Lord John could not act +differently -- Palmerston the great European fuss-maker -- Mr. +Seward's "two pickled rods" for England -- Lord Lyons -- His pathway +strewn with broken glass -- Gen. Stone arrested -- Sumner's +resolutions infuse a new spirit in the Constitution -- Mr. Seward +beyond salvation -- He works to save slavery -- Weed has ruined him -- +The New York press -- "Poor Tribune" -- The Evening Post -- The Blairs +-- Illusions dispelled -- "All quiet on the Potomac" -- The London +papers -- Quill-heroes can be bought for a dinner -- French opinion -- +Superhuman efforts to save slavery -- It is doomed! -- "All you +worshippers of darkness cannot save it!" -- The Hutchinsons -- +Corporal Adams -- Victories in the West -- Stanton the man! -- +Strategy (hear!) + + + MARCH, 1862. 165 + +The Africo-Americans -- Fremont -- The Orleans -- Confiscation -- +American nepotism -- The Merrimac -- Wooden guns -- Oh shame! -- Gen. +Wadsworth -- The rats have the best of Stanton -- McClellan goes to +Fortress Monroe -- Utter imbecility -- The embarkation -- McClellan a +turtle -- He will stick in the marshes -- Louis Napoleon behaves nobly +-- So does Mr. Mercier -- Queen Victoria for freedom -- The great +strategian -- Senator Sumner and the French minister -- Archbishop +Hughes -- His diplomatic activity not worth the postage on his +correspondence -- Alberoni-Seward -- Love's labor lost. + + + APRIL, 1862. 180 + +Immense power of the President -- Mr. Seward's Egeria -- Programme of +peace -- The belligerent question -- Roebucks and Gregories scums -- +Running the blockade -- Weed and Seward take clouds for camels -- +Uncle Sam's pockets -- Manhood, not money, the sinews of war -- +Colonization schemes -- Senator Doolittle -- Coal mine speculation -- +Washington too near the seat of war -- Blair demands the return of a +fugitive slave woman -- Slavery is Mr. Lincoln's "_mammy_" -- He will +not destroy her -- Victories in the West -- The brave navy -- +McClellan subsides in mud before Yorktown -- Telegraphs for more men +-- God will be tired out! -- Great strength of the people -- +Emancipation in the District -- Wade's speech -- He is a monolith -- +Chase and Seward -- N. Y. Times -- The Rothschilds -- Army movements +and plans. + + + MAY, 1862. 198 + +Capture of New Orleans -- The second siege of Troy -- Mr. Seward +lights his lantern to search for the Union-saving party -- +Subserviency to power -- Vitality of the people -- Yorktown evacuated +-- Battle of Williamsburg -- Great bayonet charge! -- Heintzelman and +Hooker -- McClellan telegraphs that the enemy outnumber him -- The +terrible enemy evacuate Williamsburg -- The track of truth begins to +be lost -- Oh Napoleon! -- Oh spirit of Berthier! -- Dayton not in +favor -- Events are too rapid for Lincoln -- His integrity -- Too +tender of men's feelings -- Halleck -- Ten thousand men disabled by +disease -- The Bishop of Orleans -- The rebels retreat without the +knowledge of McNapoleon -- Hunter's proclamation -- Too noble for Mr. +Lincoln -- McClellan again subsides in mud -- Jackson defeats Banks, +who makes a masterly retreat -- Bravo, Banks! -- The aulic council +frightened -- Gov. Andrew's letter -- Sigel -- English opinion -- Mr. +Mill -- Young Europa -- Young Germany -- Corinth evacuated -- Oh, +generalship! -- McDowell grimly persecuted by bad luck. + + + JUNE, 1862. 218 + +Diplomatic circulars seasoned by stories -- Battle before Richmond -- +Casey's division disgraced -- McClellan afterwards confesses he was +misinformed -- Fair Oaks -- "Nobody is hurt, only the bleeding people" +-- Fremont disobeys orders -- N. Y. Times, World, and Herald, +opinion-poisoning sheets -- Napoleon never visible before nine o'clock +in the morning -- Hooker and the other fighters soldered to the mud -- +Senator Sumner shows the practical side of his intellect -- "Slavery a +big job!" -- McClellan sends for mortars -- Defenders of slavery in +Congress worse than the rebels -- Wooden guns and cotton sentries at +Corinth -- The navy is glorious -- Brave old Gideon Welles! -- July +4th to be celebrated in Richmond! -- Colonization again -- Justice to +France -- New regiments -- The people sublime! -- Congress -- Lincoln +visits Scott -- McDowell -- Pope -- Disloyalty in the departments. + + + JULY, 1862. 233 + +Intervention -- The cursed fields of the Chickahominy -- Titanic +fightings, but no generalship -- McClellan the first to reach James +river -- The Orleans leave -- July 4th, the gloomiest since the birth +of the republic -- Not reinforcements, but brains, wanted; and brains +not transferable! -- The people run to the rescue -- Rebel tactics -- +Lincoln does not sacrifice Stanton -- McClellan not the greatest +culprit -- Stanton a true statesman -- The President goes to James +river -- The Union as it was, a throttling nightmare! -- A man needed! +-- Confiscation bill signed -- Congress adjourned -- Mr. Dicey -- +Halleck, the American Carnot -- Lincoln tries to neutralize the +confiscation bill -- Guerillas spread like locusts. + + + AUGUST, 1862. 245 + +Emancipation -- The President's hand falls back -- Weed sent for -- +Gen. Wadsworth -- The new levies -- The Africo-Americans not called +for -- Let every Northern man be shot rather! -- End of the Peninsula +campaign -- Fifty or sixty thousand dead -- Who is responsible? -- The +army saved -- Lincoln and McClellan -- The President and the +Africo-Americans -- An Eden in Chiriqui -- Greeley -- The old lion +begins to awake -- Mr. Lincoln tells stories -- The rebels take the +offensive -- European opinion -- McClellan's army landed -- Roebuck -- +Halleck -- Butler's mistakes -- Hunter recalled -- Terrible fighting +at Manassas -- Pope cuts his way through -- Reinforcements slow +incoming -- McClellan reduced in command. + + + SEPTEMBER, 1862. 258 + +_Consummatum est!_ -- Will the outraged people avenge itself? -- +McClellan satisfies the President -- After a year! -- The truth will +be throttled -- Public opinion in Europe begins to abandon us -- The +country marching to its tomb -- Hooker, Kearney, Heintzelman, Sigel, +brave and true men -- Supremacy of mind over matter -- Stanton the +last Roman -- Inauguration of the pretorian regime -- Pope accuses +three generals -- Investigation prevented by McClellan -- McDowell +sacrificed -- The country inundated with lies -- The demoralized army +declares for McClellan -- The pretorians will soon finish with liberty +-- Wilkes sent to the West Indian waters -- Russia -- Mediation -- +Invasion of Maryland -- Strange story about Stanton -- Richmond never +invested -- McClellan in search of the enemy -- Thirty miles in six +days -- The telegrams -- Wadsworth -- Capitulation of Harper's Ferry +-- Five days' fighting -- Brave Hooker wounded -- No results -- No +reports from McClellan -- Tactics of the Maryland campaign -- Nobody +hurt in the staff -- Charmed lives -- Wadsworth, Judge Conway, Wade, +Boutwell, Andrew -- This most intelligent people become the +laughing-stock of the world! -- The proclamation of emancipation -- +Seward to the Paisley Association -- Future complications -- If Hooker +had not been wounded! -- The military situation -- Sigel persecuted by +West Point -- Three cheers for the carriage and six! -- How the great +captain was to catch the rebel army -- Interview with the Chicago +deputation -- Winter quarters -- The conspiracy against Sigel -- +Numbers of the rebel army -- Letters of marque. + + + OCTOBER, 1862. 288 + +Costly infatuation -- The do-nothing strategy -- Cavalry on lame +horses -- Bayonet charges -- Antietam -- Effect of the Proclamation -- +Disasters in the West -- The Abolitionists not originally hostile to +McClellan -- Helplessness in the War Department -- Devotedness of the +people -- McClellan and the proclamation -- Wilkes -- Colonel Key -- +Routine engineers -- Rebel raid into Pennsylvania -- Stanton's +sincerity -- Oh, unfighting strategians -- The administration a +success -- _De gustibus_ -- Stuart's raid -- West Point -- St. Domingo +-- The President's letter to McClellan -- Broad church -- The +elections -- The Republican party gone -- The remedy at the polls -- +McClellan wants to be relieved -- Mediation -- Compromise -- The +rhetors -- The optimists -- The foreigners -- Scott and Buchanan -- +Gladstone -- Foreign opinion and action -- Both the extremes to be put +down -- Spain -- Fremont's campaign against Jackson -- Seward's +circular -- General Scott's gift -- "Oh, could I go to a camp!" -- +McClellan crosses the Potomac -- Prays for rain -- Fevers decimate the +regiments -- Martindale and Fitz John Porter -- The political balance +to be preserved -- New regiments -- O poor country! + + + NOVEMBER, 1862. 311 + +Empty rhetoric -- The future dark and terrible -- Wadsworth defeated +-- The official bunglers blast everything they touch -- Great and holy +day! McClellan gone overboard! -- The planters -- Burnside -- +McClellan nominated for President -- Awful events approaching -- +Dictatorship dawns on the horizon -- The catastrophe. + + + + +DIARY. + + + + +MARCH, 1861. + + Inauguration day -- The message -- Scott watching at the door of + the Union -- The Cabinet born -- The Seward and Chase struggle -- + The New York radicals triumph -- The treason spreads -- The + Cabinet pays old party debts -- The diplomats confounded -- Poor + Senators! -- Sumner is like a hare tracked by hounds -- Chase in + favor of recognizing the revolted States -- Blunted axes -- Blair + demands action, brave fellow! -- The slave-drivers -- The month + of March closes -- No foresight! no foresight! + + +For the first time in my life I assisted at the simplest and grandest +spectacle--the inauguration of a President. Lincoln's message good, +according to circumstances, but not conclusive; it is not positive; it +discusses questions, but avoids to assert. May his mind not be +altogether of the same kind. Events will want and demand more +positiveness and action than the message contains assertions. The +immense majority around me seems to be satisfied. Well, well; I wait, +and prefer to judge and to admire when actions will speak. + +I am sure that a great drama will be played, equal to any one known in +history, and that the insurrection of the slave-drivers will not end +in smoke. So I now decide to keep a diary in my own way. I scarcely +know any of those men who are considered as leaders; the more +interesting to observe them, to analyze their mettle, their actions. +This insurrection may turn very complicated; if so, it must generate +more than one revolutionary manifestation. What will be its +march--what stages? Curious; perhaps it may turn out more interesting +than anything since that great renovation of humanity by the great +French Revolution. + +The old, brave warrior, Scott, watched at the door of the Union; his +shadow made the infamous rats tremble and crawl off, and so Scott +transmitted to Lincoln what was and could be saved during the +treachery of Buchanan. + +By the most propitious accident, I assisted at the throes among which +Mr. Lincoln's Cabinet was born. They were very painful, but of the +highest interest for me, and I suppose for others. I participated some +little therein. + +A pledge bound Mr. Lincoln to make Mr. Seward his Secretary of State. +The radical and the puritanic elements in the Republican party were +terribly scared. His speeches, or rather demeanor and repeated +utterances since the opening of the Congress, his influence on Mr. +Adams, who, under Seward's inspiration, made his speech _de lana +caprina_, and voted for compromises and concessions,--all this spread +and fortified the general and firm belief that Mr. Seward was ready to +give up many from among the cardinal articles of the Republican creed +of which he was one of the most ardent apostles. They, the +Republicans, speak of him in a way to remind me of the dictum, "_omnia +serviliter pro dominatione_," as they accuse him now of subserviency +to the slave power. The radical and puritan Republicans likewise dread +him on account of his close intimacy with a Thurlow Weed, a Matteson, +and with similar not over-cautious--as they call them--lobbyists. + +Some days previous to the inauguration, Mr. Seward brought Mr. Lincoln +on the Senate floor, of course on the Republican side; but soon Mr. +Seward was busily running among Democrats, begging them to be +introduced to Lincoln. It was a saddening, humiliating, and revolting +sight for the galleries, where I was. Criminal as is Mason, for a +minute I got reconciled to him for the scowl of horror and contempt +with which he shook his head at Seward. The whole humiliating +proceeding foreshadowed the future policy. Only two or three +Democratic Senators were moved by Seward's humble entreaties. The +criminal Mason has shown true manhood. + +The first attempt of sincere Republicans was to persuade Lincoln to +break his connection with Seward. This failed. To neutralize what was +considered quickly to become a baneful influence in Mr. Lincoln's +councils, the Republicans united on Gov. Chase. This Seward opposed +with all his might. Mr. Lincoln wavered, hesitated, and was bending +rather towards Mr. Seward. The struggle was terrific, lasted several +days, when Chase was finally and triumphantly forced into the +Cabinet. It was necessary not to leave him there alone against Seward, +and perhaps Bates, the old cunning Whig. Again terrible opposition by +Seward, but it was overcome by the radicals in the House, in the +Senate, and outside of Congress by such men as Curtis, Noyes, J. S. +Wadsworth, Opdyke, Barney, &c., &c., and Blair was brought in. Cameron +was variously opposed, but wished to be in by Seward; Welles was from +the start considered sound and safe in every respect; Smith was +considered a Seward man. + +From what I witnessed of Cabinet-making in Europe, above all in France +under Louis Philippe, I do not forebode anything good in the coming-on +shocks and eruptions, and I am sure these must come. This Cabinet as +it stands is not a fusion of various shadowings of a party, but it is +a violent mixing or putting together of inimical and repulsive forces, +which, if they do not devour, at the best will neutralize each other. + +Senator Wilson answered Douglass in the Senate, that "when the +Republican party took the power, treason was in the army, in the navy, +in the administration," etc. Dreadful, but true assertion. It is to be +seen how the administration will act to counteract this ramified +treason. + +What a run, a race for offices. This spectacle likewise new to me. + +The Cabinet Ministers, or, as they call them here, the Secretaries, have +old party debts to pay, old sores to avenge or to heal, and all this by +distributing offices, or by what they call it here--patronage. Through +patronage and offices everybody is to serve his friends and his party, +and to secure his political position. Some of the party leaders seem to +me similar to children enjoying a long-expected and ardently wished-for +toy. Some of the leaders are as generals who abandon the troops in a +campaign, and take to travel in foreign parts. Most of them act as if +they were sure that the battle is over. It begins only, but nobody, or +at least very few of the interested, seem to admit that the country is +on fire, that a terrible struggle begins. (Wrote in this sense an +article for the National Intelligencer; insertion refused.) They, the +leaders, look to create engines for their own political security, but no +one seems to look over Mason and Dixon's line to the terrible and with +lightning-like velocity spreading fire of hellish treason. + +The diplomats utterly upset, confused, and do not know what god to +worship. All their associations were with Southerners, now traitors. +In Southern talk, or in that of treacherous Northern Democrats, the +diplomats learned what they know about this country. Not one of them +is familiar, is acquainted with the genuine people of the North; with +its true, noble, grand, and pure character. It is for them a terra +incognita, as is the moon. The little they know of the North is the +few money or cotton bags of New York, Boston, Philadelphia,--these +would-be betters, these dinner-givers, and whist-players. The +diplomats consider Seward as the essence of Northern feeling. + +How little the thus-called statesmen know Europe. Sumner, Seward, etc. +already have under consideration if Europe will recognize the secesh. +Europe recognizes _faits accomplis_, and a great deal of blood will +run before secesh becomes _un fait accompli_. These Sewards, Sumners, +etc. pay too much attention to the silly talk of the European +diplomats in Washington; and by doing this these would-be statesmen +prove how ignorant they are of history in general, and specially +ignorant of the policy of European cabinets. Before a struggle decides +a question a recognition is bosh, and I laugh at it. + +The race, the race increases with a fearful rapidity. No flood does it +so quick. Poor Senators! Some of them must spend nights and days to +decide on whom to bestow this or that office. Secretaries or Ministers +wrangle, _fight_ (that is the word used), as if life and death +depended upon it. + +Poor (Carlylian-meaning) good-natured Senator Sumner, in his earnest, +honest wish to be just and of service to everybody, looks as a hare +tracked by hounds; so are at him office-seekers from the whole +country. This hunting degrades the hounds, and enervates the patrons. + +I am told that the President is wholly absorbed in adjusting, +harmonizing the amount of various salaries bestowed on various States +through its office-holders and office-seekers. + +It were better if the President would devote his time to calculate +the forces and resources needed to quench the fire. Over in Montgomery +the slave-drivers proceed with the terrible, unrelenting, fearless +earnestness of the most unflinching criminals. + +After all, these crowds of office-hunters are far from representing +the best element of the genuine, laborious, intelligent people,--of +its true healthy stamina. This is consoling for me, who know the +American people in the background of office-hunters. + +Of course an alleviating circumstance is, that the method, the system, +the routine, oblige, nay force, everybody to ask, to hunt. As in the +Scriptures, "Ask, and you will get; or knock, and it will be opened." +Of course, many worthy, honorable, deserving men, who would be +ornaments to the office, must run the gauntlet together with the +hounds. + +It is reported, and I am sure of the truth of the report, that +Governor Chase is for recognizing, or giving up the revolted Cotton +States, so as to save by it the Border States, and eventually to fight +for their remaining in the Union. What logic! If the treasonable +revolt is conceded to the Cotton States, on what ground can it be +denied to the thus called Border States? I am sorry that Chase has +such notions. + +It is positively asserted by those who ought to know, that Seward, +having secured to himself the Secretaryship of State, offered to the +Southern leaders in Congress compromise and concessions, to assure, by +such step, his confirmation by the Democratic vote. The chiefs +refused the bargain, distrusting him. All this was going on for weeks, +nay months, previous to the inauguration, so it is asserted. But +Seward might have been anxious to preserve the Union at any price. His +enemies assert that if Seward's plan had succeeded, virtually the +Democrats would have had the power. Thus the meaning of Lincoln's +election would have been destroyed, and Buchanan's administration +would have been continued in its most dirty features, the name only +being changed. + +Old Scott seems to be worried out by his laurels; he swallows incense, +and I do not see that anything whatever is done to meet the military +emergency. I see the cloud. + +Were it true that Seward and Scott go hand in hand, and that both, and +even Chase, are blunted axes! + +I hear that Mr. Blair is the only one who swears, demands, asks for +action, for getting at them without losing time. Brave fellow! I am +glad to have at Willard's many times piloted deputations to the doors +of Lincoln on behalf of Blair's admission into the Cabinet. I do not +know him, but will try to become nearer acquainted. + +But for the New York radical Republicans, already named, neither Chase +nor Blair would have entered the Cabinet. But for them Seward would +have had it totally his own way. Members of Congress acted less than +did the New Yorkers. + +The South, or the rebels, slave-drivers, slave-breeders, constitute +the most corrosive social decompositions and impurities; what the +human race throughout countless ages successively toiled to purify +itself from and throw off. Europe continually makes terrible and +painful efforts, which at times are marked by bloody destruction. This +I asserted in my various writings. This social, putrefied evil, and +the accumulated matter in the South, pestilentially and in various +ways influenced the North, poisoning its normal healthy condition. +This abscess, undermining the national life, has burst now. Somebody, +something must die, but this apparent death will generate a fresh and +better life. + +The month of March closes, but the administration seems to enjoy the +most beatific security. I do not see one single sign of +foresight,--this cardinal criterion of statesmanship. Chase measures +the empty abyss of the treasury. Senator Wilson spoke of treason +everywhere, but the administration seems not to go to work and to +reconstruct, to fill up what treason has disorganized and emptied. +Nothing about reorganizing the army, the navy, refitting the arsenals. +No foresight, no foresight! either statesmanlike or administrative. +Curious to see these men at work. The whole efforts visible to me and +to others, and the only signs given by the administration in concert, +are the paltry preparations to send provisions to Fort Sumpter. What +is the matter? what are they about? + + + + +APRIL, 1861. + + Seward parleying with the rebel commissioners -- Corcoran's + dinner -- The crime in full blast! -- 75,000 men called for -- + Massachusetts takes the lead -- Baltimore -- Defence of + Washington -- Blockade discussed -- France our friend, not + England -- Warning to the President -- Virginia secedes -- + Lincoln warned again -- Seward says it will all blow over in + sixty to ninety days -- Charles F. Adams -- The administration + undecided; the people alone inspired -- Slavery must perish! -- + The Fabian policy -- The Blairs -- Strange conduct of Scott -- + Lord Lyons -- Secret agent to Canada. + + +Commissioners from the rebels; Seward parleying with them through some +Judge Campbell. Curious way of treating and dealing with rebellion, +with rebels and traitors; why not arrest them? + +Corcoran, a rich partisan of secession, invited to a dinner the rebel +commissioners and the foreign diplomats. If such a thing were done +anywhere else, such a pimp would be arrested. The serious diplomats, +Lord Lyons, Mercier, and Stoeckl refused the invitation; some smaller +accepted, at least so I hear. + +The infamous traitors fire on the Union flag. They treat the garrison +of Sumpter as enemies on sufferance, and here their commissioners go +about free, and glory in treason. What is this administration about? +Have they no blood; are they fishes? + +The crime in full blast; _consummatum est._ Sumpter bombarded; +Virginia, under the nose of the administration, secedes, and the +leaders did not see or foresee anything: flirted with Virginia. + +Now, they, the leaders or the administration, are terribly startled; +so is the brave noble North; the people are taken unawares; but no +wonder; the people saw the Cabinet, the President, and the military in +complacent security. These watchmen did nothing to give an early sign +of alarm, so the people, confiding in them, went about its daily +occupation. But it will rise as one man and in terrible wrath. _Vous +le verrez mess. les Diplomates._ + +The President calls on the country for 75,000 men; telegram has +spoken, and they rise, they arm, they come. I am not deceived in my +faith in the North; the excitement, the wrath, is terrible. Party +lines burn, dissolved by the excitement. Now the people is in fusion +as bronze; if Lincoln and the leaders have mettle in themselves, then +they can cast such arms, moral, material, and legislative, as will +destroy at once this rebellion. But will they have the energy? They do +not look like Demiourgi. + +Massachusetts takes the lead; always so, this first people in the +world; first for peace by its civilization and intellectual +development, and first to run to the rescue. + +The most infamous treachery and murder, by Baltimoreans, of the +Massachusetts men. Will the cowardly murderers be exemplarily +punished? + +The President, under the advice of Scott, seems to take coolly the +treasonable murders of Baltimore; instead of action, again parleying +with these Baltimorean traitors. The rumor says that Seward is for +leniency, and goes hand in hand with Scott. Now, if they will handle +such murderers in silk gloves as they do, the fire must spread. + +The secessionists in Washington--and they are a legion, of all hues +and positions--are defiant, arrogant, sure that Washington will be +taken. One risks to be murdered here. + +I entered the thus called Cassius Clay Company, organized for the +defence of Washington until troops came. For several days patrolled, +drilled, and lay several nights on the hard floor. Had compensation, +that the drill often reproduced that of Falstaff's heroes. But my +campaigners would have fought well in case of emergency. Most of them +office-seekers. When the alarm was over, the company dissolved, but +each got a kind of certificate beautifully written and signed by +Lincoln and Cameron. I refused to take such a certificate, we having +had no occasion to fight. + +The President issued a proclamation for the blockade of the Southern +revolted ports. Do they not know better? + +How can the Minister of Foreign Affairs advise the President to resort +to such a measure? Is the Minister of Foreign Affairs so willing to +call in foreign nations by this blockade, thus transforming a purely +domestic and municipal question into an international, public one? + +The President is to quench the rebellion, a domestic fire, and to do +it he takes a weapon, an engine the most difficult to handle, and in +using of which he depends on foreign nations. Do they not know better +here in the ministry and in the councils? Russia dealt differently +with the revolted Circassians and with England in the so celebrated +case of the Vixen. + +The administration ought to know its rights of sovereignty and to +close the ports of entry. Then no chance would be left to England to +meddle. + +Yesterday N---- dined with Lord Lyons, and during the dinner an +anonymous note announced to the Lord that the proclamation of the +blockade is to be issued on to-morrow. N----, who has a romantic turn, +or rather who seeks for _midi a 14-3/4 heures_, speculated what lady +would have thus violated a _secret d'Etat_. + +I rather think it comes from the Ministry, or, as they call it here, +from the Department. About two years ago, when the Central Americans +were so teased and maltreated by the filibusters and Democratic +administration, a Minister of one of these Central American States +told me in New York that in a Chief of the Departments, or something +the like, the Central Americans have a valuable friend, who, every +time that trouble is brewing against them in the Department, gives +them a secret and anonymous notice of it. This friend may have +transferred his kindness to England. + +How will foreign nations behave? I wish I may be misguided by my +political anglophobia, but England, envious, rapacious, and the +Palmerstons and others, filled with hatred towards the genuine +democracy and the American people, will play some bad tricks. They +will seize the occasion to avenge many humiliations. Charles Sumner, +Howe, and a great many others, rely on England,--on her anti-slavery +feeling. I do not. I know English policy. We shall see. + +France, Frenchmen, and Louis Napoleon are by far more reliable. The +principles and the interest of France, broadly conceived, make the +existence of a powerful Union a statesmanlike European and world +necessity. The cold, taciturn Louis Napoleon is full of broad and +clear conceptions. I am for relying, almost explicitly, on France and +on him. + +The administration calls in all the men-of-war scattered in all +waters. As the commercial interests of the Union will remain +unprotected, the administration ought to put them under the protection +of France. It is often done so between friendly powers. Louis Napoleon +could not refuse; and accepting, would become pledged to our side. + +Germany, great and small, governments and people, will be for the +Union. Germans are honest; they love the Union, hate slavery, and +understand, to be sure, the question. Russia, safe, very safe, few +blackguards excepted; so Italy. Spain may play double. I do not expect +that the Spaniards, goaded to the quick by the former fillibustering +administrations, will have judgment enough to find out that the +Republicans have been and will be anti-fillibusters, and do not crave +Cuba. + +Wrote a respectful warning to the President concerning the unavoidable +results of his proclamation in regard to the blockade; explained to +him that this, his international demonstration, will, and forcibly +must evoke a counter proclamation from foreign powers in the interest +of their own respective subjects and of their commercial relations. +Warned, foretelling that the foreign powers will recognize the rebels +as belligerents, he, the President, having done it already in some +way, thus applying an international mode of coercion. Warned, that the +condition of belligerents, once recognized, the rebel piratical crafts +will be recognized as privateers by foreign powers, and as such will +be admitted to all ports under the secesh flag, which will thus enjoy +a partial recognition. + +Foreign powers may grumble, or oppose the closing of the ports of +entry as a domestic, administrative decision, because they may not +wish to commit themselves to submit to a paper blockade. But if the +President will declare that he will enforce the closing of the ports +with the whole navy, so as to strictly guard and close the maritime +league, then the foreign powers will see that the administration does +not intend to humbug them, but that he, the President, will only +preserve intact the fullest exercise of sovereignty, and, as said the +Roman legist, he, the President, "_nil sibi postulat quod non aliis +tribuit_." And so he, the President, will only execute the laws of +his country, and not any arbitrary measure, to say with the Roman +Emperor, "_Leges etiam in ipsa arma imperium habere volumus._" Warned +the President that in all matters relating to this country Louis +Napoleon has abandoned the initiative to England; and to throw a small +wedge in this alliance, I finally respectfully suggested to the +President what is said above about putting the American interests in +the Mediterranean under the protection of Louis Napoleon. + +Few days thereafter learned that Mr. Seward does not believe that +France will follow England. Before long Seward will find it out. + +All the coquetting with Virginia, all the presumed influence of +General Scott, ended in Virginia's secession, and in the seizure of +Norfolk. + +Has ever any administration, cabinet, ministry--call it what name you +will--given positive, indubitable signs of want and absence of +foresight, as did ours in these Virginia, Norfolk, and Harper's Ferry +affairs? Not this or that minister or secretary, but all of them ought +to go to the constitutional guillotine. Blindness--no mere +short-sightedness--permeates the whole administration, Blair excepted. +And Scott, the politico-military adviser of the President! What is the +matter with Scott, or were the halo and incense surrounding him based +on bosh? Will it be one more illusion to be dispelled? + +The administration understood not how to save or defend Norfolk, nor +how to destroy it. No name to be found for such concrete incapacity. +The rebels are masters, taking our leaders by the nose. Norfolk gives +to them thousands of guns, &c., and nobody cries for shame. They ought +to go in sackcloth, those narrow-sighted, blind rulers. How will the +people stand this masterly administrative demonstration? In England +the people and the Parliament would impeach the whole Cabinet. + +Charles Sumner told me that the President and his Minister of Foreign +Affairs are to propose to the foreign powers the accession of the +Union to the celebrated convention of Paris of 1856. All three +considered it a master stroke of policy. They will not catch a fly by +it. + +Again wrote respectfully to Mr. Lincoln, warning him against a too +hasty accession to the Paris convention. Based my warning,-- + +1st. Not to give up the great principles contained in Marcy's +amendment. + +2d. Not to believe or suppose for a minute that the accession to the +Paris convention at this time can act in a retroactive sense; +explained that it will not and cannot prevent the rebel pirates from +being recognized by foreign powers as legal privateers, or being +treated as such. + +3d. For all these reasons the Union will not win anything by such a +step, but it will give up principles and chain its own hands in case +of any war with England. Supplicated the President not to risk a step +which logically must turn wrong. + +Baltimore still unpunished, and the President parleying with various +deputations, all this under the guidance of Scott. I begin to be +confused; cannot find out what is the character of Lincoln, and above +all of Scott. + +Governors from whole or half-rebel States refuse the President's call +for troops. The original call of 75,000, too small in itself, will be +reduced by that refusal. Why does not the administration call for more +on the North, and on the free States? In the temper of this noble +people it will be as easy to have 250,000 as 75,000, and then rush on +them; submerge Virginia, North Carolina, etc.; it can be now so easily +done. The Virginians are neither armed nor organized. Courage and +youth seemingly would do good in the councils. + +The free States undoubtedly will vindicate self-government. Whatever +may be said by foreign and domestic croakers, I do not doubt it for a +single minute. The free people will show to the world that the +apparently loose governmental ribbons are the strongest when everybody +carries them in him, and holds them. The people will show that the +intellectual magnetism of convictions permeating the million is by far +stronger than the commonly called governmental action from above, and +it is at the same time elastic and expansive, even if the official +leaders may turn out to be altogether mediocrities. The self-governing +free North will show more vitality and activity than any among the +governed European countries would be able to show in similar +emergencies. This is my creed, and I have faith in the people. + +The infamous slavers of the South would even be honored if named +Barbary States of North America. + +Before the inauguration, Seward was telling the diplomats that no +disruption will take place; now he tells them that it will blow over +in from sixty to ninety days. Does Seward believe it? Or does his +imagination or his patriotism carry him away or astray? Or, perhaps, +he prefers not to look the danger in the face, and tries to avert the +bitter cup. At any rate, he is incomprehensible, and the more so when +seen at a distance. + +Something, nay, even considerable efforts ought to be made to +enlighten the public opinion in Europe, as on the outside, +insurrections, nationalities, etc., are favored in Europe. How far the +diplomats sent by the administration are prepared for this task? + +Adams has shown in the last Congress his scholarly, classical +narrow-mindedness. Sanford cannot favorably impress anybody in Europe, +neither in cabinets, nor in saloons, nor the public at large. He looks +and acts as a _commis voyageur_, will be considered as such at first +sight by everybody, and his features and manners may not impress +others as being distinguished and high-toned. + +Every historical, that is, human event, has its moral and material +character and sides. To ignore, and still worse to blot out, to reject +the moral incentives and the moral verdict, is a crime to the public +at large, is a crime towards human reason. + +Such action blunts sound feelings and comprehension, increases the +arrogance of the evil-doers. The moral criterion is absolute and +unconditional, and ought as such unconditionally to be applied to the +events here. Things and actions must be called by their true names. +What is true, noble, pure, and lofty, is on the side of the North, and +permeates the unnamed millions of the free people; it ought to be +separated from what is sham, egotism, lie or assumption. Truth must be +told, never mind the outcry. History has not to produce pieces for the +stage, or to amuse a tea-party. + +Regiments pour in; the Massachusetts men, of course, leading the van, +as in the times of the tea-party. My admiration for the Yankees is +justified on every step, as is my scorn, my contempt, etc., etc., of +the Southern _chivalrous_ slaver. + +Wrote to Charles Sumner expressing my wonder at the undecided conduct +of the administration; at its want of foresight; its eternal parleying +with Baltimoreans, Virginians, Missourians, etc., and no step to tread +down the head of the young snake. No one among them seems to have the +seer's eye. The people alone, who arm, who pour in every day and in +large numbers, who transform Washington into a camp, and who crave for +fighting,--the people alone have the prophetic inspiration, and are +the genuine statesmen for the emergency. + +How will the Congress act? The Congress will come here emerging from +the innermost of the popular volcano; but the Congress will be +manacled by formulas; it will move not in the spirit of the +Constitution, but in the dry constitutionalism, and the Congress will +move with difficulty. Still I have faith, although the Congress never +will seize upon parliamentary omnipotence. Up to to-day, the +administration, instead of boldly crushing, or, at least, attempting +to do it; instead of striking at the traitors, the administration is +continually on the lookout where the blows come from, scarcely having +courage to ward them off. The deputations pouring from the North urge +prompt, decided, crushing action. This thunder-voice of the twenty +millions of freemen ought to nerve this senile administration. The +Southern leaders do not lose one minute's time; they spread the fire, +arm, and attack with all the fury of traitors and criminals. + +The Northern merchants roar for the offensive; the administration is +undecided. + +Some individuals, politicians, already speak out that the slaveocratic +privileges are only to be curtailed, and slavery preserved as a +domestic institution. Not a bit of it. The current and the development +of events will run over the heads of the pusillanimous and +contemptible conservatives. Slavery must perish, even if the whole +North, Lincoln and Seward at its head, should attempt to save it. + +Already they speak of the great results of Fabian policy; Seward, I am +told, prides in it. Do those Fabiuses know what they talk about? +Fabius's tactics--not policy--had in view not to expose young, +disheartened levies against Hannibal's unconquered veterans, but +further to give time to Rome to restore her exhausted means, to +recover political influences with other Italian independent +communities, to re-conclude broken alliances with the cities, etc. But +is this the condition of the Union? Your Fabian policy will cost +lives, time, and money; the people feels it, and roars for action. +Events are great, the people is great, but the official leaders may +turn out inadequate to both. + +What a magnificent chance--scarcely equal in history--to become a +great historical personality, to tower over future generations. But I +do not see any one pointing out the way. Better so; the principle of +self-government as the self-acting, self-preserving force will be +asserted by the total eclipse of great or even eminent men. + +The administration, under the influence of drill men, tries to form +twenty regiments of regulars, and calls for 45,000 three years' +volunteers. What a curious appreciation of necessity and of numbers +must prevail in the brains of the administration. Twenty regiments of +regulars will be a drop in water; will not help anything, but will be +sufficient to poison the public spirit. Citizens and people, but not +regulars, not hirelings, are to fight the battle of principle. +Regulars and their spirit, with few exceptions, is worse here than +were the Yanitschars. + +When the principle will be saved and victorious, it will be by the +devotion, the spontaneity of the people, and not by Lincoln, Scott, +Seward, or any of the like. It is said that Seward rules both Lincoln +and Scott. The people, the masses, do not doubt their ability to +crush by one blow the traitors, but the administration does. + +What I hear concerning the Blairs confirms my high opinion of both. +Blair alone in the Cabinet represents the spirit of the people. + +Something seems not right with Scott. Is he too old, or too much of a +Virginian, or a hero on a small scale? + +If, as they say, the President is guided by Scott's advice, such +advice, to judge from facts, is not politic, not heroic, not thorough, +not comprehensive, and not at all military, that is, not broad and +deep, in the military sense. It will be a pity to be disappointed in +this national idol. + +Scott is against entering Virginia, against taking Baltimore, against +punishing traitors. Strange, strange! + +Diplomats altogether out of their senses; they are bewildered by the +uprising, by the unanimity, by the warlike, earnest, unflinching +attitude of the masses of the freemen, of my dear Yankees. The diplomats +have lost the compass. They, duty bound, were diplomatically obsequious +to the power held so long by the pro-slavery party. They got accustomed +to the arrogant assumption and impertinence of the slavers, and, +forgetting their European origin, the diplomats tacitly--but for their +common sense and honor I hope reluctantly--admitted the assumptions of +the Southern banditti to be in America the nearest assimilation to the +chivalry and nobility of old Europe. Without taking the cudgel in +defence of European nobility, chivalry, and aristocracy, it is +sacrilegious to compare those infamous slavers with the old or even with +the modern European higher classes. In the midst of this slave-driving, +slave-worshipping, and slave-breeding society of Washington, the +diplomats swallowed, gulped all the Southern lies about the +Constitution, state-rights, the necessity of slavery, and other like +infamies. The question is, how far the diplomats in their respective +official reports transferred these pro-slavery common-places to their +governments. But, after all, the governments of Europe will not be +thoroughly influenced by the chat of their diplomats. + +Among all diplomats the English (Lord Lyons) is the most sphinx; he is +taciturn, reserved, listens more than he speaks; the others are more +communicative. + +What an idea have those Americans of sending a secret agent to Canada, +and what for? England will find it out, and must be offended. I would +not have committed such an absurdity, even in my palmy days, when I +conspired with Louis Napoleon, sat in the councils with Godefroi +Cavaignac, or wrote instructions for Mazzini, then only a beginner +with his _Giovina Italia_, and his miscarried Romarino attempt in +Savoy. + +Of what earthly use can be such _politique provocatrice_ towards +England? Or is it only to give some money to a hungry, noisy, and not +over-principled office-seeker? + + + + +MAY, 1861. + + The administration tossed by expedients -- Seward to Dayton -- + Spread-eagleism -- One phasis of the American Union finished -- + The fuss about Russell -- Pressure on the administration + increases -- Seward, Wickoff, and the Herald -- Lord Lyons + menaced with passports -- The splendid Northern army -- The + administration not up to the occasion -- The new men -- Andrew, + Wadsworth, Boutwell, Noyes, Wade, Trumbull, Walcott, King, + Chandler, Wilson -- Lyon jumps over formulas -- Governor Banks + needed -- Butler takes Baltimore with two regiments -- News from + England -- The "belligerent" question -- Butler and Scott -- + Seward and the diplomats -- "What a Merlin!" -- "France not + bigger than New York!" -- Virginia invaded -- Murder of Ellsworth + -- Harpies at the White House. + + +Rumors that the President, the administration, or whoever has it in +his hands, is to take the offensive, make a demonstration on Virginia +and on Baltimore. But these ups and downs, these vacillations, are +daily occurrences, and nothing points to a firm purpose, to a decided +policy, or any policy whatever of the administration. + +A great principle and a great cause cannot be served and cannot be +saved by half measures, and still less by tricks and by paltry +expedients. But the administration is tossed by expedients. Nothing is +hitherto done, and this denotes a want of any firm decision. + +Mr. Seward's letter to Dayton, a first manifesto to foreign nations, +and the first document of the new Minister of Foreign Affairs. It is +bold, high-toned, and American, but it has dark shadows; shows an +inexperienced hand in diplomacy and in dealing with events. The +passages about the frequent changes in Europe are unnecessary, and +unprovoked by anything whatever. It is especially offensive to France, +to the French people, and to Louis Napoleon. It is bosh, but in Europe +they will consider it as _une politique provocatrice_. + +For the present complications, diplomatic relations ought to be +conducted with firmness, with dignity, but not with an arrogant, +offensive assumption, not in the spirit of spread-eagleism; no brass, +but reason and decision. + +Americans will find out how absolute are the laws of history, as stern +and as positive as all the other laws of nature. To me it is clear +that one phasis of American political growth, development, &c., is +gone, is finished. It is the phasis of the Union as created by the +Constitution. This war--war it will be, and a terrible one, +notwithstanding all the prophecies of Mr. Seward to the contrary--this +war will generate new social and constitutional necessities and new +formulas. New conceptions and new passions will spring up; in one +word, it will bring forth new social, physical, and moral creations: +so we are in the period of gestation. + +Democracy, the true, the noble, that which constitutes the +signification of America in the progress of our race--democracy will +not be destroyed. All the inveterate enemies here and in Europe, all +who already joyously sing the funeral songs of democracy, all of them +will become disgraced. Democracy will emerge more pure, more powerful, +more rational; destroyed will be the most infamous oligarchy ever +known in history; oligarchy issued neither from the sword, nor the +gown, nor the shop, but wombed, generated, cemented, and sustained by +traffic in man. + +The famous Russell, of the London Times, is what I always thought him +to be--a graphic, imaginative writer, with power of description of all +he sees, but not the slightest insight in events, in men, in +institutions. Russell is not able to find out the epidermis under a +shirt. And they make so much fuss about him; Seward brings him to the +first cabinet dinner given by the President; Mrs. Lincoln sends him +bouquets; and this man, Russell, will heap blunders upon blunders. + +The pressure on the administration for decided, energetic action +increases from all sides. Seldom, anywhere, an administration receives +so many moral kicks as does this one; but it seems to stand them with +serenity. Oh, for a clear, firm, well-defined purpose! + +The country, the people demands an attack on Virginia, on Richmond, +and Baltimore; the country, better than the military authorities, +understands the political and military necessities; the people has the +consciousness that if fighting is done instantly, it will be done +cheaply and thoroughly by a move of its finger. The administration can +double the number of men under arms, but hesitates. What slow +coaches, and what ignorance of human nature and of human events. The +knowing ones, the wiseacres, will be the ruin of this country. They +poison the sound reason of the people. + +What the d---- is Seward with his politicians' policy? What can +signify his close alliance with such outlaws as Wikoff and the Herald, +and pushing that sheet to abuse England and Lord Lyons? Wikoff is, so +to speak, an inmate of Seward's house and office, and Wikoff declared +publicly that the telegram contained in the Herald, and so violent +against England and Lord Lyons, was written under Seward's dictation. +Wikoff, I am told, showed the MS. corrected in Seward's handwriting. +Lord Lyons is menaced with passports. Is this man mad? Can Seward for +a moment believe that Wikoff knows Europe, or has any influence? He +may know the low resorts there. Can Seward be fool enough to irritate +England, and entangle this country? Even my anglophobia cannot stand +it. Wrote about it warning letters to New York, to Barney, to Opdyke, +to Wadsworth, &c. + +The whole District a great camp; the best population from the North in +rank and file. More intelligence, industry, and all good national and +intellectual qualities represented in those militia and volunteer +regiments, than in any--not only army, but society--in Europe. +Artisans, mechanics of all industries, of trade, merchants, bankers, +lawyers; all pursuits and professions. Glorious, heart-elevating +sight! These regiments want only a small touch of military +organization. + +Weeks run, troops increase, and not the first step made to organize +them into an army, to form brigades, not to say divisions; not yet two +regiments manoeuvring together. What a strange idea the military chief +or chiefs, or department, or somebody, must have of what it is to +organize an army. Not the first letter made. Can it be ignorance of +this elementary knowledge with which is familiar every corporal in +Europe? When will they start, when begin to mould an army? + +The administration was not composed for this emergency, and is not up +to it. The government hesitates, is inexperienced, and will +unavoidably make heaps of mistakes, which may endanger the cause, and +for which, at any rate, the people is terribly to pay. The loss in men +and material will be very considerable before the administration will +get on the right track. It is painful to think, nay, to be sure of it. +Then the European anti-Union politicians and diplomats will credit the +disasters to the inefficiency of self-government. The diplomats, +accustomed to the rapid, energetic action of a supreme or of a +centralized power, laugh at the trepidation of ours. But the fault is +not in the principle of self-government, but in the accident which +brought to the helm such an amount of inexperience. Monarchy with a +feeble head is even in a worse predicament. Louis XV., the Spanish and +Neapolitan Bourbons, Gustavus IV., &c., are thereof the historical +evidences. + +May the shock of events bring out new lights from the people! One day +the administration is to take the initiative, that is, the offensive, +then it recedes from it. No one understands the organization and +handling of such large bodies. They are to make their apprenticeship, +if only it may not to be too dearly paid. But they cannot escape the +action of that so positive law in nature, in history, and, above all, +absolute in war. + +Wrote to Charles Sumner, suggesting that the ice magnates send here +from Boston ice for hospitals. + +The war now waged against the free States is one made by the most +hideous _sauvagerie_ against a most perfectioned and progressive +civilization. History records not a similar event. It is a hideous +phenomenon, disgracing our race, and it is so, look on it from +whatever side you will. + +A new man from the people, like Governor Andrew, of Massachusetts, +acts promptly, decisively; feels and speaks ardently, and not as the +rhetors. Andrew is the incarnation of the Massachusetts, nay, of the +genuine American people. I must become acquainted with Andrew. +Thousands of others like Andrew exist in all the States. Can anybody +be a more noble incarnation of the American people than J. S. +Wadsworth? I become acquainted with numerous men whom I honor as the +true American men. So Boutwell, of Massachusetts, Curtis Noyes, +Senator Wade, Trumbull, Walcott, from Ohio, Senator King, Chandler, +and many, many true patriots. Senator Wilson, my old friend, is up to +the mark; a man of the people, but too mercurial. + +Captain or Major Lyon in St. Louis, the first initiator or revelator +of what is the absolute law of necessity in questions of national +death or life. Lyon jumped over formulas, over routine, over clumsy +discipline and martinetism, and saved St. Louis and Missouri. + +It is positively asserted that General Scott's first impression was to +court-martial Lyon for this breach of discipline, for having acted on +his own patriotic responsibility. + +Can Scott be such a dried-up, narrow-minded disciplinarian, and he the +Egeria of Lincoln! Oh! oh! + +Diplomats tell me that Seward uses the dictatorial I, speaking of the +government. Three cheers for the new Louis XIV.! + +Governor Banks would be excellent for the _Intendant General de +l'Armee_: they call it here _General Quartermaster_. Awful disorder +and slowness prevail in this cardinal branch of the army. Wrote to +Sumner concerning Banks. + +Gen. Butler took Baltimore; did what ought to have been done a long +time ago. Butler did it on his own responsibility, without orders. +Butler acted upon the same principle as Lyon, and, _horrabile dictu_, +astonished, terrified the parleying administration. Scott wishes to +put Butler under arrest; happily Lincoln resisted his boss (so Mr. +Lincoln called Scott before a deputation from Baltimore). Scott, +Patterson, and Mansfield made a beautiful _strategical_ horror! They +began to speak of strategy; plan to approach Baltimore on three +different roads, and with about 35,000 men. Butler did it one morning +with two regiments, and kicked over the senile strategians in council. + +The administration speaks with pride of its forbearing, that is, +parleying, policy. The people, the country, requires action. +_Congressus impar Achilli_: Achilles, the people, and _Congressus_ the +forbearing administration. + +Music, parades, serenades, receptions, &c., &c., only no genuine +military organization. They do it differently on the other side of the +Potomac. There the leaders are in earnest. + +Met Gov. Sprague and asked him when he would have a brigade; his +answer was, soon; but this soon comes very slow. + +News from England. Lord John Russell declared in Parliament that the +Queen, or the English government, will recognize the rebels in the +condition of "belligerents." O England, England! The declaration is +too hasty. Lord John cannot have had news of the proclamation of the +blockade when he made that declaration. The blockade could have served +him as an excuse for the haste. English aristocracy and government +show thus their enmity to the North, and their partiality to slavers. +What will the anglophiles of Boston say to this? + +Neither England or France, or anybody in Europe, recognized the +condition of "belligerents" to Poles, when we fought in Russia in +1831. Were the Magyars recognized as such in 1848-'49? Lord +Palmerston called the German flag hard names in the war with Denmark +for Schleswig-Holstein; and now he bows to the flag of slavers and +pirates. If the English statesmen have not some very particular reason +for this hasty, uncalled-for condescension to the enemies of humanity, +then curse upon the English government. I recollect that European +powers recognized the Greeks "belligerents" (Austria opposed) in their +glorious struggle against the slavers, the Turks. But then this +stretching of positive, international comity,--this stretching was +done in the interest of freedom, of right, and of humanity, against +savages and slaughterers. On the present occasion England did the +reverse. O England, England, thou Judas Iscariot of nations! Seward +said to John Jacob Astor, and to a New York deputation, that this +English declaration concerning "belligerents" is a mere formality, +having no bearing at all. I told the contrary to Astor and to others, +assuring them that Mr. Seward will soon find, to the cost of the +people and to his own, how much complication and trouble this _mere +formality_ will occasion, and occasion it before long. Is Seward so +ignorant of international laws, of general or special history, or was +it only said to throw dust? + +Wrote about the "belligerents" a warning letter to the President. + +Butler, in command of Fortress Monroe, proposes to land in Virginia +and to take Norfolk; Scott, the highest military authority in the +land, opposes. Has Scott used up his energy, his sense, and even his +military judgment in defending Washington before the inauguration? He +is too old; his brains, _cerebellum_, must be dried up. + +Imbecility in a leader is often, nay always, more dangerous than +treason; the people can find out--easily, too--treason, but is +disarmed against imbecility. + +What a thoughtlessness to press on Russia the convention of Paris? +Russia has already a treaty with America, but in case of a war with +England, the Russian ports on the Pacific, and the only one accessible +to Americans, will be closed to them by the convention of Paris. + +The governors of the States of Ohio, Illinois, Pennsylvania assure the +protection of their respective States to the Union men of the Border +States. What a bitter criticism on the slow, forbearing policy of the +administration. Mr. Lincoln seems to be a rather slow intellect, with +slow powers of perception. However, patience; perhaps the shock of +events will arouse and bring in action now latent, but good and +energetic qualities. As it stands now, the administration, being the +focus of activity, is tepid, if not cold and slow; the circumference, +that is, the people, the States, are full of fire and of activity. +This condition is altogether the reverse of the physiological and all +other natural laws, and this may turn out badly, as nature's laws +never can be with impunity reversed or violated. + +The diplomats complain that Seward treats them with a certain +rudeness; that he never gives them time to explain and speak, but +interrupts by saying, "I know it all," etc. If he had knowledge of +things, and of the diplomatic world, he would be aware that the more +firmness he has to use, the more politeness, even fastidiousness, he +is to display. + +Scott does not wish for any bold demonstration, for any offensive +movement. The reason may be, that he is too old, too crippled, to be +able to take the field in person, and too inflated by conceit to give +the glory of the active command to any other man. Wrote to Charles +Sumner in Boston to stir up some inventive Yankee to construct a +wheelbarrow in which Scott could take the field in person. + +In a conversation with Seward, I called his attention to the fact that +the government is surrounded by the finest, most complicated, intense, +and well-spread web of treason that ever was spun; that almost all +that constitutes society and is in a daily, nay hourly, contact with +the various branches of the Executive, all this, with soul, mind, and +heart is devoted to the rebels. I observed to him that _si licet +exemplis in parvo grandibus uti_. Napoleon suffered more from the +bitter hostility of the _faubourg St. Germain_, than from the armies +of the enemy; and here it is still worse, as this hostility runs out +into actual, unrelenting treason. To this Mr. Seward answered with the +utmost serenity, "that before long all this will change; that when he +became governor of New York, a similar hostility prevailed between the +two sections of that State, but soon he pacified everything." What a +Merlin! what a sorcerer! + +Some simple-minded persons from the interior of the State of New York +questioned Mr. Seward, in my presence, about Europe, and "what they +will do there?" To this, with a voice of the Delphic oracle, he +responded, "that after all France is not bigger than the State of New +York." Is it possible to say such trash even as a joke? + +Finally, the hesitations of General Scott are overcome. "Virginia's +sacred soil is invaded;" Potomac crossed; looks like a beginning of +activity; Scott consented to move on Arlington Heights, but during two +or three days opposed the seizure of Alexandria. Is that all that he +knows of that hateful watchword--strategy--nausea repeated by every +ignoramus and imbecile? + +Alexandria being a port of entry, and having a railroad, is more a +strategic point for the invasion of Virginia than are Arlington +Heights. + +The brave Ellsworth murdered in Alexandria, and Scott insisted that +Alexandria be invaded and occupied by night. In all probability, +Ellsworth would not have been murdered if this villanous nest had been +entered by broad daylight. As if the troops were committing a crime, +or a shameful act! O General Scott! but for you Ellsworth would not +have been murdered. + +General McDowell made a plan to seize upon Manassas as the centre of +railroads, the true defence of Washington, and the firm foothold in +Virginia. Nobody, or only few enemies, were in Manassas. McDowell +shows his genuine military insight. Scott, and, as I am told, the +whole senile military council, opposed McDowell's plan as being too +bold. Do these mummies intend to conduct a war without boldness? + +Thick clouds of patriotic, well-intentioned harpies surround all the +issues of the executive doors, windows, crevasses, all of them ready +to turn an honest, or rather dishonest, penny out of the fatherland. +Behind the harpies advance the busy-bodies, the would-be +well-informed, and a promiscuous crowd of well-intentioned +do-nothings. + + + + +JUNE, 1861. + + Butler emancipates slaves -- The army not organized -- Promenades + -- The blockade -- Louis Napoleon -- Scott all in all -- + Strategy! -- Gun contracts -- The diplomats -- Masked batteries + -- Seward writes for "bunkum" -- Big Bethel -- The Dayton letter + -- Instructions to Mr. Adams. + + +The emancipation of slaves is virtually inaugurated. Gen. Butler, once +a hard pro-slavery Democrat, takes the lead. _Tempora mutantur et +nos_, &c. Butler originated the name of _contrabands of war_ for +slaves faithful to the Union, who abandon their rebel masters. A +logical Yankee mind operates as an _accoucheur_ to bring that to +daylight with which the events are pregnant. + +The enemies of self-government at home and abroad are untiring in +vaticinations that a dictatorship now, and after the war a strong +centralized government, will be inaugurated. I do not believe it. +Perhaps the riddle to be solved will be, to make a strong +administration without modifying the principle of self-government. + +The most glorious difference between Americans and Europeans is, that +in cases of national emergencies, every European nation, the Swiss +excepted, is called, stimulated to action, to sacrifices, either by a +chief, or by certain families, or by some high-standing individual, +or by the government; here the people forces upon the administration +more of all kinds of sacrifices than the thus called rulers can grasp, +and the people is in every way ahead of the administration. + +Notwithstanding that a part of the army crossed the Potomac, very +little genuine organization is done. They begin only to organize +brigades, but slowly, very slowly. Gen. Scott unyielding in his +opposition to organizing any artillery, of which the army has very, +very little. This man is incomprehensible. He cannot be a clear-headed +general or organizer, or he cannot be a patriot. + +As for the past, single regiments are parading in honor of the +President, of members of the Cabinet, of married and unmarried +_ladies_, but no military preparatory exercise of men, regiments, or +brigades. It sickens to witness such _incurie_. + +Mr. Seward promenading the President from regiment to regiment, from +camp to camp, or rather showing up the President and himself. Do they +believe they can awake enthusiasm for their persons? The troops could +be better occupied than to serve for the aim of a promenade for these +two distinguished personalities. + +Gen. Scott refuses the formation of volunteer artillery and of new +cavalry regiments, and the active army, more than 20,000 men, has a +very insufficient number of batteries, and between 600 and 800 +cavalry. Lincoln blindly follows his boss. Seward, of course, sustains +Scott, and confuses Lincoln. Lincoln, Scott, Seward and Cameron +oppose offers pouring from the country. To a Mr. M----, from the State +of New York, who demanded permission to form a regiment of cavalry, +Mr. Lincoln angrily answered, that (patriotic) offers give more +"trouble to him and the administration than do the rebels." + +The debates of the English Parliament raise the ire of the people, +nay, exasperate even old fogyish Anglo-manes. + +Persons very familiar with the domestic relations of Gen. Scott assure +me that the vacillations of the old man, and his dread of a serious +warfare, result from the all-powerful influence on him of one of his +daughters, a rabid secessionist. The old man ought to be among relics +in the Patent office, or sent into a nursery. + +The published correspondence between Lord Lyons and Lord Russell +concerning the blockade furnishes curious revelations. + +When the blockade was to be declared, Mr. Seward seems to have been a +thorough novice in the whole matter, and in an official interview with +Lord Lyons, Mr. Seward was assisted by his chief clerk, who was +therefore the quintessence of the wisdom of the foreign affairs, a man +not even mastering the red-tape traditions of the department, without +any genuine instruction, without ideas. For this chief clerk, all that +he knew of a blockade was that it was in use during the Mexican war, +that it almost yearly occurred in South American waters, and every +tyro knows there exists such a thing as a blockade. But that was all +that this chief clerk knew. Lord Lyons asked for some special +precedents or former acts of the American government. The chief, and +his support, the chief clerk, ignored the existence of any. Lord Lyons +went home and sent to the department American precedents and +authorities. No Minister of Foreign Affairs in Europe, together with +his chief clerk, could ever be caught in such a _flagrante delicto_ of +ignorance. This chief clerk made Mr. Seward make _un pas de clerc_, +and this at the start. As Lord Lyons took a great interest in the +solution of the question of blockade, and as the chief clerk was the +_oraculum_ in this question, these combined facts may give some clue +to the anonymous advice sent to Lord Lyons, and mentioned in the month +of April. + +Suggested to Mr. Seward to at once elevate the American question to a +higher region, to represent it to Europe in its true, holy character, +as a question of right, freedom, and humanity. Then it will be +impossible for England to quibble about technicalities of the +international laws; then we can beat England with her own arms and +words, as England in 1824, &c., recognized the Greeks as belligerents, +on the plea of aiding freedom and humanity. The Southern insurrection +is a movement similar to that of the Neapolitan brigands, similar to +what partisans of the Grand Dukes of Tuscany or Modena may attempt, +similar to any--for argument's sake--supposed insurrection of any +Russian bojars against the emancipating Czar. Not in one from among +the above enumerated cases would England concede to the insurgents the +condition of belligerents. If the Deys of Tunis and Tripoli should +attempt to throw off their allegiance to the Sultan on the plea that +the Porte prohibits the slave traffic, would England hurry to +recognize the Deys as belligerents? + +Suggested to Mr. Seward, what two months ago I suggested to the +President, to put the commercial interests in the Mediterranean, for a +time, under the protection of Louis Napoleon. + +I maintain the right of closing the ports, against the partisans of +blockade. _Qui jure suo utitur neminem laedit_, says the Roman +jurisconsult. + +The condition of Lincoln has some similarity with that of Pio IX. in +1847-48. Plenty of good-will, but the eagle is not yet breaking out of +the egg. And as Pio IX. was surrounded by this or that cardinal, so is +Mr. Lincoln by Seward and Scott. + +Perhaps it may turn out that Lincoln is honest, but of not +transcendent powers. The war may last long, and the military spirit +generated by the war may in its turn generate despotic aspirations. +Under Lincoln in the White House, the final victory will be due to the +people alone, and he, Lincoln, will preserve intact the principle +which lifted him to such a height. + +The people is in a state of the healthiest and most generous +fermentation, but it may become soured and musty by the admixture of +Scott-Seward vacillatory powders. + +Scott is all in all--Minister or Secretary of War and +Commander-in-chief. How absurd to unite those functions, as they are +virtually united here, Scott deciding all the various military +questions; he the incarnation of the dusty, obsolete, everywhere +thrown overboard and rotten routine. They ought to have for Secretary +of War, if not a Carnot, at least a man of great energy, honesty, of +strong will, and of a thorough devotion to the cause. Senator Wade +would be suitable for this duty. Cameron is devoted, but I doubt his +other capacities for the emergency, and he has on his shoulders +General Scott as a dead weight. + +Charles Sumner, Mr. Motley, Dr. Howe, and many others, consider it as +a triumph that the English Cabinet asked Mr. Gregory to postpone his +motion for the recognition of the Southern Confederacy. Those +gentlemen here are not deep, and are satisfied with a few small crumbs +thrown them by the English aristocracy. Generally, the thus-called +better Americans eagerly snap at such crumbs. + +It is clear that the English Cabinet wished this postponement for its +own sake. A postponement spares the necessity to Russells, +Palmerstons, Gladstones, and _hoc genus omne_, to show their hands. +Mr. Adams likewise is taken in. + +_Military organization_ and _strategic points_ are the watchwords. +_Strategic points_, strategy, are natural excrescences of brains which +thus shamefully conceive and carry out what the abused people believe +to be _the_ military organization. + +Strategy--strategy repeats now every imbecile, and military fuss +covers its ignorance by that sacramental word. Scott cannot have in +view the destruction of the rebels. Not even the Austrian Aulic +Council imagined a strategy combined and stretching through several +thousands of miles. + +The people's strategy is best: to rush in masses on Richmond; to take +it now, when the enemy is there in comparatively small numbers. +Richmond taken, Norfolk and the lost guns at once will be recovered. +So speaks the people, and they are right; here among the wiseacres not +one understands the superiority of the people over his own little +brains. + +Warned Mr. Seward against making contracts for arms with all kinds of +German agents from New York and from abroad. They will furnish and +bring, at the best, what the German governments throw out as being of +no use at the present moment. All the German governments are at work +to renovate their fire-arms. + +The diplomats more and more confused,--some of them ludicrously so. +Here, as always and everywhere, diplomacy, by its essence, is +virtually _statu quo_; if not altogether retrograde, is conservative, +and often ultra conservative. It is rare to witness diplomacy _in +toto_, or even single diplomats, side with progressive efforts and +ideas. English diplomacy and diplomats do it at times; but then +mostly for the sake of political intrigue. + +Even the great events of Italy are not the child of diplomacy. It went +to work _clopin, clopan_, after Solferino. + +Not one of the diplomats here is intrinsically hostile to the Union. +Not one really wishes its disruption. Some brag so, but that is for +small effect. All of them are for peace, for _statu quo_, for the +grandeur of the country (as the greatest consumer of European +imports); but most of them would wish slavery to be preserved, and for +this reason they would have been glad to greet Breckinridge or Jeff. +Davis in the White House. + +Some among the diplomats are not virtually enemies of freedom and of +the North; but they know the North from the lies spread by the +Southerners, and by this putrescent heap of refuse, the Washington +society. I am the only Northerner on a footing of intimacy with the +diplomats. They consider me an _exalte_. + +It must be likewise taken into account,--and they say so +themselves,--that Mr. Seward's oracular vaticinations about the end of +the rebellion from sixty to ninety days confuse the judgment of +diplomats. Mr. Seward's conversation and words have an official +meaning for the diplomats, are the subject of their dispatches, and +they continually find that when Mr. Seward says yes the events say no. + +Some of the diplomats are Union men out of obedience to a lawful +government, whatever it be; others by principle. The few from Central +and South American republics are thoroughly sound. The diplomats of +the great powers, representing various complicated interests, are the +more confused, they have so many things to consider. The diplomatic +tail, the smallest, insignificant, fawn to all, and turn as whirlwinds +around the great ones. + +Scott continually refused the formation of new batteries, and now he +roars for them, and hurries the governors to send them. Governor +Andrew, of Massachusetts, weeks ago offered one or two rifled +batteries, was refused, and now Scott in all hurry asks for them. + +The unhappy affair of Big Bethel gave a shock to the nation, and +stirred up old Scott, or rather the President. + +Aside of strategy, there is a new bugbear to frighten the soldiers; +this bugbear is the masked batteries. The inexperience of commanders +at Big Bethel makes already _masked batteries_ a terror of the +country. The stupid press resounds the absurdity. Now everybody begins +to believe that the whole of Virginia is covered with masked +batteries, constituting, so to speak, a subterranean artillery, which +is to explode on every step, under the feet of our army. It seems that +this error and humbug is rather welcome to Scott, otherwise he would +explain to the nation and to the army that the existence of numerous +masked batteries is an absolute material and military impossibility. +The terror prevailing now may do great mischief. + +Mr. Seward was obliged to explain, exonerate, expostulate, and +neutralize before the French Cabinet his famous Dayton letter. I was +sure it was to come to this; Mr. Thouvenel politely protested, and Mr. +Seward confessed that it was written for the American market (alias, +for _bunkum_). All this will make a very unfavorable impression upon +European diplomats concerning Mr. Seward's diplomacy and +statesmanship, as undoubtedly Mr. Thouvenel will semi-officially +confidentially communicate Mr. Seward's _faux pas_ to his colleagues. + +Mr. Seward emphatically instructs Mr. Adams to exclude the question of +slavery from all his sayings and doings as Minister to England. Just +to England! That Mr. Adams, once the leader of the constitutional +anti-slavery party, submits to this obeisance of a corporal, I am not +astonished, as everything can be expected from the man who, in support +of the compromise, made a speech _de lana caprina_; but Senator +Sumner, Chairman of the Committee of Foreign Affairs, meekly swallowed +it. + + + + +JULY, 1861. + + The Evening Post -- The message -- The administration caught + napping -- McDowell -- Congress slowly feels its way -- Seward's + great facility of labor -- Not a Know-Nothing -- Prophesies a + speedy end -- Carried away by his imagination -- Says "secession + is over" -- Hopeful views -- Politeness of the State department + -- Scott carries on the campaign from his sleeping room -- Bull + Run -- Rout -- Panic -- "Malediction! Malediction!" -- Not a + manly word in Congress! -- Abuse of the soldiers -- McClellan + sent for -- Young blood -- Gen. Wadsworth -- Poor McDowell! -- + Scott responsible -- Plan of reorganization -- Let McClellan + beware of routine. + + +It seems to me that the destinies of this admirable people are in +strange hands. Mr. Lincoln, honest man of nature, perhaps an empiric, +doctoring with innocent juices from herbs; but some others around him +seem to be quacks of the first order. I wish I may be mistaken. + +The press, the thus called good one, is vacillating. Best of all, and +almost not vacillating, is the New York Evening Post. I do not speak +of principles; but the papers vacillate, speaking of the measures and +the slowness of the administration. + +The President's message; plenty of good, honest intentions; simple, +unaffected wording, but a confession that by the attack on Sumpter, +and the uprising of Virginia, the administration was, so to speak, +caught napping. Further, up to that day the administration did not +take any, the slightest, measure of any kind for any emergency; in a +word, that it expected no attacks, no war, saw no fire, and did not +prepare to meet and quench one. + +It were, perhaps, better for Lincoln if he could muster courage and +act by himself according to his nature, rather than follow so many, or +even any single adviser. Less and less I understand Mr. Lincoln, but +as his private secretary assures me that Lincoln has great judgment +and great energy, I suggested to the secretary to say to Lincoln he +should be more himself. + +Being _tete-a-tete_ with McDowell, I saw him do things of details +which in any, even half-way organized army, belong to the speciality +of a chief of the staff. I, of course, wondered at it. McDowell, who +commands what in Europe would be called a large corps, told me that +General Scott allowed him not to form a complete staff, such a one as +he, McDowell, wished. + +And all this, so to speak, on the eve of a battle, when the army faces +the enemy. It seems that genuine staff duties are something altogether +unknown to the military senility of the army. McDowell received this +corps in the most chaotic state. Almost with his own hands he +organized, or rather put together, the artillery. Brigades are +scarcely formed; the commanders of brigades do not know their +commands, and the soldiers do not know their generals--and still they +consider Scott to be a great general! + +The Congress, well-intentioned, but entangled in formulas, slowly +feels its way. The Congress is composed of better elements than is the +administration, and it is ludicrous to see how the administration +takes airs of hauteur with the Congress. This Congress is in an +abnormal condition _for the task of directing a revolution_; _a +formula can be thrown in its face_ almost at every bold step. The +administration is virtually irresponsible, more so than the government +of any constitutional nation whatever. What great things this +administration could carry out! Congress will consecrate, legalize, +sanction everything. Perhaps no harm would have resulted if the Senate +and the House had contained some new, fresher elements directly from +the boiling, popular cauldron. Such men would take a _position_ at +once. Many of the leaders in both Houses were accustomed for many +years to make only opposition. But a long opposition influences and +disorganizes the judgment, forms not those genuine statesmen able to +grasp great events. For such emergencies as are now here, terrible +energy is needed, and only a very perfect mind resists the enervating +influence of a protracted opposition. + +Suggested to Mr. Seward that the best diplomacy was to take possession +of Virginia. Doing this, we will find all the cabinets smooth and +friendly. + +I seldom saw a man with greater facility of labor than Seward. When +once he is at work, it runs torrent-like from his pen. His mind is +elastic. His principal forte is argument on _any_ given case. But the +question is how far he masters the variegated information so necessary +in a statesman, and the more now, when the country earnestly has such +dangerous questions with European cabinets. He is still cheerful, +hopeful, and prophesies a speedy end. + +Seward has no Know-Nothingism about him. He is easy, and may have many +genuine generous traits in his character, were they not compressed by +the habits of the, not lofty, politician. At present, Seward is a moral +dictator; he has Lincoln in his hand, and is all in all. Very likely he +flatters him and imposes upon his simple mind by his over-bold, +dogmatic, but not over-correct and logical, generalizations. Seward's +finger is in all the other departments, but above all in the army. + +The opposition made to Seward is not courageous, not open, not +dignified. Such an opposition betrays the weakness of the opposers, +and does not inspire respect. It is darkly surreptitious. These +opponents call Seward hard names, but do this in a corner, although +most of them have their parliamentary chair wherefrom they can speak. +If he is bad and mischievous, then unite your forces and overthrow +him; if he is not bad, or if you are not strong enough against him, do +not cover yourself with ridicule, making a show of impotent malice. +When the Senate confirmed him, every one throughout the land knew his +vacillating policy; knew him to be for compromise, for concessions; +knew that he disbelieved in the terrible earnestness of the struggle, +and always prophesied its very speedy end. The Senate confirmed Seward +with open eyes. Perhaps at the start his imagination and his +patriotism made him doubt and disbelieve in the enormity of +treason--he could not realize that the traitors would go to the bitter +end. Seemingly, Seward still hopes that one day or another they may +return as forlorn sheep. Under the like impressions, he always +believed, and perhaps still believes, he shall be able to patch up the +quarrel, and be the savior of the Union. Very probably his +imagination, his ardent wishes, carry him away, and confuse that clear +insight into events which alone constitutes the statesman. + +Suggested to Sumner to demand the reduction of the tariff on certain +merchandises, on the plea of fraternity of the working American people +with their brethren the operatives all over Europe; by it principally +I wished to alleviate the condition of French industry, as I have full +confidence in Louis Napoleon, and in the unsophisticated judgment of +the genuine French people. The suggestion did not take with the +Senate. + +When the July telegraph brought the news of the victory at Romney +(Western Virginia), it was about midnight. Mr. Seward warmly +congratulated the President that "_the secession was over_." What a +far-reaching policy! + +When the struggle will be over, England, at least her Tories, +aristocrats, and politicians, will find themselves baffled in their +ardent wishes for the breaking of the Union. The free States will +look tidy and nice, as in the past. But more than one generation will +pass before ceases to bleed the wound inflicted by the lies, the +taunts, the vituperations, poured in England upon this noble, +generous, and high-minded people; upon the sacred cause defended by +the freemen. + +These freemen of America, up to the present time, incarnate the +loftiest principle in the successive, progressive, and historical +development of man. Nations, communities, societies, institutions, +stand and fall with that principle, whatever it be, whereof they are +the incarnation; so teaches us history. Woe to these freemen if they +will recede from the principle; if they abandon human rights; if they +do not crush human bondage, this sum of all infamies. Certainly the +question paramount to all is, to save and preserve pure +self-government in principle and in its direct application. But +although the question of slavery seems to be incidental and +subordinate to the former, virtually the question of slavery is twin +to the former. Slavery serves as a basis, as a nurse, for the most +infamous and abject aristocracy or oligarchy that was ever built up in +history, and any, even the best, the mildest, and the most honest +oligarchy or aristocracy kills and destroys man and self-government. + +From the purely administrative point of view, the principle whose +incarnation is the American people, the principle begins to be +perverted. The embodiment of self-government fills dungeons, +suppresses personal liberty, opens letters, and in the reckless +saturnalias of despotism it rivals many from among the European +despots. Europe, which does not see well the causes, shudders at this +_delirium tremens_ of despotism in America. + +Certainly, treason being in ebullition, the holders of power could not +stand by and look. But instead of an energetic action, instead of +exercising in full the existing laws, they hesitated, and treason, +emboldened, grew over their heads. + +The law inflicted the severest capital punishment on the chiefs of the +revolt in Baltimore, but all went off unharmed. The administration one +day willingly allows the law to slide from its lap, and the next +moment grasps at an unnecessary arbitrary power. Had the traitors of +Baltimore been tried by court-martial, as the law allowed, and +punished, few, if any, traitors would then have raised their heads in +the North. + +Englishmen forget that even after a secession, the North, to-day +twenty millions, as large as the whole Union eight years ago, will in +ten years be thirty millions; a population rich, industrious, and +hating England with fury. + +Seward, having complete hold of the President, weakens Lincoln's mind +by using it up in hunting after comparatively paltry expedients. +Seward-Scott's influence neutralizes the energetic cry of the country, +of the congressmen, and in the Cabinet that of Blair, who is still a +trump. + +The emancipation of slaves is spoken of as an expedient, but not as a +sacred duty, even for the maintenance of the Union. To emancipate +through the war power is an offence to reason, logic, and humanity; +but better even so than not at all. War power is in its nature +violent, transient, established for a day; emancipation is the highest +social and economical solution to be given by law and reason, and +ought to result from a thorough and mature deliberation. When the +Constitution was framed, slavery was ashamed of itself, stood in the +corner, had no paws. Now-a-days, slavery has become a traitor, is +arrogant, blood-thirsty, worse than a jackal and a hyena; deliberately +slavery is a matricide. And they still talk of slavery as sheltered by +the Constitution; and many once anti-slavery men like Seward, etc., +are ready to preserve it, to compromise with the crime. + +The existence of nations oscillates between epochs when the substance +and when the form prevails. The formation of America was the epoch +when substance prevailed. Afterward, for more than half a century, the +form was paramount; the term of substance again begins. The +Constitution is substance and form. The substance in it is perennial; +but every form is transient, and must be expanded, changed, re-cast. + +Few, if any, Americans are aware of the identity of laws ruling the +universe with laws ruling and prevailing in the historical development +of man. Rarely has an American patience enough to ascend the long +chain from effect to cause, until he reaches the first cause, the +womb wherein was first generated the subsequent distant effect. So, +likewise, they cannot realize that at the start the imperceptible +deviation from the aim by and by widens to a bottomless gap until the +aim is missed. Then the greatest and the most devoted sacrifices are +useless. The legal conductors of the nation, since March 6th, ignore +this law. + +The foreign ministers here in Washington were astonished at the +_politeness_, when some time ago the Department sent to the foreign +ministers a circular announcing to them that armed vessels of the +neutrals will be allowed to enter at pleasure the rebel blockaded +ports. This favor was not asked, not hoped for, and was not necessary. +It was too late when I called the attention of the Department to the +fact that such favors were very seldom granted; that they are +dangerous, and can occasion complications. I observed that during the +war between Mexico and France, in 1838, Count Mole, Minister of +Foreign Affairs, and the Premier of Louis Philippe, instructed the +admiral commanding the French navy in the Mexican waters, to oppose, +even by force, any attempt made by a neutral man-of-war to enter a +blockaded port. And it was not so dangerous then as it may be in this +civil war. But the chief clerk adviser of the Department found out +that President Polk's administration during the Mexican war granted a +similar permission, and, glad to have a precedent, his powerful brains +could not find out the difference between _then_ and _now_. + +The internal routine of the ministry, and the manner in which our +ministers are treated abroad by the Chief at home, is very strange, +humiliating to our agents in the eyes of foreign Cabinets. Cassius +Clay was instructed to propose to Russia our accession to the +convention of Paris, but was not informed from Washington that our +ministers at Paris, London, etc., were to make the same propositions. +When Prince Gortschakoff asked Cassius Clay if similar propositions +were made to the other cosigners of the Paris convention, our minister +was obliged to confess his utter ignorance about the whole proceeding. +Prince Gortschakoff good-naturedly inquired about it from his +ministers at Paris and London, and enlightened Cassius Clay. + +No ministry of foreign affairs in Europe would treat its agents in +such a trifling manner, and, if done, a minister would resent it. + +This mistake, or recklessness, is to be credited principally to the +internal chief, or director of the department, and not to the minister +himself. By and by, the chief clerks, these routinists in the former +coarse traditions of the Democratic administrations, will learn and +acquire better diplomatic and bureaucratic habits. + +If one calls the attention of influential Americans to the +mismanagement in the organization of the army; to the extraordinary +way in which everything, as organization of brigades, and the inner +service, the quartermaster's duty, is done, the general and inevitable +answer is, "We are not military; we are young people; we have to +learn." Granted; but instead of learning from the best, the latest, +and most correct authorities, why stick to an obsolete, senile, musty, +rotten, mean, and now-a-days impracticable routine, which is +all-powerful in all relating to the army and to the war? The Americans +may pay dear for thus reversing the rules of common sense. + +General Scott directs from his sleeping room the movements of the two +armies on the Potomac and in the Shenandoah valley. General Scott has +given the order to advance. At least a strange way, to have the +command of battle at a distance of thirty and one hundred miles, and +stretched on his fauteuil. Marshal de Saxe, although deadly sick, was +on the field at Fontenoy. What will be the result of this +experimentalization, so contrary to sound reason? + +Fighting at Bull Run. One o'clock, P. M. Good news. Gen. Scott says +that although we were 40-100 in disadvantage, nevertheless his plans +are successful--all goes as he arranged it--all as he foresaw it. +Bravo! old man! If so, I make _amende honorable_ of all that I said up +to this minute. Two o'clock, P. M. General Scott, satisfied with the +justness and success of his strategy and tactics--takes a nap. + +_Evening._--Battle lost; rout, panic. The army almost disbanded, in +full run. So say the forerunners of the accursed news. Malediction! +Malediction! + +What a horrible night and day! rain and cold; stragglers and +disbanded soldiers in every direction, and no order, nobody to gather +the soldiers, or to take care of them. + +As if there existed not any military or administrative authority in +Washington! Under the eyes of the two commanders-in-chief! Oh, +senility, imbecility, ignominy! In Europe, a commander of a city, or +any other military authority whatever, who should behave in such a +way, would be dismissed, nay, expelled, from military service. What I +can gather is, that the enemy was in full retreat in the centre and on +one flank, when he was reinforced by fresh troops, who outflanked and +turned ours. If so, the panic can be explained. Even old veteran +troops generally run when they are outflanked. + +Johnston, whom Patterson permitted to slip, came to the rescue of +Beauregard. So they say. It is _en petit_ Waterloo, with +Blucher-Johnston, and Grouchy-Patterson. But had Napoleon's power +survived after Waterloo, Grouchy, his chief of the staff, and even +Ney,[1] for the fault at Quatre-bras, would have been court-martialed +and shot. Here these blind Americans will thank Scott and Patterson. + + [Footnote 1: That such would have been the presumed fate of Ney at + the hands of Napoleon, I was afterwards assured by the old Duke of + Bassano, and by the Duchess Abrantes.] + +Others say that a bold charge of cavalry arrived on our rear, and +threw in disorder the wagons and the baggage gang. That is nothing +new; at the battle of Borodino some Cossacks, pouncing upon the French +baggage, created a panic, which for a moment staggered Napoleon, and +prevented him in time from reinforcing Ney and Davoust. But McDowell +committed a fault in putting his baggage train, the ambulances +excepted, on a road between the army and its reserves, which, in such +a manner, came not in action. By and by I shall learn more about it. + +The Congress has made a worse Bull Run than the soldiers. Not a single +manly, heroic word to the nation and the army. As if unsuccess always +was dishonor. This body groped its way, and was morally stunned by the +blow; the would-be leaders more than the mass. + +Suggested to Sumner to make, as the Romans did, a few stirring words +on account of the defeat. + +Some mean fellows in Congress, who never smelt powder, abused the +soldiers. Those fellows would have been the first to run. Others, +still worse, to show their abject flunkeyism to Scott, and to humbug +the public at large about their intimacy with this fetish, make +speeches in his defence. Scott broadly prepared the defeat, and now, +through the mouths of flunkeys and spit-lickers,[2] he attempts to +throw the fault on the thus called politicians. + + [Footnote 2: Foremost among them was the editor of the New York + Times, publishing a long article wherein he proved that he had + been admitted to General Scott's table, and that the General + unfolded to him, the editor, the great anaconda strategy. Exactly + the thing to be admired and gulped by a man of such _variegated_ + information as that individual. + + That little villianish "article" had a second object: it was to + filch subscribers from the Tribune, which broke down, not over + courageously.] + +The President telegraphed for McClellan, who in the West, showed +_rapidity of movement_, the first and most necessary capacity for a +commander. Young blood will be infused, and perhaps senility will be +thrown overboard, or sent to the Museum of the Smithsonian Institute. + +At Bull Run the foreign regiments ran not, but covered the retreat. +And Scott, and worse than he, Thomas, this black spot in the War +Department, both are averse to, and when they can they humiliate, the +foreigners. A member of Congress, in search of a friend, went for +several miles up the stream of the fugitive army; great was his +astonishment to hear spoken by the fugitives only the unmixed, pure +Anglo-Saxon. + +My friend, J. Wadsworth, behaved cool, brave, on the field, and was +devoted to the wounded. Now, as always, he is the splendid type of a +true man of the people. + +Poor, unhappy McDowell! During the days when he prepared the army, he +was well aware that an eventual success would be altogether attributed +to Scott; but that he, McDowell, would be the scapegoat for the +defeat. Already, when on Sunday morning the news of the first +successes was known, Scott swallowed incense, and took the whole +credit of it to himself. Now he accuses the politicians. + +Once more. Scott himself prepared the defeat. Subsequent elucidation +will justify this assertion. One thing is already certain: one of the +reasons of the lost battle is the exhaustion of troops which +fought--and the number here in Washington is more than 50,000 men. +Only an imbecile would divide the forces in such a way as to throw +half of it to attack a superior and entrenched enemy. But Scott wished +to shape the great events of the country in accordance with his +narrow, ossified brains, and with his peculiar patriotism; and he did +the same in the conduct of the war. + +I am sure some day or other it will come out that this immense +fortification of Manassas is a similar humbug to the masked batteries; +and Scott was the first to aggrandize these terrible national +nightmares. Already many soldiers say that they did not see any +fortifications. Very likely only small earthworks; if so, Scott ought +to have known what was the position and the works of an enemy encamped +about thirty miles from him. If he, Scott, was ignorant, then it shows +his utter imbecility; if he knew that the fortifications were +insignificant, and did not tell it to the troops, then he is worse +than an incapable chief. Up to the present day, all the military +leaders of ancient and modern times told their troops before a battle +that the enemy is not much after all, and that the difficulties to +overcome are rather insignificant. After the battle was won, +everything became aggrandized. Here everybody, beginning with Scott, +ardently rivalled how to scare and frighten the volunteers, by stories +of the masked batteries of Manassas, with its several tiers of +fortifications, the terrible superiority of the Southerners, etc., +etc. In Europe such behavior would be called treason. + +The administration and the influential men cannot realize that they +must give up their old, stupid, musty routine. McClellan ought to be +altogether independent of Scott; be untrammelled in his activity; have +large powers; have direct action; and not refer to Scott. What is this +wheel within a wheel? Instead of it, Scott, as by concession, cuts for +McClellan a military department of six square miles. Oh, human +stupidity, how difficult thou art to lift! + +Scott will paralyze McClellan as he did Lyon and Butler. Scott always +pushed on his spit-lickers, or favorites, rotten by old age. But Scott +has pushed aside such men as Wool and Col. Smith; refused the services +of many brave as Hooker and others, because they never belonged to his +flunkeys. + +Send to McClellan a plan for the reorganization of the army. + +1st. True mastership consists in creating an army with extant +elements, and not in clamoring for what is altogether impossible to +obtain. + +2d. The idea is preposterous to try to have a large thus-called +regular army. A small number, fifteen to twenty thousand men, divided +among several hundreds of thousands of volunteers, would be as a drop +of water in a lake. Besides, this war is to be decided by the great +masses of the volunteers, and it is uncivic and unpatriotic to in any +way nourish the wickedly-assumed discrimination between regulars and +volunteers. + +3d. Good non-commissioned officers and corporals constitute the sole, +sound, and easy articulations of a regiment. Any one who ever was in +action is aware of this truth. With good non-commissioned officers, +even ignorant lieutenants do very little harm. The volunteer regiments +ought to have as many good sergeants and corporals as possible. + +4th. To provide for this want, and for reasons mentioned above, the +relics of the regular army ought to be dissolved. Let us have one +army, as the enemy has. + +5th. All the rank and file of the army ought to be made at once +corporals and sergeants, and be distributed as much as possible among +the volunteers. + +6th. The non-commissioned regulars ought to be made commissioned +officers, and with officers of all grades be distributed and merged in +the one great army. + +For the first time since the armaments, I enjoyed a genuine military +view. McClellan, surrounded as a general ought to be, went to see the +army. It looks martial. The city, likewise, has a more martial look +than it had all the time under Scott. It seems that a young, strong +hand holds the ribbons. God grant that McClellan may preserve his +western vigor and activity, and may not become softened and dissolved +by these Washington evaporations. If he does, if he follows the +routine, he will become as impotent as others before him. Young man, +beware of Washington's corrupt but flattering influences. To the camp! +to the camp! A tent is better for you than a handsome house. The tent, +the fumes of bivouacs, inspired the Fredericks, the Napoleons, and +Washingtons. + +Up to this day they make more history in Secessia than here. Jeff. +Davis overshadows Lincoln. Jeff. Davis and his gang of malefactors are +pushed into the whirlpool of action by the nature of their crime; +here, our leaders dread action, and grope. The rebels have a clear, +decisive, almost palpable aim; but here * * + + + + +AUGUST, 1861. + + The truth about Bull Run -- The press staggers -- The Blairs + alone firm -- Scott's military character -- Seward -- Mr. Lincoln + reads the Herald -- The ubiquitous lobbyist -- Intervention -- + Congress adjourns -- The administration waits for something to + turn up -- Wade -- Lyon is killed -- Russell and his shadow -- + The Yankees take the loan -- Bravo, Yankees! -- McClellan works + hard -- Prince Napoleon -- Manassas fortifications a humbug -- + Mr. Seward Improves -- Old Whigism -- McClellan's powers enlarged + -- Jeff. Davis makes history -- Fremont emancipates in Missouri + -- The Cabinet. + + +The truth about Bull Run will, perhaps, only reach the people when it +becomes reduced to an historical use. I gather what I am sure is true. + +About three weeks ago General McDowell took upon himself the +responsibility to attack the enemy concentrated at Manassas. Deciding +upon this step, McDowell showed the determination of a true soldier, +and a cool, intelligent courage. According to rumors permeating the +whole North; rumors originated by secessionists in and around +Washington, and in various parts of the free States; rumors gulped by +a part of the press, and never contradicted, but rather nursed, at +headquarters, Manassas was a terrible, unknown, mysterious something; +a bugbear, between a fortress made by art and a natural fastness, +whose approaches were defended for miles by numberless masked +batteries, and which was filled by countless thousands of the most +ferocious warriors. Such was Manassas in public opinion when McDowell +undertook to attack this formidable American Torres Vedras, and this +with the scanty and almost unorganized means in men and artillery +allotted to him by the senile wisdom of General Scott. General +McDowell obtained the promise that Beauregard alone was to be before +him. To fulfil this promise, General Scott was to order Patterson to +keep Johnston, and a movement was to be made on the James River, so as +to prevent troops coming from Richmond to Manassas. As it was already +said, Patterson, a special favorite of General Scott, kindly allowed +Johnston to save Beauregard, and Jeff. Davis with troops from Richmond +likewise was on the spot. McDowell planned his plan very skilfully; no +European general would have done better, and I am sure that such will +be the verdict hereafter. Some second-rate mistakes in the execution +did not virtually endanger its success; but, to say the truth, +McDowell and his army were defeated by the imbecility of the supreme +military authority. Imbecility stabbed them in the back. + +One part of the press, stultified and stupefied, staggered under the +blow; the other part showed its utter degradation by fawning on Scott +and attacking the Congress, or its best part. The Evening Post +staggered not; its editors are genuine, laborious students, and, above +all, students of history. The editors of the other papers are +politicians; some of them are little, others are big villains. All, +intellectually, belong to the class called in America more or less +well-read men; information acquired by reading, but which in itself is +not much. + +The brothers Blair, almost alone, receded not, and put the defeat +where it belonged--at the feet of General Scott. + +The _rudis indigestaque moles_, torn away from Scott's hands, already +begins to acquire the shape of an army. Thanks to the youth, the +vigor, and the activity of McClellan. + +General Scott throws the whole disaster on politicians, and abuses +them. How ungrateful. His too lofty pedestal is almost exclusively the +work of politicians. I heard very, very few military men in America +consider Scott a man of transcendent military capacity. Years ago, +during the Crimean campaign, I spent some time at West Point in the +society of Cols. Robert Lee, Walker, Hardee, then in the service of +the United States, and now traitors; not one of them classed Scott +much higher above what would be called a respectable capacity; and of +which, as they said, there are many, many in every European army. + +If one analyzes the Mexican campaign, it will be found that General +Scott had, comparatively, more officers than soldiers; the officers +young men, full of vigor, and in the first gush of youth, who +therefore mightily facilitated the task of the commander. Their names +resound to-day in both the camps. + +Further, generals from the campaign in Mexico assert that three of the +won battles were fought against orders, which signifies that in Mexico +youth had the best of cautious senility. It was according to the law +of nature, and for it it was crowned with success. + +Mr. Seward has a very active intellect, an excellent man for current +business, easy and clear-headed for solving any second-rate +complications; but as for his initiative, that is another question. +Hitherto his initiative does not tell, but rather confuses. Then he +sustains Scott, some say, for future political capital. If so it is +bad; worse still if Mr. Seward sustains Scott on the ground of high +military fitness, as it is impossible to admit that Mr. Seward knows +anything about military affairs, or that he ever _studied_ the +description _of any battle_. At least, I so judge from his +conversation. + +Mr. Lincoln has already the fumes of greatness, and looks down on the +press, reads no paper, that dirty traitor the New York Herald +excepted. So, at least, it is generally stated. + +The enemies of Seward maintain that he, Seward, drilled Lincoln into +it, to make himself more necessary. + +Early, even before the inauguration, McDowell suggested to General +Scott to concentrate in Washington the small army, the depots +scattered in Texas and New Mexico. Scott refused, and this is called a +general! God preserve any cause, any people who have for a savior a +Scott, together with his civil and military partisans. + +If it is not direct, naked treason which prevails among the nurses, +and the various advisers of the people, imbecility, narrow-mindedness, +do the same work. Further, the way in which many leech, phlebotomize, +cheat and steal the people's treasury, is even worse than rampant +treason. I heard a Boston shipbuilder complain to Sumner that the +ubiquitous lobbyist, Thurlow Weed, was in his, the builder's, way +concerning some contracts to be made in the Navy Department, etc., +etc. Will it turn out that the same men who are to-day at the head of +affairs will be the men who shall bring to an end this revolt or +revolution? It ought not to be, as it is contrary to logic, and to +human events. + +Lincoln alone must forcibly remain, he being one of the incarnated +formulas of the Constitution, endowed with a specific, four years' +lasting existence. + +The Americans are nervous about foreign intervention. It is difficult +to make them understand that no intervention is to be, and none can be +made. Therein the press is as silly as the public at large. Certainly +France does not intend any meddling or intervention; of this I am +sure. Neither does England seriously. + +Next, if these two powers should even thirst for such an injustice, +they have no means to do it. If they break our blockades, we make war, +and exclude them from the Northern ports, whose commerce is more +valuable to them than that of the South. I do not believe the foreign +powers to be forgetful of their interest; they know better their +interests than the Americans. + +The Congress adjourned, abandoning, with a confidence unparalleled in +history, the affairs of the country in the hands of the not over +far-sighted administration. The majority of the Congress are good, and +fully and nobly represent the pure, clear and sure aspirations, +instincts, nay, the clear-sightedness of the people. In the Senate, as +in the House, are many, very many true men, and men of pure devotion, +and of clear insight into the events; men superior to the +administration; such are, above all, those senators and +representatives who do not attempt or aim to sit on a pedestal before +the public, before the people, but wish the thing to be done for the +thing itself. But for _the formula_ which chains their hands, feet, +and intellect, the Congress contained several men who, if they could +act, would finish the secession in a double-quick time. But the whole +people move in the treadmill of formulas. It is a pity that they are +not inspired by the axiom of the Roman legist, _scire leges non est +hoc verba earum tenere, sed vim ac potestatem_. Congress had positive +notions of what ought to be done; the administration, Micawber-like, +looks for that something which may turn up, and by expedients patches +all from day to day. + +What may turn up nobody can foresee; matter alone without mind cannot +carry the day. The people have the mind, but the official legal +leaders a very small portion of it. Come what will, I shall not break +down; I shall not give up the holy principle. If crime, rebellion, +_sauvagerie_, triumph, it will be, not because the people failed, but +it will be because mediocrities were at the helm. Concessions, +compromises, any patched-up peace, will for a century degrade the name +of America. Of course, I cannot prevent it; but events have often +broken but not bent me. I may be burned, but I cannot be melted; so if +secesh succeeds, I throw in a cesspool my document of naturalization, +and shall return to Europe, even if working my passage. + +It is maddening to read all this ignoble clap-trap, written by +European wiseacres concerning this country. Not one knows the people, +not one knows the accidental agencies which neutralize what is grand +and devoted in the people. + +Some are praised here as statesmen and leaders. A statesman, a leader +of such a people as are the Americans, and in such emergencies, must +be a _man_ in the fullest and loftiest comprehension. All the noblest +criteria of moral and intellectual manhood ought to be vigorously and +harmoniously developed in him. He ought to have a deep and lively +moral sense, and the moral perception of events and of men around him. +He ought to have large brains and a big heart,--an almost +all-embracing comprehension of the inside and outside of events,--and +when he has those qualities, then only the genius of foresight will +dwell on his brow. He ought to forget himself wholly and +unconditionally; his reason, his heart, his soul ought to merge in +the principles which lifted him to the elevated station. Who around me +approaches this ideal? So far as I know, perhaps Senator Wade. + +I wait and wait for the eagle which may break out from the White +House. Even the burning fire of the national disaster at Bull Run left +the egg unhatched. _Utinam sim falsus_, but it looks as if the slowest +brains were to deal with the greatest events of our epoch. Mr. Lincoln +is a pure-souled, well-intentioned patriot, and this nobody doubts or +contests. But is that all which is needed in these terrible +emergencies? + +Lyon is killed,--the only man of initiative hitherto generated by +events. We have bad luck. I shall put on mourning for at least six +weeks. They ought to weep all over the land for the loss of such a +man; and he would not have been lost if the administration had put him +long ago in command of the West. O General Scott! Lyon's death can be +credited to you. Lyon was obnoxious to General Scott, but the +General's influence maintains in the service all the doubtful +capacities and characters. The War Department, as says Potter, +bristles with secessionists, and with them the old, rotten, +respectable relics, preserved by General Scott, depress and nip in the +bud all the young, patriotic, and genuine capacities. + +As the sea corrodes the rocks against which it impinges, so egotism, +narrow-mindedness, and immorality corrode the best human +institutions. For humanity's sake, Americans, beware! + +Always the clouds of harpies around the White House and the +Departments,--such a generous ferment in the people, and such +impurities coming to the surface! + +Patronage is the stumbling stone here to true political action. By +patronage the Cabinet keeps in check Congressmen, Senators, etc. + +I learn from very good authority that when Russell, with his shadow, +Sam. Ward, went South, Mr. Seward told Ward that he, Seward, intends +not to force the Union on the Southern people, if it should be +positively ascertained that that people does not wish to live in the +Union! I am sorry for Seward. Such is not the feeling of the Northern +people, and such notions must necessarily confuse and make vacillating +Mr. Seward's--that is, Mr. Lincoln's--policy. Seward's patriotism and +patriotic wishes and expectations prevent him from seeing things as +they are. + +The money men of Boston decided the conclusion of the first national +loan. Bravo, my beloved Yankees! In finances as in war, as in all, not +the financiering capacity of this or that individual, not any special +masterly measures, etc., but the stern will of the people to succeed, +provides funds and means, prevents bankruptcy, etc. The men who give +money send an agent here to ascertain how many traitors are still kept +in offices, and what are the prospects of energetic action by the +administration. + +McClellan is organizing, working hard. It is a pleasure to see him, so +devoted and so young. After all, youth is promise. But already +adulation begins, and may spoil him. It would be very, very saddening. + +Prince Napoleon's visit stirs up all the stupidity of politicians in +Europe and here. What a mass of absurdities are written on it in +Europe, and even by Americans residing there. All this is more than +equalled by the _solemn_ and _wise_ speculations of the Americans at +home. Bar-room and coffee-house politicians are the same all over the +world, the same, I am sure, in China and Japan. To suppose Prince +Napoleon has any appetite whatever for any kind of American crown! +Bah! He is brilliant and intelligent, and to suppose him to have such +absurd plans is to offend him. But human and American gullibility are +bottomless. + +The Prince is a noble friend of the American cause, and freely speaks +out his predilection. His sentiments are those of a true Frenchman, +and not the sickly free-trade pro-slaveryism of Baroche with which he +poisoned here the diplomatic atmosphere. Prince Napoleon's example +will purify it. + +As I was sure of it, the great Manassas fortifications are a humbug. +It is scarcely a half-way fortified camp. So say the companions of the +Prince, who, with him, visited Beauregard's army. So much for the +great Gen. Scott, whom the companions of the Prince call a +_magnificent ruin_. + +The Prince spoke with Beauregard, and the Prince's and his companions' +opinion is, that McDowell planned well his attack, but failed in the +execution; and Beauregard thought the same. The Prince saw McClellan, +and does not prize him so high as we do. These foreign officers say +that most probably, on both sides, the officers will make most correct +plans, as do pupils in military schools, but the execution will depend +upon accident. + +Mr. Seward shows every day more and more capacity in dispatching the +regular, current, diplomatical business affairs. In all such matters +he is now at home, as if he had done it for years and years. He is no +more spread-eagle in his diplomatic relations; is easy and prompt in +all secondary questions relating to secondary interests, and daily +emerging from international complications. + +Hitherto the war policy of the administration, as inspired and +directed by Scott, was rather to receive blows, and then to try to +ward them off. I expect young McClellan to deal blows, and thus to +upturn the Micawber policy. Perhaps Gen. Scott believed that his name +and example would awe the rebels, and that they would come back after +having made a little fuss and done some little mischief. But Scott's +greatness was principally built up by the Whigs, and his hold on +Democrats was not very great. Witness the events of Polk's and +Pierce's administrations. His Mississippi-Atlantic strategy is a +delirium of a softening brain. Seward's enemies say that he puts up +and sustains Scott, because in the case of success Scott will not be +in Seward's way for the future Presidency. Mr. Lincoln, an old Whig, +has the Whig-worship for Scott; and as Mr. Lincoln, in 1851, stumped +for Scott, the candidate for the Presidency, the many eulogies +showered by Lincoln upon Scott still more strengthened the worship +which, of course, Seward lively entertains in Lincoln's bosom. Thus +the relics of Whigism direct now the destinies of the North. Mr. +Lincoln, Gen. Scott, Mr. Seward, form a triad, with satellites like +Bates and Smith in the Cabinet. But the Whigs have not the reputation +of governmental vigor, decision, and promptitude. + +The vitiated impulse and direction given by Gen. Scott at the start, +still prevails, and it will be very difficult to bring it on the right +track--to change the general as well as the war policy from the +defensive, as it is now, to the offensive, as it ought to have been +from the beginning. The North is five to one in men, and one hundred +to one in material resources. Any one with brains and energy could +suppress the rebellion in eight weeks from to-day. + +Mr. Lincoln in some way has a slender historical resemblance to Louis +XVI.--similar goodness, honesty, good intentions; but the size of +events seems to be too much for him. + +And so now Mr. Lincoln is wholly overshadowed by Seward. If by miracle +the revolt may end in a short time, Mr. Seward will have most of the +credit for it. In the long run the blame for eventual disasters will +be put at Mr. Lincoln's door. + +Thank heaven! the area for action and the powers of McClellan are +extended and increased. The administration seems to understand the +exigencies of the day. + +I am told that the patriotic and brave Senator Wade, disgusted with +the slowness and inanity of the administration, exclaimed, "I do not +wonder that people desert to Jeff. Davis, as he shows brains; I may +desert myself." And truly, Jeff. Davis and his gang make history. + +Young McClellan seems to falter before the Medusa-_ruin_ Scott, who is +again at his tricks, and refuses officers to volunteers. To carry +through in Washington any sensible scheme, more boldness is needed +than on the bloodiest battle-field. + +If Gen. Scott could have disappeared from the stage of events on the +sixth of March, his name would have remained surrounded with that halo +to which the people was accustomed; but now, when the smoke will blow +over, it may turn differently. I am afraid that at some future time +will be applied to Scott * * * _quia turpe ducunt parere minoribus, et +quae imberbi didicere, senes perdenda fateri_. + +Not self-government is on trial, and not the genuine principle of +democracy. It is not the genuine, virtual democracy which conspired +against the republic, and which rebels, but an unprincipled, infamous +oligarchy, risen in arms to destroy democracy. From Athens down to +to-day, true democracies never betrayed any country, never leagued +themselves with enemies. From the time of Hellas down to to-day, all +over the world, and in all epochs, royalties, oligarchies, +aristocracies, conspired against, betrayed, and sold their respective +father-lands. (I said this years ago in America and Europe.) + +Fremont as initiator; he emancipates the slaves of the disloyal +Missourians. Takes the advance, but is justified in it by the +slowness, nay, by the stagnancy of the administration. + +Gen. Scott opposed to the expedition to Hatteras! + +If it be true that Seward and Chase already lay the tracks for the +Presidential succession, then I can only admire their short-sightedness, +nay, utter and darkest blindness. The terrible events will be a +schooling for the people; the future President will not be a schemer +already shuffling the cards; most probably it will be a man who serves +the country, forgetting himself. + +Only two members in the Cabinet drive together, Blair and Welles, and +both on the right side, both true men, impatient for action, action. +Every day shows on what false principle this Cabinet was constructed, +not for the emergency, not in view to suppress the rebellion, but to +satisfy various party wranglings. Now the people's cause sticks in the +mud. + + + + +SEPTEMBER, 1861. + + What will McClellan do? -- Fremont disavowed -- The Blairs not in + fault -- Fremont ignorant and a bungler -- Conspiracy to destroy + him -- Seward rather on his side -- McClellan's staff -- A Marcy + will not do! -- McClellan publishes a slave-catching order -- The + people move onward -- Mr. Seward again -- West Point -- The + Washington defences -- What a Russian officer thought of them -- + Oh, for battles! -- Fremont wishes to attack Memphis; a bold + move! -- Seward's influence over Lincoln -- The people for + Fremont -- Col. Romanoff's opinion of the generals -- McClellan + refuses to move -- Manoeuvrings -- The people uneasy -- The staff + -- The Orleans -- Brave boys! -- The Potomac closed -- Oh, poor + nation! -- Mexico -- McClellan and Scott. + + +Will McClellan display unity in conception, and vigor in execution? +That is the question. He seems very energetic and active in organizing +the army; but he ought to take the field very soon. He ought to leave +Washington, and have his headquarters in the camp among the soldiers. +The life in the tent will inspire him. It alone inspired Frederick II. +and Napoleon. Too much organization may become as mischievous as the +no organization under Scott. Time, time is everything. The levies will +fight well; may only McClellan not be carried away by the notion and +the attempt to create what is called a perfect army on European +pattern. Such an attempt would be ruinous to the cause. It is +altogether impossible to create such an army on the European model, +and no necessity exists for it. The rebel army is no European one. +Civil wars have altogether different military exigencies, and the +great tactics for a civil war are wholly different from the tactics, +etc., needed in a regular war. Napoleon differently fought the +Vendeans, and differently the Austrians, and the other coalesced +armies. May only McClellan not become intoxicated before he puts the +cup to his lips. + +Fremont disavowed by Lincoln and the administration. This looks bad. I +have no considerable confidence in Fremont's high capacities, and +believe that his head is turned a little; but in this question he was +right in principle, and right in legality. A commander of an army +operating separately has the exercise of full powers of war. + +The Blairs are not to be accused; I read the letter from F. Blair to +his brother. It is the letter of a patriot, but not of an intriguer. +Fremont establishes an absurd rule concerning the breach of military +discipline, and shows by it his ignorance and narrow-mindedness. So +Fremont, and other bungling martinets, assert that nobody has the +right to criticise the actions of his commander. + +Fremont is ignorant of history, and those around him who put in his +head such absurd notions are a pack of mean and servile spit-lickers. +An officer ought to obey orders without hesitation, and if he does not +he is to be court-martialed and shot. But it is perfectly allowable to +criticise them; it is in human nature--it was, is, and will be done in +all armies; see in Curtius and other historians of Alexander of +Macedon. It was continually done under Napoleon. In Russia, in 1812, +the criticism made by almost all the officers forced Alexander I. to +leave the army, and to put Kutousoff over Barclay. In the last Italian +campaign Austrian officers criticised loudly Giulay, their commander, +etc., etc. + +Conspiracy to destroy Fremont on account of his slave proclamation. +The conspirators are the Missouri slaveholders: Senator Brodhead, old +Bates, Scott, McClellan, and their staffs. Some jealousy against him +in the Cabinet, but Seward rather on Fremont's side. + +McClellan makes his father-in-law, a man of _very_ secondary capacity, +the chief of the staff of the army. It seems that McClellan ignores +what a highly responsible position it is, and what a special and +transcendent capacity must be that of a chief of the staff--the more +so when of an army of several hundreds of thousands. I do not look for +a Berthier, a Gneisenau, a Diebitsch, or Gortschakoff, but a Marcy +will not do. + +Colonel Lebedeef, from the staff of the Emperor Alexander II., and +professor in the School of the Staff at St. Petersburg, saw here +everything, spoke with our generals, and his conclusion is that in +military capacity McDowell is by far superior to McClellan. Strange, +if true, and foreboding no good. + +Mr. Lincoln begins to call a demagogue any one who does not admire all +the doings of his administration. Are we already so far? + +McClellan under fatal influences of the rampant pro-slavery men, and +of partisans of the South, as is a Barlow. All the former associations +of McClellan have been of the worst kind--Breckinridgians. But perhaps +he will throw them off. He is young, and the elevation of his +position, his standing before the civilized world, will inspire and +purify him, I hope. Nay, I ardently wish he may go to the camp, to the +camp. + +McClellan published a slave-catching order. Oh that he may discard +those bad men around him! + +Struggles with evils, above all with domestic, internal evils, absorb +a great part of every nation's life. Such struggles constitute its +development, are the landmarks of its progress and decline. + +The like struggles deserve more the attention of the observer, the +philosopher, than all kinds of external wars. And, besides, most of +such external wars result from the internal condition of a nation. At +any rate, their success or unsuccess almost wholly depends upon its +capacity to overcome internal evils. A nation even under a despotic +rule may overcome and repel an invasion, as long as the struggle +against the internal evils has not broken the harmony between the +ruler and the nation. Here the internal evil has torn a part of the +constitutional structure; may only the necessary harmony between this +high-minded people and the representative of the transient +constitutional formula not be destroyed. The people move onward, the +formula vacillates, and seems to fear to make any bold step. + +If the cause of the freemen of the North succumbs, then humanity is +humiliated. This high-spirited exclamation belongs to Tassara, the +Minister from Spain. Not the diplomat, but the nobly inspired _man_ +uttered it. + +But for the authoritative influence of General Scott, and the absence +of any foresight and energy on the part of the administration, the +rebels would be almost wholly without military leaders, without naval +officers. The Johnsons, Magruders, Tatnalls, Buchanans, ought to have +been arrested for treason the moment they announced their intention to +resign. + +Mr. Seward has many excellent personal qualities, besides his +unquestionable eminent capacity for business and argument; but why is +he neutralizing so much good in him by the passion to be all in all, +to meddle with everything, to play the knowing one in military +affairs, he being in all such matters as innocent as a lamb? It is not +a field on which Seward's hazarded generalizations can be of any +earthly use; but they must confuse all. + +Seward is free from that coarse, semi-barbarous know-nothingism which +rules paramount, not the genuine people, but the would-be something, +the half-civilized _gentlemen_. Above all, know-nothingism pervades +all around Scott, who is himself its grand master, and it nestles +there _par excellence_ in more than one way. It is, however, to be +seen how far this pure American-Scott military wisdom is something +real, transcendent. Up to this day, the pure Americanism, West Point +schoolboy's conceit, have not produced much. The defences of +Washington, so much clarioned as being the product of a high +conception and of engineering skill,--these defences are very +questionable when appreciated by a genuine military eye. A Russian +officer of the military engineers, one who was in the Crimea and at +Sebastopol, after having surveyed these defences here, told me that +the Russian soldiers who defended Sebastopol, and who learned what +ought to be defences, would prefer to fight outside than inside of the +Washington forts, bastions, defences, etc., etc., etc. + +Doubtless many foreigners coming to this country are not much, but the +greatest number are soldiers who saw service and fire, and could be of +some use at the side of Scott's West Point greenness and presumption. + +If we are worsted, then the fate of the men of faith in principles +will be that of Sisyphus, and the coming generation for half a century +will have uphill work. + +If not McClellan himself, some intriguers around him already dream, +nay, even attempt to form a pure military, that is, a reckless, +unprincipled, unpatriotic party. These men foment the irritation +between the arrogance of the thus-called regular army, and the pure +abnegation of the volunteers. Oh, for battles! Oh, for battles! + +Fremont wished at once to attack Fort Pillow and the city of Memphis. +It was a bold move, but the concerted civil and military wisdom +grouped around the President opposed this truly great military +conception. + +Mr. Lincoln is pulled in all directions. His intentions are excellent, +and he would have made an excellent President for quiet times. But +this civil war imperatively demands a man of foresight, of prompt +decision, of Jacksonian will and energy. These qualities may be latent +in Lincoln, but do not yet come to daylight. Mr. Lincoln has no +experience of men and events, and no knowledge of the past. Seward's +influence over Lincoln may be explained by the fact that Lincoln +considers Seward as the alpha and omega of every kind of knowledge and +information. + +I still hope, perhaps against hope, that if Lincoln is what the masses +believe him to be, a strong mind, then all may come out well. Strong +minds, lifted by events into elevated regions, expand more and more; +their "mind's eye" pierces through clouds, and even through rocks; +they become inspired, and inspiration compensates the deficiency or +want of information acquired by studies. Weak minds, when transported +into higher regions, become confused and dizzy. Which of the two will +be Mr. Lincoln's fate? + +The administration hesitates to give to the struggle a character of +emancipation; but the people hesitate not, and take Fremont to their +heart. + +As the concrete humanity, so single nations have epochs of gestation, +and epochs of normal activity, of growth, of full life, of manhood. +Americans are now in the stage of manhood. + +Col. Romanoff, of the Russian military engineer corps, who was in the +Crimean war, saw here the men and the army, saw and conversed with the +generals. Col. R. is of opinion that McDowell is by far superior to +McClellan, and would make a better commander. + +It is said that McClellan refuses to move until he has an army of +300,000 men and 600 guns. Has he not studied Napoleon's wars? Napoleon +scarcely ever had half such a number in hand; and when at Wagram, +where he had about 180,000 men, himself in the centre, Davoust and +Massena on the flanks, nevertheless the handling of such a mass was +too heavy even for his, Napoleon's, genius. + +The country is--to use an Americanism--in a pretty fix, if this +McClellan turns out to be a mistake. I hope for the best. 600 guns! +But 100 guns in a line cover a mile. What will he do with 600? Lose +them in forests, marshes, and bad roads; whence it is unhappily a fact +that McClellan read only a little of military history, misunderstood +what he read, and now attempts to realize hallucinations, as a boy +attempts to imitate the exploits of an Orlando. It is dreadful to +think of it. I prefer to trust his assertion that, once organized, he +soon, very soon, will deal heavy and quick blows to the rebels. + +I saw some manoeuvrings, and am astonished that no artillery is +distributed among the regiments of infantry. When the rank and file +see the guns on their side, the soldiers consider them as a part of +themselves and of the regiment; they fight better in the company of +guns; they stand by them and defend them as they defend their colors. +Such a distribution of guns would strengthen the body of the +volunteers. But it seems that McClellan has no confidence in the +volunteers. Were this true, it would denote a small, very small mind. +Let us hope it is not so. One of his generals--a martinet of the first +class--told me that McClellan waits for the organization of _the +regulars_, to have them for the defence of the guns. If so, it is +sheer nonsense. These narrow-minded West Point martinets will become +the ruin of McClellan. + +McClellan could now take the field. Oh, why has he established his +headquarters in the city, among flunkeys, wiseacres, and spit-lickers? +Were he among the troops, he would be already in Manassas. The people +are uneasy and fretting about this inaction, and the people see what +is right and necessary. + +Gen. Banks, a true and devoted patriot, is sacrificed by the stupidity +of what they call here the staff of the great army, but which +collectively, with its chief, is only a mass of conceit and +ignorance--few, as General Williams, excepted. Banks is in the face of +the enemy, and has no cavalry and no artillery; and here are immense +reviews to amuse women and fools. + +Mr. Mercier, the French Minister, visited a considerable part of the +free States, and his opinions are now more clear and firm; above all, +he is very friendly to our side. He is sagacious and good. + +Missouri is in great confusion--three parts of it lost. Fremont is not +to be accused of all the mischief, but, from effect to cause, the +accusation ascends to General Scott. + +Gen. Scott insisted to have Gen. Harney appointed to the command of +Missouri, and hated Lyon. If, even after Harney's recall, Lyon had +been appointed, Lyon would be alive and Missouri safe. But hatred, +anxiety of rank, and stupidity, united their efforts, and prevailed. +Oh American people! to depend upon such inveterate blunderers! + +Were McClellan in the camp, he would have no flatterers, no +antechambers filled with flunkeys; but the rebels would not so easily +get news of his plans as they did in the affair on Munson's Hill. + +The Orleans are here. I warned the government against admitting the +Count de Paris, saying that it would be a _deliberate_ breach of good +comity towards Louis Napoleon, and towards the Bonapartes, who prove +to be our friends; I told that no European government would commit +itself in such a manner, not even if connected by ties of blood with +the Orleans. At the start, Mr. Seward heeded a little my advice, but +finally he could not resist the vanity to display untimely +spread-eagleism, and the Orleans are in our service. Brave boys! It is +a noble, generous, high-minded, if not an altogether wise, action. + +If a mind is not nobly inspired and strong, then the exercise of +power makes it crotchety and dissimulative in contact with men. To my +disgust, I witness this all around me. + +The American people, its institutions, the Union--all have lost their +virginity, their political innocence. A revolution in the +institutions, in the mode of life, in notions begun--it is going on, +will grow and mature, either for good or evil. Civil war, this most +terrible but most maturing passion, has put an end to the boyhood and +to the youth of the American people. Whatever may be the end, one +thing is sure--that the substance and the form will be modified; nay, +perhaps, both wholly changed. A new generation of citizens will grow +and come out from this smoke of the civil war. + +The Potomac closed by the rebels! Mischief and shame! Natural fruits +of the dilatory war policy--Scott's fault. Months ago the navy wished +to prevent it, to shell out the rebels, to keep our troops in the +principal positions. Scott opposed; and still he has almost paramount +influence. McClellan complains against Scott, and Lincoln and Seward +flatter McClellan, but look up to Scott as to a supernatural military +wisdom. Oh, poor nation! + +In Europe clouds gather over Mexico. Whatever it eventually may come +to, I suggested to Mr. Seward to lay aside the Monroe doctrine, not to +meddle for or against Mexico, but to earnestly protest against any +eventual European interference in the internal condition of the +political institutions of Mexico. + +Continual secondary, international complications, naturally growing +out from the maritime question; so with the Dutch cheesemongers, with +Spain, with England--all easily to be settled; they generate fuss and +trouble, but will make no fire. + +Gen. Scott's partisans complain that McClellan is very disrespectful +in his dealings with Gen. Scott. I wonder not. McClellan is probably +hampered by the narrow routine notions of Scott. McClellan feels that +Scott prevents energetic and prompt action; that he, McClellan, in +every step is obliged to fight Gen. Scott's inertia; and McClellan +grows impatient, and shows it to Scott. + + + + +OCTOBER, 1861. + + Experiments on the people's life-blood -- McClellan's uniform -- + The army fit to move -- The rebels treat us like children -- We + lose time -- Everything is defensive -- The starvation theory -- + The anaconda -- First interview with McClellan -- Impressions of + him -- His distrust of the volunteers -- Not a Napoleon nor a + Garibaldi -- Mason and Slidell -- Seward admonishes Adams -- + Fremont goes overboard -- The pro-slavery party triumph -- The + collateral missions to Europe -- Peace impossible -- Every + Southern gentleman is a pirate -- When will we deal blows? -- + Inertia! inertia! + + +As in the mediaeval epoch, and some time thereafter, anatomists and +physiologists experimented on the living villeins, that is, on +peasantry, serfs, and called this process _experientia in anima vili_, +so this naive administration experiments in civil and in military +matters on the people's life-blood. + +McClellan, stirred up by the fools and peacocks around him, has sent +to the War Department a project of a showy uniform for himself and his +staff. It would be to laugh at, if it were not insane. McClellan very +likely read not what he signed. + +The army is in sufficient rig and organization to take the field; but +nevertheless McClellan has not yet made a single movement imperatively +prescribed by the simplest tactics, and by the simplest common sense, +when the enemy is in front. Not a single serious reconnoissance to +ascertain the real force of the enemy, to pierce through the curtain +behind which the rebels hide their real forces. It must be conceded to +the rebel generals that they show great skill in humbugging us. +Whenever we try to make a step we are met by a seemingly strong force +(tenfold increased by rumors spread by the secessionists among us, and +gulped by our stupidity), which makes us suppose a deep front, and a +still deeper body behind. And there is the humbug, I am sure. If, on +such an extensive line as the rebels occupy, the main body should +correspond to what they show in front, then the rebel force must +muster several hundreds of thousands. Such large numbers they have +not, and I am sure that four-fifths of their whole force constitutes +their vanguard, and behind it the main body is chaff. The rebels treat +us as if we were children. + +McClellan fortifies Washington; Fremont, St. Louis; Anderson asks for +engineers to fortify some spots in Kentucky. This is all a defensive +warfare, and not so will the rebel region be conquered. We lose time, +and time serves the rebels, as it increases their moral force. Every +day of their existence shows their intrinsic vitality. + +The theory of starving the rebels out is got up by imbeciles, wholly +ignorant of such matters; wholly ignorant of human nature; wholly +ignorant of the degree of energy, and of abnegation, which criminals +can display when firmly decided upon their purpose. This absurdity +comes from the celebrated anaconda Mississippi-Atlantic strategy. + +Oh! When in Poland, in 1831, the military chiefs concentrated all the +forces in the fortifications of Warsaw, all was gone. Oh for a dashing +general, for a dashing purpose, in the councils of the White House! +The constitutional advisers are deaf to the voice of the people, who +know more about it than do all the departments and the military +wiseacres. The people look up to find as big brains and hearts as are +theirs, and hitherto the people have looked up in vain. The radical +senators, as a King, a Trumbull, a Wade, Wilson, Chandler, Hale, etc., +the true Republicans in the last session of Congress--further, men as +Wadsworth and the like, are the true exponents of the character, of +the clear insight, of the soundness of the people. + +McClellan, and even the administration, seem not to realize that pure +military considerations cannot fulfil the imperative demands of the +political situation. + +_October 6th._--I met McClellan; had with him a protracted +conversation, and could look well into him. I do not attach any value +to physiognomies, and consider phrenology, craniology, and their +kindred, to be rather humbugs; but, nevertheless, I was struck with +the soft, insignificant inexpressiveness of his eyes and features. My +enthusiasm for him, my faith, is wholly extinct. All that he said to +me and to others present was altogether unmilitary and inexperienced. +It made me sick at heart to hear him, and to think that he is to +decide over the destinies and the blood of the people. And he already +an idol, incensed, worshipped, before he did anything whatever. +McClellan may have individual courage, so has almost every animal; but +he has not the decision and the courage of a military leader and +captain. He has no real confidence in the troops; has scarcely any +idea how battles are fought; has no confidence in and no notion of the +use of the bayonet. I told him that, notwithstanding his opinion, I +would take his worst brigade of infantry, and after a fortnight's +drill challenge and whip any of the best rebel brigades. + +Some time ago it was reported that McClellan considered this war had +become a duel of artillery. Fools wondered and applauded. I then +protested against putting such an absurdity in McClellan's mouth; now +I must believe it. To be sure, every battle is in part a duel of +artillery, but ends or is decided by charges of infantry or cavalry. +Cannonading alone never constituted and decided a battle. No position +can be taken by cannonading alone, and shells alone do not always +force an enemy to abandon a position. Napoleon, an artillerist _par +excellence_, considered campaigns and battles to be something more +than duels of artillery. The great battle of Borodino, and all others, +were decided when batteries were stormed and taken. Eylau was a battle +of charges by cavalry and by infantry, besides a terrible cannonading, +etc., etc. McClellan spoke with pride of the fortifications of +Washington, and pointed to one of the forts as having a greater +profile than had the world-renowned Malakoff. What a confusion of +notions, what a misappreciation of relative conditions! + +I cannot express my sad, mournful feelings, during this conversation +with McClellan. We spoke about the necessity of dividing his large +army into corps. McClellan took from the table an Army Almanac, and +pointed to the names of generals to whom he intended to give the +command of corps. He feels the urgency of the case, and said that Gen. +Scott prevented him from doing it; but as soon as he, McClellan, shall +be free to act, the division will be made. So General Scott is +everywhere to defend senile routine against progress, and the +experience of modern times. + +The rebels deserve, to the end of time, many curses from outraged +humanity. By their treason they forced upon the free institutions of +the North the necessity of curtailing personal liberty and other +rights; to make use of despotism for the sake of self-defence. + +The enemy concentrates and shortens his lines, and McClellan dares not +even tread on the enemy's heels. Instead of forcing the enemy to do +what we want, and upturn his schemes, McClellan seemingly does the +bidding of Beauregard. We advance as much as Beauregard allows us to +do. New tactics, to be sure, but at any rate not Napoleonic. + +The fighting in the West and some small successes here are obtained by +rough levies; and those imbecile, regular martinets surrounding +McClellan still nurse his distrust in the volunteers. All the wealth, +energy, intellect of the country, is concentrated in the hands of +McClellan, and he uses it to throw up entrenchments. The partisans of +McClellan point to his highly scientific preparations--his science. He +may have some little of it, but half-science is worse than thorough +ignorance. Oh! for one dare-devil in the Lyon, or in the old-fashioned +Yankee style. McClellan is neither a Napoleon, nor a Cabrera, nor a +Garibaldi. + +Mason and Slidell escaped to Havana on their way to Europe, as +commissioners of the rebels. According to all international +definitions, we have the full right to seize them in any neutral +vessel, they being political contrabands of war going on a publicly +avowed errand hostile to their true government. Mason and Slidell are +not common passengers, nor are they political refugees invoking the +protection of any neutral flag. They are travelling commissioners of +war, of bloodshed and rebellion; and it is all the same in whatever +seaport they embark. And if the vessel conveying them goes from +America to Europe, or _vice versa_, Mr. Seward can let them be seized +when they have left Havana, provided he finds it expedient. + +We lose time, and time is all in favor of the rebels. Every day +consolidates their existence--so to speak, crystallizes them. +Further--many so-called Union men in the South, who, at the start, +opposed secession, by and by will get accustomed to it. Secession +daily takes deeper root, and will so by degrees become _un fait +accompli_. + +Mr. Adams, in his official relations with the English government, +speaks of the rebel pirates as of lawful privateers. Mr. Seward +admonished him for it. Bravo! + +It is so difficult, not to say impossible, to meet an American who +concatenates a long series of effects and causes, or who understands +that to explain an isolated fact or phenomenon the chain must be +ascended and a general law invoked. Could they do it, various +bunglings would be avoided, and much of the people's sacrifices +husbanded, instead of being squandered, as it is done now. + +Fremont going overboard! His fall will be the triumph of the +pro-slavery party, headed by the New York Herald, and supported by +military old fogies, by martinets, and by double and triple political +and intellectual know-nothings. Pity that Fremont had no brilliant +military capacity. Then his fall could not have taken place. + +Mr. Seward is too much ruled by his imagination, and too hastily +discounts the future. But imagination ruins a statesman. Mr. Seward +must lose credit at home and abroad for having prophesied, and having +his prophecies end in smoke. When Hatteras was taken (Gen. Scott +protested against the expedition), Mr. S. assured me that it was the +beginning of the end. A diplomat here made the observation that no +minister of a European parliamentary government could remain in power +after having been continually contradicted by facts. + +Now, Mr. Seward devised these collateral missions to Europe. He very +little knows the habit and temper of European cabinets if he believes +that such collateral confidential agents can do any good. The European +cabinets distrust such irresponsible agents, who, in their turn, +weaken the influence and the standing of the genuine diplomatic +agents. Mr. S., early in the year, boasted to abolish, even in Europe, +the system of passports, and soon afterwards introduced it at home. So +his imagination carries him to overhaul the world. He proposes to +European powers a united expedition to Japan, and we cannot prevent at +home the running of the blockade, and are ourselves blockaded on the +Potomac. All such schemes are offsprings of an ambitious imagination. +But the worst is, that every such outburst of his imagination Mr. +Seward at once transforms into a dogma, and spreads it with all his +might. I pity him when I look towards the end of his political career. +He writes well, and has put down the insolent English dispatch +concerning the _habeas corpus_ and the arrests of dubious, if not +treacherous, Englishmen. Perhaps Seward imagines himself to be a +Cardinal Richelieu, with Lincoln for Louis XIII. (provided he knows as +much history), or may be he has the ambition to be considered a +Talleyrand or Metternich of diplomacy. But if any, he has some very, +very faint similarity with Alberoni. He easily outwits here men around +him; most are politicians as he; but he never can outwit the statesmen +of Europe. Besides, diplomacy, above all that of great powers, is +conceived largely and carried on a grand scale; the present diplomacy +has outgrown what is commonly called (but fallaciously) Talleyrandism +and Metternichism. + +McClellan and the party which fears to make a bold advance on the +enemy make so much fuss about the country being cut up and wooded; it +proves only that they have no brains and no fertility of expedients. +This country is not more cut up than is the Caucasus, and the woods +are no great, endless, primitive forests. They are rather groves. In +the Caucasus the Russians continually attack great and dense forests; +they fire in them several round shots, then grape, and then storm them +with the bayonet; and the Circassians are no worse soldiers than are +the Southrons. + +European papers talk much of mediation, of a peaceful arrangement, of +compromise. By intuition of the future the Northern people know very +well the utter impossibility of such an arrangement. A peace could not +stand; any such peace will establish the military superiority of the +arrogant, reckless, piratical South. The South would teem with +hundreds of thousands of men ready for any piratical, fillibustering +raid, enterprise, or excursion, of which the free States north and +west would become the principal theatres. Such a marauding community +as the South would become, in case of success, will be unexampled in +history. The Cylician pirates, the Barbary robbers, nay, the Tartars +of the 12th, 13th, and 14th centuries, were virtuous and civilized in +comparison with what would be an independent, man-stealing, and +man-whipping Southern agglomeration of lawless men. The free States +could have no security, even if _all_ the thus _called_ gentlemen and +men of honor were to sign a treaty or a compromise. The Southern +pestilential influence would poison not only the North, but this whole +hemisphere. The history of the past has nothing to be compared with +organized, legal piracy, as would become the thus-called Southern +chivalry on land and on sea; and soon European maritime powers would +be obliged to make costly expeditions for the sake of extirpating, +crushing, uprooting the nest of pirates, which then will embrace about +twelve millions,--_every_ Southern gentleman being a pirate at heart. + +This is what the Northern people know by experience and by intuition, +and what makes the people so uneasy about the inertia of the +administration. + +Mr. Lincoln, Mr. Seward, Gen. Scott, and other great men, are soured +against the people and public opinion for distrusting, or rather for +criticising their little display of statesmanlike activity. How +unjust! As a general rule, of all human sentiments, confidence is the +most scrutinizing one. If _confidence_ is bestowed, it wants to +perfectly know the _why_. But from the outset of this war the American +people gave and give to everybody full, unsuspecting confidence, +without asking the why, without even scrutinizing the actions which +were to justify the claim. + +Up to this day Secesh is the positive pole; the Union is the +negative,--it is the blow recipient. When, oh, when will come the +opposite? When will we deal blows? Not under McClellan, I suspect. + + + + +NOVEMBER, 1861. + + Ball's Bluff -- Whitewashing -- "Victoria! Old Scott gone + overboard!" -- His fatal influence -- His conceit -- Cameron -- + Intervention -- More reviews -- Weed, Everett, Hughes -- Gov. + Andrew -- Boutwell -- Mason and Slidell caught -- Lincoln + frightened by the South Carolina success -- Waits unnoticed in + McClellan's library -- Gen. Thomas -- Traitors and pedants -- The + Virginia campaign -- West Point -- McClellan's speciality -- When + will they begin to see through him? + + +The season is excellent for military operations, such as any Napoleon +could wish it. And we, lying not on our oars or arms, but in our beds, +as our _spes patriae_ is warmly and cosily established in a large +house, receiving there the incense and salutations of all flunkeys. +Even cabinet ministers crowd McClellan's antechambers! + +The massacre at Ball's Bluff is the work either of treason, or of +stupidity, or of cowardice, or most probably of all three united. + +No European government and no European nation would thus coolly bear +it. Any commander culpable of such stupidity would be forever +disgraced, and dismissed from the army. Here the administration, the +Cabinet, and all the Scotts, the McClellans, the Thomases, etc., +strain their brains and muscles to whitewash themselves or the +culprit--to represent this massacre as something very innocent. + +Victoria! Victoria! Old Scott, Old Mischief, gone overboard! So +vanished one of the two evil genii keeping guard over Mr. Lincoln's +brains. But it will not be so easy to redress the evil done by Scott. +He nailed the country's cause to such a turnpike that any of his +successors will perhaps be unable to undo what Old Mischief has done. +Scott might have had certain, even eminent, military capacity; but, +all things considered, he had it only on a small scale. Scott never +had in his hand large numbers, and hundreds of European generals of +divisions would do the same that Scott did, even in Mexico. Any one in +Europe, who in some way or other participated in the events of the +last forty years, has had occasion to see or participate in one single +day in more and better fighting, to hear more firing, and smell more +powder, than has General Scott in his whole life. + +Scott's fatal influence palsied, stiffened, and poisoned every noble +or higher impulse, and every aspiration of the people. Scott +diligently sowed the first seeds of antagonism between volunteers and +regulars, and diligently nursed them. Around his person in the War +Department, and in the army, General Scott kept and maintained +officers, who, already before the inauguration, declared, and daily +asserted, that if it comes to a war, few officers of the army will +unite with the North and remain loyal to the Union. + +He never forgot to be a Virginian, and was filled with all a +Virginian's conceit. To the last hour he warded off blows aimed at +Virginia. To this hour he never believed in a serious war, and now +_requiescat in pace_ until the curse of coming generations. + +McClellan is invested with all the powers of Scott. McClellan has more +on his shoulders than any man--a Napoleon not excepted--can stand; and +with his very limited capacity McClellan must necessarily break under +it. Now McClellan will be still more idolized. He is already a kind of +dictator, as Lincoln, Seward, etc., turn around him. + +In a conversation with Cameron, I warned him against bestowing such +powers on McClellan. "What shall we do?" was Cameron's answer; +"neither the President nor I know anything about military affairs." +Well, it is true; but McClellan is scarcely an apprentice. + +Again the intermittent fear, or fever, of foreign intervention. How +absurd! Americans belittle themselves talking and thinking about it. +The European powers will not, and cannot. That is my creed and my +answer; but some of our agents, diplomats, and statesmen, try to made +capital for themselves from this fever which they evoke to establish +before the public that their skill preserves the country from foreign +intervention. Bosh! + +All the good and useful produced in the life and in the economy of +nations, all the just and the right in their institutions, all the ups +and downs, misfortunes and disasters befalling them, all this was, is, +and forever will be the result of logical deductions from +pre-existing dates and facts. And here almost everybody forgets the +yesterday. + +A revolution imposes obligations. A revolution makes imperative the +development and the practical application of those social principles +which are its basis. + +The American Revolution of 1776 proclaimed self-government, equality +before all, happiness of all, etc.; it is therefore the peremptory +duty of the American people to uproot domestic oligarchy, based upon +living on the labor of an enslaved man; it has to put a stop to the +moral, intellectual, and physical servitude of both, of whites and of +colored. + +Eminent men in America are taunted with the ambition to reach the +White House. In itself it is not condemnable; it is a noble or an +ignoble ambition, according to the ways and means used to reach that +aim. It is great and stirring to see one's name recorded in the list +of Presidents of the United States; but there is still a record far +shorter, but by far more to be envied--a record venerated by our +race--it is the record of truly _great men_. The actually inscribed +runners for the White House do not think of this. + +No one around me here seems to understand (and no one is familiar +enough with general history) that protracted wars consolidate a +nationality. Every day of Southern existence shapes it out more and +more into a _nation_, with all the necessary moral and material +conditions of existence. + +Seeing these repeated reviews, I cannot get rid of the idea that by +such shows and displays McClellan tries to frighten the rebels in the +Chinaman fashion. + +The collateral missions to England, France, and Spain, are to add +force to our cause before the public opinion as well as before the +rulers. But what a curious choice of men! It would be called even an +unhappy one. Thurlow Weed, with his offhand, apparently sincere, if +not polished ways, may not be too repulsive to English refinement, +provided he does not buttonhole his interlocutionists, or does not pat +them on the shoulder. So Thurlow Weed will be dined, wined, etc. But +doubtless the London press will show him up, or some "Secesh" in +London will do it. I am sure that Lord Lyons, as it is his paramount +duty, has sent to Earl Russell a full and detailed biography of this +Seward's _alter ego_, sent _ad latus_ to Mr. Adams. Thurlow Weed will +be considered an agreeable fellow; but he never can acquire much +weight and consideration, neither with the statesmen, nor with the +members of the government, nor in saloons, nor with the public at +large. + +Edward Everett begged to be excused from such a false position offered +to him in London. Not fish, not flesh. It was rather an offence to +proffer it to Everett. The old patriot better knows Europe, its +cabinets, and exigencies, than those who attempted to intricate him in +this ludicrous position. He is right, and he will do more good here +than he could do in London--there on a level with Thurlow Weed! + +Archbishop Hughes is to influence Paris and France,--but whom? The +public opinion, which is on our side, is anti-Roman, and Hughes is an +Ultra Montane--an opinion not over friendly to Louis Napoleon. The +French clergy in every way, in culture, wisdom, instruction, theology, +manners, deportment, etc., is superior to Hughes in incalculable +proportions, and the French clergy are already generally anti-slavery. +Hughes to act on Louis Napoleon! Why! the French Emperor can outwit a +legion of Hugheses, and do this without the slightest effort. Besides, +for more than a century European sovereigns, governments, and +cabinets, have generally given up the use of bishops, etc., for +political, public, or confidential missions. Mr. Seward stirs up old +dust. All the liberal party in Europe or France will look astonished, +if not worse, at this absurdity. + +All things considered, it looks like one of Seward's personal tricks, +and Seward outwitted Chase, took him in by proffering a similar +mission to Chase's friend, Bishop McIlvaine. But I pity Dayton. He is +a high-toned man, and the mission of Hughes is a humiliation to +Dayton. + +Whatever may be the objects of these missions, they look like petty +expedients, unworthy a minister of a great government. + +Mason and Slidell caught. England will roar, but here the people are +satisfied. Some of the diplomats make curious faces. Lord Lyons +behaves with dignity. The small Bremen flatter right and left, and do +it like little lap-dogs. + +Governor Andrew of Massachusetts, ex-Governor Boutwell, are tip-top +men--men of the people. The Blairs are too heinous, too violent, in +their persecution of Fremont. Warned M. Blair not to protect one whom +Fremont deservedly expelled. But M. Blair, in his spite against +Fremont, took a mean adventurer by the hand, and entangled therein the +President. + +The vessel and the crew are excellent, and would easily obey the hand +of a helmsman, but there is the rub, where to find him? Lincoln is a +simple man of the prairie, and his eyes penetrate not the fog, the +tempest. They do not perceive the signs of the times--cannot embrace +the horizon of the nation. And thus his small intellectual insight is +dimmed by those around him. Lincoln begins now already to believe that +he is infallible; that he is ahead of the people, and frets that the +people may remain behind. Oh simplicity or conceit! + +Again, Lincoln is frightened with the success in South Carolina, as in +his opinion this success will complicate the question of slavery. He +is frightened as to what he shall do with Charleston and Augusta, +provided these cities are taken. + +It is disgusting to hear with what superciliousness the different +members of the Cabinet speak of the approaching Congress--and not one +of them is in any way the superior of many congressmen. + +When Congress meets, the true national balance account will be +struck. The commercial and piratical flag of the secesh is virtually +in all waters and ports. (The little cheese-eater, the Hollander, was +the first to raise a fuss against the United States concerning the +piratical flag. This is not to be forgotten.) 2d. Prestige, to a great +extent, lost. 3d. Millions upon millions wasted. Washington besieged +and blockaded, and more than 200,000 men kept in check by an enemy not +by half as strong. 4th. Every initiative which our diplomacy tried +abroad was wholly unsuccessful, and we are obliged to submit to new +international principles inaugurated at our cost; and, summing up, +instead of a broad, decided, general policy, we have vacillation, +inaction, tricks, and expedients. The people fret, and so will the +Congress. Nations are as individuals; any partial disturbance in a +part of the body occasions a general chill. Nature makes efforts to +check the beginning of disease, and so do nations. In the human +organism nature does not submit willingly to the loss of health, or of +a limb, or of life. Nature struggles against death. So the people of +the Union will not submit to an amputation, and is uneasy to see how +unskilfully its own family doctors treat the national disease. + +Port Royal, South Carolina, taken. Great and general rejoicing. It is +a brilliant feat of arms, but a questionable military and war policy. +Those attacks on the circumference, or on extremities, never can +become a death-blow to secesh. The rebels must be crushed in the +focus; they ought to receive a blow at the heart. This new strategy +seems to indicate that McClellan has not heart enough to attack the +fastnesses of rebeldom, but expects that something may turn up from +these small expeditions. He expects to weaken the rebels in their +focus. I wish McClellan may be right in his expectations, but I doubt +it. + +Officers of McClellan's staff tell that Mr. Lincoln almost daily comes +into McClellan's library, and sits there rather unnoticed. On several +occasions McClellan let the President wait in the room, together with +other common mortals. + +The English statesmen and the English press have the notion deeply +rooted in their brains that the American people fight for empire. The +rebels do it, but not the free men. + +Mr. Seward's emphatical prohibition to Mr. Adams to mention the +question of slavery may have contributed to strengthen in England the +above-mentioned fallacy. This is a blunder, which before long or short +Seward will repent. It looks like astuteness--_ruse_; but if so, it is +the resource of a rather limited mind. In great and minor affairs, +straightforwardness is the best policy. Loyalty always gets the better +of astuteness, and the more so when the opponent is unprepared to meet +it. Tricks can be well met by tricks, but tricks are impotent against +truth and sincerity. But Mr. Seward, unhappily, has spent his life in +various political tricks, and was surrounded by men whose intimacy +must have necessarily lowered and unhealthily affected him. All his +most intimates are unintellectual mediocrities or tricksters. + +Seward is free from that infamous know-nothingism of which this Gen. +Thomas is the great master (a man every few weeks accused of treason +by the public opinion, and undoubtedly vibrating between loyalty here +and sympathy with rebels). + +All this must have unavoidably vitiated Mr. Seward's better nature. In +such way only can I see plainly why so many excellent qualities are +marred in him. He at times can broadly comprehend things around him; +he is good-natured when not stung, and he is devoted to his men. + +As a patriot, he is American to the core--were only his domestic +policy straightforward and decided, and would he only stop meddling +with the plans of the campaign, and let the War Department alone. + +Since every part of his initiative with European cabinets failed, +Seward very skilfully dispatches all the minor affairs with +Europe--affairs generated by various maritime and international +complications. Were his domestic policy as correct as is now his +foreign policy, Seward would be the right man. + +Statesmanship emerges from the collision of great principles with +important interests. In the great Revolution, the thus called fathers +of the nation were the offsprings of the exigencies of the time, and +they were fully up to their task. They were vigorous and fresh; their +intellect was not obstructed by any political routine, or by tricky +political praxis. Such men are now needed at the helm to carry this +noble people throughout the most terrible tempest. So in these days +one hears so much about constitutional formulas as safeguards of +liberty. True liberty is not to be virtually secured by any framework +of rules and limitations, devisable only by statecraft. The perennial +existence of liberty depends not on the action of any definite and +ascertainable machinery, but on continual accessions of fresh and +vital influences. But perhaps such influences are among the noblest, +and therefore among the rarest, attributes of man. + +Abroad and here, traitors and some pedants on formulas make a noise +concerning the violation of formulas. Of course it were better if such +violations had been left undone. But all this is transient, and evoked +by the direst necessity. The Constitution was made for a healthy, +normal condition of the nation; the present condition is abnormal. +Regular functions are suspended. When the human body is ruined or +devoured by a violent disease, often very tonic remedies are +used--remedies which would destroy the organism if administered when +in a healthy, normal condition. A strong organism recovers from +disease, and from its treatment. Human societies and institutions pass +through a similar ordeal, and when they are unhinged, extraordinary +and abnormal ways are required to maintain the endangered society and +restore its equipoise. + +Examining day after day the map of Virginia, it strikes one that a +movement with half of the army could be made down from Mount Vernon by +the two turnpike roads, and by water to Occoquan, and from there to +Brentsville. The country there seems to be flat, and not much wooded. +Manassas would be taken in the rear, and surrounded, provided the +other half of the army would push on by the direct way from here to +Manassas, and seriously attack the enemy, who thus would be broken, +could not escape. This, or any plan, the map of Virginia ought to +suggest to the staff of McClellan, were it a staff in the true +meaning. Dybitsch and Toll, young colonels in the staff of Alexander +I., 1813-'14, originated the march on Paris, so destructive to +Napoleon. History bristles with evidences how with staffs originated +many plans of battles and of campaigns; history explains the paramount +influence of staffs on the conduct of a war. Of course Napoleon wanted +not a suggestive, but only an executive staff; but McClellan is not a +Napoleon, and has neither a suggestive nor an executive staff around +him. A Marcy to suggest a plan of a campaign or of a battle, to watch +over its execution! + +I spoke to McDowell about the positions of Occoquan and Brentsville. +He answered that perhaps something similar will be under +consideration, and that McClellan must show his mettle and capacity. I +pity McDowell's confidence. + +Besides, the American army as it was and is educated, nursed, brought +up by Gen. Scott,--the army has no idea what are the various and +complicated duties of a staff. No school of staff at West Point; +therefore the difficulty to find now genuine officers of the staff. +If McClellan ever moves this army, then the defectiveness of his staff +may occasion losses and even disasters. It will be worse with his +staff than it was at Jena with the Prussian staff, who were as +conceited as the small West Point clique here in Washington. + +West Point instructs well in special branches, but does not +necessarily form generals and captains. The great American Revolution +was fought and made victorious by men not from any military schools, +and to whom were opposed commanders with as much military science as +there was possessed and current in Europe. Jackson, Taylor, and even +Scott, are not from the school. + +I do not wish to judge or disparage the pupils from West Point, but I +am disgusted with the supercilious and ridiculous behavior of the +clique here, ready to form praetorians or anything else, and poisoning +around them the public opinion. Western generals are West Point +pupils, but I do not hear them make so much fuss, and so +contemptuously look down on the volunteers. These Western generals +pine not after regulars, but make use of such elements as they have +under hand. The best and most patriotic generals and officers here, +educated at West Point, are numerous. Unhappily a clique, composed of +a few fools and fops, overshadows the others. + +McClellan's speciality is engineering. It is a speciality which does +not form captains and generals for the field,--at least such instances +are very rare. Of all Napoleon's marshals and eminent commanders, +Berthier alone was educated as engineer, and his speciality and high +capacity was that of a chief of the staff. Marescott or Todleben would +never claim to be captains. The intellectual powers of an engineer are +modeled, drilled, turned towards the defensive,--the engineer's brains +concentrate upon selecting defensive positions, and combine how to +strengthen them by art. So an engineer is rather disabled from +embracing a whole battle-field, with its endless casualties and space. +Engineers are the incarnation of a defensive warfare; all others, as +artillerists, infantry, and cavalry, are for dashing into the +unknown--into the space; and thus these specialities virtually +represent the offensive warfare. + +When will they begin to see through McClellan, and find out that he is +not the man? Perhaps too late, and then the nation will sorely feel +it. + +Mr. Seward almost idolizes McClellan. Poor homage that; but it does +mischief by reason of its influence on the public opinion. + + + + +DECEMBER, 1861. + + The message -- Emancipation -- State papers published -- Curtis + Noyes -- Greeley not fit for Senator -- Generalship all on the + rebel side -- The South and the North -- The sensationists -- The + new idol will cost the people their life-blood! -- The Blairs -- + Poor Lincoln! -- The Trent affair -- Scott home again -- The war + investigation committee -- Mr. Mercier. + + +McClellan is now all-powerful, and refuses to divide the army into +corps. Thus much for his brains and for his consistency. + +The message--a disquisition upon labor and capital; hesitancy about +slavery. The President wishes to be pushed on by public opinion. But +public opinion is safe, and expects from the official leader a decided +step onwards. The message gives no solution, suggests none, accounts +not for the lost time--foreshadows not a vigorous, energetic effort to +crush the rebellion; foreshadows not a vigorous, offensive war. The +message is an honest paper, but says not much. + +The question of emancipation is not clear even in the heads of the +leading emancipationists; not one thinks to give freeholds to the +emancipated. It is the only way to make them useful to themselves and +to the community. Freedom without land is humbug, and the fools speak +of exportation of the four millions of slaves, depriving thus the +country of laborers, which a century of emigration cannot fill again. +All these fools ought to be sent to a lunatic asylum. + +To export the emancipated would be equivalent to devastation of the +South, to its transformation into a wilderness. Small freeholds for +the emancipated can be cut out of the plantations of rebels, or out of +the public lands of each State--lands forfeited by the rebellion. + +State papers published. The instructions to the various diplomatic +agents betray a beginner in the diplomatic career. By writing special +instructions for each minister, Mr. Seward unnecessarily increased his +task. The cause, reasons, etc., of the rebellion are one and the same +for France or Russia, and a single explanatory circular for all the +ministers would have done as well and spared a great deal of labor. +Cavour wrote one circular to all cabinets, and so do all European +statesmen. So, as they are, the State papers are a curious +agglomeration of good patriotism and confusion. So the Minister to +England is to avoid slavery; the Minister to France has the contrary. +All this is not smartness or diplomacy, but rather confusion, +insincerity, and double-dealing. One must conclude that Lincoln and +Seward have themselves no firm opinion. The instructions to Mexico +would sound nobly-worded but for the confusion and the veil ordered to +be thrown upon the cause of secession. That to Italy, above all to +Austria, has a smack of a schoolmaster displaying his information +before a gaping boy. It is offensive to the Minister going to Vienna. +It may be suspected that some of these instructions were written to +make capital at home, to astonish Mr. Lincoln with the knowledge of +Europe and the familiarity with European affairs. All this display +will prove to Europeans rather an ignorance of Europe. The +correspondence on the Paris convention is splendid, although the +initiative taken by Seward on this question was a mistake. But he +argued well the case against the English and French reservations. + +Never any government whatever treated so tenderly its worst and most +dangerous enemies as does this government the Washington +secessionists, spies for the enemy, and spreading false news here to +frighten McClellan. + +The old regular, but partly worn-out Republican leaders throttle and +neutralize the new, fresh, vigorous accessions. So Curtis Noyes, one +of the most eminent and devoted men, could not come into the Senate +because Greeley wished to be elected. + +No living man has rendered greater services to the people during the +last twenty years than Greeley; but he ought to remain in his +speciality. Greeley is no more fit for a Senator than to take the +command of a regiment. Besides, the events already run over his head; +Greeley is slowly breaking down. + +McClellan is beset with all kinds of inventors, contractors, etc. He +mostly endorses their suggestions, and on this authority the most +extravagant orders are given by the War Department. All this ought to +be investigated. Somebody back of McClellan may be found as being the +real patron of these leeches. + +If the genius or capacity of a commander consists not only in closely +observing the movements of the enemy, but likewise in penetrating the +enemy's plans and in modifying his own in proportion as they are +deranged by an unexpected movement or a rapid march, then the +generalship is altogether on the other side, and on ours not a sign, +not a breath of it. + +A civil war is mostly the purifying fire in a nation's existence. It +is to be hoped that this great convulsion will purify the free States +by sounding the death-knell of these small intriguing politicians. The +American people at large will acquire earnestness, knowledge of men, +and clear insight into its own affairs. Tricky politicians will be +discarded, and true men backed by majorities. + +The South has for its leaders the chiefs who for years organized the +secession, who waged everything on its success, as life, honor, +fortune, and who incite and carry with them the ignorant masses. + +The reverse is in the North. Mr. Lincoln was not elected for +suppressing the rebellion, nor did he make his Cabinet in view of a +terrible national struggle for death or life. Neither Lincoln nor his +Cabinet are the inciters or the inspiring leaders of the people, but +only expressions--not _ad hoc_--of the national will. This is one +reason why the administration is slower than the people, and why the +rebel administration is quicker than ours. + +The second reason, and generated by the first, is, that every rebel +devotes his whole soul and energy to the success of the rebellion, +forcibly forgetting his individuality. Our thus called leaders think +first of their little selves, whose aggrandizement the public events +are to secure, and the public cause is to square itself with their +individual schemes. + +Such is the policy of almost all those at the helm here. Not one among +them is to be found deserving the name of a statesman, endowed with a +great devotion, and with a great power, for the service of a great and +noble aim. From the solemn hour that the fatherland honorably chains +him to its service, the genuine statesman exists no more for himself, +but for his country alone. If necessary, he ought to consider himself +a victim to the public good, even were the public unjust towards him. +He is to treat as enemies all the dirty, tricky, and mean passions and +men. His enemies will hate, but the country, his enemies included, +will esteem him. Such a man will be the genuine man of the American +people, but he exists not in the official spheres. + +It is for the first time in history that a young, insignificant man, +without a past, without any reason, is put in such a lofty position as +has been McClellan; he is to be literally kicked into greatness, and +into showing eventually courage. All this is a psychological problem! + +Kent's Commentary upon the qualifications of a President is the best +criticism upon Lincoln. + +These mosquitoes of public opinion, the sensation-seekers, the +sentimental preachers, the lecturers, the amateurs of the thus called +representative men, these oratorical falsifiers of history, but +considered here as luminaries, are already at their pernicious, nay, +accursed work. + +They poison the judgment of the people. These hero-seekers for their +sermons, lectures, and sensation productions, have already found all +the criteria of a hero in McClellan, even in his chin, in the back of +his horse, etc., etc., and now herald it all over the country. Curses +be upon them. + +No nation has ever raised idols with such facility as do the +Americans. Nay, I do not suppose that there ever existed in history a +nation with such a thirst for idols as this people. I may be a false +prophet; but this new idol, McClellan, will cost them their +life-blood. + +The Blairs are now staunch supporters of McClellan. It is +unpardonable. They ought to know, and they do know better. But Mr. +Blair wishes to be Secretary of War in Cameron's place, and wishes to +get it through McClellan. + +And poor Lincoln! I pity him; but his advisers may make out of him +something worse even than was Judas, in the curses of ages. + +Polybius asserts that when the Greeks wrote about Rome they erred and +lied, and when the Romans wrote of themselves they lied or boasted. +The same the English do in relation to themselves, and to Americans. +Above all, in this Trent affair, or excitement, all European writers +for the press, professors, doctors, etc., pervert facts, reason, and +international laws, forget the past, and lie or flatter, with a slight +exception, as is Gasparin. + +The Trent affair finished. We are a little humbled, but it was +expedient to terminate it so. With another military leader than +McClellan, we could march at the same time to Richmond, and invest +Canada before any considerable English force could arrive there. But +with such a hero at our head, better that it ends so. Europe will +applaud us, and the relation with England will become clarified. +Perhaps England would not have been so stiff in this Trent affair but +for the fixed idea in Russell's, Newcastle's, Palmerston's, etc., +heads that Seward wishes to pick a quarrel with England. + +The first weeks of Seward's premiership pointed that way. Mr. Seward +has the honors of the Trent affair. It is well as it is; the argument +is smart, but a little too long, and not in a genuine diplomatic +style. But Lincoln ought to have a little credit for it, as from the +start he was for giving the traitors up. + +The worst feature of the whole Trent affair is, that it brought back +home from France this old mischief, General Scott. He will again +resume his position as the first military authority in the country, +confuse the judgment of Lincoln, of the press, and of the people, and +again push the country into mire. + +The Congress appointed a War Investigating Committee, Senator Wade at +the head. There is hope that the committee will quickly find out what +a terrible mistake this McClellan is, and warn the nation of him. But +Lincoln, Seward, and the Blairs, will not give up their idol. + +Louis Napoleon said his word about the Trent affair. All things +considered, the conduct of the Emperor cannot be complained of. The +Thouvenel paper is serious, severe, but intrinsically not unfriendly. +Quite the contrary. Up to this time I am right in my reliance on Louis +Napoleon, on his sound, cool, but broad comprehension. + +Mr. Mercier behaves well, and he is to be relied on, provided we show +mettle and fight the traitors. Now, as the European imbroglio is +clarified, _at them_, _at them_! But nothing to hope or expect from +McClellan. I daily preach, but in the wilderness. Prince de Joinville +made a very ridiculous fuss about the Trent affair. + +Americans believe that a statesman must be an orator. Schoolboy-like, +they judge on English precedents. In England, the Parliament is +omnipotent; it makes and unmakes administrations, therefore oratory is +a necessary corollary in a statesman; but here the Cabinet acts +without parliamentary wranglings, and a Jackson is the true type of an +American statesman. Washington was not an orator, nor was Alexander +Hamilton. + + + + +JANUARY, 1862. + + The year 1861 ends badly -- European defenders of slavery -- + Secession lies -- Jeremy Diddlers -- Sensation-seekers -- + Despotic tendencies -- Atomistic Torquemadas -- Congress chained + by formulas -- Burnside's expedition a sign of life -- Will this + McClellan ever advance? -- Mr. Adams unhorsed -- He packs his + trunks -- Bad blankets -- Austria, Prussia, and Russia -- The + West Point nursery -- McClellan a greater mistake than Scott -- + Tracks to the White House -- European stories about Mr. Lincoln + -- The English ignorami -- The slaveholder a scarcely varnished + savage -- Jeff. Davis -- "Beauregard frightens us -- McClellan + rocks his baby" -- Fancy army equipment -- McClellan and his + chief of staff sick in bed -- "No satirist could invent such + things" -- Stanton in the Cabinet -- "This Stanton is the people" + -- Fremont -- Weed -- The English will not be humbugged -- Dayton + in a fret -- Beaufort -- The investigating committee condemn + McClellan -- Lincoln in the clutches of Seward and Blair -- Banks + begs for guns and cavalry in vain -- The people will awake! -- + The question of race -- Agassiz. + + +An ugly year ended in backing before England, having, at least, +relative right on our side. Further, the ending year has revealed a +certain incapacity in the Republican party's leaders, at least its +official leaders, to administer the country and to grasp the events. +If the new year shall be only the continuation of the faults, the +mistakes, and the incapacities prevailing during 1861, then the worst +is to be expected. + +The lowest in moral degradation is an European defending slavery here +or in Europe. Such Europeans are far below the condemned criminals. +Still lower are such Europeans who become defenders of slavery after +having visited plantations, where, in the shape of wines and +delicacies, they tasted human blood, and then, hyenas-like, smacked +their lips And thirsted for more. + +Always the same stories, lies, and humbugs concerning the hundreds of +thousands of rebels in Manassas. These lies are spread here in +Washington by the numerous secessionists--at large, by such ignoble +sheets as the New York Herald and Times; and McClellan seems to +willingly swallow these lies, as they justify his inaction and c----. + +The city is more and more crowded with Jeremy Diddlers, with +lecturers, with sensation-seekers, all of them in advance discounting +their hero, and showing in broad light their gigantic stupidity. One +of this motley finds in McClellan a Norman chin, the other muscle, the +third a brow for laurels (of thistle I hope), another a square, +military, heroic frame, another firmness in lips, another an +unfathomed depth in the eye, etc., etc. Never I heard in Europe such +balderdash. And the ladies--not the women and gentlewomen--are worse +than the men in thus stupefying themselves and those around them. + +The thus called arbitrary acts of the government prove how easily, on +the plea of patriotic necessity, a people, nay, the public opinion, +submits to arbitrary rule. All this, servility included, explains the +facility with which, in former times, concentrated and concrete +despotisms have been established. Here every such arbitrary action is +submitted to, because it is so new, and because the people has the +childish, naive, but, to it, honorable confidence, that the power +entrusted by the people is used in the interest and for the welfare of +the people. But all the despots of all times and of all nations said +the same. However, in justice to Mr. Lincoln, he is pure, and has no +despotical longings, but he has around him some atomistic Torquemadas. + +It will be very difficult to the coming generations to believe that a +people, a generation, who for half a century was outrunning the time, +who applied the steam and the electro-magnetic telegraph, that the +same people, when overrun by a terrible crisis, moved slowly, waited +patiently, and suffered from the mismanagement of its leaders. This is +to be exclusively explained by the youthful self-consciousness of an +internal, inexhaustible vital force, and by the child-like +inexperience. + +The Congress, that is, the majority, shows that it is aware of the +urgency of the case, and of the dangerous position of the country. But +still the best in Congress are chained, hampered by the formulas. + +The good men in both the houses seem to be firmly decided not to +quietly stand by and assist in the murder of the nation by the +administrative and military incapacity. This was to be expected from +such men as Wade, Grimes, Chandler, Hale, Wilson, Sumner (too +classical), and other Republicans in the Senate, and from the numerous +pure, radical Republicans in the House. + +Burnside's expedition is a sign of life. But all these expeditions on +the circumference, even if successful, will be fruitless if no bold, +decided movement is at once made at the centre, at the heart of the +rebellion. But McClellan, as his supporters say, matures his +_strategical_ plans. O God! General Scott lost _by strategy_ +three-fourths of the country's cause, and very probably by strategy +McClellan will jeopardize what remains of it. + +Will this McClellan ever advance? If he lingers, he may find only rats +in Manassas. McClellan is ignorant of the great, unique rule for all +affairs and undertakings,--it is to throw the whole man in one thing +at one time. It is the same in the camp as in the study, for a captain +as for a lawyer, the savant, and the scholar. + +It is to be regretted that some of the men truly and thoroughly +devoted to the cause of freedom and of humanity, mix with it such an +enormous quantity of personal, almost childish vanity, as to puzzle +many minds concerning the genuine nobleness of their devotion. It is +to be regretted that those otherwise so self-sacrificing patriots +discount even their martyrdom and persecutions, and credit them to +their frivolous self-satisfaction. + +Most of the thus-called well-informed Americans rather skim over than +thoroughly study history. Above all, it applies to the general history +of the Christian era, and of our great epoch (from the second half of +the 18th century). Most of the Americans are only very superficially +familiar with the history of continental Europe, or know it only by +its contact with the history of England. Many of them are more +familiar with the classical wars of Alexander, Hannibal, Caesar, etc., +than with those of Gustavus, Frederick II., and even of Napoleon. Were +it otherwise, _strategy_ would not to such an extent have taken hold +of their brains. + +Mr. Adams was terribly unhorsed during the Trent excitement in +England; he literally began to pack up his trunks, and asked a +personal advice from Lord John Russell. + +What a devoted patriot this Sandford in Belgium is; he has continual +_itchings in his hand_ to pay a _higher price_ for bad blankets that +they may not fall into the hands of secesh agents; so with cloth, so +perhaps with arms. _Oh, disinterested patriot!_ + +Austria and Prussia whipped in by England and France, and at the same +time glad to have an occasion to take the airs of maritime powers. +Austria and Prussia sent their advice concerning the Trent affair. The +kick of asses at what they suppose to be the dying lion. + +Austria and Prussia! Great heavens! Ask the prisons of both those +champions of violated rights how many better men than Slidell and +Mason groaned in them; and the conduct of those powers against the +Poles in 1831! Was it neutral or honest? + +I am sure that Russia will behave well, and abstain from coming +forward with uncalled-for and humiliating advice. Russia is a true +great power,--a true friend,--and such noble behavior will be in +harmony with the character of Alexander II., and with the friendliness +and clear perception of events held by the Russian minister here. I +hope that when the war is over the West Point nursery will be +reformed, and a general military organization introduced, such a one +as exists in Switzerland. + +McClellan is a greater mistake than was even Scott. McClellan knows +not the A B C of military history of any nation or war, or he would +not keep this army so in camp. He would know that after recruits have +been roughly instructed in the rudiments of a drill, the next best +instructor is fighting. So it was in the thirty years' war; so in the +American Revolution; so in the first French revolutionary wars. +Strategians, martinets, lost the battles, or rather the campaigns, of +Austerlitz, of Jena, etc. In 1813 German rough levies fought almost +before they were drilled, and at Bautzen French recruits were +victorious over Prussians, Russians, and Austrians. The secesh fight +with fresh levies, etc. + +Numerous political intriguers surrounding McClellan are busily laying +tracks for him to the White House. What will Seward and Chase say to +it, and even old Abe, who himself dreams of re-election, or at least +his friends do it for him? All these candidates forget that the surest +manner to reach the White House is not to think of it--to forget +oneself and to act. + +It is amusing to find in European papers all the various stories about +Mr. Lincoln. There he is represented as a violent, blood-thirsty +revolutionaire, dragging the people after him. In this manner, those +European imbeciles are acquainted with American events, character, +etc. They cannot find out that in decision, in clear-sightedness and +soundness of judgment, the people are far ahead of Mr. Lincoln and of +his spiritual or constitutional conscience-keepers. And the same +imbeciles, if not _canailles_, speak of a mob-rule over the President, +etc. Some one ought to enlighten those French and English supercilious +ignorami that something like a mob only prevails in such cities as New +York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore; and nine-tenths of such a mob are +mostly yet unwashed, unrepublicanized Europeans. The ninety-nine +one-hundredths of the freemen of the North are more orderly, more +enlightened, more law-abiding, and more moral than are the English +lordlings, somebodies, nobodies, and would-be somebodies. In the West, +lynch-law, to be sure, is at times used against brothels, bar-rooms, +gambling-houses, and thieves. It would be well to do the same in +London, were it not that most of the lynch-lawed may not belong to the +people. If the European scribblers were not past any honest impulse, +they would know that the South is the generator and the congenial +region for the mob, the filibusters, the revolver and the bowie-knife +rule. In the South the proportion of mobs to decency is the reverse of +that prevailing in the free States. The _slavery gentleman_ is a +scarcely varnished savage, for whom the highest law is his reckless +passion and will. + +If Jeff. Davis succeeds, he will be the founder of a new and great +slaveholding empire. His name will resound in after times; but history +will record his name as that of a curse to humanity. + +And so Davis is making history and Lincoln is telling stories. +Beauregard gets inspired by the fumes of bivouacs; McClellan by the +fumes of flatterers. Beauregard frightens us, McClellan rocks his +baby. Beauregard shares the camp-fires of his soldiers; he sees them +daily, knows them, as it is said, one by one; McClellan lives +comfortably in the city, and appears only to the soldiers as the great +Lama on special occasions. Camp-fellowship inspired all the great +captains and established the magnetic current between the leader and +the soldier. + +McClellan organized a board of generals, arriving daily from the +camps, to discuss some new fancy army equipment. And Lincoln, Seward, +Blair, and all the tail of intriguers and imbeciles, still admire him. +In no other country would such a futile man be kept in command of +troops opposed to a deadly and skilful enemy. + +For several weeks, McClellan and his chief of the staff (such as he +is) are sick in bed, and no one is _ad interim_ appointed to attend to +the current affairs of our army of 600,000, having the enemy before +their nose. Oh human imbecility! No satirist could invent such things; +and if told, it would not be believed in Europe. + +The McClellan-worship by the people at large is to be explained by the +firm, ardent will of the people to crush the rebels, and by the +general feeling of the necessity of a man for that purpose. Such is +the case with the true, confiding people in the country; but here, +contractors, martinets, and intriguers are the blowers of that +worship. Lincoln is as is the people at large; but a Seward, a Blair, +a Herald, a Times, and their respective and numerous tails,--as for +their motives, they are the reverse of Lincoln and of the people. + +Victories in Kentucky, beyond the circumference or the direct action +from here; they are obtained without strategy and by rough levies. But +this voice of events is not understood by the McClellan tross. + +Change in the Cabinet: Stanton, a new man, not from the parlor, and +not from the hacks. His bulletin on the victory in Kentucky +inaugurated a new era. It is a voice that nobody hitherto uttered in +America. It is the awakening voice of the good genius of the people, +almost as that which awoke Lazarus. This Stanton is the people; I +never saw him, but I hope he is the man for the events; perhaps he may +turn out to be _my_ statesman. + +I wish I could get convinced of the real superiority of Fremont. It is +true that he was treated badly and had natural and artificial +difficulties to over come; it is true that to him belongs the credit +of having started the construction of the mortar fleet; but likewise +it is true that he was, at the mildest, unsurpassingly reckless in +contracts and expenditures, and I shall never believe him a general. +With all this, Fremont started a great initiative at a time when +McClellan and three-fourths of the generals of his creation considered +it a greater crime to strike at a _gentleman_ slaveholder than to +strike at the Union. + +The courtesies and hospitalities paid to Thurlow Weed by English +society are clamored here in various ways. These courtesies prove the +high breeding and the good-will of a part, at least, of the English +aristocracy and of English statesmen. I do not suppose that Thurlow +Weed could ever have been admitted in such society if he were +travelling on his own merits as the great lobbyist and politician. At +the utmost, he would have been shown up as a _rara avis_. But +introduced to English society as the master spirit of Mr. Seward, and +as Seward's semi-official confidential agent, Thurlow Weed was +admitted, and even petted. But it is another question if this palming +of a Thurlow Weed upon the English high-toned statesmen increased +their consideration for Mr. Seward. The Duke of Newcastle and others +are not yet softened, and refuse to be humbugged. + +Whoever has the slightest knowledge of how affairs are transacted, is +well aware that the times of a personal diplomacy are almost gone. The +exceptions are very rare, very few, and the persons must be of other +might and intellectual mettle than a Sandford, Weed, or Hughes. Great +affairs are not conducted or decided by conversations, but by great +interests. Diplomatic agents, at the utmost, serve to keep their +respective governments informed about the run of events. Mr. Mercier +does it for Louis Napoleon; but Mr. Mercier's reports, however +friendly they may be, cannot much influence a man of such depth as +Louis Napoleon, and to imagine that a Hughes will be able to do it! I +am ashamed of Mr. Seward; he proves by this would-be-crotchety policy +how little he knows of events and of men, and how he undervalues Louis +Napoleon. Such humbug missions are good to throw dirt in the eyes of a +Lincoln, a Chase, etc., but in Europe such things are sent to +Coventry. And Hughes to influence Spain! Oh! oh! + +Dayton frets on account of the mission of Hughes. Dayton is right. +Generally Dayton shows a great deal of good sense, of good +comprehension, and a noble and independent character. He is not a +flatterer, not servile, and subservient to Mr. Seward, as are +others--Mr. Adams, Mr. Sandford, and some few other diplomatic agents. + +The active and acting abolitionists ought to concentrate all their +efforts to organize thoroughly and efficiently the district of +Beaufort. The success of a productive colony there would serve as a +womb for the emancipation at large. + +Mr. Seward declares that he has given up meddling with military +affairs. For his own sake, and for the sake of the country, I ardently +wish it were so; but--I shall never believe it. + +The Investigating Committee has made the most thorough disclosures of +the thorough incapacity of McClellan; but the McClellan men, Seward, +Blair, etc., neutralize, stifle all the good which could accrue to the +country from these disclosures. And Lincoln is in their clutches. The +administration by its influence prevents the publication of the +results of this investigation, prevents the truth from coming to the +people. Any hard name will be too soft for such a moral prevarication. + +McClellan is either as feeble as a reed, or a bad man. The disorder +around here is nameless. Banks compares it to the time of the French +Directory. Banks has no guns, no cavalry, and is in the vanguard. He +begs almost on his knees, and cannot get anything. And the country +pays a chief of the staff, and head of the staffers. + +The time must come, although it be now seemingly distant, that the +people will awake from this lethargy; that it will perceive how much +of the noblest blood of the people, how much time and money, have been +worse than recklessly squandered. The people will find it out, and +then they will ask those Cains at the wheel an account of the innocent +blood of Abel, the country's son, the country's cause. + +The defenders of, and the thus called moderate men on the question of +slavery, utter about it the old rubbish composed of the most thorough +ignorance and of disgusting fallacies, in relation to this pseudo +science, or rather lie, about races. More of it will come out in the +course of the Congressional discussions. Not one of them is aware that +independent science, that comparative anatomy, physiology, +psychology, anthropology, that philosophy of history altogether and +thoroughly repudiate all these superficially asserted, or +tried-to-be-established, intrinsic diversities and peculiarities of +races. All these would-be axioms, theories, are based on sand. In true +science the question of race as represented by the Southern school +partisans of slavery, with Agassiz, the so-called professor of +Charleston by European savans, at their head,--that question is at the +best an illusive element, and endangers the accuracy of induction. As +it presents itself to the unprejudiced investigator, race is nothing +more than the single manifestation of anterior stages of existence, +the aggregate expression of the pre-historic vicissitudes of a people. + +If those would-be knowing arguers on slavery, race, etc., were only +aware of the fact that such people as the primitive Greeks, or the +ancestors of classical Greeks, that the ancestors of the Latins, that +even the roving, robbing ancestors of the Anglo Saxons, in some way or +other, have been anthropophagi, and worshipped fetishes; and even as +thus called already civilized, they sacrificed men to gods,--could our +great pro-slavers know all this, they would be more decent in their +ignorant assertions, and not, so self-satisfied, strut about in their +dark ignorance. + +Those who are afraid that the freed negroes of the South will run to +the Northern free States, display an ignorance still greater than the +former. When the enslaved colored Americans in the South shall be +_all_ thoroughly emancipated in that now cursed region, then they will +remain in the, to them, congenial climate, and in the favorable +economical conditions of labor and of existence. Not only those +emancipated will not run North, but the colored population from the +free States, incited and stirred up by natural attractions, will leave +the North for the South, as small streamlets and rivulets run into a +large current or river. + +The rebels extend on an immense bow, nearly one hundred miles, from +the lower to the upper Potomac. Our army, two to one, is on the span +of the arc, and we do nothing. A French sergeant would be better +inspired than is McClellan. + + + + +FEBRUARY, 1862. + + Drifting -- The English blue book -- Lord John could not act + differently -- Palmerston the great European fuss-maker -- Mr. + Seward's "two pickled rods" for England -- Lord Lyons -- His + pathway strewn with broken glass -- Gen. Stone arrested -- + Sumner's resolutions infuse a new spirit in the Constitution -- + Mr. Seward beyond salvation -- He works to save slavery -- Weed + has ruined him -- The New York press -- "Poor Tribune" -- The + Evening Post -- The Blairs -- Illusions dispelled -- "All quiet + on the Potomac" -- The London papers -- Quill-heroes can be + bought for a dinner -- French opinion -- Superhuman efforts to + save slavery -- It is doomed! -- "All you worshippers of darkness + cannot save it!" -- The Hutchinsons -- Corporal Adams -- + Victories in the West -- Stanton the man! -- Strategy (hear! + hear!) + + +We are obliged, one by one, to eat our official high-toned assertions +and words, and day after day we drift towards putting the rebels on an +equal footing with ourselves. We declared the privateers to be pirates +(which they are), and now we proffer their exchange against our +colonels and other honorable prisoners. So one radical evil generates +numberless others. And from the beginning of the struggle this radical +evil was and is the want of earnestness, of a firm purpose, and of a +straight, vigorous policy by the administration. _Paullatim summa +petuntur_ may turn out true--but for the rebels. + +The publication of the English blue book, or of official +correspondence between Lord Lyons and Lord John Russell, throws a new +light on the conduct of the English Cabinet; and, anglophobe as I am, +I must confess that, all things considered, above all the +unhappily-justified distrust of England in Mr. Seward's policy,--from +the first day of our troubles Lord John Russell could not act +differently from what he did. Lord John Russell had to reconcile the +various and immense interests of England, jeopardized by the war, with +his sincere love of human liberty. Therein Lord John Russell differs +wholly from Lord Palmerston, this great European fuss-maker, who hates +America. As far as it was possible, Lord J. Russell remained faithful +to the noble (not hereditary, but philosophical) traditions of his +blood. Lord John Russell's letter to Lord Lyons (No. 17), February 20, +1861, although full of distrust in the future policy of Mr. Lincoln's +Cabinet towards England, is nevertheless an honorable document for his +name. + +Lord J. Russell was well aware that the original plan of Mr. Seward +was to annoy and worry England. Everything is known in this world, and +especially the incautious words and conversations of public men. +Months before the inauguration, Mr. Seward talked to senators of both +parties that he had in store "two pickled rods" for England. The one +was to be Green (always drunken), the Senator from Missouri, on +account of the colored man Anderson; the other Mr. Nesmith, the +Senator from Oregon, and the San Juan boundaries. Undoubtedly the +Southern senators did not keep secret the like inimical forebodings +concerning Mr. Seward's intentions towards England. Undoubtedly all +this must have been known to Lord J. Russell when he wrote the +above-mentioned letter, No. 17. + +More even than Lord John Russell's, Lord Lyons's official +correspondence since November, 1860, inspires the highest possible +respect for his noble sentiments and character. Above all, one who +witnessed the difficulties of Lord Lyons's position here, and how his +pathway was strewn with broken glass, and this by all kinds of hands, +must feel for him the highest and most sincere consideration. From the +official correspondence, Lord Lyons comes out a friend of humanity and +of human liberty,--just the reverse of what he generally was supposed +to be. And during the whole Trent affair, Lord Lyons's conduct was +discreet, delicate, and generous. Events may transform Lord Lyons into +an official enemy of the Union; but a mind soured by human meanness is +soothingly impressioned by such true nobleness in a diplomat and an +Englishman. + +Gen. Stone, of Ball's Bluff infamous massacre, arrested. Bravo! At the +best, Stone was one of those conceited regulars who admired slavery, +and who would have wished to save the Union in their own peculiar way. +I wish he may speak, as in all probability he was not alone. + +Sumner's resolutions infuse a new spirit in the Constitution, and +elevate it from the low ground of a dead formula. The resolutions +close the epoch of the Stories, of the Kents, of the Curtises, and +inaugurate a higher comprehension of American constitutionalism. +During this session Charles Sumner triumphantly and nobly annihilated +the aspersions of his enemies, representing him as a man of one hobby, +but lacking any practical ideas. His speech on currency was among the +best. Not so with his speech about the Trent affair. It is +superficial, and contains misconceptions concerning treaties, and +other blunders very strange in a would-be statesman. + +Ardently devoted to the cause of justice and of human rights, Sumner +weakens the influence which he ought to exercise, because he impresses +many with the notion that he looks more to the outside effect produced +by him than to the intrinsic value of the subject; he makes others +suppose that he is too fond of such effect, and, above all, of the +effect produced in Europe among the circle of his English and European +acquaintances. + +It is positively asserted that Lincoln agreed to take Mr. Seward in +the Cabinet, because Weed and others urgently represented that Mr. +Seward is the only man in the Republican party who is familiar with +Europe, with her statesmen, and their policy. O Lord! O Lord! And +where has Seward acquired all this information? Mr. Seward had not +even the first A B C of it, or of anything else connected with it. +And, besides, such a kind of special information is, at the utmost, of +secondary necessity for an American statesman. Marcy had it not, and +was a true, a genuine statesman. Undoubtedly, nature has endowed +Seward with eminent intellectual qualities, and with germs for an +eminent statesman. But the intellectual qualities became blunted by +the long use of crotchets and tricks of a politician, by the +associations and influence of such as Weed, etc.; thereby the better +germs became nipped, so to speak, in the bud. Mr. Seward's acquired +information by study, by instruction, and by reading, is quite the +reverse of what in Europe is regarded as necessary for a statesman. +Often, very often, I sorrowfully analyze and observe Mr. Seward, with +feelings like those evoked in us by the sight of a noble ruin, or of a +once rich, natural panorama, but now marred by large black spots of +burned and dead vegetation, or by the ashes of a volcano. + +Now, Mr. Seward is beyond salvation--a "disappointed man," as he +called himself in a conversation with Judge Potter, M. C.; he changed +aims, and perhaps convictions. For Mr. Seward, slavery is no more the +most hideous social disease; he abandoned that creed which elevated +him in the confidence of the people. Now he works to preserve as much +as possible of the curse of slavery; he does it on the plea of Union +and conservatism; but in truth he wishes to disorganize the pure +Republican party, which he hates since the Chicago Convention and +since the days of the formation of the Cabinet. Under the advice of +Weed, Mr. Seward attempts to form a (thus called) Union and +conservative party, which at the next turn may carry him into the +White House. + +Seward considers Weed his good genius; but in reality Weed has ruined +Seward. Now Mr. Seward supports _strategy_, imbecility, and McClellan. +The only explanation for me is, that Seward, participating in all +military counsels and strategic plans, and not understanding any of +them, finds it safer to back McClellan, and thus to deceive others +about his own ignorance of military matters. + +The press--the New York one--worse and worse; the majority wholly +degraded to the standard of the Herald and of the Times. The _poor_ +Tribune, daily fading away, altogether losing that bold, lofty spirit +of initiative to which for so many years the Tribune owed its +all-powerful and unparalleled influence over the free masses. Now, at +times, the Tribune is similar to an old, honest sexagenarian, +attempting to draw a night-cap over his ears and eyes. The flames of +the holy fire, so common once in the Tribune, flash now only at +distant, very distant epochs. The Evening Post towers over all of +them. If the Evening Post never at a jump went as far as once did the +Tribune, the Evening Post never made or makes a retrograde step; but +perhaps slowly, but steadily and boldly, moves on. The Evening Post is +not a paper of politicians or of jobbers, but of enlightened, +well-informed, and strong-hearted patriots and citizens. + +Mr. Blair, after all, is only an ambitious politician. My illusion +about both the brothers is wholly dispelled and gone. I regret it, but +both sustain McClellan, both look askant on Stanton, and belong to +the conditional emancipationists, colonizationists, and other RADICAL +preservers of slavery. All such form a class of superficial +politicians, of compromisers with their creed, and are corrupters of +others. + +How ardently I would prefer not to so often accuse others; but more +than forty years of revolutionary and public life and experience have +taught me to discriminate between deep convictions and assumed +ones--to highly venerate the first, and to keep aloof from the second. +Gold is gold, and pinchbeck is pinchbeck, in character as in metal. + +McClellan acts as if he had taken the oath to some hidden and veiled +deity or combination, by all means not to ascertain anything about the +condition of the enemy. Any European if not American old woman in +pants long ago would have pierced the veil by a strong reconnoissance +on Centreville. Here "all quiet on the Potomac." And I hear generals, +West Pointers, justifying this colossal offence against common sense, +and against the rudiments of military tactics, and even science. Oh, +noble, but awfully dealt with, American people! + +At times Mr. Seward talks and acts as if he lacked altogether the +perception of the terrible earnestness of the struggle, of the dangers +and responsibilities of his political position, as well now before the +people as hereafter before history. Often I can scarcely resist +answering him, Beware, beware! + +Lincoln belittles himself more and more. Whatever he does is done +under the pressure of events, under the pressure of the public +opinion. These agencies push Lincoln and slowly move him, +notwithstanding his reluctant heaviness and his resistance. And he a +standard-bearer of this noble people! + +Those mercenary, ignorant, despicable scribblers of the London Times, +of the Tory Herald, of the Saturday Review, and of the police papers +in Paris, as the Constitutionnel, the Pays, the Patrie, all of them +lie with unparalleled facility. Any one knows that those hungry +quill-heroes can be got for a good dinner and a _douceur_. + +I am sorry that the Americans ascribe to Louis Napoleon and to the +French people the hostility to human rights as shown by those +_echappes des bagnes de la litterature_. Louis Napoleon and the French +people have nothing in common with those literary blacklegs. + +The _Journal des Debats_, the _Opinion Nationale_, the _Presse_, the +_Siecle_, etc., constitute the true and honest organs of opinion in +France. In the same way A. de Gasparin speaks for the French people +with more authority than does Michel Chevalier, who knows much more +about free trade, about canals and railroads, but is as ignorant of +the character, of the spirit, and of the institutions of the American +people, as he is ignorant concerning the man in the moon. So the +lawyer Hautefeuille must have received a fee to show so much ill-will +to the cause of humanity, and such gigantic ignorance. + +_Who began the civil war?_ is repeatedly discussed by those quill +cut-throats and allies on the Thames and on the Seine. + +Here some smaller diplomats (not Sweden, who is true to the core to +the cause of liberty), and, above all, the would-be fashionable +_galopins des legations_, are the cesspools of secession news, picked +up by them in secesh society. Happily, the like _galopins_ are the +reverse of the opinions of their respective chiefs. + +What superhuman efforts are made in Congress, and out of it, in the +Cabinet, in the White House, by Union men,--Seward imagines he leads +them,--by the weak-brained, and by traitors, to save slavery, if not +all, at least a part of it. Every concession made by the President to +the enemies of slavery has only one aim; it is to mollify their urgent +demands by throwing to them small crumbs, as one tries to mollify a +boisterous and hungry dog. By such a trick Lincoln and Seward try to +save what can be saved of the peculiar institution, to gratify, and +eventually to conciliate, the South. This is the policy of Lincoln, of +Seward, and very likely of Mr. Blair. Such political _gobe-mouche_ as +Doolittle and many others, are, or will be, taken in by this +manoeuvre. + +Scheme what you like, you schemers, wiseacres, politicians, and +would-be statesmen, nevertheless slavery is doomed. Humanity will have +the best against such pettifoggers as you. I know better. I have the +honor to belong to that European generation who, during this half of +our century, from Tagus and Cadiz to the Wolga, has gored with its +blood battle-fields and scaffolds; whose songs and aspirations were +re-echoed by all the horrible dungeons; by dungeons of the +blood-thirsty Spanish inquisition, then across Europe and Asia, to the +mines of Nertschinsk, in the ever-frozen Altai. We lost all we had on +earth; seemingly we were always beaten; but Portugal and Spain enjoy +to-day a constitutional regime that is an improvement on absolutism. +France has expelled forever the Bourbons, and universal suffrage, +spelt now by the French people, is a progress, is a promise of a great +democratic future. Germany has in part conquered free speech and free +press. Italy is united, Romanism is falling to pieces, Austria is +undermined and shaky, and broken are the chains on the body of the +Russian serf. All this is the work of the spirit of the age, and our +generation was the spirit's apostle and confessor. And so it will be +with slavery, and all you worshippers of darkness cannot save it. + +Not the one who strikes the first blow begins a civil war, but he who +makes the striking of the blow imperative. The Southern robbers cannot +claim exemption; they stole the arsenals, and struck the first blow at +Sumpter. So much for the infamous quill-heroes of the London Times, +the Herald, and _tutti quanti_. + +The highest crime is treason in arms, and this crime is praised and +defended by the English would-be high-toned press. But sooner or later +it will come out how much apiece was paid to the London Times, the +Herald, and the Saturday Review for their venomous articles against +the Union. + +McClellan expelled from the army the Hutchinson family. It is mean and +petty. Songs are the soul and life of the camp, and McClellan's +_heroic deeds_ have not yet found their minstrel. + +After all, McClellan has organized--nothing! McDowell has, so to +speak, formed the first skeletons of brigades, divisions, of parks of +artillery, etc. The people uninterruptedly poured in men and +treasures, and McClellan only continued what was commenced before him. + +I positively know that already in December Mr. Lincoln began to be +doubtful of McClellan's generalship. This doubtfulness is daily +increasing, and nevertheless Mr. Lincoln keeps that incapacity in +command because he does not wish _to hurt McClellan's feelings_. +Better to ruin the noble people, the country! I begin to draw the +conclusion that Mr. Lincoln's good qualities are rather negative than +positive. + +Mr. Adams complains that he is kept in the dark about the policy of +the administration, and cannot answer questions made to him in London. +But the administration, that is, Lincoln and Seward, are a little _a +la_ Micawber, expecting what may turn up. And, besides this, the great +orator _de lana caprina_ (Mr. Adams) deliberately degraded himself to +the condition of a corporal under Mr. Seward's orders. + +Victories in the West, results of the new spirit in the War +Department. Stanton will be the man. + +It is a curious fact that such commanders as Halleck, etc., sit in +cities and fight through those under them; and there are ignoble +flatterers trying to attribute these victories to McClellan, and to +his _strategy_. As if battles could be commanded by telegraph at one +thousand miles' distance. It is worse than imbecility, it is idiotism +and _strategy_. + +Stanton calls himself a man of one idea. How he overtops in the +Cabinet those myrmidons with their many petty notions! One idea, but a +great and noble one, makes the great men, or the men for great events. +Would God that the people may understand Stanton, and that +pettifoggers, imbeciles, and traitors may not push themselves between +the people and Stanton, and neutralize the only man who has _the one +idea_ to break, to crush the rebellion. + +Every day Mr. Lincoln shows his want of knowledge of men and of +things; the total absence of _intuition_ to spell, to see through, and +to disentangle events. + +If, since March, 1861, instead of being in the hands of pettifoggers, +Mr. Lincoln had been in the hands of _a man of one idea_ as is +Stanton, nine-tenths of the work would have been accomplished. + +McClellan's flunkeys claim for him the victories in the West. It is +impossible to settle which is more to be scorned in them, their +flunkeyism or their stupidity. + +_Lock-jaw_ expedition. For any other government whatever, in one even +of the most abject favoritism, such a humbug and silly conduct of the +commander and of his chief of the staff would open the eyes even of a +Pompadour or of a Dubarry. Here, _our great rulers and ministers_ shut +the more closely their mind's (?) eyes * * * * * + +For the first time in one of his dispatches Mr. Corporal Adams _dares_ +to act against orders, and mentions--but very slightly--slavery. Mr. +Adams observes to his chief that in England public opinion is very +sensitive; at last the old freesoiler found it out. + +How this public opinion in America is unable to see the things as they +naturally are. Now the public fights to whom to ascribe the victories +in the West. Common sense says, Ascribe them, 1st, to the person who +ordered the fight (Stanton); 2d, exclusively to the generals who +personally commanded the battles and the assaults of forts. Even +Napoleon did not claim for himself the glory for battles won by his +generals when in his, Napoleon's, absence. + +For weeks McClellan and his thus called staff diligently study +international law, strategy (hear, hear!), tactics, etc. His aids +translate for his use French and German writers. One cannot even apply +in this case the proverb, "Better late than never," as the like +hastily scraped and undigested sham-knowledge unavoidably must +obfuscate and wholly confuse McClellan's--not Napoleonic--brains. + +The intriguers and imbeciles claim the Western victories as the +illustration of McClellan's great _strategy_. Why shows he not a +little _strategy_ under his nose here? Any old woman would surround +and take the rebels in Manassas. + +Now they dispute to Grant his deserved laurels. If he had failed at +Donelson, the _strategians_ would have washed their hands, and thrown +on Grant the disaster. So did Scott after Bull Run. + +Mr. Lincoln, McClellan, Seward, Blair, etc., forget the terrible +responsibility for thus recklessly squandering the best blood, the +best men, the best generation of the people, and its treasures. But +sooner or later they will be taken to a terrible account even by the +Congress, and at any rate by history. + +It is by their policy, by their support of McClellan, that the war is +so slow, and the longer it lasts the more human sacrifices it will +devour, and the greater the costs of the devastation. Stanton alone +feels and acts differently, and it seems that the rats in the Cabinet +already begin their nightly work against him. These rats are so +ignorant and conceited! + +The celebrated Souvoroff was accused of cruelty because he always at +once stormed fortresses instead of investing them and starving out the +inhabitants and the garrisons. The old hero showed by arithmetical +calculations that his bloodiest assaults never occasioned so much loss +of human life as did on both sides any long siege, digging, and +approaches, and the starving out of those shut up in a fortress. This +for McClellan and for the intriguing and ignorant RATS. + + + + +MARCH, 1862. + + The Africo-Americans -- Fremont -- The Orleans -- Confiscation -- + American nepotism -- The Merrimac -- Wooden guns -- Oh shame! -- + Gen. Wadsworth -- The rats have the best of Stanton -- McClellan + goes to Fortress Monroe -- Utter imbecility -- The embarkation -- + McClellan a turtle -- He will stick in the marshes -- Louis + Napoleon behaves nobly -- So does Mr. Mercier -- Queen Victoria + for freedom -- The great strategian -- Senator Sumner and the + French minister -- Archbishop Hughes -- His diplomatic activity + not worth the postage on his correspondence -- Alberoni-Seward -- + Love's labor lost. + + +Men like this Davis, Wickliffe, and all the like _pecus_, roar against +the African race. The more I see of this doomed people, the more I am +convinced of their intrinsic superiority over all their white +revilers, above all, over this slaveholding generation, rotten, as it +is, to the core. When emancipated, the Africo-Americans in immense +majority will at once make quiet, orderly, laborious, intelligent, and +free cultivators, or, to use European language, an excellent +peasantry; when ninety-nine one-hundredths of slaveholders, either +rebels or thus called loyal, altogether considered, as human beings +are shams, are shams as citizens, and constitute caricatures and +monsters of civilization. + +Civilization! It is the highest and noblest aim in human destinies +when it makes the man moral and true; but civilization invoked by, +and in which strut traitors, slaveholders, and abettors of slavery, +reminds one of De Maistre's assertion, that the devil created the red +man of America as a counterfeit to man, God's creation in the Old +World. This so-called civilization of the slaveholders is the devil's +counterfeit of the genuine civilization. + +The Africo-Americans are the true producers of the Southern +wealth--cotton, rice, tobacco, etc. When emancipated and transformed +into small farmers, these laborious men will increase and ameliorate +the culture of the land; and they will produce by far more when the +white shams and drones shall be taken out of their way. In the South, +bristling with Africo-American villages, will almost disappear +fillibusterism, murder, and the bowie knife, and other supreme +manifestations of Southern _chivalrous high-breeding_. + +Fremont's reports and defence show what a disorder and insanity +prevailed under the rule of Scott. Fremont's military capacity perhaps +is equal to zero; his vanity put him in the hands of wily flatterers; +but the disasters in the West cannot be credited to him. Fremont +initiated the construction of the mortar flotilla on the Mississippi +(I positively know such is the fact), and he suggested the capture of +various forts, but was not sustained at this sham, the headquarters. + +These Orleans have wholly espoused and share in the fallacious and +mischievous notions of the McClellanites concerning the volunteers. +Most probably with the authority of their name, they confirm +McClellan's fallacious notions about the necessity of a great regular +army. The Orleans are good, generous boys, but their judgment is not +yet matured; they had better stayed at home. + +Confiscation is the great word in Congress or out of it. The property +of the rebels is confiscable by the ever observed rule of war, as +consecrated by international laws. When two sovereigns make war, the +victor confiscates the other's property, as represented by whole +provinces, by public domains, by public taxes and revenues. In the +present case the rebels are the sovereigns, and their property is +therefore confiscable. But for the sake of equity, and to compensate +the wastes of war, Congress ought to decree the confiscation of +property of all those who, being at the helm, by their political +incapacity or tricks contribute to protract the war and increase its +expense. + +Mr. Lincoln yields to the pressure of public opinion. A proof: his +message to Congress about emancipation in the Border States. Crumb No. +1 thrown--reluctantly I am sure--to the noble appetite of freemen. I +hope history will not credit Mr. Lincoln with being the initiator. + +American nepotism puts to shame the one practised in Europe. All +around here they keep offices in pairs, father and son. So McClellan +has a father in-law as chief of the staff, a brother as aid, and then +various relations, clerks, etc., etc., and the same in some other +branches of the administration. + +The Merrimac affair. Terrible evidence how active and daring are the +rebels, and we sleepy, slow, and self-satisfied. By applying the +formula of induction from effect to cause, the disaster occasioned by +the Merrimac, and any further havoc to be made by this iron +vessel,--all this is to be credited to McClellan. + +If Norfolk had been taken months ago, then the rebels could not have +constructed the Merrimac. Norfolk could have been easily taken any day +during the last six months, _but for strategy_ and the _maturing of +great plans_! These are the sacramental words more current now than +ever. Oh good-natured American people! how little is necessary to +humbug thee! + +Oh shame! oh malediction! The rebels left Centreville,--which turns +out to be scarcely a breastwork, with wooden guns,--and they slipped +off from Manassas. + +When McClellan got the news of the evacuation, he gravely considered +where to lean his right or left flanks, and after the consideration, +two days after the enemy _wholly_ completed the evacuation, McClellan +moves at the head of 80,000 men--to storm the wooden guns of +Centreville. Two hours after the news of the evacuation reached the +headquarters, Gen. Wadsworth asked permission to follow with his +brigade, during the night, the retreating enemy. But it was not +_strategy, not a matured plan_. If Gen. Wadsworth had been in command +of the army, not one of the rats from Manassas would have escaped. +The reasons are, that Gen. Wadsworth has a quick, clear, and +wide-encompassing conception of events and things, a clear insight, +and many other inborn qualities of mind and intellect. + +The Congress has a large number of very respectable capacities, and +altogether sufficient for the emergencies, and the Congress would do +more good but for the impediments thrown in its way by the +double-dealing policy prevailing in Mr. Lincoln's Cabinet and +administration. The majority in Congress represent well the spirit of +self-government. It is a pity that Congress cannot crush or purify the +administration. + +All that passes here is maddening, and I am very grateful to my father +and mother for having endowed me with a frame which resists the blows. + +The pursuit of the enemy abandoned, the basis of operations changed. +The rats had the best of Stanton. _Utinam sim falsus propheta_, but if +Stanton's influence is no more all-powerful, then there is an end to +the short period of successes. Mr. Lincoln's council wanted to be +animated by a pure and powerful spirit. Stanton was the man, but he is +not a match for impure intriguers. Also McClellan goes to Fortress +Monroe, to Yorktown, to the rivers. This plan reveals an utter +military imbecility, and its plausibility can only catch ----. + +1st. Common sense shows that the rebels ought to be cut off from their +resources, that is, from railroads, and from communication with the +revolted States in the interior, and to be precipitated into the +ocean. To accomplish it our troops ought to have marched by land to +Richmond, and pushed the enemy towards the ocean. Now McClellan pushes +the rebels from the extremity towards the centre, towards the focus of +their basis,--exactly what they want. + +I am sure that McClellan is allured to this strategy by the success of +the gunboats on the Mississippi. He wishes that the gunboats may take +Richmond, and he have the credit of it. + +The Merrimac is still menacing in Hampton Roads, and may, some day or +other, play havoc with the transports. The communications by land are +always more preferable than those by water--above all for such a great +army. A storm, etc., may do great mischief. + +McClellan assures the President, and the other intriguers and fools +constituting his supporters, that in a few days he will throw 55,000 +men on Yorktown. He and his staff to do such a thing, which would be a +masterpiece even for the French military leaders and their staffs! He, +McClellan, never knew what it was to embark an army. Those who believe +him are even greater imbeciles than I supposed them to be. Poor +Stanton, to be hampered by imbecility and intrigue! I went to +Alexandria to see the embarkation; it will last weeks, not days. + +From Yorktown to Richmond, the country is marshy, very marshy; +McClellan, a turtle, a _dasippus_, will not understand to move quick +and to overcome the impediments. Faulty as it is to drive the rebels +from the sea towards their centre, this false move would be corrected +by rash and decisive movements. But McClellan will stick in the +marshes, and may never reach Richmond by that road. + +Any man with common sense would go directly by land; if the army moves +only three miles a day it will reach Richmond sooner than by the other +way. Such an army in a spell will construct turnpike roads and +bridges, and if the rebels tear up the railroads, they likewise could +be easily repaired. Progressing in the slowest, in the most genuine +McClellan manner, the army will reach Richmond with less danger than +by the Peninsula. + +The future American historian ought to record in gold and diamonds the +names of those who in the councils opposed McClellan's new strategy. +Oh! Mr. Seward, Mr. Seward, why is your name to be recorded among the +most ardent supporters of this _strategy_? + +Jeff. Davis sneers at the immense amount of money, etc., spent by Mr. +Lincoln. As he, Jeff. Davis, is still quietly in Richmond, and his +army undestroyed, of course he is right to sneer at Mr. Lincoln and +McClellan, whom he, Jeff. Davis, kept at bay with wooden guns. + +Senator Sumner takes airs to defend or explain McClellan. The Senator +is probably influenced by Blair. The Senator cannot be classed among +traitors and intriguers supporting the _great strategian_. Perhaps +likewise the Senator believes it to be _distingue_ to side with +_strategy_. + +If the party and the people could have foreseen that civil war was +inevitable, undoubtedly Mr. Lincoln would not have been elected. But +as the cause of the North would have been totally ruined by the +election of Lincoln's Chicago competitor, Mr. Lincoln is the lesser of +the two evils. + +A great nuisance is this competition for all kinds of news by the +reporters hanging about the city, the government, and the army. Some +of these reporters are men of sense, discernment, and character; but +for the sake of competition and priority they fish up and pick up what +they can, what comes in their way, even if such news is altogether +beyond common sense, or beyond probability. + +In this way the best among the newspapers have confused and misled the +sound judgment of the people; so it is in relation to the overwhelming +numbers of the rebels, and by spreading absurdities concerning +relations with Europe. The reporters of the Herald and of the Times +are peremptorily instructed to see the events through the perverted +spectacles of their respective bosses. + +Mr. Adams gets either frightened or warm. Mr. A. insists on the +slavery question, speaks of the project of Mason and Slidell in London +to offer certain moral concessions to English anti-slavery +feeling,--such as the regulations of marriage, the repeal of laws +against manumission, etc. Mr. Adams warns that these offers may make +an impression in England. + +When all around me I witness this revolting want of energy,--Stanton +excepted,--this vacillation, these tricks and double-dealings in the +governmental spheres, then I wish myself far off in Europe; but when I +consider this great people outside of the governmental spheres, then I +am proud to be one of the people, and shall stay and fall with them. + +How meekly the people accept the disgrace of the wooden guns and of +the evacuation of Manassas! It is true that the partisans of +McClellan, the traitors, the intriguers, and the imbeciles are +devotedly at work to confuse the judgment of the people at large. + +Mr. Dayton's semi-official conversation with Louis Napoleon shows how +well disposed the Emperor was and is. The Emperor, almost as a favor, +asks for a decided military operation. And in face of such news from +Europe, Lincoln, Seward, and Blair sustain the _do-nothing +strategian_! + +Until now Louis Napoleon behaves nobly, and not an atom of reproach +can be made by the American people against his policy; and our policy +many times justly could have soured him, as the acceptation of the +Orleans, etc. No French vessels ran anywhere the blockade; secesh +agents found very little if any credit among French speculators. Very +little if any arms, munitions, etc., were bought in France. And in +face of all these positive facts, the American wiseacres here and in +Europe, all the bar-room and street politicians here and there, all +the would-be statesmen, all the sham wise, are incessant in their +speculations concerning certain invisible, deep, treacherous schemes +of Louis Napoleon against the Union. This herd is full of stories +concerning his deep hatred of the North; they are incessant in their +warnings against this dangerous and scheming enemy. Some Englishmen in +high position stir up this distrust. On the authority of letters +repeatedly received from England, Senator Sumner is always in fits of +distrust towards the policy of France. The last discovery made by all +these deep statesmen here and in France is, that Louis Napoleon +intends to take Mexico, to have then a basis for cooperation with the +rebels, and to destroy us. But Mexico is not yet taken, and already +the allies look askance at each other. Those great Anglo-American +Talleyrands, Metternichs, etc., bring down the clear and large +intellect of Louis Napoleon to the atomistic proportions of their own +sham brains. I do not mean to foretell Louis Napoleon's policy in +future. Unforeseen emergencies and complications may change it. I +speak of what was done up to this day, and repeat, _not the slightest +complaint can be made against Louis Napoleon_. And in justice to Mr. +Mercier, the French minister here, it must be recorded that he +sincerely seconds the open policy of his sovereign. Besides, Mr. +Mercier now openly declares that he never believed the Americans to be +such a great and energetic people as the events have shown them to be. +I am grateful to him for this sense of justice, shared only by few of +his diplomatic colleagues. + +In one word, official and unofficial Europe, in its immense majority, +is on our side. The exceptions, therefore, are few, and if they are +noisy, they are not intrinsically influential and dangerous. The +truest woman, Queen Victoria, is on the side of freedom, of right, and +of justice. This ennobles even her, and likewise ennobles our cause. +Not the bad wishes of certain Europeans are in our way, but our +slowness, the McClellanism and its supporters. + +_Quidquid delirant reges, plectuntur achivi!_ The _achivi_ is the +people, and the McClellanists are the _reges_. + +Mr. Seward, elated by victories, insinuates to foreign powers that +they may stop the "recognition of belligerents." Oh imagination! Such +things ought not even to be insinuated, as logic and common sense +clearly show that the foreign cabinets cannot do it, and thus stultify +themselves. Seward believes that his rhetoric is irresistible, and +will move the cabinets of France and of England. * * * Not the +"recognition of belligerents;" let the rebels slip off from Manassas, +etc. Mr. Seward would do better for himself and for the country to +give up meddling with the operations of the war, and backing the +bloodless campaigns of the _strategian_. But Mr. Seward, carried away +by his imagination, believes that the cabinets will yield to his +persuasive voice, and then, oh! what a feather in his diplomatic cap +before the befogged Mr. Lincoln, and before the people. But _pia +desideria_. + +In all the wars, as well as in all the single campaigns and battles, +every _captain_ deserving this name aimed at breaking his enemy in the +centre or at seizing his basis of operations, wherefrom the enemy +draws its resources and forces. The great _strategian_ changed all +this; he goes directly to the circumference instead of aiming at the +heart. + +Mr. Seward, answering Mr. Dayton's dispatch concerning his, Dayton's, +conversation with Louis Napoleon, points to Europe being likewise +menaced by revolutionists. Unnecessary spread-eagleism, and an awful +want of any, even diplomatic, tact. I hope that Mr. Dayton, who has so +much sound sense and discernment, will keep to himself this freak of +Mr. Seward's untamable imagination. + +Under the influence of insinuations received from his English friends, +Senator Sumner said to Mr. Mercier (I was present) that with every +steamer he expects a joint letter of admonition directed by the French +and English to our government. Mr. Mercier retorted, "How can you, +sir, have such notions? you are too great a nation to be treated in +this way. Such letters would do for Greece, etc., but not for you." I +was sorry and glad for the lesson thus given. + +Archbishop Hughes was not over-successful in France, and went off +rather second-best in the opinion of the press, of the public, and of +the Catholic, even ultra-Montane clergy of France. All this on +account of his conditional anti-slaverism and unconditional +pro-slaverism. All this was easily to be foreseen. His Eminence is in +Rome, and from Rome is to influence Spain in our favor. + +Oh diplomacy! oh times of Capucine and Jesuit fathers and of Abbes! +We, the children of the eighteenth century, we recall you to life. I +do not suppose that the whole diplomatic activity of his Eminence is +worth the postage of his correspondence. But Uncle Sam is generous, +and pays him well. So it is with Thurlow Weed, who tries to be +economical, is unsuccessful, and cries for more monish. A schoolboy on +a spree! + +It seems that Weed loses not his time, and tries with Sandford to turn +_a penny_ in Belgium. Oh disinterested saviors of the country, and +patriots! + +But for this violent development of our domestic affairs, Mr. Seward +would have appeared before the world as the mediator between the Pope +and the insubordinate European nations, sovereigns, and cabinets. + +Oh, Alberoni! oh, imaginary! It beats any of the wildest poets. In +justice it must be recorded, that this great scheme of mediation was +dancing before Mr. Seward's imagination at the epoch when he was sure +that, once Secretary of State, his speeches would be current and read +all over the South; and they, the speeches, would crush and extinguish +secession. This Mr. Seward assured one of the patriotic members of +Buchanan's expiring Cabinet. + +Mr. Seward is now busy building up a conservative Union party North +and South to preserve slavery, and to crush the rampant Sumnerism, as +Thurlow Weed calls it, and advises Seward to do so. + +Mr. Seward's unofficial agents, Thurlow Weed, his Eminence, and +others, are untiring in the incense of their benefactor. Occasionally, +Mr. Lincoln gets a small share of it. + +Sandford in Paris and Brussels, Mr. Adams and Thurlow Weed in London, +work hard to assuage and soften the harsh odor in which Mr. Seward is +held, above all, among certain Englishmen of mark. It seems, however, +that _love's labor is lost_, and Mr. Adams, scholar-like, explains the +unsuccess of their efforts by the following philosophy: That in great +convulsions and events it is always the most eminent men who become +selected for violent and vituperative attacks. This is Mr. Seward's +fate, but time will dispel the falsehoods, and render him justice. +Well, be it so. + +Weed tried hard to bring the Duke of Newcastle over to Mr. Seward; but +the Duke seems perfectly unmoved by the blandishments, etc. To think +that the strict and upright Duke, who knows Weed, could be shaken by +the ubiquitous lobbyist! Rather the other way. + +One not acquainted with Mr. Seward's ardent republicanism may suspect +him of some dictatorial projects, to judge from the zeal with which +some of the diplomatic agents in Europe, together with the unofficial +ones there, extol to all the world Mr. Seward's transcendent +superiority over all other eminent men in America. Are the European +statesmen to be prepared beforehand, or are they to be befogged and +prevented from judging for themselves? If so, again is _love's labor +lost_. European statesmen can perfectly take Mr. Seward's measure from +his uninterrupted and never-fulfilled prophecies, and from other +diplomatic stumblings; and one look suffices European men of mark to +measure a Hughes, a Weed, a Sandford, and _tutti quanti_. + +In Mr. Lincoln's councils, Mr. Stanton alone has the vigor, the +purity, and the simplicity of a man of deep convictions. Stanton alone +unites the clear, broad comprehension of the exigencies of the +national question with unyielding action. He is the _statesman_ so +long searched for by me. He, once a friend of McClellan, was not +deterred thereby from condemning that do-nothing _strategy_, so +ruinous and so dishonorable. Stanton is a Democrat, and therefore not +intrinsically, perhaps not even relatively, an anti-slavery man, but +he hesitates not now to destroy slavery for the preservation of the +Union. I am sure that every day will make Stanton more clear-sighted, +and more radical in the question of Union and rebellion. And Seward +and Blair, who owe their position to their anti-slavery principles, +_arcades ambo_, try now to save something of slavery, and turn against +Stanton. + + + + +APRIL, 1862. + + Immense power of the President -- Mr. Seward's Egeria -- + Programme of peace -- The belligerent question -- Roebucks and + Gregories scums --Running the blockade -- Weed and Seward take + clouds for camels --Uncle Sam's pockets -- Manhood, not money, + the sinews of war --Colonization schemes -- Senator Doolittle -- + Coal mine speculation --Washington too near the seat of war -- + Blair demands the return of a fugitive slave woman -- Slavery is + Mr. Lincoln's "_mammy_" -- He will not destroy her -- Victories + in the West -- The brave navy --McClellan subsides in mud before + Yorktown -- Telegraphs for more men -- God will be tired out! -- + Great strength of the people --Emancipation in the District -- + Wade's speech -- He is a monolith --Chase and Seward -- N. Y. + Times -- The Rothschilds -- Army movements and plans. + + +If the military conduct of McClellan, from the first of January to the +day of the embarkation of the troops for Yorktown--if this conduct +were tried by French marshals, or by the French chief staff, or by the +military authorities and chief staffs of Prussia, Russia, and even of +Austria, McClellan would be condemned as unfit to have any military +command whatever. I would stake my right hand on such a verdict; and +here the would-be strategians, the traitors, the intriguers, and the +imbeciles prize him sky-high. + +Only by personal and close observation of the inner working of the +administrative machinery is it possible to appreciate and to +understand what an immense power the Constitution locates in the +hands of a President. Far more power has he than any constitutional +sovereign--more than is the power of the English sovereign and of her +Cabinet put together. In the present emergencies, such a power in the +hands of a Wade or of a Stanton would have long ago saved the country. + +Mr. Seward looks to all sides of the compass for a Union party in the +South, which may rise politically against the rebels. That is the +advice of Weed, Mr. Seward's Egeria. I doubt that he will find many, +or even any. First kill the secesh, destroy the rebel power, that is, +the army, and then look for the Union men in the South. Mr. Seward, in +his generalizations, in his ardent expectations, etc., etc., forgets +to consider--at least a little--human nature, and, not to speak of +history, this _terra incognita_. Blood shed for the nationality makes +it grow and prosper; a protracted struggle deepens its roots, carries +away the indifferent, and even those who at the start opposed the +move. All such, perhaps, may again fall off from the current of +rebellion, but that current must first be reduced to an imperceptible +rivulet; and Mr. Seward, sustaining the do-nothing strategian, acts +against himself. + +Mr. Seward's last programme is, after the capture of Richmond and of +New Orleans, to issue a proclamation--to offer terms to the rebels, to +restore the old Union in full, to protect slavery and all. For this +reason he supports McClellan, as both have the same plan. Of such a +character are the assurances given by Mr. Seward to foreign diplomats +and governments. He tries to make them sure that a large Union party +will soon be forthcoming in the South, and again sounds his +vaticinations of the sacramental ninety days. I am sorry for this his +incurable passion to play the Pythoness. It is impossible that such +repeated prophecies shall raise him high in the estimation of the +European statesmen. Impossible! Impossible! whatever may be the +contrary assertions of his adulators, such as an Adams, a Sandford, a +Weed, a Bigelow, a Hughes, and others. When Mr. Seward proudly +unveiled this his programme, a foreign diplomat suggested that the +Congress may not accept it. Mr. Seward retorted that he cares not for +Congress; that he will appeal to the people, who are totally +indifferent to the abolition of slavery. + +Why does Mr. Seward deliberately slander the American people, and this +before foreign diplomats, whose duty it is to report all Mr. Seward's +words to their respective governments? Such words uttered by Mr. +Seward justify the assertions of Lord John Russell, of Gladstone, +those true and high-minded friends of human liberty, that the North +fights for empire and not for a principle. The people who will answer +to Mr. Seward's appeal will be those whose creed is that of the New +York Herald, the Boston Courier, the people of the Fernando and Ben +Woods, of the Vallandighams, etc. + +What is the use of urging on the foreign Cabinets--above all, England +and France--to rescind the recognition of belligerents? They cannot +do it. It does not much--nay, not any--harm, as the English +speculators will risk to run the blockade if the rebels are +belligerent or not. And besides, the English and French Cabinets may +throw in Mr. Seward's face the decisions of our own prize courts, who, +on the authority of Mr. Seward's blockade, in their judicial +decisions, treat the rebels as belligerents. The European statesmen +are more cautious and more consequential in their acts than is our +Secretary. + +As it stands now, the conduct of the English government is very +correct, and not to be complained of. I do not speak of the infamous +articles in the Times, Herald, etc., or of the Gregories and such +scums as the Roebucks; but I am satisfied that Lord John Russell +wishes us no harm, and that it is our own policy which confuses and +makes suspicious such men as Russell, Gladstone, and others of the +better stamp. + +As for the armaments of secesh vessels in Liverpool and the Bahamas, +it is so perfectly in harmony with the English mercantile character +that it is impossible for the government to stop it. + +The English merchant generally considers it as a lawful enterprise to +run blockades; in the present case the premium is immense; it is so in +a twofold manner. 1st, the immediate profits on the various cargoes +exchanged against each other by a successful running of the blockade; +such profits must equal several hundred per cent. 2d, the prospective +profits from an eventual success of the rebellion for such friends as +are now supporting the rebels. These prospects must be very alluring, +and are partly justified by our slow war, slow policy. I am sure that +the like armaments for the secessionists are made by shares owned by +various individuals; the individual risk of each shareholder being +comparatively insignificant when compared with the prospective gains. + +If Seward, McClellan, and Blair had not meddled with Stanton, not +weakened his decisions, nor befogged Mr. Lincoln, Richmond would be in +our hands, together with Charleston and Savannah; and all the +iron-clad vessels built in England for secesh would be harmless. + +Mr. Weed and Mr. Seward expect Jeff. Davis to be overthrown by their +imaginary Southern Union party. O, wiseacres! if both of you had only +a little knowledge of human nature--not of that one embodied in +lobbyists--and of history, then you would be aware that if Jeff. Davis +is to be deposed it will be by one more violent than he, and you would +not speculate and take clouds for camels. During the weeks of +embarkation for Yorktown, the thorough incapacity of McClellan's chief +of the staff was as brilliant as the cloudless sun. It makes one +shudder to think what it will be when the campaign will be decidedly +and seriously going on. + +It is astonishing, and psychologically altogether incomprehensible, to +see persons, justly deserving to be considered as intelligent, deny +the evidence of their own senses; forbid, so to speak, their sound +judgment to act; to be befogged by thorough imbeciles; to consider +incapacity as strategy, and to take imbecility for deep, mysterious, +great combinations and plans. Even the Turks could not long be +humbugged in such a way. + +No sovereign in the world, not even Napoleon in his palmiest days, +could thus easily satisfy his military whims concerning the most +costly and variegated material for an army, as does McClellan. He +changes his plans; every such change is gorgeously satisfied and +millions thrown away. Guns, mortars, transports, spades, etc., appear +at his order as if by charm; and all this to veil his utter +incapacity. This Yorktown expedition uncovers Washington and the +North, and such a deep plan could have been imagined only by a +_strategian_. + +What are doing in Europe all these various agents of Mr. Seward, and +paid by Uncle Sam? all these Weeds, Sandfords, Hughes, Bigelows, and +whoever else may be there? They cannot find means in their brains to +better direct, inform, or influence the European press. Almost all the +articles in our favor are only defensive and explanatory; the +offensive is altogether carried by the secesh press in England and in +France. But to deal offensive blows, our agents would be obliged to +stand firm on human principles, and show up all the dastardly +corruption of slavery, of slaveholders, and of rebels. Such a warfare +is forbidden by Mr. Seward's policy; and perhaps if such a Weed should +speak of corruption, some English secesh may reprint Wilkeson's +letter. In one word, our cause in Europe is very tamely represented +and carried on. Members of the Chamber of Deputies in Paris complain +that they can nowhere find necessary information concerning certain +facts. There Seward's agents have not even been able to correct the +fallacies about the epoch of the Morrill tariff,--fallacies so often +invoked by the secesh press,--and many other similar statements. I +shall not wonder if the public opinion in Europe by and by may fall +off from our cause. Our defensive condition there justifies the +assumptions of the secesh. As we dare not expose their crimes, the +public in Europe must come to this conclusion, that secesh may be +right, and may begin to consider the North as having no principle. + +And to think that all these agents heavily phlebotomize Uncle Sam's +pockets to obtain such contemptible results! + +Many persons, some among them of influence and judgment, still speak +and speculate upon what they call the starving of the rebellion. They +calculate upon the comparative poverty of the rebels, repeating the +fallacious adage, that money is the sinews of war. Money is so, but +only in a limited degree, and more limited than is generally supposed; +more limited even now when war is a very expensive pastime. + +This fallacy, first uttered by the aristocrat Thucydides, was repeated +over and over again until it became a statesmanlike creed. But even +Thucydides gave not to that _dictum_ such a general sense, and +Macchiavelli scorned the fallacy and exposed it. When poor, the +Spartans have been the bravest. The historical halo surrounding the +name of Sparta originated at that epoch when the use of money and of +gold had been almost forbidden. The wealth of Athens began after the +victories over the Persians; but those victories were won when the +Athenians were comparatively poor. So it was with the Romans until the +subjugation of Carthage, and in modern Europe the Swiss, etc., etc., +etc. + +Manhood in a people, and self-sacrifice, are the genuine sinews of +war; wealth alone saved no nation from disgrace and from death, nay, +often accelerated the catastrophe. + +The colonization of Africo-Americans is still discussed; very likely +inspired by Seward and by his Yucatan schemes. Senator Doolittle runs +himself down at a fearful rate. I regret Doolittle's mistake. Those +colonizers forget that if they should export even 100,000 persons a +year, an equal number will be yearly born at home, not to speak of +other impossibilities. If carried on on a small scale, this scheme +amounts to nothing; and on a grand scale it is altogether impossible, +besides being as stupid as it is recklessly cruel. Only those persons +insist on colonization who hate or dread general emancipation. + +When the slaves shall be emancipated, then the owners of plantations +will be forced to offer very acceptable terms to the newly made free +laborers to have their plantations cultivated, which otherwise must +become waste and useless lands, and the planters themselves poor +starving wretches. With very little of governmental interference, the +mutual relation between planter and laborer can be regulated, and the +planter will be the first to oppose colonization. + +Look from whatever side you like, a colonization schemer is a cruel +deceiver, he is an enemy of emancipation, and if he claims to be an +emancipator then he is an enemy of the planter and of the prosperity +of the southern region. + +Besides, the present scheme of colonization to Chiriqui is an infamous +speculation to help some Ambrosio Thompson to work coal mines in that +part of Central America. That individual has a grant for some lands in +Chiriqui, and there these poor victims are to be exported. The grant +itself is contested by the New Grenadian government. Those poor +coolies will be the prey of speculators; there will arise claims +against the Grenadian government--a rich mine for lobbyists and +claimants. Infamy! and these fathers of the country are as blind as +moles. Central America is always in convulsions, and of course the +colonists will be robbed by every party of those semi-savages. The +colonists being Methodists, etc., will be pointed out by the stupid +Catholic clergy as being heretics and miscreants. + +Washington's proximity to the theatre of war in Virginia is the +greatest impediment for rapid movements; it is the ruin of generals +and of armies. + +Being within reach of the seat of government and of the material +means, the generals are never ready, but always have something to +complete, something to ask for, and so days after days elapse. In all +other countries and governments of the world the commanders move on, +and the objects of secondary necessity are sent after them. + +In all other countries and wars the principal aim of commanders is to +become conspicuous by rapidity of movements. The paramount glory is to +have achieved and obtained important results with comparatively +limited means. Here, the greater the slowness with which they move, +the greater captains they are; and the more expensive their +operations, the surer they are of the applause of the administration, +and of a great many f----. + +After all, the above is the result of pre-existing causes. Slowness, +indecision, and waste of money, are the prominent features of this +administration. + +Stanton excepted, I again think of the dictum of Professor Steffens, +and every day believe it more. + +Mr. Blair worse and worse; is more hot in support of McClellan, more +determined to upset Stanton, and I heard him demand the return of a +poor fugitive slave woman to some of Blair's Maryland friends. + +Every day I am confirmed in my creed that whoever had slavery for +_mammy_ is never serious in the effort to destroy it. Whatever such +men as Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Blair will do against slavery, will never +be radical by their own choice or conviction, but will be done +reluctantly, and when under the unavoidable pressure of events. + +Mr. Seward restive and bitter against all who criticise. Mr. Seward +assumes that everybody does his best, and ought therefore to be +applauded. But Mr. Seward forgets the proverb about hell being paved +with good intentions. In this terrible emergency the people want men +who _really_ do the best, and not those who only try and intend to do +it. + +McClellan had the full sway so long--appointed so many, perhaps more +than sixty, brigadier generals--that it is not astonishing when those +appointees prefer rather not to see for themselves, but blindly +"hurrah" for their creator. + +Victories in the West, triumphantly establishing the superiority of +our soldiers in open battle-fields, and the superiority of all +generals who are distant from any contact with Washington, as Pope, +Grant, Curtis, Mitchell, Sigel, and others. The brave navy,--this pure +democratic element which assures the greatest results, and makes the +less laudatory noise. The navy is admirable; the navy is the purest +and most glorious child of the people. + +The destruction of the rebellion saves the future generations of the +Southern whites. Secession would for centuries have bred and raised +only formidable social hyenas. + +McClellan subsided in mud before Yorktown. Any other, only even +half-way, military capacity commanding such forces would have made a +lunch of Yorktown. But our troops are to dig, perhaps their graves, +to the full satisfaction of Mr. Lincoln, Mr. Seward, and Mr. Blair. + +McClellan telegraphs for more men, and he has more already than he can +put in action, and more than he has room for. He subsides in digging. +The rebels will again fool him as they fooled him in Manassas. If +McClellan could know anything, then he would know this--that nothing +is so destructive to an army as sieges, as diggings, and camps, and +nothing more disciplines and re-invigorates men, makes them true +soldiers, than does marching and fighting. Poor Stanton! how he must +suffer to be overruled by imbeciles and intriguers. McClellan +telegraphing for reinforcements plainly shows how unmilitary are his +brains. He and a great many here believe that the greater the mass of +troops, the surer the victory. History mostly teaches the contrary; +but speak to American wiseacres about history! He, McClellan, and +others on his side, ignore the difficulty of handling or swinging an +army of 100,000 men. + +A good general, confident in his troops, will not hesitate to fight two +to three. But McClellan feels at ease when he can, at the least, have +two to one. In Manassas he had three to one, and conquered--wooden guns! +We will see what he will conquer before Yorktown. + +Louis Napoleon always well disposed, but of course he cannot swallow +Mr. Seward's demand about belligerents. I am so glad and so proud that +up to this day events justify my confidence in the French policy, +although our policy may tire not only Louis Napoleon, but tire the God +whom we worship and invoke. I should not wonder if God, tired by such +McClellans, Lincolns, Sewards, Blairs, etc., finally gives us the cold +shoulder. This demand concerning belligerents is a diplomatic and +initiative step made by Mr. Seward; it is unsuccessful, as are all his +initiatives, and no wonder. + +Mr. Lincoln, incited by Mr. Seward and by Mr. Blair, overrules the +opinion of the purest, the ablest, and the most patriotic men in +Congress--that of Stanton, and of the few good generals unbefogged by +McClellanism. Such a power as the Constitution gives to a President is +the salvation of the people when in the hands of a Jackson, but when +in the hands of a Lincoln, ----! + +The muscular strength of the American people, and the strength of its +backbone, beat all the Herculeses and Atlases supporting the globe. +Any other people would have long ago broke down under the policy and +the combined weight of Lincoln, Seward, and McClellan. + +Mr. Lincoln is forced out again from one of his pro-slavery +entrenchments; he was obliged to yield, and to sign the hard-fought +bill for emancipation in the District of Columbia; but how +reluctantly, with what bad grace he signed it! Good boy; he wishes not +to strike his _mammy_; and to think that the friends of humanity in +Europe will credit this emancipation not where it is due, not to the +noble pressure exercised by the high-minded Northern masses, but to +this Kentucky ----. + +Senator Wade made a powerful speech in relation to the arrest of +General Stone. It was powerful, patriotic, and rises to the skies over +the Lilliputian oratory of the thus-called scholars, etc. Wade is a +monolith,--he is cut out full in a rock. + +It seems that the new law increasing the number of judges for the +Supreme Court weakened many backbones. Congress ought to have added +the clause that a senator can be nominated only after six years from +the day of the promulgation. + +Mr. Seward again chalked before the dazzled eyes of foreign powers +certain future military operations; but again events have been so +impolite as to upturn Mr. Seward's prophecies. + +The report of the Senate committee on the destruction of Norfolk +speaks of the "insane delusion" of the administration. I am proud to +have considered it in the same light about a year ago. + +Mr. Thouvenel politely but logically refuses to acquiesce in Mr. +Seward's demand concerning the belligerents. Thouvenel's reasons are +plausible. The support given to strategy by Mr. Seward,--that support +does more mischief to us than do all the pirates and all the +violations of blockade. Let us take Richmond,--a thing impossible with +McClellan,--and take by land Charleston, Savannah, etc.; then the +pirates and belligerents are strangulated. And--as says Gen. +Sherman--Savannah and Charleston could have been taken several months +ago. Orders from Washington forbade to do it; and it would be curious +to ascertain how far Mr. Seward is innocent in the perpetration of +these orders. + +Chase and Seward dear-dearing each other! Amusing! Kilkenny cats! At +this game Seward will have the best of Chase, who is not a match for +tricks. + +The New York Times attacks Capt. Dahlgren, of the Navy Yard. It is in +the nature of the "little villain" to bespatter men of such devotion, +patriotism, and eminent capacity as is Captain Dahlgren. + +Thurlow Weed calls the Tribune "infernal," because it wishes a serious +war, and thus prevents the raising of a Union party in the South, so +flippantly looked for by him and Mr. Seward, his pupil. I see the time +coming when all these _gentlemen_ of the concessions, of the +not-hurting policy,--when all these conservative seekers for the Union +party will try, Pilatus-like, to wash their hands of the innocent +blood; but you shall try, and not succeed, to whitewash your stained +hands; you have less excuses on your side than had the Roman proconsul +on his side. + +When Mr. Mercier was in Richmond, some of the rebel leaders and +generals told him that they believed not their senses on learning that +McClellan was going to Yorktown; that he never could have selected a +better place for them, and that they were sure of his destruction on +the Peninsula. + +Perhaps McClellan wished to try his hand and rehearse the siege of +Sebastopol. + +If McClellan's ignorance of military history were not so well +established, he would know that since Archimedes, down to Todleben, +more genius was displayed in the defence than in the attack of any +place. The making of approaches, parallels, etc., is an affair of +engineering school routine. Napoleon took Toulon rather as an +artillerist, who, having, calculated the reach of projectiles, put his +battery on a spot wherefrom he shelled Toulon. Napoleon took Mantua by +destroying the Austrian army which hastened to the relief of the +fortress. But the great American strategian knows better, and +satisfies (as said above) the rebels. + +The New York Herald, the New York Times, and other staunch supporters +of McClellan, again and again trumpet that the rebels fear McClellan, +that they consider him to be the ablest general opposed to them. The +rebels are smart, and so is their ally, the New York Herald. As for +the Times, it is only a flunkeying "little villain." + +McDowell, Banks, Fremont have about 70,000 men; the last two are +nearly at the head of the Shenandoah valley; they could unite with +McDowell, and march and take Richmond. They beg to be ordered to do +it, and so wishes Stanton; but, fatally befogged by McClellan, by +McClellan's clique in the councils, or by strategians, Lincoln +emphatically forbids any junction, any movement; the President forbids +McDowell to take Fredericksburg, or to throw a bridge across the +river. And thus McClellan prevents any glorious military operation; is +losing in the mud a hundred men daily by disease, and Mr. +Lincoln--still infatuated. But infatuation is the disease of small and +weak brains. + +Rothschild in Paris, and very likely the Rothschilds in London, are +for the North. But if the Rothschilds show that they well understand +and respect the Old Testament, whose spirit is anti-slavery, they show +they understand better the true Christian spirit than do the +Christians. The Rothschilds show themselves more thoroughly of our +century than are such Michel Chevaliers, or such impure Roebucks, and +all the supporters of free trade in human flesh. + +McClellan's supporters, and such strategians as Blair and Seward, +assert that McClellan's plan was ruined by not sending McDowell to +Gloucester; that then the whole rebel army would have been caught in a +trap. That silly plan to go to the Peninsula is defended in a still +more silly way. + +By McDowell's going to Gloucester, Washington would have been wholly +at the mercy of an army of thirty to forty thousand men; the +celebrated defences of Washington, this result of the united wisdom of +Scott and McClellan, facilitating to the rebel army a raid on +Washington. + +Further; McClellan, in concocting and _maturing_ his thus called +plans, probably believes that the rebels will do just the thing which, +in his calculations, he wishes them to do; and such erroneous +suppositions are the sole basis of his _plans_. But the rebels +repeatedly showed themselves by far too smart for his _Napoleonic_ +brains; and besides, not much wit to the rebel generals was necessary +to see through and through what the great Napoleon was about, by +ordering McDowell to Gloucester. Of course, the rebel generals would +not have had the politeness towards McClellan to sheepishly accede to +his wishes, and go into the trap. The whole plan was worse than +childish, and I am glad to learn that several generals showed brains +to condemn it. The whole plan was up to the comprehension of +McClellanites, of consummate strategians in McClellan's official +tross, for those in the Cabinet and out of it. + +Would God that all this ends not in disasters. If it ends well it will +be the first time success has crowned such transcendent incapacity. + + + + +MAY, 1862. + + Capture of New Orleans -- The second siege of Troy -- Mr. Seward + lights his lantern to search for the Union-saving party -- + Subserviency to power -- Vitality of the people -- Yorktown + evacuated -- Battle of Williamsburg -- Great bayonet charge! -- + Heintzelman and Hooker -- McClellan telegraphs that the enemy + outnumber him -- The terrible enemy evacuate Williamsburg -- The + track of truth begins to be lost -- Oh Napoleon! -- Oh spirit of + Berthier! -- Dayton not in favor -- Events are too rapid for + Lincoln -- His integrity -- Too tender of men's feelings -- + Halleck -- Ten thousand men disabled by disease -- The Bishop of + Orleans -- The rebels retreat without the knowledge of McNapoleon + -- Hunter's proclamation -- Too noble for Mr. Lincoln -- + McClellan again subsides in mud -- Jackson defeats Banks, who + makes a masterly retreat -- Bravo, Banks! -- The aulic council + frightened -- Gov. Andrew's letter -- Sigel -- English opinion -- + Mr. Mill -- Young Europa -- Young Germany -- Corinth evacuated -- + Oh, generalship! -- McDowell grimly persecuted by bad luck. + + +The capture of New Orleans. The undaunted bravery of the Navy--this +most beautiful leaf in the American history. The Navy fights without +talk and _strategy_, because it does not look to win the track to the +White House. The capture of New Orleans may lead the rebels to +evacuate Yorktown and to fool the great strategian. + +It is a very threatening symptom, that no genuine harmony--nay, no +sympathy--exists between the best, the purest, the most intelligent, +the most energetic members of both the Houses of Congress and the +President, including the leading spirit of his Cabinet. The New York +Herald is the principal supporter of Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Seward; in +the Congress their supporters are the Democrats, and all those who +wish to make concessions to the South, who ardently wish to preserve +slavery, and in any way to patch up the quarrel. + +In times as trying as are the present ones, such a shameful and +dangerous anomaly must, in the long run, destroy either the government +or the nation. If it turns out differently here, the exclusive reason +thereof will be the great vitality of the people. All the deep and +dangerous wounds inflicted by the policy of the administration will be +healed by the vigorous, vital energy of the people. + +"For Heaven's sake finish quick your war!" Such are the +exclamations--nay, the prayers--coming from the French statesmen, as +Fould and others, from our devoted friends, as Prince Napoleon, and +from all the famishing, but nevertheless nobly-behaving, operatives in +England. And here McClellan inaugurates before Yorktown a second siege +of Troy or of Sebastopol; Lincoln forbids the junction of McDowell +with Banks and Fremont, by which Richmond could be easily taken from +the west side, where it ought to be attacked; and Mr. Seward reads the +like dispatches and backs McClellan; Mr. S. lights his lantern in +search North and South of the Union-saving party! + +Speak to me of subserviency to power by European aristocrats, +courtiers, etc.! What almost every day I witness here of subserviency +of influential men to the favored and office-distributing power, all +things compared and considered, beats whatever I saw in Europe, even +in Russia at the Nicolean epoch. + +General Cameron, in his farewell speech, said that at the beginning of +the civil war General Scott told him, Cameron, that he, Scott, never +in his life was more pained than when a Virginian reminded him of his +paramount duties to his State. I take note of this declaration, as it +corroborates what a year ago I said in this diary concerning the +disastrous hesitations of General Scott. + +It is said that Turtschininoff is all in all in General Mitchell's +command. Turtschininoff is a genuine and distinguished officer of the +staff, and educated in that speciality so wholly unknown to +West-Pointers. Several among the foreigners in the army are thoroughly +educated officers of the staff, and would be of great use if employed +in the proper place. But envy and know-nothingism are doubly in their +way. Besides, the foreign officers have no tenderness for the Southern +cause and Southern chivalry, and would be in the cause with their +whole heart. + +By the insinuations of an anonymous correspondent in the Tribune, Mr. +Seward tries to re-establish his anti-slavery reputation. But how is +it that foreign diplomats, that the purest of his former political +friends, consider him to be now the savior of what he once persecuted +in his speeches? + +At every step this noble people vindicates and asserts the vitality of +self-government, continually jeopardized by the inexhaustible errors +of the policy followed by the master-spirits in the administration. +European doctors, prophets, vindictive enemies like the London Times, +the Saturday Review, etc., and the French journals of the police, all +of them are daily--nay, hourly--baffled in their expectations--paper +money and no bankruptcy, no inflation, bonds equal to gold, etc., etc. +And all this, not because there is any great or even small statesman +or financier at the head of the administration, but because the people +at large have confidence in themselves, in their own energies; because +they have the determination to succeed, and not to be bankrupt; not to +discredit their own decisions. All these phenomena, so new in the +history of nations, are incomprehensible to European wiseacres; they +are too much for the hatred and dulness of the Europeans in France, +England, and for that of the many Europeans here. + +Yorktown evacuated!--under the nose of an army of 160,000 men, and +within the distance of a rifle shot!--evacuated quietly, of course, +during several days. One cannot abstain from saying Bravo! to the +rebel generals. Their high capacity forces the mind to an involuntary +applause. Traitors, intriguers, and imbeciles applaud, extol the +results of the bloodless strategy. McClellan is used by the rebels +only to be fooled by them. It must be so. It is one proof more of the +transcendent capacity of the strategian, and, above all, of the +capacity and efficiency of the chief of the staff of the great army. +Such an operation as that of Yorktown, anywhere else, would be +considered as the highest disgrace; here, glorifications of strategy. +McClellan's bulletins from Yorktown describe the rebel fortifications +as being almost impregnable. Of course impregnable! but only to him. + +Battle at Williamsburg; and McClellan and his so perfect staff +altogether ignorant of the whole bloody but honorable affair as fought +against terrible odds by Heintzelman and Hooker; but the great +Napoleon's bulletin mentions a _real_--Oh hear! hear the great +Mars!--_charge with the bayonet_, made at the other extremity of +Williamsburg, and in which from twenty to forty men were killed! + +Heintzelman's and Hooker's personal conduct, and that of their troops, +was heroic beyond name. McClellan ignored the battle; ignored what was +going on, and, as it is said, gave orders to Sumner not to support +Heintzelman. + +McClellan telegraphs that the enemy far outnumbers him (fears count +doubly), but that he will do his utmost and his best. This Napoleon of +the New York Herald's manufacture in everything is the reverse of all +the leaders and captains known in history: all of them, when before +the battle they addressed their soldiers, represented the enemy as +inferior and contemptible; after the battle was won, the enemy was +extolled. + +From the first of his addresses to this his last dispatch from +Williamsburg, McClellan always speaks of the terrible enemy whom he is +to encounter; and in this last dispatch he tries to frighten not only +his army, but the whole country. During the night _the terrible enemy_ +evacuated Williamsburg; McClellan breathes more free, takes fresh +courage, and his bulletin estimates the enemy's forces at 50,000. + +The track of truth begins to be lost. By comparing dates, bulletins, +and notes, it results that at the precise minute when McClellan +telegraphed his wail concerning the large numbers of the enemy and the +formidable fortifications of Williamsburg, the rebels were evacuating +them, pressed and expelled therefrom by Hooker, Kearney, and +Heintzelman. Oh Napoleon! Oh spirits not only of Berthier and of +Gneisenau, but of the most insignificant chiefs of staffs, admire your +caricature at the head of the army commanded by this freshly-backed +Napoleon! + +A foreign diplomat was in McClellan's tent before Yorktown, on the eve +of the day when the rebels wholly evacuated it. One of McClellan's +aids suggested to the general that the comparative silence of the +rebel artillery might forebode evacuation. "Impossible!" answered the +New York Herald's Napoleon. "I know everything that passes in their +camp, and I have them fast." (I have these details from the +above-mentioned diplomat.) In the same minute, when the strategian +spoke in this way, at least half of the rebel army had already +withdrawn from Yorktown. Comments thereupon are superfluous. + +Dayton, from Paris, very sensibly objects to the policy of insisting +that England and France shall annul their decision concerning the +belligerents. Dayton considers such a demand to be, for various +reasons, out of season. I am sure that Dayton is respected by Louis +Napoleon and by Thouvenel on account of his sound sense and rectitude, +although he _parleys not_ French. Dayton must impress everybody +differently from that French parleying claims' prosecutor and +itinerant agent of a sewing machine, who breakfasts in Brussels with +Leopold, and the same day dines in Paris with Thouvenel, and may +take his supper in h----l, so far as the interest of the cause is +concerned. But Dayton seems not to be in favor with the department. + +The admirers of McClellan assert that one parallel digged by him was +sufficient to frighten the rebels and force them to evacuate. Good for +what it is worth for such mighty ignorant brains. The mortars, the +hundred-pounders, frightened the rebels; they break down not before +parallels, strategy, or Napoleon, but before the intellectual +superiority of the North, in the present case embodied in mortars and +other armaments. + +Following the retreating enemy, McClellan loses more prisoners than he +makes from the enemy. A new and perfectly original, perfectly _sui +generis_ mode of warfare, but altogether in harmony with all the other +martial performances of the pet of the New York Herald, of Messrs. +Seward and Blair, and of the whole herd of intriguers and imbeciles. + +People who approach him say that Mr. Lincoln's conceit groweth every +day. I guess that Seward carefully nurses the weed as the easiest way +to dominate over and to handle a feeble mind. + +Since Mr. Mercier judges by his own eyes, and not by those of former +various Washington associations, his inborn soundness and perspicacity +have the upper hand. He is impartial and just to both parties; he is +not bound to have against the rebels feelings akin to mine, but he is +well disposed, and wishes for the success of the Union. + +The events are too grand and too rapid for Lincoln. It is impossible +for him to grasp and to comprehend them. I do not know any past +historical personality fully adequate to such a task. Happily in this +occurrency, the many, the people at large, by its grasp and +forwardness, supplies and neutralizes the inefficiency or the +tergiversations, intrigues and double-dealings of the few, of the +official leaders, advisers, etc. + +I willingly concede to Mr. Lincoln all the best and most variegated +mental and intellectual qualities, all the virtues as claimed for him +by his eulogists and friends. I would wish to believe, as they do, Mr. +Lincoln to be infallible and impeccable. But all those qualities and +virtues represented to form the residue of his character, all shining +when in private life, some way or other are transformed from positives +into negatives, since Mr. Lincoln's contact with the pulsations and +the hurricane of public life. Thus Mr. Lincoln's friends assert that +all his efforts tend to conciliate parties and even individuals. This +candor was beneficial and efficient in the court or bar-rooms, or +around a supper table in Springfield. It was even more so, perhaps, +when seasoned with stories more or less * * * But one who tries to +conciliate between two antipodic principles, or between pure and +impure characters, unavoidably must dodge the principal points at +issue. Such is the stern law of logic. Who dodges, who biasses, +unavoidably deviates from that straight and direct way at the end of +which dwells truth. Further: feeble, expectative and vacillating +minds, deprived of the faculty to embrace in all its depth and +extension the task before them,--such minds cannot have a clear +purpose, nor the firm perception of ways and means leading to the aim, +and still less have they the sternness of conviction so necessary for +men dealing with such mighty events, on which depend the life and +death of a society. Such men hesitate, postpone, bias and deviate from +the straight way. Such men believe themselves in the way to truth, +when they are aside of it. It results therefrom, that when certain +amiable qualities, such as conciliation, a little dodging, hesitation, +etc., are practised in private life and in a very restrained area, +their deviations from truth are altogether imperceptible, and they are +then positive good qualities, nay, virtues. But such qualities, +transported and put into daily friction with the tempestuous +atmosphere of human events, lose their ingenuousness, their innocence, +their good-naturedness; the imperceptibility of their intrinsic +deviation becomes transparent and of gigantic dimensions. + +Mr. Lincoln's crystal-pure integrity prevented not the most frightful +dilapidation, nay, robbing of the treasury by contractors, etc., etc. +Nor has it kept pure his official household. His friend Lamon and the +to-be-formed regiments; the splendid equipages and _coupes_ of his +youthful secretaries, to be sure, came not from Springfield, etc., +etc., nor sees he through the rascally scheme of the Chiriqui +colonization. + +Mr. Lincoln, his friends assert, does not wish to hurt the feelings of +any one with whom he has to deal. Exceedingly amiable quality in a +private individual, but at times turning almost to be a vice in a man +entrusted with the destinies of a nation. So he never could decide to +hurt the feelings of McClellan, and this after all the numerous proofs +of his incapacity. But Mr. Lincoln hurts thereby, and in the most +sensible manner, the interests, nay, the lives, of the twenty millions +of people. I am sure that McClellan may lose the whole army, and why +not if he continues as he began? and Mr. Lincoln will support and keep +him, as to act otherwise would hurt McClellan's, Marcy's, Seward's, +and perhaps Blair's feelings. + +Finally, Mr. Lincoln, advised, they say, by Mr. Seward, holds in +contempt public opinion as manifested by the press, with the exception +of the incense burnt to him by the New York Herald. If this is true, +Mr. Lincoln's mind is cunningly befogged. + +It is very soothing for the quiet of private life to ignore +newspapers; but all over Europe men in power, sovereigns and +ministers, carefully and daily study and watch the opinions of the +newspapers, and principally of those which oppose and criticise them. + +Such, Mr. Lincoln, is the wisdom of the truly experienced statesman. +Better ask Louis Napoleon than Seward. + +I am astonished that concerning Mexico Louis Napoleon was taken in by +Almonte. Experience ought to have fully made him familiar with the +general policy of political refugees. This policy was, is, and will be +always based on imaginary facts. + +Political refugees befog themselves and befog others. And this Mr. de +Saligny must be a d----; Louis Napoleon ought to expel him from the +service. + +Halleck likewise seems to lay the track to the White House. Nothing +has been done since he took the command in person. Halleck, as does +also McClellan, tries to make all his measures so sure, so perfect, +that he misses his aim, and becomes fooled by the enemy. In war, as in +anything else, after having quickly prepared and taken measures, a man +ought to act, and rely as much as possible on fortune--that is, on his +own acuteness--how to cut the knot when he meets it in his path. + +Halleck before Corinth, and McClellan before Manassas and Yorktown, +both spend by far more time than it took Napoleon from Boulogne and +Bretagne to march into the heart of Germany, surround and capture Mack +at Ulm, and come in view of Vienna. + +The French and English naval officers in the Mississippi assured our +commanders that it was impossible to overcome the various defences +erected by the rebels. Our men gave the lie to those envious +forebodings. McClellan, in a dispatch, assures the Secretary of War +that he, McClellan, will take care of the gunboats. _Risum teneatis._ + +The most contemptible flunkeys on the face of the earth are the +wiseacres, and the thus-called framers of public opinion. Until yet +McClellan, literally, has not stood by when a cartridge was burned, +and they sing hosanna for him. + +Ten thousand men have been disabled by diseases before Yorktown; add +to it the several thousands in a similar way disabled in the camp +before Manassas, and it makes more than would have cost two battles, +fought between the Rappahannock and Richmond,--battles which must have +settled the question. + +Although ultra-Montane, the Bishop of Orleans nobly condemns slavery. +The Bishop's pastoral is an answer to H. E., Archbishop of New York. +The French bishop therein is true to the spirit of the Catholic +church. The Irish archbishop, compared to him, appears a dabbler in +Romanism. + +During the administration of Pierce and of Buchanan, the Democratic +senators ruled over the President and the Cabinet. Perhaps it is not +as it ought to be; but for the salvation of the country it were +desirable that a curb be put on Mr. Lincoln, Mr. Seward, Mr. Blair, by +the Republican senators, by men like Wade, Wilson, Chandler, Grimes, +Fessenden, Hale, and others. + +The retreat of the rebels was masterly conducted, and their pursuit by +McClellan has no name. Nowhere has this Napoleon got at them. The +affair at Williamsburg was bravely done by Heintzelman and Hooker; but +it was done without the knowledge of McNapoleon, and contrary to his +expectations and strategy. This he confesses in one of his _masterly_ +bulletins. Perhaps McNapoleon ignored Heintzelman's corps' heroic +actions, because neither Heintzelman, nor Hooker, nor Kearney worship +_strategy, and the deep, well-matured plans of Mc_. + +General Hunter's proclamation in South Carolina is the greatest social +act in the course of this war. How pale and insignificant are Mr. +Lincoln's disquisitions aside of that proclamation, which is greeted +in heaven by angels and cherubim--provided they are a reality. + +Of course Mr. Lincoln overrules General Hunter's proclamation. It is +too human, too noble, too great, for the tall Kentuckian. Many say +that Seward, Blair, Seaton from the Intelligencer, and other Border +State patriots, pressed upon Lincoln. I am sure that it gave them very +little trouble to put Mr. Lincoln straight ---- with slaveocracy. +Henceforth every Northern man dying in the South is to be credited to +Mr. Lincoln! + +Mr. Lincoln again publishes a disquisition, and points to the signs of +the times. But does Mr. Lincoln perceive other, more awful, signs of +the times? Does he see the bloody handwriting on the wall, condemning +his unnatural, vacillating, dodging policy? + +All things considered, it will not be astonishing in Europe if they +lose patience and sneer at the North, when they learn that McClellan +is continually doing strategy; when they will read his bulletins; when +they will find out that from West Point to Richmond he pursued the +enemy at the _enormous_ speed of two miles a day,--and that of course +nobody was hurt,--and finally, that, surrounded by a brilliant and +costly staff, he was ignorant of the condition of the roads, and of +the existence of marshes and swamps into which he plunged the army. + +The President repeatedly speaks of his strong will to restore the +Union. Very well; but why not use for it the best, the most decided, +and the most thorough means and measures? + +Continually I meet numbers and numbers of soldiers who are discharged +because disabled in the camps during winter. Thus McClellan's +bloodless strategy deprived several thousands of their health, without +in the least hurting the enemy. And daily I meet numbers of +able-bodied Africo-Americans, who would make excellent soldiers. I +decided to try to form a regiment of the Africo-Americans, and, after +whipping the F. F. V.'s, establish, beyond doubt, the perfect equality +of the thus called races. + +McClellan subsides in mud,--digs,--and the sick list of the army +increases hourly at a fearful ratio. And McClellan refuses to slaves +admittance within his lines. If, at least, McClellan was a fighting +general; but a mud-mole as he ------. Any other general in any other +country, in Asia, in Africa, etc., would use any elements whatever +within his grasp, by using which he could strengthen his own and +weaken the enemy's resources. McNapoleon knows better! + +One of the best diplomatic documents by Mr. Seward is that on Mexico; +and so is also the policy pursued by him. Why does Mr. Seward dabble +in war and strategy at home? + +McClellan digs, and by his wailings has disorganized the corps of +McDowell, and of Banks, who retreats and is pressed by Jackson. The +men who advised, or the McClellan worshippers who prevented the union +of McDowell with Banks and Fremont, are as criminal as any one can be +in Mr. Lincoln's councils. + +Now Jackson is reorganized; he penetrated between Fremont and Banks, +who were sorely weakened by transferring continually divisions from +one to another army, and this between the Chickahominy and the lower +Shenandoah. + +New diplomatic initiative by Mr. Seward. France and England are +requested to declare to the rebels that they have no support to +expect from the above-mentioned powers. + +This initiative would be splendid if it could succeed; but it cannot, +and for the same logical reasons as failed the recent initiative about +belligerents. Such unsuccessful initiatives are lowering the +consideration of that statesman who makes them. Such failures show a +want of diplomatic and statesmanlike perspicacity. + +The nation is assured by Mr. Lincoln and by Mr. Seward that a perfect +harmony prevails in the Cabinet. Beautiful if true. + +General Banks attacked by Jackson and defeated; but, although +surrounded, makes a masterly retreat, without even being considerably +worsted. Bravo, Banks! Such retreats do as much honor to a general as +a won battle. + +This bold raid of Jackson--a genuine general--wholly disorganized that +army which, if united weeks ago, could have taken Richmond, and +rendered Jackson's brilliant dash impossible. The military aulic +council of the President is frightened out of its senses, and asks the +people for 100,000 defenders. General Wadsworth advised not to thus, +without any necessity, frighten the country. + +On this occasion Governor Andrew, of Massachusetts, wrote a scorching +letter to the administration on account of General Hunter's +proclamation. Governor Andrew always acts, speaks, and writes to the +point. + +This alarming appeal, so promptly responded to, has its good, as it +will show to Europe the untired determination of the free States. + +The President took it into his head to direct himself, by telegraph, +the military operations from Fredericksburg to Shenandoah. The country +sees with what results. The military advisers of the President seem no +better than are his civil advisers--Seward, Blair, etc. If the +President earnestly wishes to use his right as Commander-in-Chief, +then he had better take in person the command of the army of the +Potomac. + +There McClellan's diggings and strategy neutralize the gallantry of +the generals and of the troops. There action, not digging, is needed. +I wrote to the President; suggesting to make Sigel his chief of the +staff (Sigel has been educated for it), and then to let our generals +fight under his, the President's, eyes. + +Great injustice was and is done to Mr. Seward by the lying and very +extensively spread rumor that he is often intoxicated. I am sure that +it is not so, and I contradict it with all my might. At last I +discovered the reason of the rumor. It is Mr. Seward's unhappy passion +for generalizations. He goes off like a rocket. Most people hearing +him become confused, understand nothing, are unable to follow him in +his soarings, and believe him to be intoxicated. His devotees alone +get in ecstacies when these rockets fly. + +Every time after any success of our troops, that perfidious sheet, the +London Times, puts on innocent airs, and asks, "Why are the Americans +so bitter against England?" Why? At every disaster the Times pours +upon the North the most malicious, poisonous, and lacerating +derisions; derisions to pierce the skin of a rhinoceros. When in that +strain no feeling is respected by this lying paper. + +Derision of the North was the Times's order of the day even before the +civil war really began. People, who probably have it from the fountain +itself, assert that in one of his hours of whiskey expansion the great +Russell let the cat out, and confessed that the Times's firm purpose +was, and is, to definitely break the Union. + +Until this hour that reptile's efforts have been unsuccessful; it +could not even bring the Cabinet over to its heinous purposes. A +counterpoise and a counter poison exist in England's higher spheres, +and I credit it to that noblest woman the queen, to Earl Russell, and +to some few others. + +The would-be English _noblesse_, the Tories, and all the like genuine +nobodies, or _would-be_ somebodies, affect to side with the South. +They are welcome to such an alliance, and even parentage. _Similis +simili gaudet._ Nobody with his senses considers the like +_gentlemen_ as representing the progressive, humane, and enlightened +part of the English nation; the American people may look down upon +their snobbish hostility. J. S. Mill--not to speak of his +followers--has declared for the cause of the North. His intellectual +support more than gorgeously compensates the cause of right and of +freedom, even for the loss or for the sneers of the whole +aristocracy, and of snobdom, of somebodies and of would-be gentlemen +of the whole Britannia Empire, including the Canadian beggarly +manikins. + +By their arrogance the Englishmen are offensive to all the nations of +the world; but they are still more so by their ingrained snobbyism. +(See about it Hugo Grotius.) Further: During the last thirty years the +London Times and the Lord Fussmaker Palmerston have done more to make +us hate England than even did the certain inborn and not over-amiable +traits in the English character. + +A part of the young foreign diplomacy here have a very strong secesh +bend; they consider the slaveholders to be aristocrats, and thus like +to acquire an aristocratic perfume. But, aristocratically speaking, +most of this promiscuous young Europa are parvenus, and the few titled +among them have heraldically no noble blood in their veins. No wonder +that here they mistake monstrosities for real noblesse. Enthusiastic +is young Germany--that is, young Bremen. + +Young European Spain here is remarkably discreet, as in the times of a +Philip II., of an Alba. + +Corinth evacuated under the nose of Halleck, as Manassas and Yorktown +have been evacuated under the nose of McClellan. Nay, Halleck, equally +strong as was the enemy, the first day of the evacuation ignores what +became of Beauregard with between sixty and eighty thousand men. Oh +generalship! Gen. Halleck is a gift from Gen. Scott. If Halleck makes +not something better, it will turn out to be a very poor gift. _Timeo +Danaos_, etc., concerning the North and the gifts from "_the highest +military authority in the land_." + +McDowell is grimly persecuted by bad luck. Since March, twice he +organized an excellent and strong corps, with which he could have +marched on Richmond, and both times his corps was wholly +disorganized--first by McClellan's wails for more, the second time by +the President and his aulic council. And now all the ignorance and +stupidity, together with all the McClellanites, accuse McDowell. Pity +that he was so near Washington; otherwise his misfortune could not +have so thoroughly occurred. + + + + +JUNE, 1862. + + Diplomatic circulars seasoned by stories -- Battle before + Richmond -- Casey's division disgraced -- McClellan afterwards + confesses he was misinformed -- Fair Oaks -- "Nobody is hurt, + only the bleeding people" -- Fremont disobeys orders -- N. Y. + Times, World, and Herald, opinion-poisoning sheets -- Napoleon + never visible before nine o'clock in the morning -- Hooker and + the other fighters soldered to the mud -- Senator Sumner shows + the practical side of his intellect -- "Slavery a big job!" -- + McClellan sends for mortars -- Defenders of slavery in Congress + worse than the rebels -- Wooden guns and cotton sentries at + Corinth -- The navy is glorious -- Brave old Gideon Welles! -- + July 4th to be celebrated in Richmond! -- Colonization again -- + Justice to France -- New regiments -- The people sublime! -- + Congress -- Lincoln visits Scott -- McDowell -- Pope -- + Disloyalty in the departments. + + +Mr. Seward takes off from Mr. Adams the gag on the question of +slavery. Perhaps even Mr. Adams might have been a little fretting. A +long speculative dispatch, wherein, among some good things, one finds +some generalizations and misstatements concerning the distress in +Ireland, generated by want of potatoes (vide Parl. De.), and not from +want of cotton, as says Mr. Seward--a confession that the government +"covers the weakness of the insurgents" and "takes care of the welfare +of the insurgents." What a tenderness, and what an ingratitude of the +rebels to acknowledge it by blows! Another confession, more precious, +that the poor slaves are the best and the only bravely devoted Union +men in the South, although occasionally shot for their devotion by our +generals, expelled from the lines (vide Halleck's order No. 3), and +delivered to the tender mercies of their masters. Finally, _immediate_ +emancipation is held before the eyes of the English statesmen rather +as a Medusa head; then a kind of story--perhaps to please Mr. +Lincoln--or quotation from _some_ writer, etc. So far as I recollect, +it is for the first time that diplomatic circulars are seasoned by +stories. But, _dit moi qui tu hante je te dirai qui tu es_. + +Mr. Seward repeatedly asserts, in writing and in words, that he has no +eventual views towards the White House. Well, it may be so or not. But +if his friends may succeed in carrying his nomination, then, of +course, reluctantly, he will bend his head to the people's will, +and--accept. When in past centuries abbots and bishops were elected, +they _reluctantly_ accepted fat abbeys and bishoprics; the investiture +was given in the sacramental words, _accipe onus pro peccatis_. + +A battle by Richmond. McClellan telegraphs a victory, and it comes out +that we lost men, positions, camps, and artillery. The President +patiently bears such humbugging, and the country--submits. + +McClellan disgraces a part of the brave General Casey's division. +Whatever might have been the conduct of the soldiers in detail, one +thing is certain, that the division was composed of rough levies; +that they fought three hours, being almost surrounded by overwhelming +forces; that they kept ground until reinforcements came; that the +breaking of the division cannot be true, or was only partial, and that +McClellan was not at all on the ground. + +This battle of Fair Oaks is another evidence of the transcendent +incapacity of the chief of the staff of the army of the Potomac, and +of Gen. McClellan's veracity. In a subsequent bulletin the general +confesses that he was misinformed concerning the conduct of Gen. +Casey's division. + +In any other army in the world, a chief of the staff who would assign +to a division a post so advanced, so isolated, so cut off from the +rest of the army, as was Gen. Casey's position,--such a chief of the +staff would be at once dismissed. Here, oh here, nobody is hurt, +nobody is to be hurt--only the bleeding people. + +As to the conduct of the soldiers, they fought well; thorough veterans +scarcely could have behaved better. McClellan turns out worse even +than I expected. + +The President's campaign against Jackson--very unsuccessful. Fremont +came not up to the mark; disobeyed orders. No excuse whatever for such +disobedience. + +One is at a loss which is to be more admired, the ignorance or the +impudence of such opinion-confusing and opinion-poisoning sheets as +the New York Times, the World, the Herald, etc. They sing _hosanna_ +for McClellan's victories. In advance they praise the to-be-fought +battles on selected fields of battle, and after the plans have been +matured for weeks, nay for months. + +A plan of a whole campaign, a general survey of it, may be prepared +and matured long before the campaign begins. But to mature for weeks a +plan of a battle! All the genuine great captains seldom had the +selection of a field of battle, as they rapidly moved in search of or +to meet their enemies, and fought them where they found them. For the +same reason, they scarcely had more than forty-eight hours to mature +their plans. Such is the history and the character of nine-tenths of +the great battles fought in the world. + +When Napoleon overthrew Prussia and Austria, he beforehand prepared +those campaigns; but neither Jena, Eylau, Friedland, Austerlitz or +Wagram were the fields of battle of his special choice. But Napoleon +moved his armies as did all the great captains before him, and as must +do all great captains after him. Only American great captains sit down +in the mud and dig. + +At times in the West, Pope, Mitchell, Nelson, Grant moved their +forces, and beat the enemy. I am sure that these brave generals and +the braves of the army of the Potomac most certainly are early risers. +A certain Napoleon never is visible before nine o'clock in the +morning. So I hear from a French officer who is not in the service, +but follows the movements of the Potomac army. + +In McClellan's army Heintzelman, Hooker, Kearney, Sumner, and many +others, would move quick, would fight and beat; but a leaden weight +presses, and solders them to the mud. I must write an article to the +press concerning the rapidity of movements,--this golden rule for any +conduct of a war. + +Since he was in the field, McNapoleon neither planned nor assisted in +person in any encounter. When are his great plans to burst out? + +In one of his recently published dispatches, Mr. Seward makes an awful +mistake in trying to establish the difference between a revolution and +a civil war, as to their respective relations to foreign interference +and support. A little knowledge of history, and a less presumption, +would have spared to him such an exposure. A revolution in a nation +can be effected, and generally is effected, without a foreign +intervention, and without even an appeal to it. Most of the civil wars +look to foreign help. So teaches history, whatever may be Mr. Seward's +contrary generalizations. + +Mr. Seward is unrelenting in his efforts to build up the Union-saving +slavery party, and is sure, as he says, to be able to manage the +Republicans, in and out of Congress. We shall see. + +Senator Sumner very well discusses the tax-bill, and again shows the +practical side of his intellect. Sumner proves that a laborious +intellect can grasp and master the most complicated matters. If Sumner +could only have more experience of men and things, he would not be so +Germanly--_naive_. + +Mr. Seward triumphantly publishes the Turkish hatti, by which pirates +are excluded from the Ottoman ports. Oh, Jemine! to be patronized by +the Turks! Misfortune brings one with strange bedfellows. + +On the occasion of the organization of slaves at Beaufort, Mr. Lincoln +exclaimed, "Slavery is a big job, and will smother us!" It will, if +dealt with in your way, Mr. President. + +McClellan sends for mortars and hundred-pounders; these monsters are +to fight, but not he. Well, even so, if possible. + +The Southern leaders send to Europe officers of artillery to buy arms +and ammunition, and are well served. Our good administration sends +speculators, railroad engineers, agents of sewing machines, and the +arms bought by them kill our own soldiers, and not the enemies. + +English papers taunt the Americans that in one hundred years the +country must become a monarchy. The Americans have now a foretaste of +some among the features of monarchy, among others of favoritism. The +Pompadours and the Dubarrys could not have sustained a McClellan at +the cost of so many lives and so many millions. Then the dabbling in +war, and other etc.'s, performed in the most approved Louis XIV.'s or +Nicolean style. + +Worse than the rebels, and by far more abject and degraded, are the +defenders of slavery, of treason, and of rebellion in the Congress, in +the press, and in the public opinion. No gallows high enough for +them. + +McClellan crowds the marshes with heavy artillery, and may easily lose +them at the smallest disaster. His army is overburdened with artillery +in a country where the moving of guns must be exceedingly difficult, +nay, often impossible. And then the difficulty of having such a large +number of men drilled for the service of guns. Scarcely any army in +Europe possesses artillerists in such numbers as are now required +here. Few guns well served make more execution than large numbers of +them fired at random. + +Instead of concentrating his army and attacking at once the rebels in +Richmond, McClellan extends his army over nearly sixty miles! To keep +such an extensive line more than 300,000 would be required. Oh, +heavens! this man is more ignorant of warfare than his worst enemies +have suspected him. + +It is reported that at Corinth the rebels had not only wooden guns, +but cotton manikins as sentries. God grant it may not be true, as it +would make the slow, pedantic Halleck even below McClellan. + +The future historian will be amazed, bewildered, nay, he may lose his +senses, discovering the heaps of confusion and of ignorance which +caused the disasters of Banks, the escape of Jackson, etc., etc. + +It is impossible to resist the admiration inspired by the skill, the +daring, the fertility of intellectual resources displayed by the +rebels; all this is so thoroughly contrasted by what is done by our +legal chiefs. + +Pity that such manhood is shown in the defence of the most infamous +cause ever known in the history of the world. To conquer an +independence with the sole object to procreate, to breed, to traffic +in, and to whip slaves! + +The navy is glorious everywhere, and not fussy. The people can never +sufficiently remunerate the navy, if patriotic services are to be +remunerated. The same would be with the army but for the Napoleons! + +The published correspondence between the rebels Rust and Hunter fully +justifies my confidence in Louis Napoleon's sound judgment. That +publication clearly establishes how the press here is wholly unable to +conceive or to comprehend the policy of the great European nations. +The press heaps outrages and nurses suspicions against Napoleon. The +Sandfords and others knowingly stir up suspicions to make believe that +their smartness averts the evil. Poor chaps! When great interests are +at stake, neither their fuss, nor any dispatch, however elaborate, can +exercise a shadow of influence. + +It seems that a Babylonian confusion prevails in the movements, in the +distribution, and in the combination of the various parts of the army +under McClellan. I should wonder if it were otherwise, with such a +general and supported by such a chief of the staff. + +Brave old Gideon Welles (Neptune) instructing his sailors to fight, +and not to calculate, and "not to deliver anybody against his personal +wish." + +These imbecile reporters and letter-writers for the press, and other +sensationists, make me enraged with their sneers at the poverty of the +rebels. If so, the more heroism. They forget the "beggars" of the +Dutch insurrection against Philip II. + +The cat is out, and I am sorry for it. The world is informed that the +revolution is finished, and now the civil war begins. Oh generalizer! +oh philosopher of history! oh prophet as to the speedy end of the +civil _war_! Oh stop, oh stop! Not by digging will your pet McClellan +bring the war to a speedy close. + +I am often enraged against myself not to be able to admire Mr. Seward, +and to be obliged to judge his whole policy in such, perhaps too +severe, a manner. What can I do, what can I do? No one, not even Gen. +Scott and Mr. Lincoln, since January, 1861, has exercised an influence +equal to Mr. Seward's on the affairs of the country, and _amicus +Plato, etc., sed magis amica veritas_. + +Mr. Seward believes that July 4th will be celebrated by us in +Richmond. He and McClellan spread this hope; Doolittle believes it. We +could be in Richmond any day under any other general, not a Napoleon; +we may never be there if led on by McClellan, inspired by Mr. Seward's +policy. + +The French amateur in McClellan's army is disgusted with McNapoleon, +and speaks with contempt of the reckless waste of men, of material, +etc. He calls it cruel, brainless, and uses a great many other +exclamations. + +The healthful activity of Stanton, his broad and clear perception of +almost all exigencies of these critical times, are continually baffled +and neutralized by the allied McClellan, Blair, Seward, New York Times +and New York Herald. Such an alliance can easily confuse even the +strongest brains. + +The colonization again on the _tapis_, and all the wonted display of +ignorance, stupidity, ill-will, and phariseeism towards genuine +liberty. + +Seward gave up his Yucatan scheme. Chiriqui has the lead. And finally, +some foreign diplomats try to make conspicuous their little royalties. +So Denmark tries to cultivate the barren rocks of St. Thomas with the +poor captives. It will be a new kind of apprenticeship under cruel +masters. I hear that Mr. Lincoln is caught in the trap, and that a +convention _ad hoc_ is soon to be concluded. This time, at least, Mr. +Seward's name will remain outside. + +I am uneasy, fearing we may commit some spread-eagleism towards France +during this present Mexican imbroglio. I will do my utmost to explain +to influential senators the truth concerning Louis Napoleon's +political conduct towards the North, the absurdity of any hostile +demonstration against France, and the dirt constituting the substratum +of the new Mexican treaty. + +"French policy may change towards us," say the anti-Napoleons; "Louis +Napoleon will unmask his diplomatic batteries," etc., etc. + +Well, Louis Napoleon may change when he finds that we are incorrigible +imbeciles, and that the great interests, which to defend is his duty, +are jeopardized; but not before. As for masked batteries, I considered +worse than fools all those who believed in masked batteries at +Manassas; and in the same light I consider all the believers in +diplomatic masked batteries. I was not afraid of the one, and am not +of the other. + +Not one single French vessel has run, or attempted to run, the +blockade; not one has left the ports of France, or of the French West +Indies, loaded with arms or ammunition for the insurgents. As for the +barking of French papers, or of some second or third rate saloons, +barkings thus magnified by American letter-writers, I know too much of +Paris and of society to take notice of it. I am sure that the whole +rebel tross in Paris, male and female, have not yet been admitted into +any single saloon of the _real_ good or high society in Paris, and +never will be. A thus called _highly accomplished and fashionable +lady_ from New Orleans, or from Washington, may easily be taken for a +country dress-maker, or for a chamber-maid, not fit for first families +of the genuine good and high society in Paris, and all over Europe. + +Stanton, the true patriot, frets in despair at McClellan's keeping the +army in the unhealthiest place of Virginia. Stanton's opponents, the +rats, find all right, even the deaths by disease. In the end +McClellan is to be all the better for it. Is there no penitentiary for +all this mob? + +New regiments pour in, the people are sublime in their devotion; only +may these regiments not become sacrificed to the Jaggernaut of +imbecility. + +Whatever may say its revilers, this Congress will have a noble and +pure page in American history. I speak of the majority. + +The Congress showed energy, clear and broad comprehension and +appreciation of the events and of men. The Congress was ready for +every sacrifice, and would have accelerated the crushing of the +rebellion but for the formulas, and for the inadequacy of the majority +in the administration. If the Congress had no great leaders, the +better for it; it had honest and energetic men, and their leader was +their purpose, their pure belief in the justice of their cause and in +the people. Such leaders elevate higher any political body than could +ever a Clay, a Webster, etc., etc. + +The Congress is palsied by the inefficiency of the administration, and +but for this, the Congress would have done far more for the salvation +of the country. All the best men in Congress support Stanton, and this +alone speaks volumes. It is a curse that the administration is so +independent of the Congress. Oh, why this Congress possesses not the +omnipotence of an English Parliament? Then the Congress would have +prevented all the evils hitherto brought upon the country by the +vacillating military and general policy. Step by step this policy +brings the country to the verge of an abyss, and it will tax all the +energy of the people not to be precipitated in it. + +Mr. Lincoln has gone to get inspiration and information from Gen. +Scott. Good God! Can this man never go out from this rotten treadmill? +One more advice from the "great ruin," and the country will also be a +ruin. + +Flatterers, sensation writers, and all this _magna clientum caterva_ +extol to the skies Mr. Lincoln's firmness and straightforwardness. The +firmness is located, and is to be discovered in various places--in the +lips, in the chin, in the jaw, and God knows where else. I cannot +detect any firmness in his actions beyond that of sticking to +McClellan,--of whom he has the worst opinion,--and of resisting the +emancipation and the arming of Africo-Americans. He has firmness in +letting the country be ruined. + +McClellan's bulletins constitute the most original and strange +collection of style in general, and of military style in particular. +Capt. Morin says that the first thing is to teach McClellan how to +write military bulletins. + +Mr. Seward's crew of politicians is busily at work among congressmen, +etc., to prepare a strong party in support of the administration's +eventual concessions to slavery, in case Richmond is taken. Ultra +Democratic, half secession Senators are sounded. + +The more the events complicate, the more they require a powerful, +all-embracing mind, but in the same proportion subside Mr. Lincoln, +Mr. Seward, Mr. Weed, and all the rest of the great men. Alone the +people and their true men subside not. + +Poor McDowell suffers for the sins of others--above all, for those of +Mr. Lincoln and of his aulic council. He is internally broken down, +but behaves nobly; not as does this poor Fremont, whose disappearance +from the military scene cannot and must not be regretted. He is not a +military capacity; he was again badly surrounded, and his last battle +was fought at random, without any unity. I spoke about it with various +foreign officers serving under him, and all agree in the incapacity of +Fremont and of his staff. + +Gen. Pope, a man for the circumstances, acted well in the West; at +last a new man. + +McClellan inaugurated new tactics. It is to approach the enemy's army +by parallels and by trenches. He will not take or scare the enemy, but +he will immortalize his name far above the immortality of all not +great generals. + +Night and day ambulances are conveying the sick and wounded here, and +large numbers, thousands upon thousands, going north. One must cry +tears of blood to witness such destruction, such a sacrifice of the +noblest people on the shrine of utter military incapacity. And the +traitors, the imbeciles, and the intriguers sing _hallelujah_ to +McClellan, and daily throw their slime at Stanton. + +From time to time rumors and complaints are made concerning the +ill-will or disloyalty of some of the _employes_ in the Departments. +The explanation thereof may be that some of the thus called old +fogies, above all in the War Department, may be unfriendly to the war +without being disloyal. Such venerables took root in comfortable +situations; they slowly trod in the easy path of rusty and musty +routine, and at once the war shook them to the bone, exposing the +incapacity and the inefficiency of many; it forced upon them the +horror of _cogitandi_ about new matters, and an amount of daily duties +to be performed in offices which formerly equalled sinecures. Further, +these relics dread to be superseded by more active and intelligent +men; and _inde irae_. + + + + +JULY, 1862. + + Intervention -- The cursed fields of the Chickahominy -- Titanic + fightings, but no generalship -- McClellan the first to reach + James river -- The Orleans leave -- July 4th, the gloomiest since + the birth of the republic -- Not reinforcements, but brains, + wanted; and brains not transferable! -- The people run to the + rescue -- Rebel tactics -- Lincoln does not sacrifice Stanton -- + McClellan not the greatest culprit -- Stanton a true statesman -- + The President goes to James river -- The Union as it was, a + throttling nightmare! -- A man needed! -- Confiscation bill + signed -- Congress adjourned -- Mr. Dicey -- Halleck, the + American Carnot -- Lincoln tries to neutralize the confiscation + bill -- Guerillas spread like locusts. + + +When at epochs of great social convulsions events and circumstances +put certain individuals into an eminent or elevated position, their +names become intertwined with the great epoch. In the eyes of the +masses and of the vulgar observers, such names acquire a high +importance on account of the commonly made confusion between +circumstances and personal merit, and, moonlight-like, such names +reverberate not their own, but a borrowed splendor. Thus much for the +official pilots of this great people. + +The usual paroxysm of the foreign intervention fever. It ought to be +so easy to understand, that out of self-respect foreign powers will +not risk any intervention on paper; and to make an effective +intervention a hundred thousand men will be necessary, as the first +course. For such a service no foreign power is prepared. Intervention +is silly talk. McClellan and all kinds of his supporters do more for +the South than could England and France united. + +It was a poor trick to gather by telegraph the signatures of the +governors for an offer of troops to the President. It was done for +effect in Europe; but events seem to have a grudge against Mr. Seward; +the same steamer carried over the Atlantic the news of our defeats in +the Chickahominy swamps. + +To attempt a change of such an extensive basis as was occupied by our +army under the eyes of a daring, able, skilful enemy, in a country +wooded and marshy, and without roads! This movement was perhaps +necessary, and could not be avoided; but why at the start had such a +basis been selected? Such a selection made disasters inevitable, and +they followed. + +All kinds of accounts pour in from these cursed fields of the +Chickahominy. Foreign officers--whose veracity I can believe--speak +enthusiastically of the undaunted bravery of the volunteers and of +their generals; _but a general generalship_ was not to be found during +those titanic fightings. What I gathered from the _suite_ of the +Orleans is, that Gen. McClellan was totally confused, was totally +ignorant of the condition of the corps, was never within distance to +give or to be asked for orders, and was the first to reach the banks +of the James and to sleep on board the gunboat Galena. At Winchester, +Banks in person covered the retreat. + +The Orleans left. I pity them; they will be hooted in Europe. They +shared some of McClellan's fallacious and petty notions, and very +likely they have been gulled by the McClellan-Seward expectations of +taking Richmond before July 4th. + +Gen. Hunter's letter about fugitive slaves, and rebels fugitive from +the flag of the Union, is the noblest contra distinction. No rhetor +could have invented it. Hang yourselves, oh rhetors! + +_July 4th._--The gloomiest since the birth of this republic. Never was +the country so low, and after such sacrifices of blood, of time, and +of money; and all this slaughtered to that Juggernaut of strategy, and +to the ignoble motley of his supporters. + +Oh you widows, bereaved mothers, sisters, and sweethearts, cry for +vengeance! Cry for vengeance, you shadows of the dead of the malaria, +or fallen in the defence of your country's honor. Stupidity has +stabbed in the back more deadly wounds than did the enemy in front. +This is the 4th of July. Oh! my old heart and my, not weak, mind are +bursting with grief. + +The people, the masses, sacrifice their blood, their time, their +fortune. What sacrifice the official leaders and pilots? All is net +gain for them. Thousands and thousands of families will be +impoverished for life, nay, for generations. It is those nameless +heroes on the fields of battle who alone uphold the honor of the +American name, as it is the people at large who have the true +statesmanship, and not the appointed guardsmen. + +Rats, hounds, all the vermin, all the impure beasts, are after +Stanton, for his not having sent reinforcements to McClellan; but none +existed, and McClellan has exhausted and devoured all the reserves. +Not reinforcements, but brains, were wanted, and brains are not +transferable. + +The people, sublime, runs again to the rescue, and Mr. Seward is so +sacrilegious, so impious, as to say that the people is generally slow. +He is fast on the road of confusion. + +I am sure that the whole movement and attack of the rebels was made, +as it could be made, at the utmost with 60,000 to 70,000 men, if even +with such a number. The rebels never attacked our whole line, but +always threw superior forces on some weak and isolated point. This the +rebels did during the last battles. The rebels showed great +generalship. Jackson is already the legendary hero, and deserves to +be. + +McClellan never attacked, but _always_ was surprised and forced to +fight, so the rebels were sure that he would not dare anything to +counteract and counter-manoeuvre their daring; so the rebel generals +had perfect ease for the execution of their bold but skilful plans. + +Lincoln sacrifices not Stanton, not even to Seward, to Blair, and to +the slaveocrats in Congress. That is something. + +McClellan publishes a pompous order of the day for the 4th of July, +and apes the phraseology of Napoleon's bulletins from times when by a +blow Napoleon overthrew empires. + +What I can gather from the accounts of the seven days' fighting is, +that during the battle at Gaines' Mills (to speak technically), +positively the whole army was without any basis. But traitors, +imbeciles and intriguers rend the air and the skies with their praises +of the great strategy and of the brilliant generalship. + +I am aware how difficult it will be to convince the heroic army--that +is, its rank and file--that their disasters result from want of +generalship, and not from any inferiority in numbers. All over the +world incapable commanders raise the outcry of deficiency in numbers +to cover therewith their personal deficiency of brains. Similar events +to McClellan's wails, and the confusion they create in the armies and +in the people, are nothing new in the history of wars. + +A fleet of gunboats covers the army on the James river. Once McClellan +condescendingly boasted that he would take care of the gunboats. The +worst is, that these gunboats could have done service against +Charleston, Mobile, Savannah, etc. + +After all, McClellan is not the greatest culprit. It is not his fault +that he is without military brains and without military capacity. He +tried to do the best, according to his poor intellect. The great, +eternally-to-be-damned malefactors are those who kept him in command +after having had repeated proofs of his incapacity; and still greater +are those constitutional advisers who supported McClellan against the +outcry of the best in the Cabinet and in the nation. A time may come +when the children of those malefactors will be ashamed of their +fathers' names, and--curse them. + +I have not scorn enough against the revilers and accusers of Stanton. +If Stanton could have had his free will, far different would be the +condition of affairs. Stanton's first appearance put an end to the +prevailing lethargy, and marked a new and glorious era. But, ah! how +short! The rats and the vermin were afraid of him, and took shelter +behind the incarnated strategy. Stanton embraced and embraces the +_ensemble_ of the task and of the field before him. And this +politician, Blair, to be his critic! If Stanton had been left +undisturbed in the execution of his duties as the Secretary of War, +McClellan would have been obliged to march directly to Richmond, and +the brainless strategy in the Peninsula would have been crushed in the +bud. If Stanton had not been undermined, not only the people would +have been saved from terrible disasters, but McClellan, Lincoln, +Seward, and Blair would have been saved from reproaches and from +malediction. + +Stanton likewise shows himself to be a true statesman. A Democrat in +politics, he very likely never was such a violent and decided opponent +of slavery as the Sewards and Blairs professed to be throughout their +whole lives. But now Stanton pierces the fog, perceives the +unavoidable exigencies, and is an emancipationist, when the Sewards +and the Blairs try to compromise, nay, virtually to preserve slavery. + +_July 10th._--The rebels won time to increase and gather their forces +from the south. McClellan's army may not prevent their turning against +Pope, who has too small a body to resist or to cover the whole line +from Fredericksburg to the Shenandoah. If the rebels attack Pope he +must retreat and concentrate before Washington; and then again begins +the uphill work. The people generally pour in blood, time and money; +but brains, brains are needed, and, without violating the formulas, +the people cannot inaugurate brains. Whatever the people may do, the +same quacks and bunglers will over again commit the same blunders. +Nothing can teach a little foresight to the helmsman and to some of +his seconds. Rocked by his imagination, Mr. Seward never sees clearly +the events before him and what they generate. + +The call for three hundred thousand men will be responded to. The men +will come; but will statesmanship and generalship come with them? I am +afraid that the rebels, operating with promptness and energy, may give +no time to the levies to be fully organized; the rebels will press on +Washington. + +McClellan reports to the President that he has only 50,000 men left. +The President goes to James river, and finds 83,000 ready for action. +Was it ignorance in McClellan, or his inborn disrespect of truth, or +disrespect of the country, or something worse, that made him make such +a report? And all this passes, and Mr. Lincoln cannot hurt McClellan, +although a gory shroud extends over the whole country. + +A secretary of the French consul is here, and confirms my speculations +concerning the numbers of the rebels in the last battles on the +Chickahominy. The current and authoritative opinion in Richmond is, +that from the Potomac to the Rio Grande the rebel force never exceeded +300,000 men. If so, the more glory; and it must be so, according to +the rational analysis of statistics. + +Mr. Seward writes a skilful dispatch to explain the battles on the +Chickahominy. But no skill can succeed to bamboozle the cold, +clear-sighted European statesmen. + +No doubt Mr. Seward sincerely wished to save the Union in his own way +and according to his peculiar conception, and, after having +accomplished it, disappear from the political arena, surrounded by the +halo of national gratitude. + +But even for this aim of reconstruction of the Union as it was, Mr. +Seward, at the start, took the wrong track, and took it because he is +ignorant of history and of the logic in human affairs. To save the +Union as it was, it was imperatively necessary to strike quick and +crushing blows, and to do this in May, June, etc., 1861. Mr. Seward +could have realized then what now is only a throttling nightmare--_the +Union as it was_. But Mr. Seward sustained a policy of delays and not +of blows; the struggle protracts, and, for reasons repeatedly +mentioned, the suppression of rebellion becomes more and more +difficult, and the reconstruction of the old Union as it was a +_mirage_ of his imagination. + +But it is not Thurlow Weed, and others of that stamp, who could +enlighten Mr. Seward on such subjects--far, far above their vulgar and +mean politicianism. It is now useless to accuse and condemn Congress +for its so-called violence, as does Mr. Seward, and to assert that but +for Congress he, Mr. Seward, would have long ago patched up the +quarrel. The Congress may be as tame as a lamb, and as subject as a +foot-sole. Mr. Seward may on his knees proffer to the rebels a +compromise and the most stringent safeguards for slavery; to-day the +rebels will spurn all as they would have spurned it during the whole +year. The rebels will act as Mason did when in the Senate hall Mr. +Seward asked the traitor to be introduced to Mr. Lincoln. + +The country is in more need of a man than of the many hundreds of +thousands of new levies. + +Some time ago Mr. Seward gathered around him his devotees in Congress +(few in number), and unveiled to them that nobody can imagine what +superhuman efforts it cost him to avert foreign intervention. Very +unnecessary demonstration, as he knows it well himself, and, if it +gets into the papers, may turn out to be offensive to the two +cabinets, as they give to Mr. Seward no reason for making such +statements. Should England and France ever decide upon any such step, +then Mr. Seward may write as a Cicero, have all the learning of a +Hugo Grotius, of a Vattel, and of all other publicists combined; he +may send legions of Weeds and Sandfords to Europe, and all this will +not weigh a feather with the cabinets of London and of Paris. + +Further, no foreign powers occasioned our defeats _in the +Chickahominy_, but those who were enraptured with the Peninsula +strategy. + +Mr. Seward's letter to the great meeting in New York shows that not +his patriotism, but his confidence in success, is slightly notched. + +Nobody doubts his patriotism; but Mr. Seward tried to shape mighty +events into a mould after his not-over-gigantic mind, and now he frets +because these events tear his sacrilegious hand. + +After much opposition, vacillation, hesitation, and aversion, the +President signed the confiscation and emancipation bill. A new +evidence of how devotedly he wishes to avert any deadly blows from +slavery,--this national shame. + +The Congress adjourned after having done everything good, and what was +in its power. It separated, leaving the country's cause in a worse +condition than it was a year ago, after the Bull Run day. Many, nay, +almost all the best members of both houses are fully aware in what +hands they left the destinies of the nation. Many went away with +despair in their hearts; but the constitutional formula makes it +impossible for them to act, and to save what so badly needs a savior. + +Intervention fever again. The worst intervention is perpetrated at +home by imbeciles, by intriguers, by traitors, and by the--spades. + +Mr. Dicey, an Englishman who travelled or travels in this +country,--Mr. D. is the first among his countrymen who understands the +events here, and who is just toward the true American people;--Mr. D. +truly says that the people fight without a general, and without a +statesman, and are the more to be admired for it. + +Mr. Seward tries to appear grand before the foreign diplomats, and +talks about Cromwell, Louis Napoleon, _coup d'Etats_ against the +Congress, and about his regrets to be in the impossibility to imitate +them. Only think, Cromwell, Napoleon I., Napoleon III., Seward! Such +dictatorial dreams may explain Mr. Seward's partiality for General +McClellan, whom Seward may perhaps wish to use as Louis Napoleon used +Gen. St. Arnoud. + +Halleck is to be the American Carnot. But any change is an +improvement. If Halleck extricates the army on the James river, and +saves it from malaria,--this enemy more deadly than Jackson and +McClellan combined,--then for this single action Halleck deserves well +of the country, and his Corinth affair will, at least in part, be +atoned for. + +Mr. Lincoln makes a new effort to save his _mammy_, and tries to +neutralize the confiscation bill. Mr. Lincoln will not make a step +beyond what is called the Border-States' policy; and it may prove too +late when he will decide to honestly execute the law of Congress. Mr. +Seward gets into hysterics at the hateful name of Congress. Similar +spite he showed to a delegation from the city of New York, upbraiding +some of its members, and assuring them that delegations are not +needed,--that the administration is fully up to the task. Yes, Stanton +is, but how about some others? + +Poor Mr. Lincoln! he must stand all the mutual puffs of Seward and +Sandford, and some more in store for him when the Weeds and Hughes +will come and give an account of their doings in Europe. + +The report of the battle against Casey, as published by the rebel +General Johnston, is a masterpiece of military style, and shows how +skilfully the attack was combined. The Southern leaders have +exclusively in view the triumph of their cause. With many of our +leaders, the people's cause is made to square with their little +selfishness. + +Guerillas spread like locusts. Perhaps they are the results of our +Union-searching, slavery-saving policy. + + + + +AUGUST, 1862. + + Emancipation -- The President's hand falls back -- Weed sent for + -- Gen. Wadsworth -- The new levies -- The Africo-Americans not + called for -- Let every Northern man be shot rather! -- End of + the Peninsula campaign -- Fifty or sixty thousand dead -- Who is + responsible? -- The army saved -- Lincoln and McClellan -- The + President and the Africo-Americans -- An Eden in Chiriqui -- + Greeley -- The old lion begins to awake -- Mr. Lincoln tells + stories -- The rebels take the offensive -- European opinion -- + McClellan's army landed -- Roebuck -- Halleck -- Butler's + mistakes -- Hunter recalled -- Terrible fighting at Manassas -- + Pope cuts his way through -- Reinforcements slow in coming -- + McClellan reduced in command. + + +_Vulgatior fama est_, that Mr. Lincoln was already raising his hand to +sign a stirring proclamation on the question of emancipation; that +Stanton was upholding the President's arm that it might not grow weak +in the performance of a sacred duty; that Chase, Bates, and Welles +joined Stanton; but that Messrs. Seward and Blair so firmly objected +that the President's outstretched hand slowly began to fall back; that +to precipitate the mortification, Thurlow Weed was telegraphed; that +Thurlow Weed presented to Mr. Lincoln the Medusa-head of Irish riots +in the North against the emancipation of slaves in the South; that Mr. +Lincoln's mind faltered (oh, Steffens) before such a Chinese shadow, +and that thus once more slavery was saved. _Relata refero._ + +General Wadsworth is the good genius of the poor and oppressed race. +But for Wadsworth's noble soul and heart the Lamons and many other +blood-hounds in Washington would have given about three-fourths of the +fugitives over to the whip of the slavers. + +Within the last four weeks 600,000 new levies are called to arms. With +the 600,000 men levied previously, it is the heaviest draft ever made +from a population. No emperor or despot ever did it in a similar lapse +of time. The appreciation current here is, that the twenty millions of +inhabitants can easily furnish such a quota; but the truth is that the +draft, or the levy, or the volunteering, is made from about three +millions of men between the ages of twenty and forty years. One +million two hundred thousand in one year is equal to nearly 36-100, +and this from the most vital, the most generative, and most productive +part of the population. + +The same analysis and percentage applied to the statistics of the +population in the rebel States gives a little above 300,000 men under +arms; however, the percentage of the drafts from the full-aged +population in the South can be increased by some 15-100 over the +percentage in the North. This increase is almost exclusively +facilitated by the substratum of slavery, and our administration +devotedly takes care _ne detrimentum capiat_ that peculiar +institution. + +The last draft could be averted from the North if the four millions of +loyal Africo-Americans were called to arms. But Mr. Lincoln, with the +Sewards, the Blairs, and others, will rather see every Northern man +shot than to touch the palladium of the rebels. + +These new enormous masses will crush the rebellion, provided they are +not marshalled by strategy; but nevertheless the painful confession +must be made, that our putting in the field of three to one rebel may +confuse a future historian, and contribute to root more firmly that +stupid fallacy already asserted by the rebels, and by some among their +European upholders, of the superiority of the Southern over the +Northern thus called race. Such a stigma is inflicted upon the brave +and heroic North by the strategy, and by the vacillating, slave-saving +policy of the administration. + +This is the more painful for me to record, as most of the foreign +officers in our service, and who are experienced and good judges, most +positively assert the superior fighting qualities of the Union +volunteers over the rebels. Our troops are better fed, clad and armed, +but over our army hovers the thick mist of strategy and indecision; +the rebels are led not by anaconda strategians, but by fighting +generals, desperate, and thus externally heroic; energy inspires their +councils, their administration, and their military leaders. + +If Stanton and Halleck succeed in extricating the army on the James +river, then they will deserve the gratitude of the people. The malaria +there must be more destructive than would be many battles. + +Events triumphantly justify Stanton's opposition to the Peninsula +strategy and campaign. So ends this horrible sacrifice; between fifty +and sixty thousand killed or dead by diseases. The victims of this +holocaust have fallen for their country's cause, but the +responsibility for the slaughter is to be equally divided between +McClellan, Lincoln, Seward and Blair. Even Sylla had not on his soul +so much blood as has the above quatuor. When, after the victory over +the allied Samnites and others, at the Colline gate of Rome, Sylla +ordered the massacre of more than four thousand prisoners who laid +down their arms; when his lists of proscription filled with blood Rome +and other cities of Italy, Sylla so firmly consolidated the supremacy +of the _Urbs_ over Italy and over the world, that after twenty +centuries of the most manifold vicissitudes, transformations and +tempests, this supremacy cannot yet be upturned. But the holocaust to +strategy resulted in humiliating the North and in heaping glory on the +Southern leaders. + +If the newly called 600,000 men finish the rebellion before Congress +meets, then slavery is saved. To save slavery and to avoid +emancipation was perhaps the secret aim of Mr. Lincoln, Seward, and +Blair; who knows but that of Halleck, when the administration called +for the additional 300,000 men? + +Persons who approach Halleck say that he is a thorough pro-slavery +partisan. His order No. 3, the opinion of some officers of his staff, +and his associations, make me believe in the truth of that report. + +Mr. Seward says _sub rosa_ to various persons, that slavery is an +obsolete question, and he assures others that emancipation is a fixed +fact, and is no more to be held back; that he is no more a +conservative. How are we to understand this man? If Mr. Seward is +sincere, then his last transformation may prove that he has given up +the idea of finding a Union party in the South, or that he wishes to +reconquer--what he has lost--the confidence of the party. But this +return on his part may prove _troppo tardi_. + +The army of the Potomac is saved; the heroes, martyrs, and sufferers +are extricated from the grasp of death. This epopee in the history of +the civil war will immortalize the army, but the strategian's +immortality will differ from that of the army. + +England and France firm in their neutrality. Lord John Russell's +speeches in Parliament are all that can be desired. + +Will it ever be thoroughly investigated and elucidated why, after the +evacuation of Corinth, the onward march of our everywhere-victorious +Western armies came at once to a stand-still? The guerillas, the +increase of forces in Richmond, and some eventual disasters, may be +directly traced to this inconceivable conduct on the part of the +Western commanders or of the Commander-in-chief. Was not some +Union-searching at the bottom of that stoppage? When, months ago, a +false rumor was spread about the evacuation of Memphis and Corinth, +Mr. Seward was ready to start for the above-mentioned places, of +course in search of the Union feeling. Perhaps others were drawn into +this Union-searching, Union and slavery-restoring conspiracy. + +I have most positive reasons to believe that Gen. Halleck wished to +remove Gen. McClellan from the command of the army. The President +opposed to it. Men of honor, of word, and of truth, and who are on +intimate footing with Mr. Lincoln, repeatedly assured me that, in his +conversation, the President judges and appreciates Gen. McClellan as +he is judged and appreciated by those whom his crew call his enemies. +With all this, Mr. Lincoln, through thin and thick, supports McClellan +and maintains him in command. Such a double-dealing in the chief of a +noble people! Seemingly Mr. Seward and Mr. Blair always exercise the +most powerful influence. Both wished that the army remain in the +malarias of the James river. Whatever be their reasons, one shudders +in horror at the case with which all those culprits look on this +bloody affair. Oh you widowed wives, mothers, and sweethearts! oh you +orphaned children! oh you crippled and disabled, you impoverished and +ruined, by sacrificing to your country more than do all the Lincolns, +McClellans, Blairs, and Sewards! Some day you will ask a terrible +account, and if not the present day, posterity will avenge you. + +It is very discouraging to witness that the President shows little or +no energy in his dealings with incapacities, and what a mass of +intrigues is used to excuse and justify incapacity when the nation's +life-blood runs in streams. Without the slightest hesitation any +European government would dismiss an incapable commander of an army, +and the French Convention, that type of revolutionary and +nation-saving energy, dealt even sharper with military and other +incapacities. + +Regiments after regiments begin to pour in, to make good the deadly +mistakes of our rulers. The people, as always, sublime, inexhaustible +in its sacrifices! God grant that administrative incompetency may +become soon exhausted! + +Mr. Seward told a diplomat that his (Seward's) salary was $8,000, and +he spends double the amount; thus sacrificing to the country $8,000. +When I hear such reports about him, I feel ashamed and sorrowful on +his account. Such talk will not increase esteem for him among +foreigners and strangers; and although I am sure that Mr. Seward +intended to make a joke, even as such it was worse than a poor one. + +In his interview with a deputation composed of Africo-Americans, Mr. +Lincoln rehearsed all the clap-trap concerning the races, the +incompatibility to live together, and other like _bosh_. Mr. Lincoln +promised to them an Eden--in Chiriqui. Mr. Lincoln promised them--what +he ought to know is utterly impossible and beyond his power--that they +will form an independent community in a country already governed by +orderly and legally organized States, as are New Grenada and Costa +Rica. Happily even for Mr. Lincoln's name, the logic of human events +will save from exposure his ignorance of international laws, and his +too light and too quick assertions. I pity Mr. Lincoln; his honesty +and unfamiliarity with human affairs, with history, with laws, and +with other like etceteras, continually involve him in unnecessary +scrapes. + +The proclamation concerning the colonization is issued. It is a +display of ignorance or of humbug, or perhaps of both. Some of the +best among Americans do not utter their condemnation of this +colonization scheme, because the President is to be allowed _to carry +out his hobby_. The despots of the Old World will envy Mr. Lincoln. +Those despots can no more _carry out their hobbies_. The _Roi s'amuse_ +had its time; but the _il bondo can_ of some here, at times, beats +that of the _Italina in Algero_. + +The two letters of Greeley to the President show that the old, +indomitable lion begins to awake. As to Mr. Lincoln's answer, it reads +badly, and as for all the rest, it is the eternal dodging of a vital +question. + +Mr. Lincoln's equanimity, although not so stoical, is unequalled. In +the midst of the most stirring and exciting--nay, death-giving--news, +Mr. Lincoln has always a story to tell. This is known and experienced +by all who approach him. Months ago I was in Mr. Lincoln's presence +when he received a telegram announcing the crossing of the Mississippi +by Gen. Pope, at New Madrid. Scarcely had Mr. Lincoln finished the +reading of the dispatch, when he cracked (that is the sacramental +word) two not very washed stories. + +When the history of this administration shall become well known, +contemporary and future generations will wonder and be puzzled to know +how the most intelligent and enlightened people in the world could +produce such fruits and results of self-government. + +The rebel chiefs take the offensive; they unfold a brilliancy in +conception and rapidity in execution of which the best generals in any +army might be proud. McClellan's army was to be prevented from uniting +with Pope. But it seems that Pope manoeuvres successfully, and +approaches McClellan. + +If only our domestic policy were more to the point, England and France +could not be complained of. Mr. Mercier behaves here as loyally as can +be wished, and carefully avoids evoking any misunderstandings +whatever. So do Louis Napoleon, Mr. Thouvenel, Lord John Russell, +notwithstanding Mr. Seward's all-confusing policy. Mr. Mercier never, +never uttered in my presence anything whatever which in the slightest +manner could irritate even the _thinnest-skinned_ American. + +As I expected, Louis Napoleon and Mr. Thouvenel highly esteem Mr. +Dayton; and it will be a great mistake to supersede Mr. Dayton in +Paris by the travelling agent of the sewing machine. It seems that +such a change is contemplated in certain quarters, because the agent +parleys poor French. Such a change will not be flattering, and will +not be agreeable to the French court, to the French cabinet, and to +the French good society. + +On the continent of Europe sympathy begins to be unsettled, unsteady. +As independence is to-day the watchword in Europe, so the cause of the +rebels acquires a plausible justification. Various are the reasons of +this new counter current. Prominent among them is the vacillating, and +by Europeans considered to be INHUMAN, policy of Mr. Lincoln in regard +to slavery, the opaqueness of our strategy, and the brilliancy of the +tactics of the rebel generals, and, finally, the incapacity of our +agents to enlighten European public opinion, and to explain the true +and horrible character of the rebellion. Repeatedly I warned Mr. +Seward, telling him that the tide of public opinion was rising against +us in Europe, and I explained to him the causes; but of course it was +useless, as his agents say the contrary, and say it for reasons easily +to be understood. + +McClellan's army landed, and he is to be in command of all the troops. +I congratulate all therein concerned about this new victory. Bleed, oh +bleed, American people! Mr. Lincoln and _consortes_ insisted that +McClellan remain in command. SISTE TANDEM CARNIFEX! + +Mr. Roebuck, M. P., the gentleman! About thirty years ago, when +entering his public career as a member for Bath, Mr. Roebuck was +publicly slapped in the face during the going on of the election. A +few years ago Mr. Roebuck went to Vienna in the interests of some +lucrative railroad or Lloyd speculation, and returned to England a +fervent and devoted admirer of the Hapsburgs, and a reviler of all +that once was sacred to the disciple of Jeremy Bentham. + +General Halleck may become the savior of the country. I hope and +ardently wish that it may be so, although his qualifications for it +are of a rather doubtful nature. Gen. Halleck wrote a book on military +science, as he wrote one on international laws, and both are laborious +compilations of other people's labors and ideas. But perhaps Halleck, +if not inspired, may become a regular, methodical captain. Such was +Moreau. + +Also, Gen. Halleck is not to take the field in person. I am told that +it was so decided by Mr. Lincoln, against Halleck's wish. What an +anomalous position of a commander of armies, who is not to see a field +of battle! Such a position is a genuine, new American invention, but +it ought not to be patented, at least not for the use of other +nations. It is impossible to understand it, and it will puzzle every +one having sound common sense. + +Gen. Butler commits a mistake in taunting and teasing the French +population and the French consul in New Orleans. When Butler was going +there, Mr. Seward ought to have instructed him concerning our friendly +relations with Louis Napoleon, and concerning the character of the +French consul in New Orleans, who was not partial to secesh. There may +be some secesh French, but the bulk, if well managed, would never take +a decided position against us as long as we were on friendly terms +with Louis Napoleon. + +The President is indefatigable in his efforts to--save slavery, and to +uphold the policy of the New York Herald. + +It is said that General Hunter is recalled, and so was General Phelps +from New Orleans; General Phelps could not coolly witness the +sacrilegious massacre of the slaves. The inconceivable partiality of +the President for McClellan may, after all, be possibly explained by +the fact that Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Seward see in McClellan a--savior of +slavery. + +During two days' terrible fighting at Manassas, at Bull Run, and all +around, Pope cut his way through, but the reinforcements from +McClellan's army in Alexandria are _slow_ in coming. McClellan and his +few pets among the generals may not object to see Pope worsted. Such +things happened in other armies, even almost under the eyes of +Napoleon, as in the campaign on the Elbe, in 1813. Any one worth the +name of a general, when he has no special position to guard, and hears +the roar of cannon, by forced marches runs to the field of battle. Not +any special orders, but the roar of cannon, attracted and directed +Desaix to Marengo, and Mac Mahon to Magenta. The roar of cannon shook +the air between Bull Run and Alexandria, and ---- General McClellan +and others had positive orders to run to the rescue of Pope. + +I should not wonder if the President, enthusiasmed by this new exploit +of McClellan, were to nominate him for his, the President's, eventual +successor; Mr. Blair will back the nomination. + +It is said that during these last weeks, Wallach, the editor of the +unwashed _Evening Star_, is in continual intercourse with the +President. _Arcades ambo._ + +McClellan reduced in command; only when the life of the nation was +almost breathing its last. This concession was extorted from Mr. +Lincoln! What will Mr. Seward say to it? + + + + +SEPTEMBER, 1862. + + _Consummatum est!_ -- Will the outraged people avenge itself? -- + McClellan satisfies the President -- After a year! -- The truth + will be throttled -- Public opinion in Europe begins to abandon + us -- The country marching to its tomb -- Hooker, Kearney, + Heintzelman, Sigel, brave and true men -- Supremacy of mind over + matter -- Stanton the last Roman -- Inauguration of the pretorian + regime -- Pope accuses three generals -- Investigation prevented + by McClellan -- McDowell sacrificed -- The country inundated with + lies -- The demoralized army declares for McClellan -- The + pretorians will soon finish with liberty -- Wilkes sent to the + West Indian waters -- Russia -- Mediation -- Invasion of Maryland + -- Strange story about Stanton -- Richmond never invested -- + McClellan in search of the enemy -- Thirty miles in six days -- + The telegrams -- Wadsworth -- Capitulation of Harper's Ferry -- + Five days' fighting -- Brave Hooker wounded -- No results -- No + reports from McClellan -- Tactics of the Maryland campaign -- + Nobody hurt in the staff -- Charmed lives -- Wadsworth, Judge + Conway, Wade, Boutwell, Andrew -- This most intelligent people + become the laughing-stock of the world! -- The proclamation of + emancipation -- Seward to the Paisley Association -- Future + complications -- If Hooker had not been wounded! -- The military + situation -- Sigel persecuted by West Point -- Three cheers for + the carriage and six! -- How the great captain was to catch the + rebel army -- Interview with the Chicago deputation -- Winter + quarters -- The conspiracy against Sigel -- Numbers of the rebel + army -- Letters of marque. + + +The intrigues, the insubordination of McClellan's pets, have almost +exclusively brought about the disasters at Manassas and at Bull Run, +and brought the country to the verge of the grave. But the people are +not to know the truth. + +CONSUMMATUM EST! The people's honor is stained--the country's cause on +the verge of the grave. Will this outraged people avenge itself on the +four or five diggers? + +Old as I am, I feel a more rending pain now than I felt thirty years +ago when Poland was entombed. Here are at stake the highest interests +of humanity, of progress, of civilization. I find no words to utter my +feelings; my mind staggers. It is filled with darkness, pain, and +blood. + +Mr. Lincoln is the standard-bearer of the policy of the New York +Herald. So, before him, were Pierce and Buchanan. + +It is said that General McClellan fully satisfied the President of his +(the General's) complete innocence as to the delays which exclusively +generated the last disasters; also Gen. McClellan has justified +himself on military grounds. I wish the verdict of innocence may be +uttered by a court-martial of European generals. At any rate, the +country was thrown into an abyss. + +_After a year!_--One hundred thousand of the best, bravest, the most +devoted men slaughtered; hundreds and hundreds of millions squandered; +the army again in the entrenchments of Washington; everywhere the +defensive and losses; the enemy on the Potomac, perhaps to invade the +free States; but McClellan is in command, his headquarters as +brilliant and as numerous as a year ago; the mean flunkeys at their +post; only the country's life-blood pours in streams; but--that is of +no account. + +No acids are so dissolving and so corrosive as is the air of +Washington on patriotism. How few resist its action! Among the few are +Stanton, Chase (a passive patriot), Wadsworth, Dahlgren, and those +grouping around Stanton; so is Welles; likewise Fox; but they are +powerless. Washington is likewise the greatest garroter of truth; and +I am sure that the truth about the last battles will be throttled and +never elucidated. + +_September 3._--The Cabinets of France and of England will have a very +hard stand to resist the pressure of public opinion, carried away by +the skill and by the plausible heroism of the rebels. Public opinion +will be clamorous that something be done in favor of the rebels. +Happily, nothing else can be done but a war, and this saves us. But if +the rebels succeed without Europe, the more glory for their chiefs, +the more ignominy for ours. Public opinion begins to abandon us in +Europe. Already I have explained some of the reasons for it. + +The country is marching to its tomb, but the grave-diggers will not +confess their crime and their utter incapacity to save it. This their +stubbornness is even a greater crime. Will Halleck warn the country +against McClellan's incapacity? + +We have such generals as Hooker, Heintzelman, Kearney, etc., who +fought continually, and with odds against them, and who never were +worsted. Those three, among the best of the army, fought under Pope +and mutineered not. In any other country such men would receive large, +even the superior command; here the palm belongs to the incapable, +the _slow_, and to the flatterer. The same with Sigel. His corps is +reduced to 6,000 men; common sense shows that he ought to have at +least 25,000 under him. Sigel begged the President to have more men; +the President sent him to Halleck and McClellan, who both snubbed him +off. By my prayer Sigel, although disheartened, went to Stanton, who +received him friendly and warmly, and promised to do his utmost. +Stanton will keep his word, if only the West Point envy will not +prevent him. + +Hooker, Kearney, and Heintzelman were not in favor at the headquarters +in the Peninsula, and their commands have been continually +disorganized in favor of the pets of the Commander-in-Chief. The +country knows what the three braves did since Yorktown down to the +last day--the country knows that at the last disasters at Bull Run +these heroic generals did their fullest duty. But not even their +advice is asked at the double headquarters. Stanton alone cannot do +everything. Rats may devour a Hercules. + +It seems certain that the rebel generals have various foreign officers +in their respective staffs. The rebels wish to assure the success of +their cause; here many have only in view their personal success. The +President, although not a Blucher, may make a Gneisenau out of Sigel, +who has in view only the success of the cause, and no prospects +towards the White House. Sigel would understand how to organize a +genuine staff. + +Most of the foreigners who came to serve here came with the intention +to fight for the sacred principle of freedom, and without any further +views whatever of career and aggrandizement. In this respect Americans +are not just towards these foreigners, and the great men at +headquarters will prefer to see all go to pieces than to use the +capacity of foreigners, above all in the artillery and for the staff +duties. + +The mind--that is, Jeff. Davis, Jackson, Lee, etc.--has the best of +the matter--that is, Lincoln, McClellan, Blair, and Seward; however, +these positions are reversed when one considers the masses on both +sides. But on our side the matter commands and presses down the mind; +on the rebel side the mind of the chiefs vivifies, exalts, attracts, +and directs the matter. And the results thereof are, that not the +rebellion, but the North, is shaking. + +As _a_, not only as _the_ President, Mr. Lincoln represents nothing +beyond the unavoidable constitutional formula. For all other purposes, +as an acting, directing, inspiring, or combining power or agency, Mr. +Lincoln becomes a myth. His reality is only manifested by preserving +slavery, by sticking to McClellan, by distributing offices, by +receiving inspirations from Mr. Seward, and by digging the country's +grave. So it is from March 4, 1861, up to this, September 5th, 1862. +What else Mr. Lincoln may eventually incarnate is not now perceptible. + +Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Seward piloted the country among breakers and +rocks, from which to extricate the country requires a man who is to be +the burning focus of the whole people's soul. + +Other nations at times reached the bottom of an abyss, and they came +up again when from the tempest rending them emerged such a savior. But +here the formula may render impossible the appearance of such a +savior. The formula is the nation's hearse. The formula has +neutralized the best men in Congress, the best men in the Cabinet, as +is Stanton. + +The people have decided not, _propter vitam vivendi perdere causas_; +but the various formulas, the schemers, the grave-diggers, and the +aspirants for the White House, think differently. + +The almost daily changes made by Mr. Lincoln in the command of the +forces are the best evidences of his good-intentioned--debility. + +Harmony belongs to the primordial laws of nature; it is the same for +human societies. But here no harmony exists between the purest, the +noblest, and the most patriotic portion of the people, and the +official exponent of the people's will, and of its higher and purer +aspirations. So here all jars dissonantly; all is confusion, because +avenged must be every violation of nature's law. + +I cannot believe that at this deadly crisis the salvation can come +from Washington. The best man here has not his free action. And the +rest of them are the country's curse. Mr. Lincoln, with McClellan, +Seward, Blair, Halleck, and scores of such, are as able to cope with +this crisis as to stop the revolution of our planet. + +_Up to this day_, from among those foremost, the only man whose hands +remain unstained with the country's, his mother's, and his brethren's +blood, the last Roman, is Stanton. + +_September 7._--During last night troops marched to meet the enemy, +saluting with deafening shouts and cheers the residence of McClellan; +spit-lickers as a Kennedy, giving the sign by waving his hat. Such +shouts would cheer up the mind but for the fact that they were mostly +raised for the victory over those who demanded an investigation of the +causes of _slowness_ and insubordination,--those exclusive causes of +the defeat of Pope's army. Those shouts were thrown out as defiance to +justice, to truth, and to law. Those shouts marked the inauguration of +the _pretorian regime_. General McClellan and other generals have +forced the President to _postpone_ the investigation into the conduct +of the _slow_ and of the insubordinate generals, all three special +favorites of McClellan. General McClellan appeared before the soldiers +surrounded by his _old identical staff_, by a tross of flatterers, +and, Oh heavens! in the cortege Senator Wilson! Oh, _sancta_ not +_simplicitas_, but ---- Oh, clear-sighted Republican! + +Subsequently, I learned that Senator Wilson was present for a moment, +and only by a pure accident, at that ovation. + +_Laeszt Dich dem Teufel bey'm Haare packen, so hat Er Dich bey'm +Kopfe_, says Lessing, and so it may become here with this first +success of the pretorians, or even worse than pretorians; these here +are Yanitschars of a Sultan. + +Pope and his army accuse three generals of insubordination and mutiny +on the field of battle. McClellan prevents investigation; the brutal +rule of Yanitschars is inaugurated, thanks to you, Messrs. Seward and +Blair. + +McDowell sacrificed to the Yanitschars; he is the scapegoat and the +victim to popular fallacy, to the imbecility of the press, and, above +all, to the intriguers and to the conspiracy of the mutinous pets of +McClellan. Weeks and weeks ago, I foretold to McDowell that such would +be his fate, and that only in after-times history will be just towards +him. + +The country begins to be inundated and opinion poisoned by all kinds +of the most glaring lies, invented and spread by the staffs, and the +imbecile, blind partisans of McClellan. Here are some from among the +lies. + +In January (oh hear, oh hear!) General McClellan with 50,000 men +intended to make a _flying_ (oh hear, oh hear!) expedition to +Richmond, but Lincoln and Stanton opposed it. This lie divides itself +into two points. 1st lie. In January, nobody opposed General +McClellan's will, and, besides, he was sick. 2d lie. If he was so +pugnacious in January, why has he not made with the same number of men +a flying expedition only to Centreville, right under his nose? + +Emanating from the staff, such a lie is sufficient to show the +military capacity of those who concocted it. + +Second lie. That the expedition to Yorktown and the Peninsula strategy +were forced upon McClellan. I hope that the Americans have enough +memory left, and enough self-respect to recollect the truth. + +Further, the above staff asserts that, when the truth will be known +about the campaign, and the fightings in the Chickahominy, then +justice will be done to McClellan. + +Always and everywhere lost battles, bad and ignorant generalship, +require explanations, justifications, and commentaries. Well-fought +battles are justified on the spot, the same day, and by results. No +one asks or makes comments upon the fighting of Jackson. Austerlitz, +Jena, were commented on, explained, some of the chiefs were justified, +but--by Austrian and Prussian commentators. + +Until to-day French writers discuss, analyze, and comment upon the +fatal battle of Waterloo. At Waterloo Napoleon was in the square of +his heroic guards; but during the seven days' fighting on the +Chickahominy, what regiment, not to say a square, saw in its midst the +American Napoleon? + +A thousand others, similar to the above-mentioned lies, will be or are +already circulated; the mass of the people will use its common sense, +and the lies must perish. + +On September 7th, Gen. McClellan gave his word to the President to +start to the army at 12 o'clock, but started at 4 P. M. with a long +train of well-packed wagons for himself and for his staff. To be +sure, Lee, Jackson, and all the other rebel chiefs together, have not +such a train; if they had, they would not be to-day on the Potomac and +in Maryland. Most certainly those quick-moving rebels start at least +an hour earlier than they are expected to do. + +_September 9._--Up to this day Mr. Lincoln ought to have discovered +whose advice transformed him into a standard-bearer of the policy of +the New York Herald, and made him push the country to the verge of the +grave; and, nevertheless, Mr. Lincoln is deaf to the voice of all true +and pure patriots who point out the malefactors. + +Secondary events; as a lost battle, etc., depend upon material causes; +but such primordial events as is the thorough miscarriage of Mr. +Lincoln's anti-rebellion policy,--such events are generated by moral +causes. + +Jefferson Davis, Lee, Jackson, and all the generals down to the last +Southern bush-whacker, incarnate the violent and hideous passion of +slavery, now all-powerful throughout the South. Here, Lincoln, Seward, +McClellan, Blair, Halleck, etc., incarnate the negation of the purest +and noblest aspirations of the North. Stanton alone is inspired by a +national patriotic idea. No unity, no harmony between the people and +the leaders; this discord must generate disasters. + +All over the country the lie is spread that the army demanded the +reappointment of McClellan. First, the three mutinous generals did it; +but not a Kearney, the Bayard of America; very likely not Hooker and +Heintzelman--all of them soldiers, patriots, and men of honor; nor +very likely was it demanded by Keyes. I do not know positively what +was the conduct of Gen. Sumner. Gen. Burnside owes what he is, glory +and all, to McClellan. Burnside's honest gratitude and honest want of +judgment have contributed more than anything else to inaugurate the +regime of the pretorians, to justify mutiny. Halleck's conduct in all +this is veiled in mystery; it is so at least for the present; and as +truth will be kept out of sight, the country may never know the truth +about those shameful proceedings. + +I learn that Heintzelman, against his own judgment, agreed in the +McClellan movement. Well, if this is true, then, of course, the army, +for a long time misled by uninterrupted intrigues, misled by papers +such as the New York Herald and the Times,--the army or the soldiers +mightily contributed to bring about this fatal crisis. An army +composed of intelligent Americans, blinded, stultified by intriguers, +declares for a general who never, up to this day, covered with glory +his or the army's name. After this nothing more is to be expected, and +no disaster on the field of battle, no dissolution of a national +principle, can astonish my mind. Cursed be those who thus demoralized +the sound judgment of the soldiers! Cursed be my personal experience +of men and of things which makes me despair! But when an army or +soldiers become intellectually brought down to such a standard, then +the holiest cause will always be lost. Oh for a man to save the cause +of humanity! But if even such a man should appear, these pretorians +will turn against him. + +The pretorians, with the New York Herald as their flag, will soon +finish with liberty at home. McClellan, Barlow, the brothers Wood, and +Bennett, may very soon be at the helm, with the 100,000 pretorians for +support. _Similia similibus_; and here disgrace is to cure disgrace. + +These helpless grave-diggers, above all, Seward, are on the way to +pick a quarrel with England, sending a flying gunboat fleet under +Wilkes into the West Indian waters. At this precise moment it were +better to be very cautious, and rather watch strongly our coasts with +the same gunboats. + +_September 11._--A military genius at once finds out the point where +blows are to be struck, and strikes them with lightning-like speed. +The rebels act in this manner; but what point was found out, what +blows were ever dealt by McClellan? + +Individuals similar to McClellan were idolized by the Roman +pretorians, and this idolatry marks the epoch of the utmost +demoralization and degradation of the Roman empire. Witnessing such a +phenomenon in an army of American volunteers, one must give up in +despair any confidence in manhood and in common sense. + +The Journal of St. Petersburg of August 6th semi-officially refutes +the insinuations that Russia intends to recognize the South, or to +unite with France and England for any such purpose, or for mediation. +The language of the article is noble and friendly, as is all which up +to this day has been done by Alexander II. Mr. Stoeckl, the Russian +minister here, considerably contributes that such sound and friendly +views on the condition of our affairs are entertained by the Russian +Cabinet. + +_September 11._--Imbeciles agitate the question of mediation. European +cabinets will not offer it now, and nobody, not even the rebels, would +accept. No possible terms and basis exist for any mediation. A Solomon +could not find them out. If Jackson and Lee were to shell Washington, +then only the foreign ministers may be requested to step in and to +settle the terms of a capitulation or of an evacuation. The foreign +ministers here could act as mediators only if asked; not otherwise. I +am sure it will come out that the invasion of Maryland by the rebels +is made under the pressure exercised in Richmond by the Maryland +chivalry in the service of the rebellion. These runaways probably +promised an insurrection in Maryland, provided a rebel force crosses +the Potomac. (Wrote it to England.) + +All around helplessness and confusion. Conscientiously I make all +possible efforts to record what I believe to be true, and then truth +will take care of herself. + +After the study of the campaigns of Frederick II., above all, after +the study of those marvellous campaigns, combinations, manoeuvres of +Napoleon, to witness every day the combinations of McClellan is more +disgusting, more nauseous for the mind, than can be for the stomach +the strongest dose of emetic. + +The last catastrophe at Bull Run and at Manassas has a slight +resemblance with the catastrophe at Waterloo. The conduct of the +mutinous generals here is similar to the conduct of some of the French +generals during the battle of Ligny and Quatre-Bras. But here was +mutiny, and there demoralization produced by general and deeply rooted +and fatally unavoidable causes. The demoralization of the French +generals came at the end of a terrible epoch of struggles and +sacrifices, of material exhaustion, when the faith in the destinies of +Napoleon was extinct; here mutiny and demoralization seize upon the +newly-born era. + +_September 13._--What a good-natured people are the Americans! A +regiment of Pennsylvania infantry quartered for the night on the +sidewalk of the streets; officers, of course, absent; the poor +soldiers stretched on the stones, when so many empty large buildings, +when the empty (intellectually and materially empty) White House could +have given to the soldiers comfortable night quarters. It can give an +idea how they treat the soldiers in the field, if here in Washington +they care so little for them. But McClellan has forty wagons for his +staff, and forty ambulances--no danger for the latter to be used. In +European armies aristocratic officers would not dare to treat soldiers +in this way--to throw them on the pavement without any necessity. + +More than once in my life, after heavy fighting, I laid down the +knapsack for a cushion, snow for a mattrass and for a blanket; but by +the side of the soldiers, the generals, the staffs, and the officers +shared similar bedsteads. + +I hear strange stories about Stanton, and about his having ruefully +fallen in McClellan's lap. If so, then one more _man_, one more +illusion, and one more creed in manhood gone overboard, drowned in +meanness, in moral cowardice, and subserviency. + +The worshippers of strategy and of Gen. McClellan try to make the +public swallow, that the investment of Richmond by him was a +magnificent display of science, and would have been a success but for +50,000 more men under his command. + +To invest any place whatever is to cut that place from the principal, +if not from all communications with the country around, and thus +prevent, or make dangerous or difficult, the arrival of provisions, of +support, etc. + +Our gunboats, etc., in the York and the James rivers have virtually +invested Richmond on the eastern side; but that part of the Peninsula +did not constitute the great source of life for the rebel army. The +principal life-arteries for Richmond ran through four-fifths of a +circle, beginning from the southern banks of the James river and +running to the southern banks of the Rapidan and of the Rappahannock. +Through that region men, material, provisions poured into Richmond +from the whole South, and that whole region around Richmond was left +perfectly open; but strategy concentrated its wisdom on the +comparatively indifferent eastern side of the Chickahominy marshes, +and cut off the rebels from--nothing at all. + +_September 13._--General McClellan, in search of the enemy, during the +first six days makes thirty miles! Finds the enemy near Hagerstown. No +more time for strategy. + +_September 14._--General McClellan telegraphs to General Halleck +(_meliores ambo_) that he, McClellan, has "_the most reliable +information that the enemy is 190,000 strong in Maryland and in +Pennsylvania, besides 70,000 on the other side of the Potomac_." (The +same bosh about the numbers as in the Peninsula.) + +The Generals Burnside, Hooker, Sumner, Reno, fought the battle at +Hagerstown, and drove the enemy before them. General McClellan reports +a victory, _but expects the enemy to renew the fighting next day in a +considerable force_--(as at Williamsburg). McClellan telegraphs to +Halleck, "_Look for an attack on Washington._" The enemy retreats to +recross the Potomac! + +_September 15._--General Wadsworth suggested to the President one of +those bold movements by which campaigns are terminated by one blow: +"To send Heintzelman and him, Wadsworth, with some 25,000 men, to +Gordonsville (here and in Baltimore about 90,000 men), and thus cut +off the enemy from Richmond, and prevent him from rallying his +forces." But General Halleck opposes such a Murat's dash, on account +of McClellan's "looked-for attack on Washington"--by his, +McClellan's, imagination. + +_September 17._--When I wrote the above about Wadsworth and +Heintzelman, I was under the impression that the victory announced by +McClellan, Sept. 14, was more decisive; that as he had fresh the whole +corps of Fitz John Porter, and the greatest part of that of Franklin, +and other supports sent him from Washington, he would give no respite +to the enemy, and push him into the Potomac. It turned out +differently. + +The loss by capitulation of Harper's Ferry. It is a blow to us, and +very likely a disgraceful affair, not for the soldiers, but for the +commanders. + +_September 19._--Five days' fighting. Our brave Hooker wounded; +tremendous loss of life on both sides, and no decisive results. These +last battles, and those on the Chickahominy, that of Shiloh, in one +word all the fightings protracted throughout several consecutive days, +are almost unexampled in history. These horrible episodes establish +the bravery, the endurance of the soldiers, the bravery and the +ability of some among the commanders of the corps, of the divisions, +etc., and the absence of any _generalship in the commander_. + +_September 20._--Until this day Gen. McClellan has not published one +single detailed report about any of his operations since the +evacuation of Manassas in March. Thus much for the staff of the army +of the Potomac. We shall see what detailed report he will publish of +the campaign in Maryland. McClellan's bulletins from Maryland are +twins to his bulletins from the Peninsula; and there may be very +little difference between the _gained_ victories. To-day he is +ignorant of the movements of the enemy, and has more than 30,000 fresh +troops in hand. + +As in the Peninsula, so in Maryland. Although having nearly one-third +more men than the enemy, General McClellan never forced the enemy to +engage at once its whole force, never attacked the rebels on their +whole line, and never had any positive notion about the number and the +position of the opposing forces. + +The rebels had the Potomac in their rear; our army pressed them in +front, and--the rebels escaped. + +I appeal to such military heroes as Hooker; I appeal to thousands of +our brave soldiers, from generals down to the rank and file, and +further I appeal to all women with hearts and brains here and in +Europe. + +_September 20._--Gen. Mansfield killed at the head of his brigade. I +ask his forgiveness for all the criticism made upon him in this diary. +Last year, at the beginning of the war, Gen. Mansfield acted under the +orders of Gen. Scott. This explains all. + +As in the slaughters of the Chickahominy, so in the Maryland +slaughters, _nobody hurt_ in McClellan's numerous staff. Thank Heaven! +Not only his life is charmed, but the charm extends over all who +surround him,--men and beasts. + +A malediction sticks to our cause. Hooker badly, very badly wounded. +Hooker fought the greatest number of fights,--was never worsted in the +Peninsula, nor in the August disasters, and he alone has the supreme +honor of a nick-name, by the troopers' baptism: the _Fighting Joe_. +Hooker, not McClellan, ought to command the army. But no pestilential +Washington clique, none of the West-Pointers, back him, and the pets, +the pretorians, may have refused to obey his orders. + +After the escape of the rebels from Manassas in March, and after the +evacuation of Yorktown, all the intriguers and traitors grouped around +the New York Herald, and the imbeciles around the New York Times, +prized high _the masterly strategy_ and its bloodless victories. Now, +in dead, by powder and disease, in crippled, etc., McClellan destroyed +about 100,000 men, and the country's honor is bleeding, the country's +cause is on the verge of a precipice. + +How rare are men of civic heroism, of fearless civic courage; men of +the creed: _perisse mon nom mais que la patrie soit sauvee._ + +General Wadsworth feels more deeply and more painfully the disasters, +nay, the disgrace, of the country, than do almost all with whom I meet +here. During the Congress, similar were the feelings of Senator Wade, +Judge Potter, and of many other Congressmen in both the Houses. So +feel Boutwell, Andrew, the Governor of Massachusetts, and I am sure +many, many over the country. But the sensation-men and preachers, +lecturers, etc., all are to be * * * * + +_September 22._--By Mr. Seward's policy and by McClellan's strategy +and war-bulletins the bravest and the most intelligent people became +the laughing-stock of Europe and of the world. And thus is witnessed +the hitherto in history unexampled phenomenon of a devoted and brave +people of twenty millions, mastering all the wealth and the resources +of modern civilization, worsted and kept at bay by four to five +million rebels, likewise brave, but almost beggared, and cut off from +all external communications. + +_Sept. 23._--Proclamation _conditionally_ abolishing slavery from +1863. The _conditional_ is the last desperate effort made by Mr. +Lincoln and by Mr. Seward to save slavery. Poor Mr. Lincoln was +obliged to strike such a blow at his _mammy_! The two statesmen found +out that it was dangerous longer to resist the decided, authoritative +will of the masses. The words "resign," "depose," "impeach," were more +and more distinct in the popular murmur, and the proclamation was +issued. + +Very little, if any, credit is due to Mr. Lincoln or to Mr. Seward for +having thus late and reluctantly _legalized_ the stern will of the +immense majority of the American people. For the sake of sacred truth +and justice I protest before civilization, humanity, and posterity, +that Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Seward intrinsically are wholly innocent of +this great satisfaction given to the right, and to national honor. + +The absurdity of colonization is preserved in the proclamation. How +could it have been otherwise? + +But if the rebellion is crushed before January 1st, 1863, what then? +If the rebels turn loyal before that term? Then the people of the +North will be cheated. Happily for humanity and for national honor, +Mr. Lincoln's and Mr. Seward's benevolent expectations will be +baffled; the rebels will spurn the tenderly proffered leniency; these +rebels are so ungrateful towards those who "cover the weakness of the +insurgents," &c. (See the celebrated, and by the American press much +admired, despatch in May or June, 1862, Seward to Adams.) + +The proclamation is written in the meanest and the most dry routine +style; not a word to evoke a generous thrill, not a word reflecting +the warm and lofty comprehension and feelings of the immense majority +of the people on this question of emancipation. Nothing for humanity, +nothing to humanity. Whoever drew it, be he Mr. Lincoln or Mr. Seward, +it is clear that the writer was not in it either with his heart or +with his soul; it is clear that it was done under moral duress, under +the throttling pressure of events. How differently Stanton would have +spoken! + +General Wadsworth truly says, that never a noble subject was more +belittled by the form in which it was uttered. + +Brazilian m----s are much disturbed by the proclamation. + +_Sept. 23._--In his answer to the Paisley Parliamentary Reform +Association, Mr. Seward complains that the sympathy of Europe turns +now for secession. + +O Mr. Seward, Mr. Seward, who is it that contributed to turn the +current against the cause of right and of humanity? Months ago I and +others warned you; the premonitory signs and the reasons of this +change have been pointed out to you. Now you slander Europe, of which +you know as little as of the inhabitants of the moon. The generous +populations of the whole of Europe expected and waited for a positive, +unhesitating, clear recognition of human rights; day after day the +generous European minds expected to see some positive, authoritative +fact confirm that lofty conception which, at the start of this +rebellion, they had of the cause of the North. But the pure, generous +tendencies of the American people became officially, authoritatively +misrepresented; the public opinion in Europe became stuffed with empty +generalizations, with official but unfulfilled prophecies, and with +cold declamations. Those official generalizations, prophecies, and +declamations, the supineness shown by the administration in the +recognition of human rights, all this began to be considered in Europe +as being sanctioned by the whole American people; and generous +European hearts and minds began to avert in disgust from the +_misrepresented_ cause of the North. + +Two issues are before history, before the philosophy of history, and +before the social progress of our race. The first issue is the +struggle between the pure democratic spirit embodied in the Free +States, and the fetid remains of the worst part of humanity embodied +in the South. The second issue is between the perennial vitality of +the principle of self-government in the people, and the transient and +accidental results of the self-government as manifested in Mr. +Lincoln, in Mr. Seward, and their followers. I hope that this Diary +will throw some light on the second issue, and vindicate the perennial +against the transient and the accidental. + +_Sept. 24._--If the events of this war should progress as they are +foreshadowed in the proclamation of September 22, then the application +of this proclamation may create inextricable complications. Not only +in one and the same State, but in one and the same district, nay, even +in the same township, after January 1st, 1863, may be found +Africo-Americans, portions of whom are emancipated, the others in +bondage. But the stern logic of events will save the illogical, +pusillanimous, confused half-measure, as it now is. (O Steffens!) + +General McClellan confesses that if Hooker had not been wounded, then +_the road_, by which the retreat of the rebels might have been cut +off, would have been taken. Such a declaration is the most emphatic +recognition of Hooker's superior military capacity. Seldom, however, +has the loss of a general commanding only _en second_, or a wing, as +did Hooker, decided the fortunes of the day. Why did not McClellan +take _the road_ himself, after Hooker was obliged to leave the field? +When Desaix, Bessieres, and Lannes fell, Napoleon nevertheless won +the respective battles. + +_Sept. 25._--The military position of the rebels in Winchester seems +to me one of the best they ever held in this war. Winchester is the +centre of which Washington, Harper's Ferry, Williamsport, nay, even +Wheeling, seem to be the circumference. Our army under McClellan is +almost beyond the circle, crosses not the Potomac, and is now only to +watch the enemy. So much for the great McClellan's victory. Truly, the +enemy may be taken in the rear, its communications with Richmond, &c., +cut off and destroyed; but _we are safe_ on the Potomac, and this is +sufficient. McClellan is _the man of large conceptions and rapid +execution_. The best generals are _hors de combat_; as to Halleck, O, +it is not to think, not to speak. Well, I may be mistaken, but I +clearly see all this on the map of Virginia. + +_Sept. 25._--The West Point spirit persecutes Sigel with the utmost +rage. The West Point spirit seemingly wishes to have Sigel dishonored, +defeated, even if the country be thereby destroyed. The Hallecks, &c., +keep him in a subordinate position; _three days ago_ his corps was a +little over seven thousand, almost no cavalry, and most of the +artillery without horses, and he in front. + +The more I scrutinize the President's thus called emancipation +proclamation, the more cunning and less good will and sincerity I find +therein. I hope I am mistaken. But the proclamation is only an act of +the military power,--is evoked by military necessity,--and not a +civil, social, humane act of justice and equity. + +The only good to be derived from this proclamation is, that for the +first time the word _freedom_, and a general comprehension of +"emancipation," appear in an official act under the sanction of the +formula, and are inaugurated into the official, the constitutional +life of the nation. In itself it is therefore a great event for a +people so strictly attached to legality and to formulas. + +I do not recollect to have read in the history of any great, or even +of a small captain,--above all of such a one when between thirty-four +and thirty-six years old,--that he followed the army under his command +in a travelling carriage and six, when the field of operations +extended from fifty to seventy miles. Three cheers for McClellan, for +his carriage and six! + + HOW THE GREAT CAPTAIN WAS TO CATCH THE WHOLE REBEL ARMY IN + MANASSAS, IN FEBRUARY AND MARCH, A. D. 1862. + +It was to have been done by a brilliant and unsurpassable stroke of +combined strategy, tactics, manoeuvres, marches, and swimmings; also +on land and water. (O, hear! O, hear!) + +As every body knows, the rebels were encamped in the so _fearful_ +strongholds of Centreville and Manassas, all the time fooling the +commander-in-chief of the federal army in relation to their _immense_ +numbers. To attack the rebels in front, or to surround them by the +Occoquan and Brentsville, would have been a too--simple operation; by +a special, an immense, space-embracing anaconda strategy, the rebel +army was to be cut off from the whole of rebeldom, and forced to +surrender _en masse_ to the inventor of (the not yet patented, I hope) +bloodless victories. To accomplish such an immense result, a fleet of +transports was already ordered to be gathered at Annapolis. On them in +ten or fifteen days (O, hear!) an army of fifty to sixty thousand, +most completely equipped, was to be embarked, plus forty thousand in +Washington, all this to sail under the personal command of the +general-in-chief, and sail towards Richmond. Richmond taken, the rebel +army at Manassas would have been cut off, and obliged to surrender on +any terms. + +The above splendid conception was, and still is, peddled among the +army and among the nation by the admirers of, and the devotees of, +anaconda strategy. + +The expedition was to land at the mouth of the Tappahannock, a small +port, or rather a creek, used for shipping of a small quantity of +tobacco. As the port or creek has only some small attempts at wharves, +the landing of such an enormous army, with parks of artillery, with +cavalry, pontoons, and material for constructing bridges,--the landing +would not have been executed in weeks, if in months; but the projector +of the plan, perfectly losing the notion of time, calculated for ten +days. From that port the _flying_ expedition was to march directly on +Richmond through a country having only common field and dirt roads, +and this in a season when all roads generally are in an impassable +condition, through a country intersected by marshy streams, principal +among them the Matapony and the Pamunkey--to march towards Richmond +and the Chickahominy marshes. It seems that Chickahominy exercised an +attractive, Armida-like charm on the great strategian. An army loaded +with such immense trains would have sufficiently destroyed all the +roads, and rendered them impassable for itself; and the _flying_ +expedition would at once have been transformed into an expedition +sticking in the mud, similar to that subsequent in the peninsula. The +enemy was in possession of Fredericksburg and of the railroad to +Hanover Court House on one flank, and of all the best roads north of +and through Chickahominy marshes on the other flank. The _flying_ +expedition would have had for base Tappahannock and a dirt road. O +strategy! O stuff! + +The much-persecuted General McDowell exposed the worse than crudity of +the brilliant conception. By doing this, McDowell saved the country, +the administration, and the strategian from immense losses and from a +nameless shame. It is due to the people that the administration lay +before the public the scheme and the refutation. A look on the map of +Virginia must convince even the simplest mind of the brilliancy of +this conception. + +During all this time spent in such masterly operations, the rebel army +in Manassas was to quietly look on, to wait, and not move, not +retreat on Richmond. Early in March, at once the rebel army, always +undisturbed, quietly disappeared from Manassas; and this is the best +evidence of the depth of that brilliant combination, peddled under the +name of the _flying expedition to Richmond_, projected for January, +February, or March. I appeal to the verdict of sound reason; the +parties are, common sense _versus_ anaconda strategy and bloodless +victories. + +_Sept. 27._--The proclamation issued by the war power of the President +is not yet officially notified to those who alone are to execute +it--the armies and their respective commanders. Who is to be taken in? +The papers publish a detailed account of an interview between the +President and an anti-slavery deputation from Chicago. The deputation +asked for stringent measures in the spirit of the law of Congress, +which orders the emancipation of the slaves held by the rebels. The +President combated the reasons alleged by the deputation, and tried to +establish the danger and the inefficiency of the measure. A few days +after the above-mentioned debate, the President issued the +proclamation of September 22. Are his heart, his soul, and his +convictions to be looked for in the debate, or in the proclamation? + +The immense majority of the people, from the inmost of its heart, +greets the proclamation--a proof how deeply and ardently was felt its +necessity. The gratitude shown to Mr. Lincoln for having thus executed +the will of his master,--this gratitude is the best evidence how this +whole people is better, has a loftier comprehension of right and duty, +than have its elected servants. + +McClellan already speaks that the campaign is finished, and the army +is to go into winter quarters. If the people, if the administration, +and if the army will stand this, then they will justly deserve the +scorn of the whole civilized and uncivilized world. But with such +civil and military chiefs all is possible, all may be expected to be +included in their programme of--vigorous operations. + +_Sept. 28._--For some weeks I watch a conspiracy of the West Pointers, +of the commanders-in-chief, of the staffs, and of the double +know-nothing cliques united against Sigel. The aim seems to be to put +Sigel and his purposely-reduced and disorganized forces in such a +condition and position that he may be worsted or destroyed by the +enemy. To avoid dishonoring the forces under him, to avoid exposing +them to slaughter, and to avoid being thus himself dishonored, Sigel +ought to resign, and make public the reasons of his resignation. A few +days ago, I wrote and warned the Evening Post; but--but-- + +The Richmond papers confirm what I supposed concerning the motives +which pushed the rebel army across the Potomac. As the Marylanders +rose not in arms, and joined not the rebel army, the invaders had +nothing else to do but to retreat and to recross the Potomac. +McClellan ought to have thrown them into the river, which Hooker, if +not wounded, would have done, or if he had the command of our army. + +The rebels would have retreated into Virginia, even without being +attacked by McClellan, even if he only followed them, say at one day's +distance. Not having destroyed the rebels, McClellan, in reality, and +from the military stand point, accomplished very little--near to +nothing. Hooker estimates the rebel force, at the utmost, at eighty +thousand men, and that is all that they could have. McClellan had +about one hundred and twenty thousand. And--and he is to be considered +the savior of Maryland and of Pennsylvania. O, good American people! +The genuine Napoleon won all his great battles against armies which +considerably outnumbered his. + +Mr. Seward menaces England with issuing _letters of marque_ against +the Southern privateers. The menace is ridiculous, because it will not +be carried out, and, if carried out, it will become still more +ridiculous; it would be a very poor compliment to the navy to use the +whole power of private enterprise against a few rovers, and it would +be an official recognition of the rebels in the condition of +belligerents. _Quousque tandem_--O SEWARD--_abutere patientiam +nostram?_ + +_Sept. 30._--Nearly three weeks after the battle of Antietam, General +McClellan publishes what he and they call a report of his operations +in Maryland; in all not twenty lines, and devoted principally to +establish--on probabilities--the numerical losses of the enemy. The +report is a fit _pendant_ to his bulletins; is excellent for bunkum, +and to make other people justly laugh at us. + + + + +OCTOBER, 1862. + + Costly Infatuation -- The do-nothing strategy -- Cavalry on lame + horses -- Bayonet charges -- Antietam -- Effect of the + proclamation -- Disasters in the West -- The abolitionists not + originally hostile to McClellan -- Helplessness in the War + Department -- Devotedness of the people -- McClellan and the + proclamation -- Wilkes -- Colonel Key -- Routine engineers -- + Rebel raid into Pennsylvania -- Stanton's sincerity -- O, + unfighting strategians! -- The administration a success -- _De + gustibus_ -- Stuart's raid -- West Point -- St. Domingo -- The + President's letter to McClellan -- Broad church -- The elections + -- The Republican party gone -- The remedy at the polls -- + McClellan wants to be relieved -- Mediation -- Compromise -- The + rhetors. -- The optimists -- The foreigners -- Scott and Buchanan + -- Gladstone -- Foreign opinion and action -- Both the extremes + to be put down -- Spain -- Fremont's campaign against Jackson -- + Seward's circular -- General Scott's gift -- "O, could I go to a + camp!" -- McClellan crosses the Potomac -- Prays for rain -- + Fevers decimate the regiments -- Martindale and Fitz John Porter + -- The political balance to be preserved -- New regiments -- O, + poor country! + + +With what a bloody sacrifice of men this people pays for its +infatuation in McClellan, for the moral cowardice of its official +leaders, and the intrigues and the imbecility of the regulars, of some +among the West Pointers, of traitors led by the New York Herald, by +the World, and by certain Unionists on the outside, and secessionists +at heart! All these combined nourish the infatuation. All things +compared, Napoleon cost not so much to the French people, and at least +Napoleon paid it in glory. Mind and heart sicken to witness all this +here. The question to-day is, not to strengthen other generals, as +Heintzelman and Sigel, and to take the enemy in the rear, but to give +a _chance_ to McClellan to win the ever-expected, and not yet by him +won, _great battle_. McClellan continually calls for more men; all the +vital forces of the people are absorbed by him; and when he has large +numbers, he is incapable of using and handling them; so it was at the +Chickahominy, so it was at Antietam. In the way that McClellan acts +now, he may use up all the available forces of the people, if nobody +has the courage to speak out; besides, any warning voice is drowned in +the treacherous intrigues of the clique, in imbecility and +infatuation. + +At the meeting of the governors, at the various public conventions, in +the thus called public resolutions--platforms, in one word--wherever, +in any way. North, West, and East, the public life of the people has +made its voice heard: _a vigorous prosecution of the war_ was, and is, +earnestly recommended to the administration. All this will be of no +avail. By this time, by bloody and bitter experience, the American +people ought to have learned it. With his civil and military aids and +lieutenants, as the McClellans, the Hallecks, the Sewards, Mr. Lincoln +has been at work; and at the best, they have shown their utter +incapacity, if not ill-will, to carry the war on vigorously and upon +strictly military principles. Many persons in Washington know that Mr. +Seward last winter firmly backed the _do-nothing_ strategy, in the +firm belief that the rebels would be worried out, and submit without +fighting. To those statesmen and Napoleons, Carnots, &c., it is as +impossible to manoeuvre with rapidity, to strike boldly and decidedly, +as to dance on their _well-furnished_ heads. Only such a good-natured +people as the Americans can expect _something_ from that whole +_caterva_. To expect from Mr. Lincoln's Napoleons, Carnots, &c., +vigorous and rapid military operations, is the same as to mount +cavalry on thoroughly lame horses, and order it to charge _a fond de +train_. + +The worshippers of McClellan peddle that the Antietam victory became +neutralized because the enemy fell back on its second and third line. +Whatever may be in this falling back on lines, and accepting all as it +is represented, one thing is certain, that when commanders win +victories, generally they give no time to the enemy to fall back in +order on its second and third lines. But every thing gets a new stamp +under the new Napoleon. A few hours after the Antietam battle, General +McClellan telegraphed that he "_knew not_ if the enemy retreated into +the interior or to the Potomac." O, O! + +Many from among the European officers here have some experience of the +manoeuvring of large bodies--experience acquired on fields of battle, +and on reviews, and those camp manoeuvres annually practised all over +Europe. In this way the European officers, more or less, have the +_coup d'oeil_ for space and for the _terrain_, so necessary when an +army is to be put in positions on a field of battle, and which _coup +d'oeil_ few young American officers had the occasion to acquire. If +judiciously selected for the duties of the staffs, such European +officers would be of use and support to generals but for jealousy and +the West Point cliques. + +During this whole war I hear every body, but above all the West Point +wiseacres and strategians, assert that charges with the bayonet and +hand-to-hand fighting are exceedingly rare occurrences in the course +of any campaign. It is useless to speak to all those great judges of +experience and of history. + +In the account of the battles of Ligny and of Waterloo, Thiers +mentions four charges with the bayonet and hand-to-hand fighting at +Ligny, and nine at Waterloo, wherein one was made by the English, one +was made by Prussians and by French, and one by the French with +bayonet against English cavalry. In 1831 the Poles used the bayonet +more than it was used in any one campaign known in history. O, West +Point! + +It deserves to be noticed that the conspirators against Pope and +McDowell, and the pet pretorians of September 6 and 7, distinguished +themselves not very much in the battle of Antietam. Hooker commanded +McDowell's corps. + +To the number of evils inflicted upon this country by the McClellan +infatuation, must be added the fact that many young men, with +otherwise sound intellects, have been taken in, stultified, poisoned +beyond cure, by high-sounding words, as strategy, all-embracing +scientific combinations, &c.--words identified with incapacity, +defeats, and intrigue. + +In all probability, Hooker alone, when he fought, had a fixed plan at +the Antietam battle. As for a general plan, aiming either to throw the +enemy into the river, or to cut him from the river, or to accomplish +something final and decisive, seemingly no such plan existed. It looks +as if they had ignored, at the headquarters, what kind of positions +were occupied by the enemy; and the only purpose seems to have been to +fight, but without having any preconceived plan. This, at least, is +the conclusion from the manner in which the battle was fought. If any +plan had existed, the brave army would have executed it; but the enemy +retreated in order, and rather unmolested. _As always, so this time, +the bravery of the army did every thing; and, as a matter of course, +the generalship did--nothing._ + +_Oct. 4._--The proclamation of September 22 may not produce in Europe +the effect and the enthusiasm which it might have evoked if issued a +year ago, as an act of justice and of self-conscientious force, as an +utterance of the lofty, pure, and ardent aspirations and will of a +high-minded people. Europe may see now in the proclamation an action +of despair made in the duress of events; (and so it is in reality for +Mr. Lincoln, Seward, and their squad.) And in this way, a noble deed, +outpouring from the soul of the people, is reduced to pygmy and mean +proportions by ----. The name is on every body's lips. + +But it was impossible to issue this proclamation last year; at that +time the master-spirit of Mr. Lincoln's administration emphatically +assured the diplomats that the Union will be preserved, _were +slavery--to rule in Boston_. + +The continued disasters in the West can easily be explained by the +fact, that those rotten skeletons, Crittenden, Davis, and Wickliffe +control the operations of the generals. + +_Among the countless lies peddled by McClellan's worshippers, the most +enormous and the most impudent is that one by which they attempt to +explain, what in their lingo they call, the hostility of the +abolitionists towards McClellan. Concerning this matter, I can speak +with perfect knowledge of almost all the circumstances._ + +_Not one abolitionist of whatever hue, not one republican whatever, +was in any way troubled or thought about the political convictions of +General McClellan at the time when he was put at the head of the army. +All the abolitionists and republicans, who then earnestly wished, and +now wish, to have the rebellion crushed, expected General McClellan to +do it by quick, decisive, soldier-like, military operations, +manoeuvres, and fights. Senators Wade, Chandler, Trumbull, &c., in +October, 1861, principally aided McClellan to become independent of +General Scott. When, however, weeks and months elapsed without any +soldier-like action, manifestation, or enterprise whatever, all those +who were in earnest began to feel uneasy, began to murmur, not in +reference to any political opinions, whatever, held by General +McClellan, but solely and exclusively on account of his military +supineness. All those who ardently wished, and wish, that neither +slaveholders nor slavery be hurt in any way, such ones early grouped +themselves around General McClellan, believing to have found in him +the man after their own heart. That cesspool of all infamies, the New +York Herald, became the mouthpiece of all the like hypocrites. They +and the Herald were the first to pervert and to misrepresent the +indignation evoked by the do-nothing or nobody-hurt strategy, and to +call it the abolition outcry against their fetish._ + +Scarcely will it be believed what disorder, what helplessness, and +what incapacity rule paramount in the expedition of any current +business in the strictly military part of the War Department. It is +worse than any imaginable red-tape and circumlocution. And all this, +being considered a speciality and a technicality, is in the exclusive +hands of the adjutant general, a master spirit among the West +Pointers. Generally, all relating to the thus celebrated organization +of the army is an exclusive work of the West Point wisdom--is handled +by West Pointers; and, nevertheless, the general comprehension of all +details in relation to an army, how it is to be handled, all the +military details of responsibility, of higher discipline, &c., all +this is confusion, and strikes with horror any one either familiar +with such matters or using freely his sound sense. A narrow routine +which may have been innocuous with an army of sixteen thousand with +General Scott and in peace, became highly mischievous when the army +increased more than fifty times, and the war raged furiously. All this +confusion is specially produced by the wiseacres and doctors of +routine. Undoubtedly it reacts on the army, and shows of what use for +the country is, and was, that whole old nursery. + +Wherever one turns his eyes, every where a deep line separates the +patriotic activity of the people from the official activity. With the +people all is sacrifice, devotion, grandeur, and purity of purpose, by +great and small, by rich and poor, and with the poor, if possible, +even more than with the rich. With the highest and higher officials it +is either weakness, or egotism, or coolness, or intrigue, or +ignorance, or helplessness. The exceptions are few, and have been +repeatedly pointed out. + +_Oct. 8._--General McClellan's order to the army concerning the +President's proclamation shows up the man. Not a word about the object +in the proclamation, but rather unveiled insinuations that the army is +dissatisfied with emancipation, and that it may mutiny. The army ought +to feel highly honored by such insinuations in that lengthy +disquisition about his (McClellan's) position and the duties of the +army. For the honor of the brave, armed citizen-patriots it can be +emphatically asserted that the patriotic volunteers better know their +duties than do those who preach to them. Some suspect that Mr. Seward +drew the paper for McClellan, but I am sure this cannot be. It may +have been done by Bennett or some other of the Herald, or by Barlow. +If this order is the result of Mr. Lincoln's visit to the camp, and of +a transaction with Mac-Napoleon, then the President has not thereby +increased the dignity of his presidential character. + +Wilkes's Spirit of the Times incommensurably towers above the New York +Press by its dauntless patriotism; by its clear, broad, and deep +comprehension of the condition of the country. + +Colonel Key's disclosures concerning the McClellan-Halleck programme, +not to destroy the rebels and the rebellion until the next +presidential election, are throttled by the dismissal of the colonel. +But what he said, if put by the side of the words of the order to the +army, that "the remedy for political errors, if any are committed, is +to be found only in the action of the people at the polls,"--all this +ought to open even the most obtuse intellects. + +Poor (Carlyle fashion) old Greeley hurrahs for McClellan and for the +order No. 163 to the army. O for new and young men to swim among new +and young events! + +_Oct. 11._--Will any body in this country have the patriotic courage +to reform the army? that is, to dismiss from the service the West +Point clique in Washington and in the army of the Potomac. Such a +proof of strong will cannot be expected from the President; but +perhaps Congress may show it. Those first and second scholars or +graduates from West Point are all routine engineers; and who ever +heard of whole armies commanded, moved, and manoeuvred by engineers? +American invention; but not to be patented for Europe. + +_Oct. 11._--The rebel raid into Pennsylvania, under the nose of +McClellan. Is there any thing in the world capable of opening this +people's eyes? + +I doubt if at any time, and in the life of any great or small people, +there existed such a galaxy of civil and military rulers, chiefs, and +leaders, stripped of nobler manhood, as are the _great men_ here. The +blush of honor never burned their cheeks! O, the low politicians! Some +persons doubt Stanton's sincerity in his dealings with individuals. I +am not a judge thereof; but were it so, it can easily be forgiven if +he only remains sincere and true to the cause. + +One is amazed and even aghast at the impudence of the McClellan and +West Point cliques. In their lingo, heroes like Kearney, like Hooker +and Heintzelman, all such are superciliously mentioned as _only +fighting generals_. O, unfighting strategians! + +Stuart's brilliant raid was executed the day of McClellan's bombastic +proclamation about his having cleared Pennsylvania and Maryland of the +enemy. On the same day McClellan and other generals straggled about +the country, visiting cities hundreds of miles distant from the camp. +And such generals complain of straggling! Make the army fight! +inspire with confidence the soldier--then he will not straggle. + +The Evening Post, October 13, demonstrates that up to this day Mr. +Lincoln's administration is "a grand and brilliant success." Well, _de +gustibus non est disputandum_. Others may rightly think that the +achievements enumerated by the Evening Post are exclusively due to the +people; that by the people they were forced upon the administration, +(Stanton and the navy excepted;) and that the numerous failures, the +waste of human life, of money, and of time, are to be logically and +directly traced to the administration. O, subserviency! + +The McClellanites are indignant against the Pennsylvanians for not +having caught Stuart and his three thousand horses. Bravo! And what is +the army for? and, above all, what are the so expensive commander and +his staff for? + +It is perhaps natural that many from among the republican leaders +attempt to prop up the reputation of Mr. Lincoln's administrative +capacity, to kindle a halo around his name, and to sponge the waste of +blood, of means, and of time, from the tracks of his Seward-Scott-Blair +administration; but stern historical justice shall not, and cannot, do +it. + +Whatever be the high _military and scientific prowess_ shown by the +first West Point graduates and scholars, all this in no way +compensates for the _summum_ of perverted notions which are reared +there, and for the mock, sham, and clownish aristocracy by which a +high-toned West Pointer is easily recognized. Of course many and many +are the exceptions; many West Point pupils are animated by the noblest +and purest American spirit; but the genuine West Point spirit consists +in sneering and looking down with contempt at the mother and nurse; +that is, at the purely republican, purely democratic political +institutions, at the broad political and intellectual freedom to which +those clown-aristocrats owe their rearing, their little bit of +information, and those shoulder-stripes by which they are so mightily +inflated. + +What silly talk, to compare the St. Domingo insurrection with the +eventual results of emancipation in the South! In St. Domingo the +slaves were obliged to tear their liberty from the slaveholding +planter, and from a government siding with the oppressor. Here the +lawful government gives liberty to a peaceful laborer, and the planter +is an outlawed traitor. But the genuine pro-slavery democrat is +stupidly obtuse. + +_Oct. 18._--A few days ago the President wrote a letter to McClellan, +with ability and lucidity, exposing to view the military urgency of a +movement on the enemy with an army of one hundred and forty thousand +men, as has now McClellan at Harper's Ferry. But the letter ends by +saying that all that it contains is _not_ to be considered by +McNapoleon as being an order. Of course Mac obeys--the last injunction +of the letter. Mr. Lincoln wishes not to hurt the great Napoleon's +feelings; as for hurting the country, the people, the cause, this is +of--no consequence! Ah! to witness all this is to be chained, and to +die of thirst within the reach of the purest water. + +Reverend Dr. Unitarian Sensation's broad church, admirer of the +Southern gentleman, and a Jeremy Diddler. + +_Oct. 18._--The elections in several of the States evidence the deep +imprint upon the country of Lincoln-Seward disorganizing, because from +the first day vacillating, undecided, both-ways policy. The elections +reverberate the moral, the political, and the belligerent condition in +which the country is dragged and thrown by those two _master spirits_. +No decided principle inspires them and their administration, and no +principle leads and has a decided majority in the elections; neither +the democrats nor the republicans prevail; neither freedom nor +submission is the watchword; and finally, neither the North nor the +South is decidedly the master on the fields of battle. All is +confusion! + +Scarcely one genuine republican was, or is, in the cabinet; the +republican party is completely on the wane--and perhaps beyond +redemption; all this is a logical result, and was easily to be +foreseen by any body,--only not by the wiseacres of the party, not by +the republican papers in New York, as the Times, the Tribune, and the +Evening Post, only not by the Sumners, Doolittles, and many of the +like leaders, all of whom, when, about a year ago, warned against such +a cataclysm, self-confidently smiled; but who soon will cry more +bitter tears than did the daughters of Judah over the ruins of +Jerusalem. + +And now likewise the phrase in McClellan's order No. 163, about "the +remedy at the polls," the disclosures made by Colonel Key, receive +their fullest, but ominous and cursed, signification; and now the +blind can see that it is policy, and not altogether incapacity, in +McClellan to have made a war to preserve slavery and the rebels. And +thus McClellan outwitted Mr. Lincoln. + +In general, human nature is passionately attracted, nay, is subdued, +by energy, above all by civic intrepidity. It would have been so easy +for Mr. Lincoln to carry the masses, and to avoid those disasters at +the polls! But stubbornness is not energy. + +From a very reliable source I learn that a few days after the battle +of Antietam, General McClellan, or at least General or Colonel Marcy, +of McClellan's staff, insinuated to the President that General +McClellan would wish to be relieved from the command of the army, and +be assigned to quiet duties in Washington--very likely to supersede +Halleck. And the President seized not by the hairs the occasion to get +rid of the nation's nightmare, together with the pets of the commander +of the army of the Potomac. McClellan acted honestly in making the +above insinuation; he is now, in part at least, irresponsible for any +future disaster and blood. + +_Oct. 20._--I have strong indications that European powers, as England +and France, are very sanguine to mediate, but would do it only if, and +when, _asked_ by our government. Those two governments, or some other +half-friendly, may, semi-officially, insinuate to Mr. Seward to make +such a demand. A few months ago, already Mr. Dayton wrote from Paris +something about such a step. Mr. Seward is desperate, downcast, and +may believe he can serve his country by committing the cabinet to some +such combination. I must warn Stanton and others. + +In the Express and in the World the New York Herald found its masters +in ignominy. + +More or less mean, contemptible ambition among the helmsmen, but +patriotism, patriotic ambition are below zero--here in Washington. For +the sake and honor of human nature, I pray to destiny Stanton may not +fail, and still count among the Wadsworths, the Wades, and the like +pure patriots. + +The democratic elections and majorities united to Mr. Seward may +enforce a compromise, and God knows if Mr. Lincoln will oppose it to +the last. Then the only seeming salvation of the north will be the +indomitable decision of the rebels not to accept any terms except a +full recognition. + +_Oct. 22._--The incapacity of the military wiseacres borders on +idiotism, if not on something worse. To do nothing McClellan absorbs +every man, and keeps one hundred and forty thousand men on the +Maryland side of the Potomac. Sigel has only a small command of twelve +thousand men, in a position where, with one quarter of what is useless +under McClellan, with his skill, his activity, and the _truly_ +patriotic devotion of his troops, of his officers, and of the +commanders under him, Sigel would force the rebels to retreat from +Winchester, and otherwise damage them far more than _will_ or can do +such McClellans, Hallecks, and all this c----e. + +One of the greatest misfortunes for the American people is to have +considered as statesmen the rhetors, the petty politicians, and the +speech-makers. Now, those rhetors, petty politicians, and +speech-makers are at the helm, are in the Senate, and--ruin the +country. + +The optimists and the subservients still console themselves and +confuse the people by asserting that Mr. Lincoln will yet _come out_ +as a man and a statesman. Previous to such a happy change the +country's honor and the country's political and material vitality will +_run out_. + +More than a year ago Mr. Seward said to the Prince Salm and to me, +that this war ought to be fought out by foreigners; that the Americans +fought the revolutionary war, but now they are devoted to peaceful +pursuits; and that it is the duty of Europeans to save this refuge +from the thraldoms in the old world. + +Now, I see that Mr. Seward was right, although in a sense different +from that in which he uttered the above sentence. + +The Irish excepted, all the other foreign-born Americans, but +preeminently the Germans, are more in communion with the lofty, pure, +and humane element in the thus called American principle, are +therefore more in communion with the creed of the immense majority of +Americans, than are they, the present dabblers in politics, the +would-be leaders, (civil and military,) the would-be statesmen, all of +whom are eaten up by the admixture into what is vital and perennial in +the signification of America, of all that in itself is local, muddy, +petty, accidental, and transient. + +_Oct. 23._--The recent publication of General Scott's letter, and of a +writing to President Buchanan, confirms my opinion that "the highest +military authority in the land" faltered after March 4, 1861, and +inaugurated that defensive warfare wherein we _stick_ on the Potomac +until this day. + +Pseudo-liberal right-honorable Gladstone asserts that Jeff. Davis "has +made the South a nation;" then Abraham Lincoln, with W. H. Seward and +G. B. McClellan, have destroyed a noble and generous nation. + +England may now recognize the South, France may join in it, but other +great European powers, as Russia, Spain, Prussia, Austria, will not +follow in such a wake. The recognition will not materially improve the +condition of the rebels, nor raise the blockade. But as soon as +recognized, Jeff. D. may ask for a mediation, which the people--if not +Mr. Seward--will spurn. An armed mediation remains to be applied, +wherein, likewise, the other European powers will not concur. An armed +mediation between the two principles will be the _summum_ of infamy to +which English aristocracy and English mercantilism can degrade itself; +if Louis Napoleon joins therein, then his crown is not worth two +years lease, provided the Orleans have ---- + +If we should succumb under the united efforts of imbecility, of +pro-slavery treason, of Anglo-Franco-European and of American perjury, +then + + Ultima coelestis terram Astraea reliquit. + +_Oct. 25._--Only two or three days ago, in a conversation with a +diplomat, Mr. Seward asserted that both the extreme parties will be +mastered--that is, the secessionists and the abolitionists. So Mr. +Seward confesses the _credo_ and the gospel of the New York Herald, +the World, the Journal of Commerce, the National Intelligencer, and +other similar organs of secession. + +Notwithstanding the numerous complications naturally generated by the +vicinity of Cuba to Secessia, the Spanish government, Count Serrano, +the captain-general of Cuba, and Tassara, the Spanish minister here, +all have maintained the most loyal relations towards the Federal +government. It were to be very much regretted if a drunkard or a +brute, as in the affair of the Montgomery, should disturb such +relations. + +_Oct. 26._--McClellan-Blair-Seward tactics are crowned with splendid +success. By his _simplicity_ Mr. Lincoln aided therein as much as he +could. The bad season is in; any successful campaign impossible. The +rebels will be safe, and Gladstone justified. + +It is so difficult to find out the truth concerning Fremont's campaign +against Jackson, that some generalship may, after all, be credited to +him. At any rate Fremont is a better general than McClellan and the +pets in command under him, and Fremont is with his heart and soul in +the cause, of which the McClellanites cannot be accused, all of them, +their fetish included, having no heart and no soul. + +Old Europe, and, above all, official Europe, and even the Gladstones, +must be vindicated. Official Europe generally appreciates nations by +their leaders. Europe demands from such leaders actions and proofs of +statesmanship, of high capacity, if not of heroism. The attempt to +astonish Europe by speeches, by oratory, and, still worse, by +second-rate legal arguments, by what is called papers here, and in +Europe diplomatic circulars and despatches, is the same as the attempt +to eclipse bright sunlight with a burning candle. But our orators, +and, above all, Mr. Seward, flooded the European and the English +statesmen with their, at the best, indifferent productions. Official +Europe was favored with a shower of three various editions of _papers +relating to foreign relations_ in 1862, issued by the _State +Department_, together with the Sanfords, the Weeds, the Hugheses, _et +hoc genus omne_. Undoubtedly, the traitor Mason shows in England more +of fire than does the cold, stiff, prickly, and dignified son and +grandson of Presidents; and then the average of our press! O, Jemima! + +In his circular, September 22, to our agents in Europe, Mr. Seward +belies not himself. The emancipation is rather coldly announced, and +it is visible that neither Mr. Seward's heart nor soul is in it. + +The President has now the most reliable information that when Corinth +was invested by Halleck, the rebel troops were wholly demoralized, and +the enemy was astonished not to be attacked, as very little resistance +would have been made. So much for General Scott's gift in Halleck. + +The almost daily occurrences here long ago would have exasperated the +hot-headed and warm-hearted nations in Europe, and treason would have +become their watchword. O American people! thou art warm-hearted, but +of _unparallelled endurance_! + +No European nation, not even the Turks, would patiently bear such a +condition of affairs. Every where the sovereign would have been forced +to change, or to modify, the _personnel_ of his ministers and +advisers; and Mr. Lincoln is in the hands of Messrs. Seward and Blair, +both worse even than McClellan, and--cannot shake them off. + +Now, for the first time in my life, I realize why, during the last +stages of the dissolution of the Roman empire, honest men escaped into +monasteries, or why, at certain epochs of the great French revolution, +the best men went to the army. + +Ah! to witness here the meanest egotism, imbecility, and intrigue, +coolly, one by one, destroy the honor and the future of this noble +people. Curse upon my old age! above all, curse upon my obesity! +Curse upon my poverty! What a cesspool! what a mire! Only legal +slaughterers all around! O, could I go to a camp! but, of course, not +to one under McClellan. Sigel's camp. Sigel's men are not soulless; +they fight for an idea, without an eye to the White House. + +The rhetors, the stump-speakers, the politicians, and the intriguers +hold the power, and--humanity and history shudder at the results. + +_Oct. 29._--McClellan, with his wonted intrepidity and rapidity, +crossed the Potomac from all directions, pushes on Winchester, +and--will find there wherefrom every animal willingly discharges +itself. + +A foreign diplomat, one of the most eminent in the whole _corps_, said +yesterday, "No living being so ardently prays for rain as does +McClellan; rain will prevent fighting, marching, &c." Such is the +estimation of our hero. + +Fevers decimated many regiments at Harper's Ferry. If McClellan would +have marched only five miles a day, fighting even such battles without +any generalship, as he did at Antietam, the army would be healthier, +and by this time would be in Richmond. + +The decision of the court of inquiry between a patriot and the +incarnation of West Point McClellanism, between Martindale and that +Fitz-John Porter, ought to open the eyes of any one, but--not those of +Mr. Lincoln. + +Only two days ago Mr. Lincoln declared, that the reason why McClellan +and his pets are not removed is, not any confidence in McClellan's +capacity, but to preserve the political balance between the republican +and the democratic parties. + +If there exist such spiritual creations as providence, genii, or +angels watching over the destinies of nations, then, at the sight of +Lincoln-Seward-Blair doings, providence, angels, genii avert their +faces in despair. + +_Oct. 30._--New regiments coming in. It cuts into the deepest of the +heart to see such noble and devoted fellows going to be again wantonly +slaughtered by the combined military and civic inefficiency of +McClellan-Lincoln-Seward, and, above all, by their utter +heartlessness. + +When the rebels invaded Maryland, the _fighting_ generals, as +Heintzelman, advised to mass the troops between the rebels and the +Potomac, cut them from their bases and communications, push them +towards the North without a possibility of escape, instead of throwing +them back on the Potomac. Harper's Ferry would have been saved. Every +progress made by the rebels in a Northern direction would have assured +their ruin; soon their ammunition would have been exhausted, and +surrender was inevitable. But this bold plan of a _fighting_ general +could not be comprehended by pets and pretorians. Since, daily and +daily occasions occur to destroy the rebels; but that is not the game. +Instead of cutting the rebels from Gordonsville and Richmond, which +could have been done any time during the last five weeks if +Heintzelman and Sigel were not so thoroughly weakened by an ignorant, +or worse, distribution of troops, McClellan with all his might pushes +the rebels back to Richmond, back on their bases and their resources. +O, poor country! + +Even I feel humiliated to continually ascertain, by various direct and +indirect sources from Europe, in what little estimation--if not +worse--is held our administration by the principal statesmen and +governments of the old world. + + + + +NOVEMBER, 1862. + + Empty rhetoric -- The future dark and terrible -- Wadsworth + defeated -- The official bunglers blast every thing they touch -- + Great and holy day! McClellan gone overboard! -- The planters -- + Burnside -- McClellan nominated for President -- Awful events + approaching -- Dictatorship dawns on the horizon -- The + catastrophe. + + +O God, O God! to witness how, by the hands of +Lincoln-Seward-McClellan, this noblest human structure is +crumbled--and, perhaps, soon + + Pulvere vix tactae poterunt monstrare ruinae. + +May God preserve this people--those noble patriots, of which +Wadsworth, Wade, Potter of Wisconsin, Stanton, Governor Andrew, and +many others are the types, when the country will be ruined and rended +by the firm, Lincoln-Seward-McClellan, to realize the pang,-- + + Nessun maggior' dolor' che ricordarsi dell tempo felice + Nella miseria. + +O, I know what it is! + +Mr. Seward's letter, October 28, to Messrs. Connover and Palmer, is a +display of that empty rhetoric whose dust he is wont to throw into the +eyes of the good-natured masses. His plea for united action--of course +with him--is the most bitter irony on himself. Mr. Seward's policy and +action are at the helm, and he piloted "our noble ship of state" on +worse breakers than those "of eighteen months ago." + +Mr. Seward's letter is dumb on the object of the Cooper meeting. Of +course, Mr. Seward would rather swallow a viper than applaud the +abolition of slavery. + +_Nov. 5._--Lincoln-Seward politically slaughtered the republican +party, and with it the country's honor. The future looks dark and +terrible. I shudder. Dishonor on all sides. Lincoln will not +understand to use the lease of power left to him--or to fall as a man. +But to be candid, most of the thus called leaders prepared this +defeat, and most of them at the last moment may lack decision and +dignity. How repeatedly I warned the Sumners, Wilsons, and other +wiseacres, that such will be the end, that the people at large will +become exasperated by Lincoln's administration! + +The issue brought before the people was all but dignified. It would +have been better to make a straightforward issue against the +incapacity and the democratic ill-will of McClellan, than to dodge the +question, and force honest and noble men to speak against their +convictions. The issue, as made, was concocted by journalists, by +politicians; but not by statesmen, not by genuine great leaders. + +Seward triumphs. His insincerity preeminently contributed to defeat +Wadsworth. Mephisto-like, he rejoices in thus having humbled the pure +and radical patriots. + +At any rate, I shall try to expose Seward. _Arrive que pourra._ But +for him the sacred cause would have been victorious, and now--horror! +horror! + +The pro-Romanist clergy is more furiously and savagely pro-slavery +than are the Rhetts, the Yanceys, in the South; the poor +Africo-Americans are, if not the truest Christians in this country, at +any rate their Christianity is sublime when compared with the +pro-Romanism. + +O, for civic intrepidity, or all is lost! High-minded, intrepid, +self-forgetful civism and abnegation alone can avert the catastrophe. +Such is the mass of the people--but its leaders! + +_Nov. 8._--Hooker has the military instinct in him which lights the +fire, and the inspiration of the god of battles; as Halleck has +nothing of the one and of the other, and as Mr. Lincoln is--Mr. +Lincoln, so Hooker is not to be put in command of the army. Lincoln +and Halleck will find out their man. _Similis simili gaudet_, or, +_przywitala sie dupa z wiechciem_. + +_Nov. 9._--The official bunglers have blasted every thing they +touched: the people's virgin enthusiasm and unparalleled devotion; +they have endangered the country's safety. It is to hope for a miracle +to expect any thing for the better at the hands of the bunglers. Will +the shallow rhetors, will the would-be leaders in the Congress, be as +subservient to the bunglers as they have been up to this hour? + +_Nov. 9._--Great and holy day! McClellan gone overboard! Better late +than never. But this belated act of justice to the country cannot +atone for all the deadly disasters, will not remove the fearful +responsibility from Lincoln-Seward-Blair, for having so long sustained +this horrible vampire. Now is Seward's turn to jump. + +It must be acknowledged, in justice to the average of the better class +of planters, that the superficial, sociable intercourse with them is +more easy, and what is commonly considered more European, than is +similar intercourse with any corresponding class in the North. Therein +consists the whole attraction exercised by the Southerners on +Europeans visiting America--the diplomats included. I, for one, am +always uneasy, anxious, as if touching hot iron, when in intercourse +here with men with whom I am very intimate, (on the outside,) and who +now are in power. I never felt so out of the track when--once--in +intercourse with sovereigns, and with eminent men in Europe. + +_Nov. 11._--General Burnside succeeds to McClellan--gives a military +ovation to his predecessor. In his order of the day, Burnside pays +homage to McClellan, and thus implicitly condemns the government. +Burnside permits McClellan to issue such a parting word as must shake +the army and the country. + +_Nov. 12._--The democrats nominate McClellan for the next presidency. +Thus Mr. Lincoln's helplessness, Seward's hatred of the republican +creed, the treason, the imbecility, the intrigues of various others, +the lack of civic energy in the New York republican press and in the +republican politicians, except some repeatedly mentioned in this +Diary,--all this combined has built up a pedestal for such a +McClellan! + +Strange and awful events may occur even before the end of Mr. +Lincoln's administration. The democratic leaders are perverse, +unprincipled, reckless, daring beyond conception; success is their +creed, and no conscience, no honor restrain them; and in the +management of the public opinion and of their party the democrats have +evidenced a skill far above that of the republican leaders; further, +the democrats evoke the vilest, the most brutish passions dormant in +the masses; the democrats are supported by all that is brutal, savage, +ignorant, and sordid; and, to crown and strengthen all, the democrats, +united to Romanist priesthood, rule over the Irishry. + +And thus the relentless hatred with which the democrats persecute any +elevated, noble, humane aspiration; the helplessness, the incapacity +of the official and unofficial leaders of the republican party: both +these agencies combined may deal such a blow to the pure and humane +republican creed that it may not recover therefrom during the next +twenty-five years. + +To sum up,-- + +_Dictatorship with McClellan_ seems to dawn upon the horizon; the +smallest disaster--Burnside, ah!--will precipitate the catastrophe. I +pray to God (and for the first time) that I may be mistaken. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DIARY FROM MARCH 4, 1861, TO +NOVEMBER 12, 1862*** + + +******* This file should be named 28926.txt or 28926.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/8/9/2/28926 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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