fund of corruption; it enriched the commercial centres of the North, and by artificial stimulation preserved such cities as New York from decay; it interested vast numbers of politicians, contractors, and dissolute public men in continuing the war and enlarging the scale of its operations; and, indeed, the disposition to make money out of the war accounts for much of that zeal in the North, which was mistaken for political ardor or the temper of patriotic devotion.*

* The following is an extract from an unpublished letter from Gen. Washington to Richard Henry Lee, and, as an exposition of the character of the Northern people from a pen sacred to posterity, is deeply interesting. There can be no doubt of the authenticity of the letter. It has been preserved in the Lee family, who, though applied to by Bancroft, Irving, and others for a copy for publication, have hitherto refused it, on the ground that it would be improper to give to the world a private letter from the Father of his Country reflecting upon any portion of it while the old Union endured. But now, that "these people" have trampled the Constitution under foot, destroyed the government of our fathers, and invaded and desolated Washington's own county in Virginia, there can be no impropriety in showing his private opinion of the Massachusetts Yankees :

As we have now nearly completed our lines of defence, we have nothing more, in my opinion, to fear from the enemy, provided we can keep our men to their duty, and make them watchful and vigilant; but it is among the most difficult tasks I ever undertook in my life to induce these people to believe that there is or can be danger, till the bayonet is pushed at their breasts; not that it proceeds from any uncommon prowess, but rather from an unaccountable kind of stupidity in the lower class of these people, which, believe me, prevails but too generally among the officers of the Massachusetts part of the army, who are nearly of the same kidney with the privates, and adds not a little to my difficulties, as there is no such thing as getting officers of this stamp to exert themselves in carrying orders into execution. To curry favor with the men (by whom they were chosen, and on whose smiles possibly they may think they may again rely) seems to be one of the principal objects of their attention. I submit it, therefore, to your consideration, whether there is, or is not, a propriety in that resolution of the Congress which leaves the ultimate appointment of all officers below the rank of general to the governments where the regiments originated, now, the army is become Continental? To me, it appears improper in two points of view-first, it is giving that power and weight to an individual Colony which ought of right to belong to the whole. Then it damps the spirit and ardor of volunteers from all but the four New England Governments, as none but their people have the least chance of getting into office. Would it not be better, therefore, to have the warrants, which the Commander-in-Chief is authorized to give pro tempore,

But while politicians plundered the government at Washington and contractors grew rich in a single day, and a fictitious prosperity dazzled the eyes of the observer in the cities of the North, the public finances of the Yankee government had long ago become desperate. It is interesting at this point to make a brief summary of the financial condition of the North by a comparison of its public debt with the assets of the govern

ment.

The debt of the present United States, audited and floating, calculated from data up to June 30, 1862, was at least $1,300,000,000. The daily expenses, as admitted by the chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means, was between three and four millions of dollars; the debt, in one year from this time, could not be less than two thousand five hundred millions of dollars.

Under the census of 1860, all the property of every kind in all the States was estimated at less than $12,500,000,000. Since

approved or disapproved by the Continental Congress, or a committee of their body, which I should suppose in any long recess must always sit? In this case, every gentleman will stand an equal chance of being promoted, according to his merit: in the other, all offices will be confined to the inhabitants of the four New England Governments, which, in my opinion, is impolitic to a degree. I have made a pretty good slam among such kind of officers as the Massachusetts Government abounds in since I came to this camp, having broken one colonel and two captains for cowardly behavior in the action on Bunker's Hill, two captains for drawing more provisions and pay than they had men in their company, and one for being absent from his post when the enemy appeared there and burnt a house just by it. Besides these, I have at this time one colonel, one major, one captain, and two subalterns under arrest for trial. In short, I spare none, and yet fear it will not all do, as these people seem to be too inattentive to every thing but their interest.

There have been so many great and capital errors and abuses to rectify-so many examples to make, and so little inclination in the officers of inferior rank to contribute their aid to accomplish this work, that my life has been nothing else (since I came here) but one continual round of vexation and fatigue. In short, no pecuniary recompense could induce me to undergo what I have; especially, as I expect, by showing so little countenance to irregularities and public abuses as to render myself very obnoxious to a great part of these people. But as I have already greatly exceeded the bounds of a letter I will not trouble you with matters relative to my feelings.

Your affectionate friend and obedient servant,

(Signed)

Richard Henry Lee, Esq.

GEO. WASHINGTON,

:

the war commenced, the depreciation has been at least onefourth, $3,175,000,000. From $9,375,000,000 deduct the property in the seceded States, at least one-third-$3,125,000,000; leaving in the present United States, $6,250,000,000.

It will thus be seen, that the present debt of the North is one-fifth of all the property of every kind it possesses; and in one year more it will be more than one-third. No people on earth has ever been plunged in so large a debt in so short a time. No government in existence has so large a debt in proportion to the amount of property held by its people.

In continuing the narrative of the campaign in Virginia, we shall have to observe the remarkable exasperation with which the North re-entered upon this campaign, and to notice many deeds of blackness which illustrated the temper in which she determined to prosecute the desperate fortunes of the war. The military authorities of the North seemed to suppose that better success would attend a savage war, in which no quarter was to be given and no age or sex spared, than had hitherto been secured to such hostilities as are alone recognized to be lawful by civilized men in modern times. It is not necessary to comment at length upon this fallacy. Brutality in war was mistaken for vigor. War is not emasculated by the observances of civilization; its vigor and success consist in the resources of generalship, the courage of troops, the moral ardors of its cause. To attempt to make up for deficiency in these great and noble elements of vigor by mere brutal severities— such as pillage, assassination, &c., is absurd; it reduces the idea of war to the standard of the brigand; it offends the moral sentiment of the world, and it excites its enemy to the last stretch of determined and desperate exertion.

The North had placed a second army of occupation of Virginia under command of Gen. Pope, who boasted that he was fresh from a campaign in the West, where he had "seen only the backs of rebels.* This brutal braggart threatened that fire,

*This notorious Yankee commander, Major-general John Pope, was a man nearly forty years of age, a native of Kentucky, but a citizen of Illinois. He was born of respectable parents. He was graduated at West Point in 1842, and served in the Mexican war, where he was brevetted a captain.

In 1849, he conducted the Minnesota exploring expedition, and afterwards acted as topographical engineer of New Mexico, until 1853, when he was as

famine, and slaughter should be the portions of the conquered. He declared that he would not place any guard over any private property, and invited the soldiers to pillage and murder. He issued a general order, directing the murder of peaceful inhabitants of Virginia as spies if found quietly tilling their farms in his rear, even outside of his lines; and one of his brigadier-generals, Steinwehr, seized upon innocent and peaceful inhabitants to be held as hostages, to the end that they might be murdered in cold blood, if any of his soldiers were killed by some unknown persons, whom he designated as "bushwackers."

signed to the command of one of the expeditions to survey the route of the Pacific railroad. He distinguished himself on the overland route to the Pacific by "sinking" artesian wells and government money to the amount of a million of dollars. One well was finally abandoned incomplete, and afterwards a perennial spring was found by other parties in the immediate vicinity. In a letter to Jefferson Davis, then Secretary of War, urging this route to the Pacific and the boring these wells, Pope made himself the especial champion of the South.

On the breaking out of the war, Pope was made a brigadier-general of volunteers. He held a command in Missouri for some time before he became particularly noted. When General Halleck took charge of the disorganized department, Pope was placed in command of the District of Central Missouri. He was afterwards sent to southeastern Missouri. The cruel disposition of the man, of which his rude manners and a vulgar bearded face, with coarse skin, gave indications, found an abundant field for gratification in this unhappy State. His proceedings in Missouri will challenge a comparison with the most infernal record ever bequeathed by the licensed murderer to the abhorrence of mankind. And yet it was his first step in blood, the first opportunity he had ever had to feast his eyes upon slaughter and regale his ears with the cries of human agony.

Having been promoted to the rank of major-general, Pope was next appointed to act at the head of a corps to co-operate with Halleck in the reduction of Corinth. After the evacuation of Corinth by General Beauregard, Pope was sent by Halleck to annoy the rear of the Confederate army, but Beauregard turned upon and repulsed his pursuit. The report of Pope to Halleck, that he had captured 10,000 of Beauregard's army, and 15,000 stand of arms, when he had not taken a man or a musket, stands alone in the history of lying. It left him without a rival in that respectable art.

"

Such was the man who took command of the enemy's forces in northern Virginia. His bluster was as excessive as his accomplishments in falsehood. He was described in a Southern newspaper as a Yankee compound of Bobadil and Munchausen." His proclamation, that he had seen nothing of his enemies "but their backs," revived an ugly story in his private life, and gave occasion to the witty interrogatory, if the gentleman who cowhided him for offering an indignity to a lady, was standing with his back to him when he in

The people of the North were delighted with the brigandish pronunciamentos of Pope in Virginia. The government at Washington was not slow to gratify the popular passion; it hastened to change the character of the war into a campaign of indiscriminate robbery and murder. A general order was issued by the Secretary of War, directing the military commanders of the North to take private property for the convenience and use of their armies, without compensation. The public and official expressions of the spirit of the North in the war were even more violent than the clamors of the mob. The abolitionists had at last succeeded in usurping complete control of the government at Washington, and in imparting to the war the unholy zeal of their fanaticism. Nine-tenths of the legislation of the Yankee Congress had been occupied in some form or other with the question of slavery. Universal emancipation in the South, and the utter overthrow of all property, was now the declared policy of the desperate and demented leaders of the war. The Confiscation Bill, enacted at the close of the session of Congress, confiscated all the slaves belonging to those who were loyal to the South, constituting. nine-tenths at least of the slaves in the Confederate States. In the Border States occupied by the North, slavery was plainly doomed under a plan of emancipation proposed by Mr. Lincoln with the flimsy and ridiculous pretence of compensation to slaveholders.* Other violent acts of legislation were passed

flicted the chastisement. The fact was, that Pope had won his baton of mar shal by bragging to the Yankee fill. He was another instance, besides that of Butler, of the manufacture of military reputation in the North by cowardly bluster and acts of coarse cruelty to the defenceless.

At the proposed rate of valuation, these would amount to
Add for deportation and colonization $100 each,

And we have the enormous sum of

$358,833,600

119,244,533

$478,078,133