And now as regards the debt. It has been a continual source of attack by those inimical to Mr. Lincoln's administration, that the debt is almost equal to the entire wealth of the loyal States. This surplus wealth according to the last census, amounted to about 3,000 millions of moveable property, and 7,000 millions of real estate.

The latter, of course, being entirely useless as a basis of credit or a means of supporting hostilities, we leave out of the question. The sum of 3,000 millions therefore truly represented, we will say, the moveable or disposable wealth of the loyal States in 1860.

Assuming that it has increased to 4,000 millions in the meantime, an increase very much below the usual rate of augmentation, let us see how much of this has been used up in the war.

The present debt is 7,000 millions, it is true, but it must be remembered though this does not represent over half its amount of supplies. The balance represents profits, and these profits are returned to the nation. In other words the rabid and reckless contractors and sutlers, have not failed to charge double prices for every thing furnished to the Government or soldiers, so that 7,000 millions of debt only represent 1,000 millions of property consumed in the war. These unconscionable practices no longer exists, for the Government is now wide awake, and cannot be cheated so easily as it was with the Cataline, and the $3 condemned muskets, and other runious contracts made at the outset of the war.

Coutractors and sutlers now-a-days can do little more

than make an honest living. The days of public rapine are gone by.

Thus we perceive that, with a debt that represents but 1,000 millions of actual property, out of 4,000 millions of actual wealth, to say nothing of our lands and the buildings and other improvements thereon, the people of the loyal United States have suffered but little in the aggre gate, even from four years of gigantic warfare.

This fact alone should shed lustre upon the head of Mr. Lincoln, who by his own strick regard for law and his admiral measures of Administration, has kept the nation intact, and enabled it to persue, even in the midst of war, those peaceful arts, which alone can furnish means to mantain a protracted struggle in the field.

Among the many admirable qualities of Mr. Lincoln, there is none so noticeable as the warmth and purity of style which characterizes his correspondence and official documents. This is at once an index to the man's nature; a nature lofty, simple, and ardent. What could be more truly sublime than the sentiments addressed by Mr. Lincoln to the workingmen of Manchester, in response to a letter from them approving of his manly and patriotic course of action in the government of this country during the two years and a half of civil war? What more simple and unaffected than the charming note he addressed to Mr. Hackett, the actor? What more ardent than the impassioned appeal he addressed to the country upon the subject of the gradual Emancipation bill already quoted. Said A. Lincoln in this memorable document:

"I do not forget the gravity which should characterize

a paper addressed to the Congress of the nation, by the Chief Magistrate of the nation. Nor do I forget that some of you are my seniors, nor that many of you have more experience than I, in the conduct of public affairs. Yet, Ι trust that in view of the great responsibility resting upon me, you will perceive no want of respect to yourselves, in any undue earnestness I may seem to display."

"Is it doubted, then, that the plan I propose, if adopted, would shorten the war, and thus lessen its expenditure of money and of blood? Is it doubted that it would restore the national authority and national prosperity, and perpetuate both indefinitely? Is it doubted that we here-Congress and Executive-can secure its adoption? Will not the good people respond to a united and earnest appeal from us? Can we, can they, by any other means, so certainly or so speedily, assure these vital objects? We can succeed only by concert. It is not 'can any of us imagine better,' but 'can we all do better?"

"The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with diffi. culty, and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country.

"Fellow-citizens, we cannot escape history. We, of this Congress and this administration, will be remembered in spite of ourselves. No personal significance, or insignificance, can spare one or another of us. The fiery trial through which we pass will light us down in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation. We say we are for the Union. The world will not forget that we say this. We

know how to save the Union. The world knows we do know how to save it. We-even we here-hold the power, and bear the responsibility. In giving freedom to the slave we assure freedom to the free-honorable alike in that we give and what we preserve. We shall nobly. save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of earth. Other means may succeed; this could not fail. The way is plain, peaceful, generous, just-a way which, if followed, the world will forever applaud, and God must forever bless."

The writer is no hero-worshipper, and has refrained during the course of this work from rendering many a just tribute to Mr. Lincoln's character, for fear of falling into a style of adulation, but he appeals to any rightminded man, whatever be his political opinions, to say whether the foregoing extract is not full of beauties which necessarily reflect the mind that conceived it.

The italics are copied from the original, or we should have wished to italicise these lines.

Above al, fellow citizens, we cannot escape history, We of this Congress, and this Administration, will be remembered in spite of ourselves." What sincerity and truthfulness of mind shines all through these sentences! "The fiery trial through which we pass will light us down in honor or dishonor to the latest generation. Can the lips which uttered these words be those of an obscene joker, the character with which he is charged by his political enemies?

"We say we are for the Union. The world will not forget that we say this." Can the mind which prompted these noble words be the same, which, as these same enemies charge, longed for a ribald song over the heroic cerements

of Gettysburg? Impossible. The stately march of such a phrase as this never issued from a brain capable of low desires or impure thoughts. "In giving freedom to the slave, or assure freedom to the free-honorble alike in what we give, and what we preserve." Mr. Lincoln is unquestionably of an affable temper and cheerful turn of mind; he has an encouraging smile for this one, a joke for that, and a kind word for all. But he is never obscene in his seasonable merriment, and those who ascribe to him such a quality seriously mistake his character.

What can be more becoming, more respectful, more de corous, than this paragraph?

"I do not forget the gravity which should characterize a paper addressed to the Congress of the nation by the Chief Magistrate of the nation. Nor do I forget that some of you are my seniors; nor that many of you have more experience than I, in the conduct of public affairs."

How like, it sounds, to the dignified the Venetian Senate, commencing: and reverend segniors.

address of Othello to "Most potent, grave,

Be assured, fellow citizens, the man who can employ such language as this, upon occasions so eventful, is worthy of any distinction to which you can elevate him. Whatever the homeliness of his exterior, depend upon it, that honesty and true worth dwells beneath all.

In former days of European tumult the posessors of those masterpieces of art, each of which was a princely fortune of itself, resorted to a curious artifice to preserve their treasures from the sack and pillage of conquering armies. They covered over their pictures with a composition upon