AN ERRAND TO THE SOUTH IN THE SUMMER OF 1862. CHAPTER I. From England to Washington. AMONG the inconvenient results of the war between the Federal and Confederate States of America may be reckoned the stoppage of the mails. Political animosities between "North" and "South" might in many cases render tolerable the severance of epistolary communication in the New World; but sore has the privation been to thousands of kindred hearts in England and France on one side of the Atlantic, and the Southern States on the other so that indeed the "King of Hearts" might justly have raised his sceptre against this strife as well as "King Cotton." Though the first steamer B between England and America in 1819 went to Savannah in South Carolina, yet New York has long monopolized the mails even to beyond the precincts of the United States. For some months after the war broke out, letters from Europe could be sent through the Consuls at the various ports, transmitted from the Foreign Office; but by the autumn of 1861 even this mode of communication was interdicted on remonstrance from the United States' Government. A paragraph had just gone the round of the papers that Mr. Secretary Stanton had forbidden any more foreigners going South. Many declared I could not succeed. Some advised me to run the blockade. In a note to a kind friend even Mr. Adams had said, "I fear, from the increasing severity of the war, the prospect of success is not very great.' I called on Mr. Adams, and told him the sad history of our bereavements. At once his heart was moved, and he gave me the following letter to Mr. Seward:: "You may remember that some time since I sent to your care a letter addressed by a Mr. to his sister in South Carolina to apprise her of the death of a sister in this country. Since then the family have experienced another bereavement, and they have concluded to send one of their number personally to communicate this event to her. The Rev. W. W. Malet, the bearer of this note, is the person. At their solicitation I have given him this note, as they hope by means of it that his access to the disaffected region may be in a degree facilitated. "I am very truly yours, "To the Hon. W. H. Seward, Washington." Earl Russell was so kind as to give me a letter to Lord Lyons at the request of my brother, Her Majesty's Minister at Frankfort-on-Maine. To these preparations was added the family uniting in prayer. I afterwards called on Mr. Mason, Commissioner from the Confederate States, and obtained from him introductions to General Hugér (then commanding at Norfolk, Virginia), and Mr. Pickens, Governor of South Carolina. On Saturday, 10th of May, I went on board the R.M.S. "Scotia,”—her first voyage—a splendid ship |