nouncement, to see who had changed; but not until the eighth ballot could there be found any evidence whether Greeley or Evarts would rally. On that, Greeley gained five, and in a moment the Harris tickets were started by the Weed men. The fact being known that there was a break in the line caused intense excitement. Throughout the ninth ballot everybody was on their feet moving about. The ballot revealed a wonderful change of front. "The forty-nine votes recorded for Harris made his nomination certain on the next ballot.

"The moment it was known that he received sixty votes, there was a rush for Weed. He was pulled out of the Governor's room, and completely surrounded.”

At this point the feud between these old friends ought to have ended. Each of them had been instrumental in defeating the cherished object of the other. They ought to have called it even, shaken hands, and worked together for the country. But human passions are not so easily allayed; and from political opponents they had the misfortune to become personal enemies.

The following paragraphs from the Tribune may serve to complete the history of these events.

"The Albany Evening Journal says:

"The Postmaster-Generalship was once, it is said, a pet aspiration of the editor-in-chief of the Tribune.'

"The editor-in-chief of the Tribune' having been designated by several influential Republicans for Postmaster-General, in November last authorized the Honorable Schuyler Colfax to convey to the President elect his decided veto on that selection. This was before it was known that Governor Seward had reconsidered his original determination to accept no office under Mr. Lincoln.

“Even the Evening Journal will not say that it would have been presumptuous in the editor aforesaid to have aspired to office at the hands of the new President. The fact that he did not seek any such office, but early and decidedly informed those friends who suggested the matter to him that he would not be a candidate for any office whatever, is known to many. So much for that point.

"The Journal says that Mr. Lincoln appointed Mr. Seward,

"Against the persistent protestations of those who concurred with the Tribune.'

"Shuffling as this charge is, it is essentially false. The Tribune promptly and heartily approved the selection of Governor Seward for the State Department. It early and sincerely offered to support his re-election to the Senate, while it was understood that Mr. S. would take no appointment. It never in any manner opposed his selection for the Cabinet, or for whatever post under President Lincoln he might choose to accept. It has dissented from the policy to which he has recently committed himself, but never sought to bar his elevation to the honorable post assigned him, and which we trust he will fill with eminent usefulness and honor."

Perhaps I may add, that a few days after the election of Mr. Lincoln, in November, 1860, I myself heard Mr. Greeley say: "If my advice should be asked respecting Mr. Lincoln's Cabinet, I should recommend the appointment of Seward as Secretary of State. It is the place for him, and he will do honor to the country in it."

CHAPTER XXXI.

DURING THE WAR.

Mr. Greeley's opinions upon Secession before the war began-The battle of Bull RunCorrespondence with President Lincoln-His peace negotiations-Assault upon the Tribune office-Indorses the proffer of the French mission to the editor of the Herald -He writes a history of the war-He offers prizes for improved fruits.

HORACE GREELEY was slow to believe that the fire-eaters of the South meant to bring the controversy to the issue of arms. He had been accustomed from his boyhood to hear threats of secession at every Presidential election, and he was now disposed to regard the menacing attitude as part of the system of bluster by which the South for so many years had controlled the politics of the country. In commenting upon the proceedings in South Carolina, he held language which was misunderstood both by friends and foes. Quoting the passage from the Declaration of Independence, that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, he added:

·

"We do heartily accept this doctrine, believing it intrinsically sound, beneficent, and one that, universally accepted, is calculated to prevent the shedding of seas of human blood. And if it justified the secession from the British Empire of three millions of Colonists in 1776, we do not see why it would not justify the secession of five millions of Southrons from the Federal Union in 1861. If we are mistaken on this point, why does not some one attempt to show wherein and why? For our own part, while we deny the right of slaveholders to hold slaves against the will of the latter, we cannot see how twenty millions of people can rightfully hold ten, or even five, in a detested union with them, by military force.

"Of course, we understand that the principle of Jefferson, like any other broad generalization, may be pushed to extreme and baleful consequences. We can see why Governor's Island should not be at liberty to secede from the State and Nation, and allow herself to be covered with French and British batteries commanding and threatening our city. There is hardly a great principle which may not be thus 'run into the ground.' But if seven or

eight contiguous States shall present themselves authentically at Washington, saying, 'We hate the Federal Union; we have withdrawn from it; we give you the choice between acquiescing in our secession and arranging amicably all incidental questions on the one hand, and attempting to subdue us on the other,' — we could not stand up for coercion, for subjugation, for we do not think it would be just. We hold the right of self-government sacred, even when invoked in behalf of those who deny it to others. So much for the question of principle.

"Now as to the matter of policy:

"South Carolina will certainly secede. Several other Cotton States will probably follow her example. The Border States are evidently reluctant to do likewise. South Carolina has grossly insulted them by her dictatorial, reckless course. What she expects and desires is a clash of arms with the Federal government, which will at once commend her to the sympathy and co-operation of every Slave State, and to the sympathy (at least) of the pro-slavery minority in the Free States. It is not difficult to see that this would speedily work a political revolution, which would restore to slavery all, and more than all, it has lost by the canvass of 1860. We want to obviate this. We would expose the seceders to odium as disunionists, not commend them to pity as the gallant though mistaken upholders of the rights of their section in an unequal military conflict.

"We fully realize that the dilemma of the incoming administration will be a critical one. It must endeavor to uphold and enforce the laws, as well against rebellious slaveholders as fugitive slaves. The new President must fulfil the obligations assumed in his inauguration oath, no matter how shamefully his predecessor may have defied them. We fear that Southern madness may precipitate a bloody collision that all must deplore. But if 'ever seven or eight States' send agents to Washington to say, 'We want to get out of the Union,' we shall feel constrained by our devotion to human liberty to say, 'Let them go!' And we do not see how we could take the other side without coming in direct conflict with those rights of man which we hold paramount to all political arrangements, however convenient and advantageous."

These remarks appeared in the Tribune of December 17, 1860. On the 24th of the same month he held the following language:

"We believe that governments are made for peoples, not peoples for governments, - that the latter 'derive their just power from the consent of the governed'; and whenever a portion of this Union, large enough to form an independent self-subsisting nation, shall see fit to say, authentically, to the residue, 'We want to get away from you,' we shall say, and we trust self-respect, if not regard for the principle of self-government, will constrain the residue of the American people to say, 'Go!' We never yet had so poor an opinion of ourselves or our neighbors as to wish to hold others in a hated connection with us. But the dissolution of a government cannot be effected in the time required for knocking down a house of cards. Let the Cotton States, or any six or more States, say unequivocally, 'We want to get out of the Union,' and propose to effect their end peaceably and inoffensively, and we will do our best to help them out; not that we want them to go, but that we loathe the idea of compelling them to stay. All we ask is, that they exercise a reasonable patience, so as to give time for effecting their end without bloodshed."

Such editorials as these, though sincere, well meant, and unanswerable, appear to belong to the class of nothings which the editor of a daily paper is frequently obliged to utter, when the public mind is at once excited and undecided. He knew perfectly well, as we all did, that the question of secession could not be discussed at the South, and would never be fairly submitted to the people, and that there would be no such thing as a calm and peaceful waiting for the action of the people and government. "I do not believe," he wrote January 21, 1861, "in the unanimity of the South in favor of secession, because the conspirators evidently do not believe in it themselves. If they did, they would eagerly and proudly submit the question of secession to a direct vote of the people of their respective States; but this, even in South Carolina, they dare not do. Wherever they have assented to a popular vote, they have done so with manifest reluctance, and only because they needs must."

And again on the same day: "What I demand is proof that the Southern people really desire separation from the Free States. Whenever assured that such is their settled wish, I shall joyfully co-operate with them to secure the end they seek. Thus far, I have had evidence of nothing but a purpose to bully and coerce

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