their business firm, and their government had been doing, without realizing what a wrong they had done, and in what a peril they had involved their nation. [Note page 451.]

"It was gratifying to see the respect and high honor bestowed by the English people upon our ex-President, General Grant, who had so recently been there. It was difficult to account for it, and the people themselves seemed unable to explain it. In visiting Windsor Castle, one of the officials pointed out the wing of the castle and suite of rooms where, as he said, 'your General Grant' had just been entertained. He said that the Queen showed him attentions such as were scarcely shown to royalty itself. She took him to ride with her through the park. And when I asked, 'Why did you treat him with so much consideration?' his answer was, 'Oh, we liked him! we liked him!' We hardly expected any profound answer from such an official. But we made up our minds that they admired the honest, sensible, straightforward pluckiness of Wellington in him, and also that they were anxious to make in some measure the amende honorable for their lack of sympathy with us in our struggle, and the wrong they had done us in building privateers for the Confederacy.

"Thank God that is all over now, and the sympathy of blood and language, and civilization and religion, have resumed their influence, and are together the most powerful and hopeful influence in the world's future."

Another international difliculty which had arisen during our war, and which threatened trouble under our “Monroe Doctrine," was also successfully disposed of.

The French Emperor, Napoleon III, who had been anxious to recognize the independence of the Confederacy, but was unable to induce either of the three great powers of Europe, Great Britain, Prussia, or Russia-the latter especially being strongly opposed to it-to join him in it, thought

it a good time to carry out a favorite plan of his own, while our hands were tied, and in the confidence that the Confederacy would succeed in establishing an empire of its own. His plan was to overthrow the government of Mexico as a republic, and establish a monarchy, and the papacy with it, both of which had been overthrown in Mexico. So, with the sanction of the Pope, he fitted out a military expedition to Mexico in the summer of 1863, who called together those who were opposed to the Republican government under Jurez, and organized an "Assembly of Notables," which decreed the following revolutionary form of government:

1. The Mexican nation adopts, as its form of government, a limited hereditary monarchy, with a Catholic prince.

2. The sovereign shall take the title of Emperor of Mexico.

3. The imperial crown of Mexico is offered to his imperial and royal highness the Prince Ferdinand Maximilian, Archduke of Austria, for himself and his descendants.

4. If, under circumstances which cannot be foreseen, the Archduke of Austria, Ferdinand Maximilian, should not take possession of the throne which is offered to him, the Mexican nation relies on the good will of his majesty, Napoleon III, Emperor of the French, to indicate for it another Catholic prince.

This form of government was nominally submitted to the people, and by them adopted, but it was when Mexico was occupied by a French army, which held Pueblo and the city of Mexico, and this form of government was immediately overthrown when the French troops were withdrawn, showing that it was never adopted by the people, but forced upon them by military power.

Maximilian, however, accepted the offer, and was brought over by a French fleet, and crowned Emperor of Mexico, and Carlotta as Empress. But in the meantime our war had ended in our favor, and the French Emperor at once found himself obliged to abandon this enterprise, and leave this poor young prince and princess to their miserable fate.

Maximilian was forced to abandon his capital, and, broken down in health and spirit, was soon after arrested, tried and executed for treason, while Carlotta, a devoted wife and superior woman, having hope in her own personal and family influence, hastened to Europe to plead with the French Emperor, and the Emperor of Austria, to interfere in behalf of her husband.

The reason of it all was, that the "Monroe Doctrine," as it was called, whatever it might mean, and whether enforced or not, made Napoleon draw back from his ambitious enterprise of founding a Latin empire on this continent, as soon as we were in a condition to protest against it, and had power to push that protest, if it was considered necessary. It is not generally known that our position upon this subject was pressed upon us for adoption. by Lord Canning, the British statesman, and was introduced by President Monroe into his message to Congress in 1823. It was earnestly advised by ex-President Jefferson, who, in his letter to Mr. Monroe, says:-

Our first fundamental maxim should be never to entangle ourselves in the broils of Europe; our second, never to suffer Europe to meddle with our cis-Atlantic affairs. America, North and South, has a set of separate interests distinct from those of Europe, and peculiarly her own. She should, therefore, have a system of her own, separate and apart from that of Europe. While the last is laboring to become the domicile of despotism, our endeavor should surely be to make our hemisphere that of freedom. One nation (England), most of all, could disturb us in this pursuit. She now offers to lead and accompany us in it. By acceding to this position, we detach her from the bands of despots, bring her mighty weight into the scale of free government, and emancipate a continent at one stroke, which might otherwise linger long in doubt and difficulty. Great Britain is the nation which can do us the most harm of any one on all the earth, and with her on our side we need not fear the whole world. With her then we must most seriously cherish a cordial friendship, and nothing would tend more to unite our affections, than to be fighting once more side by side in the same cause. It is only protesting against the atrocious violations of the rights of nations by the interference of any one in the internal affairs of another, so flagrantly

begun by Napoleon I, and now continued by the equally lawless alliance calling itself holy.*

These ideas are summed up by President Monroe in his message in the statement of the principle in which the rights and interests of the United States are involved, that the two continents by the free and independent condition they have assumed and maintained, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers. And especially when such colonizations are organized as hereditary monarchies, and with the Roman Catholic church as the established religion, the right is claimed of protesting against it, and of carrying such protest as far as may be thought expedient to prevent it.

It was such a protest on our part against the invasion of Mexico by a French army and the establishment of an hereditary monarchy under a Catholic and foreign prince, and our ability to enforce that protest if necessary when our war was over, that made Napoleon withdraw his troops and abandon his Austrian prince to his fate. And so this protest has answered its purpose for the greater part of a century without our being obliged to resort to force, and so may it prove in the future.

* This means the "Holy Alliance" entered into in 1815 by Russia, Austria and Prussia, for the maintenance of peace and the establishment of existing dynasties."

NOTE. Page 448. As showing the perverted judgment of the English people in respect to this matter, Bishop Brooks tells us what Tennyson, one of our good friends, and whom we held in high honor, said to him: "We should think you would be ashamed to keep that award," while we were wondering that they were not ashamed to cause us such loss.

CHAPTER XXIX.

UNITED STATES SENATOR.

Governor Buckingham's Term in the Senate-His Share in Maintaining What Had Been Gained by the War-Some of His Work -His Death Shortly Before the Expiration of His Term of Office.

When the war was over, and the interests of Connecticut were well settled with the general government, and Governor Buckingham had held his office eight years, he declined re-election, and in 1868 was sent to the United States Senate.

In the meantime he had met with a sore domestic bercavement in the death of his wife. He had been singularly favored and happy in his family relations. His wife, Eliza Ripley, belonged to an old, large and respected Norwich family of eight children, who mostly settled in the town, and had families of their own, which of themselves made a considerable social circle, but concerned as they were in all the interests of society, it rather indicates the breadth of their intercourse and abounding hospitality. A Thanksgiving dinner with twenty or more at the table, an evening party of a score of nephews and nieces and several times that number of their young friends, the daily entertainment not only of men in public life, but of ministers, missionaries, students, or some neighbors from the old Lebanon home, which was near, were matters of course. And it was hospitality as sincere and unstinted as could be found anywhere. No one who ever enjoyed it, and especially was accustomed to share in it, could forget the parents and the daughter who constituted the family, and

*

This daughter became the wife of General William A. Aiken of Norwich, and the mother of a large family, where they now reside.