at Forts Henry and Donelson, was additional reason for procrastination. It put at great disadvantage the Confederate sympathizers who, in the House of Commons in March, took part in the debate on the blockade.

Neither the recent Union victories, nor the prospects of still greater successes in the near future, had much effect on the impatience of France. On April 9th, H. S. Sanford, our Minister to Belgium, had a long talk with Thouvenel, who told him that France "must have cotton"; that the French people were becoming irritated, and some of the communications he had received from the chambers of commerce were even menacing in their language; and he thought the government of the United States had unnecessarily stimulated this feeling by its vigorous refusal of communication with the South. "It may not be simply a question of policy abroad that we shall have to deal with, but of public peace at home." During the same month Weed sent to Seward many warnings of similar tenor."

2

About this time Napoleon tried to persuade Great Britain to join him in some kind of a demand on the United States for the purpose of relieving the difficulties; and he used Lindsay, the Confederate ally and Member of the House of Commons, as his spokesman. Russell refused to recognize such an undiplomatic medium. But Napoleon at least convinced Lindsay and Slidell that his efforts had been bona fide, and that he would soon act on his own responsibility, unless, in case of the loss of New Orleans, which he did not expect, this might be inexpedient.3

It was hazardous to seem to be depriving Europe of cotton. To let it through the blockade would be to surrender the very means by which that staple had been

1 Sanford to Seward, April 10, 1862. Seward MSS.

3 Seward, 85-97.

• Slidell to Benjamin, April 18, 1862.

made worthless to the Confederates. Yet in April Weed wrote from Paris that the United States must try to get free from the charge of being responsible for the cotton famine. "So, if possible, open ports, and let the enemy refuse the cotton." Lincoln's administration had merely been waiting for a suitable opportunity. This was offered by the capture of New Orleans and of Beaufort, North Carolina, near the end of April. By proclamation of May 12, 1862, these ports and Port Royal, in South Carolina, were declared open to commerce. It was expected that this would tend to relieve the tension.

After many weary months of preparation, McClellan was now engaged in the great campaign that was expected to end with the capture of Richmond. That won, it was assumed that the Confederacy would soon collapse, for its northern line of defence between the Alleghenies and the Mississippi had been destroyed and the river was practically open everywhere except in the neighborhood of Vicksburg. But the magnificent Army of the Potomac was soon to be checked in its forward march. Near the end of June inferior numbers of the enemy met and repulsed it; and, after a week of hard fighting, McClellan effected a change of base from the Chickahominy to the James river. For several days McClellan's communications with Washington were entirely cut off. Therefore, there was reason for greater alarm and panic at the capital than had yet been seen.

Seward was one of McClellan's special friends, and had expressed confidence that he would soon conquer the Confederacy. Nevertheless, when the news of McClellan's reverses reached Washington, the Secretary of State was ready with ideas and plans as to how to meet the crisis."

1 3 Seward, 85.

2 See post, p. 352.

1

Lest Europe might draw too damaging inferences, he hastened to inform Adams: "The governors of the loyal states unanimously demand a speedy close of the war, and offer all the forces required at the President's discretion. The President promptly calls for three hundred thousand men. They will be furnished with alacrity." This sufficed for merely a few days. On the 7th he made an explanation of what had taken place in Tennessee, Mississippi, and Virginia. He assumed that Halleck would capture Chattanooga, that Grant would soon be in possession of Vicksburg, and that Farragut's running past the batteries at the latter place had surmounted “the last obstacle of the navigation of the Mississippi." But no such good fortune was to attend the movements of these armies. As to the state of affairs in Virginia, some of Seward's statements were thoroughly misleading, and are to be explained only on the ground that he thought the government's interests demanded a concealment and misrepresentation of the facts. He said that the efficiency of the Federal forces had been improved, while that of the Confederates had been impaired.

Every one of the battles was a repulse of the insurgents, and the two last, which closed the series, were decided victories.

"If the representative [respective ?] parties had now to choose whether they would have the national army where it is and as it is, or back again where it was and as it was, it is not to be doubted that the insurgents would prefer to it the position and condition on the Pamunkey, and the friends of the Union the one now attained on the bank of the James."2

Some wit appropriately received similar official announcements with the remark: "Undoubtedly McClel

1 3 Seward, 110.

2

' Dip. Cor., 1862, 125, 126.

lan has won a great victory, but what the people want to know is who is responsible for it."

Seward's activity was always especially interesting whenever he became excited, as he had a right to be at this time. Because Lincoln had rejected the propositions of April 1, 1861, and the whole incident had been kept a profound secret, the Secretary was able to make a virtue of our attitude toward Spain and France. On July 10, 1862, he wrote to Dayton:

"We have interfered with the dominion or the ambitious designs of no nation. We have seen San Domingo absorbed by Spain, and been content with a protest. We have seen Great Britain strengthen her government in Canada, and have approved it. We have seen France make war against Mexico, and have not allied ourselves with that republic. We have heard and redressed every injury of which any foreign state has complained, and we have relaxed a blockade in favor of foreign commerce that we might rightfully have maintained with inflexibility. We have only complained because an attitude of neutrality encouraging to rebellion among us, adopted hastily and unnecessarily, has not been relinquished when the progress of the war showed that it was as injurious as it was illadvised.

"Under these circumstances, if intervention in any form shall come, it will find us in the right of the controversy, and in the strong attitude of self-defence. It will here bring out reserved and yet latent forces of resistance that can never go to rest until America shall be reconquered and reorganized by Europe, or shall have become isolated forever equally from the industrial and governmental systems of that continent. European statesmen, I am sure, before waging war against us, will consider their rights, interests, and resources as well as our own.

About a fortnight later Seward learned that in England and France there was again much talk of intervention. A long despatch of July 28th to Adams, and a duplicate to Dayton, explained the aims and difficul

1 Dip. Cor., 1862, 372.

ties of the war and of foreign relations. It stated that the United States continued to rely "upon the practice of justice and respect of our sovereignty by foreign powers"; but lest this might admit of an erroneous inference, he added: "It is not necessary for me to say that if this reliance fails, this civil war will, without our fault, become a war of continents-a war of the world; and whatever else may revive, the cotton trade, built upon slave labor in this country, will be irredeemably wrecked in the abrupt cessation of human bondage within the territories of the United States." With just enough sarcasm, Seward's spirit and resolution were displayed in these sentences taken from an unpublished despatch to Dayton, also of July 28th:

"France will not conquer both Mexico and the United States with one campaign. Certain politicians about the courts and the press seem to assume that this nation lies at the mercy of any invader or invaders who can muster an army of conscripts or fit out a fleet. We have no such fears that any European government thinks so. We know that in civil war, as well as in others, battles must be lost as well as won, and we should not lose our courage or resolution, even if not merely a battle, but a whole campaign, should result against us. We mean to practise justice and caution, with as much generosity as possible. We expect other powers to do the same, and so we expect to go through this, our unhappy civil war, without the complication of foreign intervention."

The Confederates were at a great disadvantage in trying to enlist active governmental assistance abroad. With their cotton they were, like Archimedes with his lever, confident that they could move the world if they once got a place to stand on. Neither France nor Great Britain would have long delayed recognition or the breaking of the blockade if the Confederacy could have