CHAPTER VII. Barbers’ shops
Barbers’ shops—Place-hunting—The Navy Yard—Dinner at Lord Lyons’—Estimate of Washington among his countrymen—Washington’s house and tomb—The Southern Commissioners—Dinner with the Southern Commissioners—Feeling towards England among the Southerners—Animosity between North and South.
March 30th.—Descended into the barber’s shop off the hall of the hotel; all the operators, men of colour, mostly mulattoes, or yellow lads, good-looking, dressed in clean white jackets and aprons, were smart, quick, and attentive. Some seven or eight shaving chairs were occupied by gentlemen intent on early morning calls. Shaving is carried in all its accessories to a high degree of publicity, if not of perfection, in America; and as the poorest, or as I may call them without offence, the lowest orders in England have their easy shaving for a penny, so the highest, if there be any in America, submit themselves in public to the inexpensive operations of the negro barber. It must be admitted that the chairs are easy and well-arranged, the fingers nimble, sure, and light; but the affectation of French names, and the corruption of foreign languages, in which the hairdressers and barbers delight, are exceedingly amusing. On my way down a small street near the Capitol, I observed in a shop window, “Rowland’s make easier paste,” which I attribute to an imperfect view of the etymology of the great “Macassar;” on another occasion, I was asked to try Somebody’s “Curious Elison,” which I am afraid was an attempt to adapt to a shaving paste, an address not at all suited to profane uses. It appears that the trade of barber is almost the birthright of the free negro or coloured man in the United States. There is a striking exemplification of natural equality in the use of brushes, and the senator flops down in the seat, and has his noble nose seized by the same fingers which the moment before were occupied by the person and chin of an unmistakeable rowdy.
In the midst of the divine calm produced by hard hand rubbing of my head, I was aroused by a stout gentleman who sat in a chair directly opposite. Through the door which opened into the hall of the hotel, one could see the great crowd passing to and fro, thronging the passage as though it had been the entrance to the Forum, or the “Salle de pas perdus.” I had observed my friend’s eye gazing fixedly through the opening on the outer world. Suddenly, with his face half-covered with lather, and a bib tucked under his chin, he got up from his seat exclaiming, “Senator! Senator! hallo!” and made a dive into the passage—whether he received a stern rebuke, or became aware of his impropriety, I know not, but in an instant he came back again, and submitted quietly, till the work of the barber was completed.
The great employment of four-fifths of the people at Willard’s at present seems to be to hunt senators and congressmen through the lobbies. Every man is heavy with documents—those which he cannot carry in his pockets and hat, occupy his hands, or are thrust under his arms. In the hall are advertisements announcing that certificates, and letters of testimonial, and such documents, are printed with expedition and neatness. From paper collars, and cards of address to carriages, and new suites of clothes, and long hotel bills, nothing is left untried or uninvigorated. The whole city is placarded with announcements of facilities for assaulting the powers that be, among which must not be forgotten the claims of the “excelsior card-writer,” at Willard’s, who prepares names, addresses, styles, and titles in superior penmanship. The men who have got places, having been elected by the people, must submit to the people, who think they have established a claim on them by their favours. The majority confer power, but they seem to forget that it is only the minority who can enjoy the first fruits of success. It is as if the whole constituency of Marylebone insisted on getting some office under the Crown the moment a member was returned to Parliament. There are men at Willard’s who have come literally thousands of miles to seek for places which can only be theirs for four years, and who with true American facility have abandoned the calling and pursuits of a lifetime for this doubtful canvas; and I was told of one gentleman, who having been informed that he could not get a judgeship, condescended to seek a place in the Post Office, and finally applied to Mr. Chase to be appointed keeper of a “lighthouse,” he was not particular where. In the forenoon I drove to the Washington Navy Yard, in company with Lieutenant Nelson and two friends. It is about two miles outside the city, situated on a fork of land projecting between a creek and the Potomac river, which is here three-quarters of a mile broad. If the French had a Navy Yard at Paris it could scarcely be contended that English, Russians, or Austrians would not have been justified in destroying it in case they got possession of the city by force of arms, after a pitched battle fought outside its gates. I confess I would not give much for Deptford and Woolwich if an American fleet succeeded in forcing its way up the Thames; but our American cousins,—a little more than kin and less than kind, who speak with pride of Paul Jones and of their exploits on the Lakes,—affect to regard the burning of the Washington Navy Yard by us, in the last war, as an unpardonable outrage on the law of nations, and an atrocious exercise of power. For all the good it did, for my own part, I think it were as well had it never happened, but no jurisconsult will for a moment deny that it was a legitimate, even if extreme, exercise of a belligerent right in the case of an enemy who did not seek terms from the conqueror; and who, after battle lost, fled and abandoned the property of their state, which might be useful to them in war, to the power of the victor. Notwithstanding all the unreasonableness of the American people in reference to their relations with foreign powers, it is deplorable such scenes should ever have been enacted between members of the human family so closely allied by all that shall make them of the same household.
The Navy Yard is surrounded by high brick walls; in the gateway stood two sentries in dark blue tunics, yellow facings, with eagle buttons, brightly polished arms, and white Berlin gloves, wearing a cap something like a French kepi, all very clean and creditable. Inside are some few trophies of guns taken from us at York Town, and from the Mexicans in the land of Cortez. The interior inclosure is surrounded by red brick houses, and stores and magazines, picked out with white stone; and two or three green grass-plots, fenced in by pillars and chains and bordered by trees, give an air of agreeable freshness to the place. Close to the river are the workshops: of course there is smoke and noise of steam and machinery. In a modest office, surrounded by books, papers, drawings, and models, as well as by shell and shot and racks of arms of different descriptions, we found Capt. Dahlgren, the acting superintendent of the yard, and the inventor of the famous gun which bears his name, and is the favourite armament of the American navy. By our own sailors they are irreverently termed “soda-water bottles,” owing to their shape. Capt. Dahlgren contends that guns capable of throwing the heaviest shot may be constructed of cast-iron, carefully prepared and moulded so that the greatest thickness of metal may be placed at the points of resistance, at the base of the gun, the muzzle and forward portions being of very moderate thickness.
All inventors, or even adapters of systems, must be earnest self-reliant persons, full of confidence, and, above all, impressive, or they will make little way in the conservative, status-quo-loving world. Captain Dahlgren has certainly most of these characteristics, but he has to fight with his navy department, with the army, with boards and with commissioners,—in fact, with all sorts of obstructors. When I was going over the yard, he deplored the parsimony of the department, which refused to yield to his urgent entreaties for additional furnaces to cast guns.
No large guns are cast at Washington. The foundries are only capable of turning out brass field-pieces and boat-guns. Capt. Dahlgren obligingly got one of the latter out to practice for us—a 12-pounder howitzer, which can be carried in a boat, run on land on its carriage, which is provided with wheels, and is so light that the gun can be drawn readily about by the crew. He made some good practice with shrapnel at a target 1200 yards distant, firing so rapidly as to keep three shells in the air at the same time. Compared with our establishments, this dockyard is a mere toy, and but few hands are employed in it. One steam sloop, the “Pawnee,” was under the shears, nearly ready for sea: the frame of another was under the building-shed. There are no facilities for making iron ships, or putting on plate-armour here. Everything was shown to us with the utmost frankness. The fuse of the Dahlgren shell is constructed on the vis inertiæ principle, and is not unlike that of the Armstrong.
On returning to the hotel, I found a magnificent bouquet of flowers, with a card attached to them, with Mrs. Lincoln’s compliments, and another card announcing that she had a “reception” at 3 o’clock. It was rather late before I could get to the White House, and there were only two or three ladies in the drawing-room when I arrived. I was informed afterwards that the attendance was very scanty. The Washington ladies have not yet made up their minds that Mrs. Lincoln is the fashion. They miss their Southern friends, and constantly draw comparisons between them and the vulgar Yankee women and men who are now in power. I do not know enough to say whether the affectation of superiority be justified; but assuredly if New York be Yankee, there is nothing in which it does not far surpass this preposterous capital. The impression of homeliness produced by Mrs. Lincoln on first sight, is not diminished by closer acquaintance. Few women not to the manner born there are, whose heads would not be disordered, and circulation disturbed, by a rapid transition, almost instantaneous, from a condition of obscurity in a country town to be mistress of the White House. Her smiles and her frowns become a matter of consequence to the whole American world. As the wife of the country lawyer, or even of the congress man, her movements were of no consequence. The journals of Springfield would not have wasted a line upon them. Now, if she but drive down Pennsylvania Avenue, the electric wire thrills the news to every hamlet in the Union which has a newspaper; and fortunate is the correspondent who, in a special despatch, can give authentic particulars of her destination and of her dress. The lady is surrounded by flatterers and intriguers, seeking for influence or such places as she can give. As Selden says, “Those who wish to set a house on fire begin with the thatch.”
March 31st, Easter Sunday.—I dined with Lord Lyons and the members of the Legation; the only stranger present being Senator Sumner. Politics were of course eschewed, for Mr. Sumner is Chairman of the Committee on Foreign Relations of the Senate, and Lord Lyons is a very discreet Minister; but still there crept in a word of Pickens and Sumter, and that was all. Mr. Fox, formerly of the United States’ Navy, and since that a master of a steamer in the commercial marine, who is related to Mr. Blair, has been sent on some mission to Fort Sumter, and has been allowed to visit Major Anderson by the authorities at Charleston; but it is not known what was the object of his mission. Everywhere there is Secession resignation, in a military sense of the word. The Southern Commissioners declare they will soon retire to Montgomery, and that any attempt to reinforce or supply the forts will be a casus belli. There is the utmost anxiety to know what Virginia will do. General Scott belongs to the State, and it is feared he may be shaken if the State goes out. Already the authorities of Richmond have intimated they will not allow the foundry to furnish guns to the seaboard forts, such as Munroe and Norfolk in Virginia. This concession of an autonomy is really a recognition of States’ Rights. For if a State can vote itself in or out of the Union, why can it not make war or peace, and accept or refuse the Federal Government? In fact, the Federal system is radically defective against internal convulsion, however excellent it is or may be for purposes of external polity. I walked home with Mr. Sumner to his rooms, and heard some of his views, which were not so sanguine as those of Mr. Seward, and I thought I detected a desire to let the Southern States go out with their slavery if they so desired it. Mr. Chase, by the way, expressed sentiments of the same kind more decidedly the other day.
April 1st.—On Easter Monday, after breakfast with Mr. Olmsted, I drove over to visit Senator Douglas. Originally engaged in some mechanical avocation, by his ability and eloquence he has raised himself to the highest position in the State short of the Presidency, which might have been his but for the extraordinary success of his opponent in a fortuitous suffrage scramble. He is called the Little Giant, being modo bipedali staturâ, but his head entitles him to some recognition of intellectual height. His sketch of the causes which have led to the present disruption of parties, and the hazard of civil war, was most vivid and able; and for more than an hour he spoke with a vigour of thought and terseness of phrase which, even on such dreary and uninviting themes as squatter sovereignty and the Kansas-Nebraska question, interested a foreigner in the man and the subject. Although his sympathies seemed to go with the South on the question of slavery and territorial extension, he condemned altogether the attempt to destroy the Union.
April 2nd.—The following day I started early, and performed my pilgrimage to “the shrine of St. Washington,” at Mount Vernon, as a foreigner on board called the place. Mr. Bancroft has in his possession a letter of the General’s mother, in which she expresses her gratification at his leaving the British army in a manner which implies that he had been either extravagant, in his expenses or wild in his manner of living. But if he had any human frailties in after life, they neither offended the morality of his age, or shocked the susceptibility of his countrymen; and from the time that the much maligned and unfortunate Braddock gave scope to his ability, down to his retirement into private life, after a career of singular trials and extraordinary successes, his character acquired each day greater altitude, strength, and lustre. Had his work failed, had the Republic broken up into small anarchical states, we should hear now little of Washington. But the principles of liberty founded in the original Constitution of the colonies themselves, and in no degree derived from or dependent on the revolution, combined with the sufferings of the Old and the bounty of nature in the New World to carry to an unprecedented degree the material prosperity, which Americans have mistaken for good government, and the physical comforts which have made some States in the Union the nearest approach to Utopia. The Federal Government hitherto “let the people alone,” and they went on their way singing and praising their Washington as the author of so much greatness and happiness. To doubt his superiority to any man of woman born, is to insult the American people. They are not content with his being great—or even greater than the great: he must be greatest of all;—“first in peace, and first in war.” The rest of the world cannot find fault with the assertion, that he is “first in the hearts of his countrymen.” But he was not possessed of the highest military qualities, if we are to judge from most of the regular actions, in which the British had the best of it; and the final blow, when Cornwallis surrendered at York Town, was struck by the arm of France, by Rochambeau and the French fleet, rather than by Washington and his Americans. He had all the qualities for the work for which he was designed, and is fairly entitled to the position his countrymen have given him as the immortal czar of the United States. His pictures are visible everywhere—in the humblest inn, in the Minister’s bureau, in the millionaire’s gallery. There are far more engravings of Washington in America than there are of Napoleon in France, and that is saying a good deal.
What have we here? The steamer, which has been paddling down the gentle current of the Potomac, here a mile and more in breadth, banked in by forest, through which can be seen homesteads and white farm-houses, in the midst of large clearings and corn-fields—has moved in towards a high bluff, covered with trees, on the summit of which is visible the trace of some sort of building—a ruined summer-house, rustic temple—whatever it may be; and the bell on deck begins to toll solemnly, and some of the pilgrims uncover their heads for a moment. The boat stops at a rotten, tumble-down little pier, which leads to a waste of mud, and a path rudely cut through the wilderness of briars on the hill-side. The pilgrims, of whom there are some thirty or forty, of both sexes, mostly belonging to the lower classes of citizens, and comprising a few foreigners like myself, proceed to climb this steep, which seemed in a state of nature covered with primæval forest, and tangled weeds and briars, till the plateau, on which stands the house of Washington and the domestic offices around it, is reached. It is an oblong wooden house, of two stories in height, with a colonnade towards the river face, and a small balcony on the top and on the level of the roof, over which rises a little paltry gazebo. There are two windows, a glass door at one end of the oblong, and a wooden alcove extending towards the slave quarters, which are very small sentry-box huts, that have been recently painted, and stand at right angles to the end of the house, with dog-houses and poultry-hutches attached to them. There is no attempt at neatness or order about the place; though the exterior of the house is undergoing repair, the grass is unkempt, the shrubs untrimmed,—neglect, squalor, and chicken feathers have marked the lawn for their own. The house is in keeping, and threatens to fall to ruin. I entered the door, and found myself in a small hall, stained with tobacco juice. An iron railing ran across the entrance to the stairs. Here stood a man at a gate, who presented a book to the visitors, and pointed out the notice therein, that “no person is permitted to inscribe his name in this book who does not contribute to the Washington Fund, and that any name put down without money would be erased.” Notwithstanding the warning, some patriots succeeded in recording their names without any pecuniary mulct, and others did so at a most reasonable rate. When I had contributed in a manner which must have represented an immense amount of Washingtoniolatry, estimated by the standard of the day, I was informed I could not go up-stairs as the rooms above were closed to the public, and thus the most interesting portion of the house was shut from the strangers. The lower rooms presented nothing worthy of notice—some lumbering, dusty, decayed furniture; a broken harpsichord, dust, cobwebs—no remnant of the man himself. But over the door of one room hung the key of the Bastille.[1] The gardens, too, were tabooed; but through the gate I could see a wilderness of neglected trees and shrubs, not unmingled with a suspicion of a present kitchen-ground. Let us pass to the Tomb, which is some distance from the house, beneath the shade of some fine trees. It is a plain brick mausoleum, with a pointed arch, barred by an iron grating, through which the light penetrates a chamber or small room containing two sarcophagi of stone. Over the arch, on a slab let into the brick, are the words: “Within this enclosure rest the remains of Gen. George Washington.” The fallen leaves which had drifted into the chamber rested thickly on the floor, and were piled up on the sarcophagi, and it was difficult to determine which was the hero’s grave without the aid of an expert, but there was neither guide nor guardian on the spot. Some four or five gravestones, of various members of the family, stand in the ground outside the little mausoleum. The place was most depressing. One felt angry with a people whose lip service was accompanied by so little of actual respect. The owner of this property, inherited from the “Pater Patriæ,” has been abused in good set terms because he asked its value from the country which has been so very mindful of the services of his ancestor, and which is now erecting by slow stages the overgrown Cleopatra’s needle that is to be a Washington monument when it is finished. Mr. Everett has been lecturing, the Ladies’ Mount Vernon Association has been working, and every one has been adjuring everybody else to give liberally; but the result so lately achieved is by no means worthy of the object. Perhaps the Americans think it is enough to say—“Si monumentum quæris, circumspice.” But, at all events, there is a St. Paul’s round those words.
On the return of the steamer I visited Fort Washington, which is situated on the left bank of the Potomac. I found everything in a state of neglect—gun carriages rotten, shot piles rusty, furnaces tumbling to pieces. The place might be made strong enough on the river front, but the rear is weak, though there is low marshy land at the back. A company of regulars were on duty. The sentries took no precautions against surprise. Twenty determined men, armed with revolvers, could have taken the whole work; and, for all the authorities knew, we might have had that number of Virginians and the famous Ben McCullough himself on board. Afterwards, when I ventured to make a remark to General Scott as to the carelessness of the garrison, he said: “A few weeks ago it might have been taken by a bottle of whisky. The whole garrison consisted of an old Irish pensioner.” Now at this very moment Washington is full of rumours of desperate descents on the capital, and an attack on the President and his Cabinet. The long bridge across the Potomac into Virginia is guarded, and the militia and volunteers of the District of Columbia are to be called out to resist McCullough and his Richmond desperadoes.
April 3rd.—I had an interview with the Southern Commissioners to-day, at their hotel. For more than an hour I heard, from men of position and of different sections in the South, expressions which satisfied me the Union could never be restored, if they truly represented the feelings and opinions of their fellow-citizens. They have the idea they are ministers of a foreign power treating with Yankeedom, and their indignation is moved by the refusal of Government to negotiate with them, armed as they are with full authority to arrange all questions arising out of an amicable separation—such as the adjustment of Federal claims for property, forts, stores, public works, debts, land purchases, and the like. One of the Judges of the Supreme Court of the United States, Mr. Campbell, is their intermediary, and of course it is not known what hopes Mr. Seward has held out to him; but there is some imputation of Punic faith against the Government on account of recent acts, and there is no doubt the Commissioners hear, as I do, that there are preparations at the Navy Yard and at New York to relieve Sumter, at any rate, with provisions, and that Pickens has actually been reinforced by sea. In the evening I dined at the British Legation, and went over to the house of the Russian Minister, M. de Stoeckl, in the evening. The diplomatic body in Washington constitute a small and very agreeable society of their own, in which few Americans mingle except at the receptions and large evening assemblies. As the people now in power are novi homines, the wives and daughters of ministers and attachés are deprived of their friends who belonged to the old society in Washington, and who have either gone off to Secession, or sympathise so deeply with the Southern States that it is scarcely becoming to hold very intimate relations with them in the face of Government. From the house of M. de Stoeckl I went to a party at the residence of M. Tassara, the Spanish Minister, where there was a crowd of diplomats, young and old. Diplomatists seldom or never talk politics, and so Pickens and Sumter were unheard of; but it is stated nevertheless that Virginia is on the eve of secession, and will certainly go if the President attempts to use force in relieving and strengthening the Federal forts.
April 4th.—I had a long interview with Mr. Seward to-day at the State Department. He set forth at great length the helpless condition in which the President and the cabinet found themselves when they began the conduct of public affairs at Washington. The last cabinet had tampered with treason, and had contained traitors; a miserable imbecility had encouraged the leaders of the South to mature their plans, and had furnished them with the means of carrying out their design. One Minister had purposely sent away the navy of the United States to distant and scattered stations; another had purposely placed the arms, ordnance, and munitions of war in undue proportions in the Southern States, and had weakened the Federal Government so that they might easily fall into the hands of the traitors and enable them to secure the war matériel of the Union; a Minister had stolen the public funds for traitorous purposes—in every port, in every department of the State, at home and abroad, on sea and by land, men were placed who were engaged in this deep conspiracy—and when the voice of the people declared Mr. Lincoln President of the United States, they set to work as one man to destroy the Union under the most flimsy pretexts. The President’s duty was clearly defined by the Constitution. He had to guard what he had, and to regain, if possible, what he had lost. He would not consent to any dismemberment of the Union nor to the abandonment of one iota of Federal property—nor could he do so if he desired.
These and many more topics were presented to me to show that the Cabinet was not accountable for the temporising policy of inaction, which was forced upon them by circumstances, and that they would deal vigorously with the Secession movement—as vigorously as Jackson did with nullification in South Carolina, if they had the means. But what could they do when such men as Twiggs surrendered his trust and sacrificed the troops to a crowd of Texans; or when naval and military officers resigned en masse, that they might accept service in the rebel forces? All this excitement would come right in a very short time—it was a brief madness, which would pass away when the people had opportunity for reflection. Meantime the danger was that foreign powers would be led to imagine the Federal Government was too weak to defend its rights, and that the attempt to destroy the Union and to set up a Southern Confederacy was successful. In other words, again, Mr. Seward fears that, in this transition state between their forced inaction and the coup by which they intend to strike down Secession, Great Britain may recognise the Government established at Montgomery, and is ready, if needs be, to threaten Great Britain with war as the consequence of such recognition. But he certainly assumed the existence of strong Union sentiments in many of the seceded States, as a basis for his remarks, and admitted that it would not become the spirit of the American Government, or of the Federal system, to use armed force in subjugating the Southern States against the will of the majority of the people. Therefore if the majority desire Secession, Mr. Seward would let them have it—but he cannot believe in anything so monstrous, for to him the Federal Government and Constitution, as interpreted by his party, are divine, heaven-born. He is fond of repeating that the Federal Government never yet sacrificed any man’s life on account of his political opinions, but if this struggle goes on it will sacrifice thousands—tens of thousands, to the idea of a Federal Union. “Any attempt against us,” he said, “would revolt the good men of the South, and arm all men in the North to defend their Government.”
But I had seen that day an assemblage of men doing a goose-step march forth dressed in blue tunics and grey trowsers, shakoes and cross-belts, armed with musket and bayonet, cheering and hurrahing in the square before the War Department, who were, I am told, the District of Columbia volunteers and militia. They had indeed been visible in various forms parading, marching, and trumpeting about the town with a poor imitation of French pas and élan, but they did not, to the eye of a soldier, give any appearance of military efficiency, or to the eye of the anxious statesman any indication of the animus pugnandi. Starved, washed-out creatures most of them, interpolated with Irish and flat-footed, stumpy Germans. It was matter for wonderment that the Foreign Minister of a nation which was in such imminent danger in its very capital, and which, with its chief and his cabinet, was almost at the mercy of the enemy, should hold the language I was aware he had transmitted to the most powerful nations of Europe. Was it consciousness of the strength of a great people, who would be united by the first apprehension of foreign interference, or was it the peculiar emptiness of a bombast which is called Buncombe? In all sincerity I think Mr. Seward meant it as it was written.
When I arrived at the hotel, I found our young artist waiting for me, to entreat I would permit him to accompany me to the South. I had been annoyed by a paragraph which had appeared in several papers, to the effect that “The talented young artist, our gifted countryman, Mr. Deodore F. Moses, was about to accompany Mr. &c. &c., in his tour through the South.” I had informed the young gentleman that I could not sanction such an announcement, whereupon he assured me he had not in any way authorised it, but having mentioned incidentally to a person connected with the press that he was going to travel southwards with me, the injudicious zeal of his friend had led him to think he would do a service to the youth by making the most of the very trifling circumstance.
I dined with Senator Douglas, where there was a large party, among whom were Mr. Chase, Secretary of the Treasury; Mr. Smith, Secretary of the Interior; Mr. Forsyth, Southern Commissioner; and several members of the Senate and Congress. Mrs. Douglas did the honours of her house with grace and charming good nature. I observe a great tendency to abstract speculation and theorising among Americans, and their after-dinner conversation is apt to become didactic and sententious. Few men speak better than Senator Douglas: his words are well chosen, the flow of his ideas even and constant, his intellect vigorous, and thoughts well cut, precise, and vigorous—he seems a man of great ambition, and he told me he is engaged in preparing a sort of Zollverein scheme for the North American continent, including Canada, which will fix public attention everywhere, and may lead to a settlement of the Northern and Southern controversies. For his mind, as for that of many Americans, the aristocratic idea embodied in Russia is very seductive; and he dwelt with pleasure on the courtesies he had received at the court of the Czar, implying that he had been treated differently in England, and perhaps France. And yet, had Mr. Douglas become President of the United States, his goodwill towards Great Britain might have been invaluable, and surely it had been cheaply purchased by a little civility and attention to a distinguished citizen and statesman of the Republic. Our Galleos very often care for none of these things.
April 5th.—Dined with the Southern Commissioners and a small party at Gautier’s, a French restaurateur in Pennsylvania Avenue. The gentlemen present were, I need not say, all of one way of thinking; but as these leaves will see the light before the civil war is at an end, it is advisable not to give their names, for it would expose persons resident in Washington, who may not be suspected by the Government, to those marks of attention which they have not yet ceased to pay to their political enemies. Although I confess that in my judgment too much stress has been laid in England on the severity with which the Federal authorities have acted towards their political enemies, who were seeking their destruction, it may be candidly admitted, that they have forfeited all claim to the lofty position they once occupied as a Government existing by moral force, and by the consent of the governed, to which Bastilles and lettres de cachêt, arbitrary arrests, and doubtful, illegal, if not altogether unconstitutional, suspension of habeas corpus and of trial by jury were unknown.
As Col. Pickett and Mr. Banks are notorious Secessionists, and Mr. Phillips has since gone South, after the arrest of his wife on account of her anti-federal tendencies, it may be permitted to mention that they were among the guests. I had pleasure in making the acquaintance of Governor Roman. Mr. Crawford, his brother commissioner, is a much younger man, of considerably greater energy and determination, but probably of less judgment. The third commissioner, Mr. Forsyth, is fanatical in his opposition to any suggestions of compromise or reconstruction; but, indeed, upon that point, there is little difference of opinion amongst any of the real adherents of the South. Mr. Lincoln they spoke of with contempt; Mr. Seward they evidently regarded as the ablest and most unscrupulous of their enemies; but the tone in which they alluded to the whole of the Northern people indicated the clear conviction that trade, commerce, the pursuit of gain, manufacture, and the base mechanical arts, had so degraded the whole race, they would never attempt to strike a blow in fair fight for what they prized so highly in theory and in words. Whether it be in consequence of some secret influence which slavery has upon the minds of men, or that the aggression of the North upon their institutions has been of a nature to excite the deepest animosity and most vindictive hate, certain it is there is a degree of something like ferocity in the Southern mind towards New England which exceeds belief. I am persuaded that these feelings of contempt are extended towards England. They believe that we, too, have had the canker of peace upon us. One evidence of this, according to Southern men, is the abolition of duelling. This practice, according to them, is highly wholesome and meritorious; and, indeed, it may be admitted that in the state of society which is reported to exist in the Southern States, it is a useful check on such men as it restrained in our own islands in the last century. In the course of conversation, one gentleman remarked, that he considered it disgraceful for any man to take money for the dishonour of his wife or his daughter. “With us,” he said, “there is but one mode of dealing known. The man who dares tamper with the honour of a white woman, knows what he has to expect. We shoot him down like a dog, and no jury in the South will ever find any man guilty of murder for punishing such a scoundrel.” An argument which can scarcely be alluded to was used by them, to show that these offences in slave States had not the excuse which might be adduced to diminish their gravity when they occurred in States where all the population were white. Indeed, in this, as in some other matters of a similar character, slavery is their summum bonum of morality, physical excellence, and social purity. I was inclined to question the correctness of the standard which they had set up, and to inquire whether the virtue which needed this murderous use of the pistol and the dagger to defend it, was not open to some doubt; but I found there was very little sympathy with my views among the company.
The gentlemen at table asserted that the white men in the slave States are physically superior to the men of the free States; and indulged in curious theories in morals and physics to which I was a stranger. Disbelief of anything a Northern man—that is, a Republican—can say, is a fixed principle in their minds. I could not help remarking, when the conversation turned on the duplicity of Mr. Seward, and the wickedness of the Federal Government in refusing to give the assurance Sumter would not be relieved by force of arms, that it must be of very little consequence what promises Mr. Seward made, as, according to them, not the least reliance was to be placed on his word. The notion that the Northern men are cowards is justified by instances in which Congressmen have been insulted by Southern men without calling them out, and Mr. Sumner’s case was quoted as the type of the affairs of the kind between the two sides.
I happened to say that I always understood Mr. Sumner had been attacked suddenly and unexpectedly, and struck down before he could rise from his desk to defend himself; whereupon a warm refutation of that version of the story was given, and I was assured that Mr. Brooks, who was a very slight man, and much inferior in height to Mr. Sumner, struck him a slight blow at first, and only inflicted the heavier strokes when irritated by the Senator’s cowardly demeanor. In reference to some remark made about the cavaliers and their connection with the South, I reminded the gentlemen that, after all, the descendants of the Puritans were not to be despised in battle: and that the best gentry in England were worsted at last by the train-bands of London, and the “rabbledom” of Cromwell’s Independents.
Mr., or Colonel, Pickett, is a tall good-looking man, of pleasant manners, and well educated. But this gentleman was a professed buccaneer, a friend of Walker, the grey-eyed man of destiny—his comrade in his most dangerous razzie. He was a newspaper writer, a soldier, a filibuster; and he now threw himself into the cause of the South with vehemence; it was not difficult to imagine he saw in that cause the realisation of the dreams of empire in the south of the Gulf, and of conquest in the islands of the sea, which have such a fascinating influence over the imagination of a large portion of the American people. He referred to Walker’s fate with much bitterness, and insinuated he was betrayed by the British officer who ought to have protected him.
The acts of Mr. Floyd and Mr. Howell Cobb, which must be esteemed of doubtful morality, are here justified by the States’ Rights doctrine. If the States had a right to go out, they were quite right in obtaining their quota of the national property which would not have been given to them by the Lincolnites. Therefore, their friends were not to be censured because they had sent arms and money to the South.
Altogether the evening, notwithstanding the occasional warmth of the controversy, was exceedingly instructive; one could understand from the vehemence and force of the speakers the full meaning of the phrase of “firing the Southern heart,” so often quoted as an illustration of the peculiar force of political passion to be brought to bear against the Republicans in the Secession contest. Mr. Forsyth, struck me as being the most astute, and perhaps most capable, of the gentlemen whose mission to Washington seems likely to be so abortive. His name is historical in America—his father filled high office, and his son has also exercised diplomatic function. Despotisms and Republics of the American model approach each other closely. In Turkey the Pasha unemployed sinks into insignificance, and the son of the Pasha deceased is literally nobody. Mr. Forsyth was not selected as Southern Commissioner on account of the political status acquired by his father; but the position gained by his own ability, as editor of “The Mobile Register,” induced the Confederate authorities to select him for the post. It is quite possible to have made a mistake in such matters, but I am almost certain that the coloured waiters who attended us at table looked as sour and discontented as could be, and seemed to give their service with a sort of protest. I am told that the tradespeople of Washington are strongly inclined to favour the southern side.
April 6th.—To-day I paid a second visit to General Scott, who received me very kindly, and made many inquiries respecting the events in the Crimea and the Indian mutiny and rebellion. He professed to have no apprehension for the safety of the capital; but in reality there are only some 700 or 800 regulars to protect it and the Navy Yard, and two field-batteries, commanded by an officer of very doubtful attachment to the Union. The head of the Navy Yard is openly accused of treasonable sympathies.
Mr. Seward has definitively refused to hold any intercourse whatever with the Southern Commissioners, and they will retire almost immediately from the capital. As matters look very threatening, I must go South and see with my own eyes how affairs stand there, before the two sections come to open rupture. Mr. Seward, the other day, in talking of the South, described them as being in every respect behind the age, with fashions, habits, level of thought, and modes of life, belonging to the worst part of the last century. But still he never has been there himself! The Southern men come up to the Northern cities and springs, but the Northerner rarely travels southwards. Indeed, I am informed, that if he were a well-known Abolitionist, it would not be safe for him to appear in a Southern city. I quite agree with my thoughtful and earnest friend, Olmsted, that the United States can never be considered as a free country till a man can speak as freely in Charleston as he can in New York or Boston.
I dined with Mr. Riggs, the banker, who had an agreeable party to meet me. Mr. Corcoran, his former partner, who was present, erected at his own cost, and presented to the city, a fine building, to be used as an art gallery and museum; but as yet the arts which are to be found in Washington are political and feminine only. Mr. Corcoran has a private gallery of pictures, and a collection, in which is the much-praised Greek Slave of Hiram Powers. The gentry of Columbia are thoroughly Virginian in sentiment, and look rather south than north of the Potomac for political results. The President, I hear this evening, is alarmed lest Virginia should become hostile, and his policy, if he has any, is temporising and timid. It is perfectly wonderful to hear people using the word “Government” at all, as applied to the President and his cabinet—a body which has no power “according to the constitution” to save the country governed or itself from destruction. In fact, from the circumstances under which the constitution was framed, it was natural that the principle point kept in view should be the exhibition of a strong front to foreign powers, combined with the least possible amount of constriction on the internal relations of the different States.
In the hotel the roar of office-seekers is unabated. Train after train adds to their numbers. They cumber the passages. The hall is crowded to such a degree that suffocation might describe the degree to which the pressure reaches, were it not that tobacco-smoke invigorates and sustains the constitution. As to the condition of the floor it is beyond description.