"Good morning, Mr. Webster; we were just talking over last night's proceedings."
"It beats anything I ever heard of," said Webster, warmly. "But what can we do?"
"Nothing just now," returned Rogers; "but I think there will soon be a time when we will have a chance to do something. In the meantime, gentlemen, we must make up our minds to say nothing. We have all been too free with our tongues. Hereafter, we must keep mum, or we will all get into Fort McHenry."
"We must just lay low, and wait till Jeff crosses the Potomac," said one of the loungers.
"If we only had arms," said Webster, musingly.
"Arms!" echoed Rogers; "why, sir, we have from five to six thousand stand of arms right here in Baltimore."
"That may be true," said Webster, "but nobody seems to know where they are."
"I am satisfied they will turn up at the right time," said Rogers. "Marshal Kane, before he was arrested, put them in the hands of men who will take good care of them until they are wanted."
"And let us hope they will be wanted inside of two weeks," put in Sloan. "We can afford to be quiet now, boys, but when the Southern army comes this way, we'll rise ten thousand strong, and help take Washington."
The opinion seemed to have fixed itself in the minds of nearly all the Southern sympathizers in the city, that in a very brief space of time, three or four weeks at the utmost limit, Baltimore would be occupied by rebel soldiers, and Jeff Davis would be there in person.