"Think so?" asked the other, with the slightest suspicion of a sneer upon his lip.
"Oh, no, I don't think anything about it—I know it," said the Englishman. "Why, you haven't got any navy."
"The deuce we haven't!" observed the other. "I guess you have not seen our navy!"
"No!—nor has any one else seen an armament worthy of the name," said the Englishman, of course supposing that he referred to the dozen of old and worm-eaten wooden ships that then made up our whole preparation for contesting the empire of the seas. "Why any one of our half dozen fleets would eat up your whole navy in half an hour. If you had seen our Baltic fleet reviewed at Spithead, as I did just at the close of the Crimean war, you would know something of what the word 'navy' meant, and you would also have some idea, you know, of what a chance you would have at fighting England!"
"Humph! well, yes, you have a pretty long string of vessels, such as they are," said his American friend. "But I told you that you did not know anything about our navy, and you do not. You speak of the 'Baltic fleet.' Now what will you say when I tell you that at one point on the Mississippi we have a line of gun-boats that would knock not only your Baltic fleet but all the rest of your fleets into smithereens, without even firing a gun?"
"Why I should only say that you were crazy, as I think you are!" said the Englishman, really expecting that his friend would by-and-bye attempt to demonstrate that the easiest way of travelling was by walking on the head instead of the feet.
"Yes, I daresay you do," said the American. "And yet I am not crazy. The only thing is that you do not yet understand me. The line of gun-boats of which I speak, is a line of warehouses at Chicago, containing at this moment from six to ten millions of bushels of grain, constantly emptying and constantly being replenished. That is the line of gun-boats to fight the world, and we can conquer the world if we only use them correctly. We can live within ourselves, without buying one dollar's-worth of anything from any nation abroad, except possibly tea (for we can make our own coffee while we can grow peas and beans); and there is not another nation on the globe that can do the same. Not a nation of you all but must have our breadstuffs or go hungry; and the sailors of your 'Baltic fleet' would not fight well, I fancy, on empty stomachs."
"Humph!" said the Englishman. "That is an odd view to take of war." But he said no more, and was evidently thinking. He had grounds for thought, and so had the whole world. We had the element of success in our own hands, in the capacity of living within ourselves. Had our resources been properly managed, the importation of all foreign goods prohibited during the period of the war, and the exportation of gold and breadstuffs forbidden and guarded against by the closest watch and the most stringent penalties, with our people practicing the self-denial and economy of the men and women of the Revolution, setting their spinning-wheels and looms once more in motion and wearing home-spuns instead of imported broadcloths and satins,—had these steps been taken, as they should have been taken, starvation would have fallen upon half Europe, and the rebellion would long before this time[15] have perished from its own weakness or been crushed out, from sheer necessity, by the European powers whose very existence its continuance was perilling.
[15] March 7th, 1863.
The smile of God has not been withdrawn from our fields and orchards; we have been continued in national health and still supplied with all the luxuries of production and abundance; and yet what is the use which we have made of these immense advantages, and what thanks have we rendered to the Supreme Being in those two most acceptable of worships, labor and success, for the health and wealth thus given and continued?