I expressed a belief in a letter, written a few days after my arrival (March 27th), that the South would never go back into the Union. The North think that they can coerce the South, and I am not prepared to say they are right or wrong; but I am convinced that the South can only be forced back by such a conquest as that which laid Poland prostrate at the feet of Russia. It may be that such a conquest can be made by the North, but success must destroy the Union as it has been constituted in times past. A strong Government must be the logical consequence of victory, and the triumph of the South will be attended by a similar result, for which, indeed, many Southerners are very well-disposed. To the people of the Confederate States there would be no terror in such an issue, for it appears to me they are pining for a strong Government exceedingly. The North must accept it, whether they like it or not.
Neither party—if such a term can be applied to the rest of the United States, and to those States which disclaim the authority of the Federal Government—was prepared for the aggressive or resisting power of the other. Already the Confederate States perceive that they cannot carry all before them with a rush, while the North have learnt that they must put forth all their strength to make good a tithe of their lately uttered threats. But the Montgomery Government are anxious to gain time, and to prepare a regular army. The North, distracted by apprehensions of vast disturbance in their complicated relations, are clamouring for instant action and speedy consummation. The counsels of moderate men, as they were called, have been utterly overruled.
The whole foundation on which South Carolina rests is cotton and a certain amount of rice; or rather she bases her whole fabric on the necessity which exists in Europe for those products of her soil, believing and asserting, as she does, that England and France cannot and will not do without them. Cotton, without a market, is so much flocculent matter encumbering the ground. Rice, without demand for it, is unsaleable grain in store and on the field. Cotton at ten cents a pound is boundless prosperity, empire and superiority, and rice or grain need no longer be regarded.
In the matter of slave-labour, South Carolina argues pretty much in the following manner: England and France (she says) require our products. In order to meet their wants, we must cultivate our soil. There is only one way of doing so. The white man cannot live on our land at certain seasons of the year; he cannot work in the manner required by the crops. He must, therefore, employ a race suited to the labour, and that is a race which will only work when it is obliged to do so. That race was imported from Africa, under the sanction of the law, by our ancestors, when we were a British colony, and it has been fostered by us, so that its increase here has been as great as that of the most flourishing people in the world. In other places, where its labour was not productive or imperatively essential, that race has been made free, sometimes with disastrous consequences to itself and to industry. But we will not make it free. We cannot do so. We hold that slavery is essential to our existence as producers of what Europe requires; nay more, we maintain it is in the abstract right in principle; and some of us go so far as to maintain that the only proper form of society, according to the law of God and the exigencies of man, is that which has slavery as its basis. As to the slave, he is happier far in his state of servitude, more civilised and religious, than he is or could be if free or in his native Africa. For this system we will fight to the end.
In the evening I paid farewell visits, and spent an hour with Mr. Toombs, who is unquestionably one of the most original, quaint, and earnest of the Southern leaders, and whose eloquence and power as a debater are greatly esteemed by his countrymen. He is something of an Anglo-maniac, and an Anglo-phobist—a combination not unusual in America—that is, he is proud of being connected with and descended from respectable English families, and admires our mixed constitution, whilst he is an enemy to what is called English policy, and is a strong pro-slavery champion. Wigfall and he are very uneasy about the scant supply of gunpowder in the Southern States, and the difficulty of obtaining it.
In the evening had a little reunion in the bed-room as before.—Mr. Wigfall, Mr. Keitt, an eminent Southern politician, Col. Pickett, Mr. Browne, Mr. Benjamin, Mr. George Sanders, and others. The last-named gentleman was dismissed or recalled from his post at Liverpool, because he fraternised with Mazzini and other Red Republicans à ce qu’ on dit. Here he is a slavery man, and a friend of an oligarchy. Your “Rights of Man” man is often most inconsistent with himself, and is generally found associated with the men of force and violence.
May 9th.—My faithful Wigfall was good enough to come in early, in order to show me some comments on my letters in the “New York Times.” It appears the papers are angry because I said that New York was apathetic when I landed, and they try to prove I was wrong by showing there was a “glorious outburst of Union feeling,” after the news of the fall of Sumter. But I now know that the very apathy of which I spoke was felt by the Government of Washington, and was most weakening and embarrassing to them. What would not the value of “the glorious outburst” have been, had it taken place before the Charleston batteries had opened on Sumter—when the Federal flag, for example, was fired on, flying from the ‘Star of the West,’ or when Beauregard cut off supplies, or Bragg threatened Pickens, or the first shovel of earth was thrown up in hostile battery? But no! New York was then engaged in discussing State rights, and in reading articles to prove the new Government would be traitors if they endeavoured to reinforce the Federal forts, or were perusing leaders in favour of the Southern Government. Haply, they may remember one, not so many weeks old, in which the “New York Herald” compared Jeff Davis and his Cabinet to the “Great Rail Splitter,” and Seward, and Chase, and came to the conclusion that the former “were gentlemen”—(a matter of which it is quite incompetent to judge)—“and would, and ought to succeed.” The glorious outburst of “Union feeling” which threatened to demolish the “Herald” office, has created a most wonderful change in the views of the proprietor, whose diverse-eyed vision is now directed solely to the beauties of the Union, and whose faith is expressed in “a hearty adhesion to the Government of our country.” New York must pay the penalty of its indifference, and bear the consequences of listening to such counsellors.
Mr. Deasy, much dilapidated, returned about twelve o’clock from his planter, who was drunk when he went over, and would not let him go to the beaver-dam. To console him, the planter stayed up all night drinking, and waking him up at intervals, that he might refresh him with a glass of whisky. This man was well off, owned land, and a good stock of slaves, but he must have been a “mean white,” who had raised himself in the world. He lived in a three-roomed wooden cabin, and in one of the rooms he kept his wife shut up from the strangers’ gaze. One of his negroes was unwell, and he took Deasy to see him. The result of his examination was, “Nigger! I guess you won’t live more than an hour.” His diagnosis was quite correct.
Before my departure I had a little farewell levée—Mr. Toombs, Mr. Browne, Mr. Benjamin, Mr. Walker, Major Deas, Colonel Pickett, Major Calhoun, Captain Ripley, and others—who were exceedingly kind with letters of introduction and offers of service. Dined as usual on a composite dinner—Southern meat and poultry bad—at three o’clock, and at four P.M. drove down to the steep banks of the Alabama River, where the castle-like hulk of the “Southern Republic” was waiting to receive us. I bade good-by to Montgomery without regret. The native people were not very attractive, and the city has nothing to make up for their deficiency, but of my friends there I must always retain pleasant memories, and, indeed, I hope some day I shall be able to keep my promise to return and see more of the Confederate ministers and their chief.