LETTERS TO MISS QUINCY. 289 



TO MISS QTJINCY. 



NEW HAVEN, April 8, 1863. 



IT is grateful to our feelings to view New Eng 

 land, as regards its state governments, as a unit, ready 

 and willing to cooperate with our loyal sisters in putting 

 down the Rebellion. Still we are waging an anxious war, 

 terribly destructive of life, and fruitful of horrid mutila 

 tions of the human form divine, caused by the ingenious 

 inventions in means of destruction, so that the old-fashioned 

 war by bullets and field artillery seems comparatively a 

 civil game. 



I trust your father's mind is cheered by hope, as my own 

 is ; and if I am disposed sometimes to despond, I endeavor 

 to realize that the rebels hold not one foot of free terri 

 tory ; that we hold several of the former Slave-States, 

 and parts of several more ; that nearly all the fortresses 

 stolen from us by the rebels are recovered ; that we hold 

 their principal southern city, and are menacing the rest; 

 that our nation is girding herself for the first time in this 

 war, as a nation ; and that' our revenue surpasses expecta 

 tion, and is cheerfully paid. In the view of all these things, 

 hope prevails, although the war may be protracted, and 

 we have the difficult problem to settle as to the eventual 

 disposition of the colored people, but God, who appears 

 to have permitted this war for the sake of destroying slav 

 ery will, I trust, provide means for the full accomplishment 

 of his own designs, although human foresight may not see 



the end I am glad if there is an improved feeling 



in England towards this country. I believe it has risen 

 little above the level of the middle classes. It is but too 

 evident that both England and France are hopefully look 

 ing to this crisis as the struggle that is to destroy our na 

 tional unity.* France insults us in no ambiguous language, 

 when she makes her wicked invasion of Mexico, on pre 

 tence of resisting the progress of the Anglo-Saxon race. 



VOL. II. 19 



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