“The shock produced by the reverse of our arms at Bull Run has passed
away. The army is reorganised; the elections show that reaction
against disunion has begun in the revolutionary States, and we may
confidently look for a restoration of the national authority
throughout the Union. If our foreign relations were once promptly
reestablished on their former basis, the disunion sentiment would
languish and perish within a year.”
In this way, after each defeat, or “reverse of our arms,” he presently
consoles himself by extracting a precious jewel, in the shape of a
moral, from the front of adversity, and transmitting it for the comfort
of the American envoys. We all remember the achievement which first made
Jackson famous, of turning suddenly on Banks at Winchester and driving
him headlong over the Potomac, previous to joining in the general
movement against M‘Clellan on the Chickahominy. Upon that event Mr
Seward remarks to Mr Adams:—
“The defeat of General Banks at Winchester yesterday, and his
withdrawal across the Potomac, are just now the prominent incidents of
the war. A careful consideration of the affair results in the
satisfactory conclusion that the movement of the enemy _was one of
merely energetic strategy_.”
What this can possibly mean, or why it should be satisfactory to Mr
Seward, or what satisfaction it could convey to Mr Adams, we are utterly
at a loss to divine. Again, on July 7th, when M‘Clellan had been driven
from the York to the James River, he tells Mr Adams that—
“The efficiency of the army of the Union is improved.... If the
representative parties had now to choose whether they would have the
national army where it is and as it is, or back again where it was and
as it was, it is not to be doubted that the insurgents would prefer to
it the position and condition on the Pamunkey, and the friends of the
Union the one now attained on the banks of the James.... The
insurgents and the world abroad will see that the virtue of the people
is adequate to the responsibilities which Providence has cast upon
them.”
July 12th, he states the cheering fact that a force is “under the
command of Major-General Pope, who has achieved great successes in the
Western States, and is esteemed an officer of great ability.”
July 28th, he says: “Our assault upon Richmond is for the moment
suspended. No great and striking movements or achievements are
occurring, and the Government is rather preparing its energies for
renewed operations than continuing to surprise the world with new and
brilliant victories.” Thus much in the way of particular information,
but the moral presently follows:—
“It is not upon isolated events, much less upon transitory popular
impulses, that Governments are expected to build their policies in
regard to foreign countries. What I think is important, not less for
foreign nations than for ourselves, is always to hold our civil war
under contemplation, not merely as streams of unequal widths and
intermitting currents, but as one continuous river, and so not to
forget its source, its direction, and not only its immediate and
local, but also its ultimate and universal, effects.”
And before the reader can recover from this tremendous passage, it is
followed up by another:—
“It is only the reflecting observer who habitually considers the
course of events occurring in any one country as being determined, or
at least materially influenced, by natural causes lying wholly or in
part outside of that country, and which create a force commonly
recognised under various names as the opinion of mankind, or the
spirit or the genius of the age or of the times.”
After uttering this extraordinary sentence, one might expect the oracle
to become exhausted; but not at all: it continues to pour forth pages of
reasoning equally close and clear on this same 28th July. And what do
our readers think of this splendid passage, written April 14th?—
“It is believed that this survey of the military position of the
Government may serve to satisfy Great Britain that those statesmen
here and abroad who, a year ago, mistook a political syncope for
national death and dissolution, altogether misunderstood the
resources, the character, and the energies of the American Union. The
blood that at first retreated to the heart, is now coursing healthily
through all the veins and arteries of the whole system; and what
seemed at first to be a hopeless paralysis, was in fact but the
beginning of an organic change to more robust and vigorous health than
the nation has ever before enjoyed.”
And when M‘Clellan finally abandoned the peninsula with the wreck of his
army, it is announced to Mr Adams, and to Mr Dayton, the Minister to
France, in this way:—
“General Halleck, upon taking command of the army, made a careful
survey of the entire military position, and concluded thereupon to
withdraw the army of the Potomac from the peninsula, and to combine
all our forces in front of Richmond. It is believed to have been
substantially accomplished without any casualty. Our new levies are
coming in in great numbers and in fine spirits. The gloom has passed
away from the public mind. Although our arrangements for resuming
offensive operations are yet incomplete, we have much confidence in
being able to do so speedily and with decisive effect.... It is
represented to us that the popular determination to maintain the Union
has at no time been as unanimous and as earnest as it is now.”
And so on of all events, whether promising success or ending in
disaster; the object being to persuade foreign Governments what a
mistake they made in countenancing such a failing business as Secession.
And when the prospect is especially cheerful—when patriots under arms
are counted by hundreds of thousands, and when any successes call for a
fresh enumeration of the triumphs of the Republic—a judicious menace is
insinuated in the despatch, by hinting that as soon as the rebellion is
crushed (which it is always just going to be) the shortcomings of those
whose duty it was to assist the Union in its “hour of distress,” will
not be forgotten by the victorious and thrice-potent Northern people.
For instance, on January 31 he says:—
“I have observed that the British people were satisfied with the
vigour and the energy of the preparations which their Government made
for the war which they expected to occur between them and ourselves.
_It may be profitable for us all to reflect_ that the military and
naval preparations which have been made by this Government to put down
the insurrection have, every day since the 1st of May last, equalled,
if not surpassed, the daily proportion of those war-preparations which
were regarded as so demonstrative in Great Britain.”