ams as may best conform to our own
interests. It can not be expected that we should permit the free
navigation of the Lower Mississippi to the West after they have
closed it against us above, without the most stringent regulations.
There is no palliation in the pretense that the blockade above was
a war measure; they can not so claim it unless we had been
acknowledged as belligerents, and hence they have forfeited all
right to free navigation as a peace measure. If, then, permission
be given to the Free States of the West to navigate the Lower
Mississippi, it should be under such restrictions as to afford a
commensurate revenue to the confederacy, and the strictest rules
regulating the ingress and egress of passengers, officers, and
hands. The West is learning us how to do without her, and we thank
her for it; we shall have but little need of her produce, as we
shall soon have a plentiful supply among our own people. An
absolute separation from all the North, with the sole and
independent control of all regulations with its people, are our
best and safest terms of peace.'

What is further hoped for is shown in remarks on the

EXTENT OF THE CONFEDERACY.

'We have conquered an outlet to the Pacific which must be
maintained, though we can desire no dominion on the Pacific coast,
but such as may be sufficient to secure the terminus of our great
Pacific railroad through Texas and Arizona. Toward the north and
east, the Maryland and Pennsylvania line, including Delaware, is
our true landmark. Kansas, on the other side, must be conquered and
confiscated to pay for the negroes stolen from us, abolitionism
expelled from its borders, and transformed into a Slave State of
the confederacy. Perhaps, after we have done with Lincoln, this
arrangement may be very acceptable to a majority in Kansas, without
force. We will have no desire to disturb Mexico so long as she
conducts herself peaceably toward us, and, as a neighbor, maintains
good faith in her dealings with us. Central America must remain as
a future consideration; and, instead of the acquisition of Cuba,
she has become our _friendly ally_, identified with us in interests
and institutions, and, so long as she continues to hold slaves,
connected with us by the closest ties.'

But the strong point of the a