ich arena. To
the North He gave short summers, bleak skies, the rocks of New England
hills, the thin soil of New York, the sand dunes of Michigan. To the
South He gave sunny Virginia, the riches of the Gulf States, the
fruitful skies, the abundant rains, the treasures of the cotton, the
sugar and the rice. Above all, God sifted all the nations of the Old
World to find blood rich enough to people the Southern States. The men
who laid the foundations of the great South were people of a heroic
type, giants and heroes of fortitude. God brought the Huguenots, and
the very flower of French chivalry into Florida and Georgia. He sifted
all Scotland and North Ireland for outstanding men for South Carolina.
He took the best blood of England for Virginia. These Southern founders
and fathers had fought in France, endured for their convictions in
Scotland, conquered their enemies in England and North Ireland, and God
rewarded them with the richest, choicest meadows and valleys of the
sunny South. And yet Slavery wrought weakness, while Liberty made the
bleak North to blossom like the rose.

It is said that plants exude poison from the roots, and soon destroy the
soil unless there is a rotation of crops. Slavery was a noxious plant,
deadlier than the nightshade, and it poisoned the South. The longer
slavery existed, the weaker the Southern giant became, until, toiling
on, the South became bankrupt through slavery, and toiling on, every
year of the war under free labour found the North growing ever richer
and stronger. Liberty is a giant that when it touches the soil renews
its strength.

Oh, if the South had but had a better cause! History affords nothing
finer than the bravery of Southern soldiers and their leaders; had they
been fighting for liberty, or some great cause that would have supported
them during the struggle instead of bankrupting them as slavery did, it
is doubtful whether any army could have defeated their soldiers.

In Liverpool Beecher literally fought with the lions of Ephesus. The
bill-boards were posted with placards in red type. All men in England
who had investments in the South and wanted to break Beecher and his
cause seemed to have assembled. From the moment he entered the room the
great audience became a mob, and with groans, hisses, cat-calls,
epithets, men interrupted the orator with cheers for the South. Speaking
was like lifting up one's voice in the midst of a hurricane, or trying
to speak while a t