tion should be clearly understood,
and that his name should bear the just responsibility.

THE SECESSION OF VIRGINIA.

All pretense of a fair submission of the question to popular vote
was finally abandoned, and the abandonment practically proclaimed
in a letter of Senator James M. Mason, which was published on the
16th of May, some ten days in advance of the election. "If it be
asked," wrote Mr. Mason, "what those shall do who cannot in conscience
vote to separate Virginia from the United States, the answer is
simple and plain. Honor and duty alike require that they should
not vote on the question, and if they retain such opinions they
must leave the State." Mr. Mason thus accurately defined what the
South understood by the submission of secession ordinances to
popular vote. It meant that a man might vote for an ordinance but
not against it; if he desired to vote against it, and persisted in
the desire, he should leave the State. It is rather a matter of
surprise that of 161,000 votes cast in Virginia on the question,
32,000 were registered against secession. These friends of the
Government were, it is true, in large part from the western section
of the State where slaves were few and the loyal sentiment was
strong. It is an interesting fact that along the mountain range
through Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and even as far South
as Georgia, the inhabitants generally sympathized with the Union.
Though often forced to aid the Rebellion, they were at heart loyal
to the government of their fathers, and on many important occasions
rendered the most valuable service to the National cause. The
devotion of large numbers in East Tennessee to the Federal Government
seriously embarrassed the new Confederacy. The remaining slave
States, Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri, gave trouble to the
administration, but did not succeed in separating themselves from
the Union. Large numbers of their people joined the Southern army,
but the political power of those States was wielded in favor of
the loyal cause. They desired to enact the part of neutrals; but
the National Government, from the first, took strong ground against
a policy so dishonorable in the States, so injurious to the Union.

The responses made by the Southern governors to the President's
call for troops are so characteristic, and afford so true a picture
of the times, as to merit notice. Nearly every one