o the United States for use as
the seat of the Federal capital. When it ceases to be used for that
purpose, it, with all its public fixtures, will revert by law to
Maryland. But," and his eye brightened to the hue of cold steel in a
way the writer will never forget, as he uttered, in a tone perfectly
self-poised, undaunted, and slightly defiant, the words, "_that is a
point which may be settled by force rather than by reason_."

This was January 1, 1861, only eleven days after South Carolina had
passed her Act of Secession, and shows that even then, notwithstanding
the professed desire of the South to depart in peace, the attack not
only upon the national principles of union, but upon the national
property as well, was projected. Mr. Davis, loaded with the benefits of
his country, yet occupied a seat in the Senate Chamber, under the most
solemn oath to uphold its Constitution, which, even if his grievances
had been well founded, afforded Constitutional and peaceful remedies
that he had never attempted to use. Presenting regards, very formal
indeed, sick at heart, indignant, and anxious, we left the house of the
traitor.

The historical conclusions to be drawn from the above slight sketches
are important in several respects. Mr. Davis, Mr. Toombs, and Mr. Hunter
are among the strongest leaders of the Rebellion. Representing the
Northern, Southeastern, and Southwestern populations of the disaffected
regions, their testimony had a wide application, and was perhaps as
characteristic and pointed in these brief conversations, occurring just
upon the eve of the bursting of the storm, as we should have heard in a
hundred interviews. That they spoke frankly was not only evidenced to
us by their entire manner, but, as it is not unimportant to repeat,
has been proved by subsequent events. The conversations, therefore,
indicate,--

1. That the grand, fundamental, legal ground for the Rebellion was a
view of Constitutional rights by which property in human beings claimed
equal protection under the General Government with the products of Free
Labor, and to be admitted, therefore, at will, to all places under the
jurisdiction of the Federal power, and not simply to be protected under
local or municipal law,--rights which the South proposed to vindicate,
constitutionally, by Secession, or, in other words, by the domination of
State over National sovereignty: an entire view of the true intent of
the Federal compacts and powers, which