na fide_ bulletins sent by the unscrupulous
abductors themselves. This became the detectives' final theory, and they
massed their skill towards it.

The unsolved mystery brooded like dog-days over man, woman, and child. A
nameless fear, that of an unknown and irresistible enemy in their midst,
paralyzed the citizens. Prayers were offered in every church,
school-house, and home. The hostilities that but lately threatened the
country ceased. Civilization breathed nothing but sympathy for the
bereaved republic. Sovereigns redoubled their private guards and quaked
upon their thrones. And yet, in the face of fears, petitions, and
threats, Congress, in a spirit of disastrous conservatism that has
marked so many of its deliberations, allowed itself to be ruled by a
dissenting minority. Detective Byrnes, hoping to gain imperishable
credit and also the reward of five hundred thousand dollars which
Congress had been liberal enough to offer, counselled delay in a private
letter to the Speaker of the House. So it happened that this august body
would not ratify the overwhelming vote for immediate payment of ransom
which had just been passed by the Senate.

This filibustering brought the country into the third week of the
calamity. The following communication to the New York _Herald_,
postmarked Boston, written in the same hand as before, brought matters
to a crisis:

"_The nation has evidently more love for their surplus than for
their President. The requisite ransom has reached six millions
of dollars in gold. The treasury is not yet exhausted, nor are
we. None can find us. Our defences are unapproachable. We laugh
at your attempts. The wife of your President, we are grieved to
say, is ill._"

This proclamation aroused a new element, which had been smouldering, to
white heat. The women of the country rose _en masse_. They fired old
societies and organized new to collect ransom. The W. C. T. U. and W. H.
M. A. and A. S. A. and A. B. C. and X. Q. B. Z. thrilled to the
occasion. Infant Bands of Hope and Daughters of Endeavor invaded private
families with demands for penny subscriptions. Weeping women persuaded
dollars by the tens, hundreds and thousands from responsive men. They
renounced their bon-bons and new dresses, parties and dowries in their
patriotic fervor. The presidents of all the women's societies in the
land trooped to Washington. They cried shame at those who trifled for
the sake of the