nd the war collapse for want of money!

And so tenacious were people and rulers of this ingrained belief, that
they cherished it, even while they saw the greenbacks of the Federal
Government stand at 25 to 30 per cent. depreciation, while their own
Treasury notes dropped rapidly from _one hundred_ to _one thousand_!

Let us pause for one moment to examine upon what basis this dream was
founded, before going into the sad picture of want--demoralization--ruin!
into which the errors of its Treasury plunged the southern people.

Accepting the delusive estimate that all the property of the United
States, in 1861, represented but one-fifth more than that of the
Confederate States; and that over three-fifths of the gold duties were
from cotton and cotton fabrics, and products of the South alone, it was
easy for the southern eye to see a future of trial, if not of ruin, for
the North. Then, too, at the beginning of the war it was reasoned that
the northern army of invasion, working on exterior lines, must
necessarily be greater far in numbers and in cost, than the army of
defense, working on interior lines. Moreover, the vast-proposed
blockade, by increasing to a point of anything like efficiency the
vessels, armament, and personnel of the United States navy, would cost
many millions. Thus, in short, the southern thinker could very readily
persuade himself that the annual expenditures of the Federal Government
must--even with the strictest economy and best management--run to
unprecedented and undreamed-of sums.

The demand for increased appropriations with the very first call of Mr.
Lincoln for troops, justified this belief; the budget of '62 to the
United States Congress went far beyond all expectation; and the wild
waste, extravagance, and robbery that swelled each succeeding estimate,
were but more and more proof to the southern thinker, that he must be
right. But he had made one grave miscalculation.

Into the woof of delusion which he continued to weave, for enwrapping
his own judgment, such reasoner omitted wholly to cross the warp of
combined result. He neglected that vastly-important filament--proper
and value-enhancing handling of his valuable production; the reality
that southern cotton, sugar and rice had become so great a factor in
national wealth, mainly through manipulation by northern hands. He did
not stop to calculate that--those hands removed and, in addition, the
ports of the South herself hermetically se