nston that a letter of his contained "arguments and statements
utterly unfounded" and "insinuations as unfounded as they were
unbecoming."

Davis was not always wise in his choice of men. His confidence in
Bragg, who was long his chief military adviser, is not sustained by
the military critics of a later age. His Cabinet, though not the
contemptible body caricatured by the malice of Pollard, was not equal
to the occasion. Of the three men who held the office of Secretary of
State, Toombs and Hunter had little if any qualification for such a
post, while the third, Benjamin, is the sphinx of Confederate history.

In a way, Judah P. Benjamin is one of the most interesting men in
American politics. By descent a Jew, born in the West Indies, he spent
his boyhood mainly at Charleston and his college days at Yale. He went
to New Orleans to begin his illustrious career as a lawyer, and from
Louisiana entered politics. The facile keenness of his intellect is
beyond dispute. He had the Jewish clarity of thought, the wonderful
Jewish detachment in matters of pure mind. But he was also an American
of the middle of the century. His quick and responsive nature--a
nature that enemies might call simulative--caught and reflected the
characteristics of that singular and highly rhetorical age. He lives in
tradition as the man of the constant smile, and yet there is no one in
history whose state papers contain passages of fiercer violence in days
of tension. How much of his violence was genuine, how much was a manner
of speaking, his biographers have not had the courage to determine. Like
so many American biographers they have avoided the awkward questions and
have glanced over, as lightly as possible, the persistent attempts of
Congress to drive him from office.

Nothing could shake the resolution of Davis to retain Benjamin in the
Cabinet. Among Davis's loftiest qualities was his sense of personal
loyalty. Once he had given his confidence, no amount of opposition
could shake his will but served rather to harden him. When Benjamin as
Secretary of War passed under a cloud, Davis led him forth resplendent
as Secretary of State. Whether he was wise in doing so, whether the
opposition was not justified in its distrust of Benjamin, is still an
open question. What is certain is that both these able men, even before
the crisis that arose in the autumn of 1862, had rendered themselves and
their Government widely unpopular. It must never be forg