d in trade between British
ports, as the "Cornubia;" some were taken from the Channel service
between England and France, as the "Eugenie;" and some were built for
opium smuggling in China. Later in the war, steamers were built
expressly for the service.

During the first two years, the captures were so infrequent that, it may
be safely stated, never before was a Government at war so well supplied
with arms, munitions, clothing and medicines--everything, in short, that
an army requires--with so little money as was paid by the Confederacy.
The shipment from England to the Islands in ordinary tramp steamers; the
landing and storage there, and the running of the blockade, cost money;
but all that was needed came from cotton practically given to the
Confederate Government by its owners.

The supplies were, in every instance, bought at the lowest cash prices
by men trained in the work as contractors for the British army. No
credit was asked. Merchants having needed supplies were frankly told
that our means were limited, and our payments would be made by cheques
on Fraser, Trenholm & Co., Liverpool, an old established and
conservative house. The effect of such buying was to create confidence
on the part of the sellers, which made them more anxious to sell than
were we to purchase. When the end came, and some of the largest sellers
were ruined, I never heard a word of complaint of their being
over-reached or in any manner treated unfairly.

As long as the system thus described continued, the South not only
equipped an army able to cope with the colossal forces constantly
advancing upon it, but it accomplished this without distressing its
people with taxes. And thus, in part, was answered Mr. Cushing's
apparently unanswerable exclamation: "What _possible_ chance can the
South have?"

But the supply of acceptable arms was not equal to the demand. The
civilized powers had but recently been equipped with modern arms. The
United States had the Springfield; England had the Enfield, which was
practically the same as the Springfield; Austria had a rifle bearing a
close resemblance to both, and of about the same calibre; Prussia had a
breech-loader which no Government would now think of issuing to troops;
France had an inferior muzzle-loader, and was experimenting with an
imitation of the Prussian needle-gun, which finally proved ruinous to
the Empire. There were few arms for sale, even in the arsenals of
Europe, which Mr. Cushing