he greater part of
the people were convinced that it was wrong, and that it did harm
to the whole country.

But this was not all. The people who held slaves at the South wanted
to add to the number. They hoped to get more of the new country west
of the Mississippi River for slave states, so that there might always
be at least as many slave states in the Union as there were free states.
But Abraham Lincoln like most of the people at the North believed
that slavery did no good to any one. He and his party were fully
determined that no slaves whatever should be taken into the
territories west of the Mississippi River, and that every new state
which should be added should be entirely free.

For this reason it happened that when Lincoln became President most
of the slave states resolved to leave the Union, and, if necessary,
to make war rather than be compelled to stay in it.

[Footnote 16: Union: several years after the close of the
Revolutionary War, by which we gained our independence of Great
Britain, the people of the thirteen states formed a new government.
That new government bound all the states together more strongly than
before, thus making, as was then said, "a more _perfect union_."

In 1861 eleven of the southern states endeavored to withdraw from
the Union; this attempt brought on the war.]

260. The North and the South in the war; President Lincoln frees the
slaves; General Grant and General Lee; peace is made.--The North had
the most men and the most money to fight with, but the people of the
South had the advantage of being able to stay at home and fight on
their own ground.

The war lasted four years (1861-1865). Many terrible battles were
fought; thousands of brave men were killed on both sides. During the
war President Lincoln gave the slaves their freedom in all the states
which were fighting against the Union, and those in the other slave
states got their freedom later. After a time General Grant obtained
the command of all the armies of the North, and General Lee became
the chief defender of the South.

[Illustration: STATUE OF LINCOLN WRITING THE EMANCIPATION
PROCLAMATION WHICH GAVE THE SLAVES THEIR FREEDOM, IN FAIRMOUNT PARK,
PHILADELPHIA.]

[Illustration: MONUMENT TO GENERAL GRANT IN LINCOLN PARK, CHICAGO.]

[Illustration: MONUMENT TO GENERAL LEE, RICHMOND, VIRGINIA.]

The last battles were fought around Richmond, Virginia, between
these two great generals. When the Southern soldiers