action of Fremont and Hunter had given life to the idea; and Lincoln
now intimated that he might yet assume this authority.

Party divisions had soon reappeared at the North. The Democrats were not
harmonious; a part called themselves "War Democrats," and a part were
ready to let the South go, or went as near that as they prudently could;
now one and now the other faction controlled the party according to time
and locality. The Republicans were more united, yet among them was a
cleavage between conservatives and radicals; the one taking for their
watchword, "the Constitution as it is and the Union as it was"; the
other eager to see the war turned against slavery; and both claiming the
President, and jealously watching any leaning on his part toward their
rivals.

There was developing at the North a profound sentiment for attacking
slavery. The war was protracted beyond all early expectation; it was
costly, bitter, woeful. What was to be at last the recompense for all
this blood and tears? Was there, if victory came at last, to be with it
no advance, nothing but the old Union, half slave and half free? For
nothing better than this were sons, fathers, brothers, husbands to be
sacrificed? Was the nation crossing a Red Sea of anguish only to emerge
into the old bondage? Rather, let us fight at once for union and for
liberty!

Those who voiced this cry could not always see the difficulties that
beset the President. Many of them failed to realize that at heart he was
as true to freedom as they. Even Lowell, in the later _Biglow Papers_,
which pleaded with deeper pathos and power than before for freedom--even
he could write of "hoisting your captain's heart up with a derrick."
Wendell Phillips on one occasion, impatient of Lincoln's attitude toward
the fugitive slave law, called him "the slave-hound from Illinois."
Beecher,--who did great service, especially by his speeches in
England,--wrote in the _Independent_ a series of articles, to spur the
President to more pronounced action. Some one gave the articles to
Lincoln; he sat down and read them all, then rose to his feet
exclaiming, "Am I a dog?"

All this time the conservatives were no less urgent that the President
must make no move against slavery. Among their spokesmen was General
McClellan. On him rested the chief hope of the North for military
success during the year following the disaster of Bull Run. He was an
admirable organizer and a good theoretical strategist