ry of the Treasury; Gideon
Welles, of great executive ability and untiring energy, became Secretary
of the Navy; Simon Cameron, an influential politician of Pennsylvania,
held the post of Secretary of War for a time, when he was succeeded by
Edwin M. Stanton, a man of immense capacity for work; Montgomery Blair,
a noted antislavery leader, was made Postmaster-General; Caleb B. Smith
became Secretary of the Interior; and Edward Bates, of Missouri,
Attorney-General. Every one of these cabinet ministers was a strong man,
and was found to be greater than he had seemed.

Jefferson Davis, of Mississippi, an old-time Democrat, was elected
President of the Southern Confederacy, and Alexander H. Stephens, a
prominent Whig of Georgia, Vice-President. Davis was born in Kentucky in
1808, and was a graduate of West Point. He was a Congressman on the
outbreak of the Mexican War, resigned his seat, entered the army, and
distinguished himself, rising to the rank of colonel. He was Secretary
of War in President Pierce's cabinet, and Senator from Mississippi on
the accession of President Buchanan,--a position which he held until the
secession of his State. He thus had had considerable military and
political experience. He was a man of great ability, but was proud,
reserved, and cold, "a Democrat by party name, an autocrat in feeling
and sentiment,--a type of the highest Southern culture, and exclusive
Southern caste." To his friends--and they were many, in spite of his
reserve--there was a peculiar charm in his social intercourse; he was
beloved in his family, and his private life was irreproachable. He
selected an able cabinet, among whom were Walker of Alabama, Toombs of
Georgia, and Benjamin of Louisiana. The Provisional Congress authorized
a regular army of ten thousand men, one hundred thousand volunteers, and
a loan of fifteen millions of dollars.

But actual hostilities had not as yet commenced. The Confederates,
during the close of Buchanan's administration, were not without hopes of
a peaceful settlement and recognition of secession, and several
conferences had taken place,--one overture being made even to the new
administration, but of course in vain.

The spark which kindled the conflagration--but little more than a month
after Lincoln's inauguration, April 12, 1861--was the firing on Fort
Sumter, and its surrender to the South Carolinians. This aroused both
the indignation and the military enthusiasm of the North, which in