nts. The apparent
effect of these figures would be a good deal heightened if it were
possible to make a correct addition in the case of each country for the
numbers killed or disabled in war up to the dates in question and for the
numbers serving afloat. Moreover, the North, when it was driven to
abandon the purely voluntary system, had not reached the point at which
the withdrawal of men from civil occupations could have been regarded
among the people as itself a national danger, or at which the Government
was compelled to deter some classes from enlisting; new industries
unconnected with the war were all the while springing up, and the
production and export of foodstuffs were increasing rapidly. For the
reasons which have been stated, there is nothing invidious in thus
answering an unavoidable question. Judged by any previous standard of
voluntary national effort, the North answered the test well. Each of our
related peoples must look upon the rally of its fathers and grandfathers
in the one case, its brothers and sons in the other, with mingled
feelings in which pride predominates, the most legitimate source of pride
in our case being the unity of the Empire. To each the question must
present itself whether the nations, democratic and otherwise, which have
followed from the first, or, like the South, have rapidly adopted a
different principle, have not, in this respect, a juster cause of pride.
In some of these countries, by common and almost unquestioning consent,
generation after generation of youths and men in their prime have held
themselves at the instant disposal of their country if need should arise;
and, in the absence of need and the absence of excitement, have
contentedly borne the appreciable sacrifice of training. With this it is
surely necessary to join a further question, whether the compulsion
which, under conscription, the public imposes on individuals is
comparable in its harshness to the sacrifice and the conflict of duties
imposed by the voluntary system upon the best people in all classes as
such.

From the manner in which the war arose it will easily be understood that
the South was quicker than the North in shaping its policy for raising
armies. Before a shot had been fired at Fort Sumter, and when only seven
of the ten Southern States had yet seceded, President Jefferson Davis had
at his command more than double the number of the United States Army as
it then was. He had already lawful