sses lovelier, kinder hearted, and more distinguished women. To
commence with the immortal Washington, the list of statesmen who
have taken part in the government of the United States shows that
all those who have shed a lustre on the country, and won the
admiration of Europe, owed their being to that much abused South.

'Is it true that so much distinction, talent, and grandeur of soul
could have sprung from all the vices, from the cruelty and
corruption which one would fain attribute now to the Southern
people? The laws of inflexible logic refute these false imputations.
And--strange coincidence--while Southern men presided over the
destinies of the Union, its gigantic prosperity was the astonishment
of the world. In the hands of Northern men, that edifice, raised
with so much care and labor by their predecessors, comes crashing
down, threatening to carry with it in its fall the industrial future
of every other nation. For long years the constant efforts of the
North, and a certain foreign country, to spread among the blacks
incendiary pamphlets and tracts have powerfully contributed to
suspend every Southern movement towards emancipation. Its people
have been compelled to close their ears to ideas which threatened
their very existence.'"

"But," said Mr. North, "here we have been, for thirty years or more,
living on an anti-slavery excitement. Grant that it is all wrong; will
you ask or expect that we shall change all at once? in a week? or in a
month? or in a year? We will not kneel to anybody; if we change, it must
be upon conviction."

"I strike hands with you there," said I, "most heartily. Our Southern
friends must understand this; they must now approach us once more with
reason and persuasion. The people at large are in a frame to be reasoned
with and persuaded; for if we can do anything within the bounds of
reason to retain the South in the Union, it will be done. We will say of
concession as the antithesis of secession, as was said of two other
things: 'Millions for defence, but not a cent for tribute.' I think that
both sections need forgiveness of God, and of each other."

"Well," said Mr. North, "after all we shall get along and get through,
even if there should be a separation."

"Mr. Worth," said I, "when you were studying Cicero, could you
understand--for I could not--how he and other patriots could feel so
strongly about t