sand newspapers, from 'Fundy' to
'Dolores.' And the most remarkable rhetorical feature of these many
dispatches is the absence of iteration, notwithstanding they were
written upon substantially one text. It is characteristic of them, as of
his speeches, that no one interlaces the other; each is complete of
itself. Mr. Seward has always possessed that varied fecundity of
expression for which Mr. Webster was admired. A gentleman who
accompanied him upon his Lincoln-election tour from Auburn to Kansas,
remarked, that listening to and recalling all the bye-play, depot
speeches, and more elaborate addresses uttered by Mr. Seward during the
campaign, he never heard him repeat upon himself, nor even speak twice
in the same groove of thought. Neither will any reader discover
throughout even these early dispatches a marked haste of thought, or a
slovenly word-link in the Saxon rhetoric.

So far, we have alluded only to the instructions prepared before
plenipotentiary departure. But the executive axe in the block of foreign
affairs having been scoured, and new faces having fully replaced the
decapitated heads in foreign diplomatic baskets, circulars, instructions
and dispatches daily accumulate, 'treading on each other's heels.' The
volume contains _one hundred and forty emanations_ from the pen of
Secretary Seward. How many more there exist is only known to the Cabinet
or the exigencies of secret service. Is not the bare arithmetical
announcement sufficient to satisfy the inquirer into Mr. Seward's
diplomatic assiduity? If not, will he please to remember as well Mr.
Seward's perusals of foreign mails, cabinet meetings, consultation of
archives or state papers or precedents, examinations into the relation
of domestic events to foreign policy, and the inspection of the sands of
peace or war in the respective hour-glasses of his department?

The circulars of Secretaries Black and Seward are promptly answered by
Mr. Dallas about a month after the inauguration, and whilst awaiting the
arrival of Charles Francis Adams. He said, among other things, 'English
opinion tends rather, I apprehend, to the theory that a peaceful
separation may work beneficially for both groups of States, and not
injuriously affect the rest of the world. The English can not be
expected to appreciate the weakness, discredit, complications and
dangers which _we_ instinctively and justly ascribe to disunion.'

In this connection, let us remark, that we recently