was strongly in
favor of their Southern brethren; but they were anxious for peace, and
for a compromise being arrived at. Whether the North would agree to
admit the constitutional right of secession, or whether it would use
force to compel the seceding States to remain in the Union, was still
uncertain; but the idea of a civil war was so terrible a one that the
general belief was that some arrangement to allow the States to go their
own way would probably be arrived at.

For the time the idea of Vincent going to West Point was abandoned.
Among his acquaintances were several young men who were already at West
Point, and very few of these returned to the academy. The feeling there
was very strongly on the side of secession. A great majority of the
students came from the Southern States, as, while the sons of the
Northern men went principally into trade and commerce, the Southern
planters sent their sons into the army, and a great proportion of the
officers of the army and navy were Southerners.

As the professors at West Point were all military men, the feeling among
them, as well as among the students, was in favor of State rights; they
considering that, according to the Constitution, their allegiance was
due first to the States of which they were natives, and in the second
place to the Union. Thus, then, many of the professors who were natives
of the seven States which had seceded resigned their appointments, and
returned home to occupy themselves in drilling the militia and the
levies, who were at once called to arms.

Still all hoped that peace would be preserved, until on the 11th of
April General Beauregard, who commanded the troops of South Carolina,
summoned Major Anderson, who was in command of the Federal troops in
Fort Sumter, to surrender, and on his refusal opened fire upon the fort
on the following day.

On the 13th the barracks of the fort being set on fire, Major Anderson,
seeing the hopelessness of a prolonged resistance, surrendered. The
effect of the news throughout the United States was tremendous, and Mr.
Lincoln at once called out 75,000 men of the militia of the various
States to put down the rebellion--the border States being ordered to
send their proportion. This brought matters to a climax. Virginia, North
Carolina, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Missouri all refused to furnish
contingents to act against the Southern States; and Virginia and North
Carolina a few days later passed Ordinances of Sece