upted their ordinary routine of
business or pleasure, or seemed conscious of being engaged in any
serious struggle which required an effort. There was no hurry, no
bustle, no excitement, no fear, no misgiving. They seemed to regard
the war as a mere bagatelle, not worth being in earnest about. The
on-looker was almost angry with their apparent indifference, apparent
insensibility, and doubted if they moved at all, Yet move they did:
guided by an unerring instinct, they moved quietly on with an elemental
force, in spite of a timid and hesitating administration, in spite of
inexperienced, over-cautious, incompetent, or blundering military
commanders, whom they gently brushed aside, and desisted not till their
object was gained, and they saw the flag of the Union floating anew in
the breeze from the capitol of every State that dared secede. No man
could contemplate them without feeling that there was in them a latent
power vastly superior to any which they judged it necessary to put
forth. Their success proves to all that what, prior to the war, was
treated as American arrogance or self-conceit, was only the outspoken
confidence in their destiny as a Providential people, conscious that to
them is reserved the hegemony of the world.

Count de Maistre predicted early in the century the failure of the
United States, because they have no proper name; but his prediction
assumed what is not the fact. The United States have a proper name by
which all the world knows and calls them. The proper name of the
country is America: that of the people is Americans. Speak of
Americans simply, and nobody understands you to mean the people of
Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Peru, Chile, Paraguay, but everybody
understands you to mean the people of the United States. The fact is
significant, and foretells for the people of the United States a
continental destiny, as is also foreshadowed in the so-called "Monroe
doctrine," which France, during our domestic troubles, was permitted,
on condition of not intervening in our civil war in favor of the
rebellion, to violate.

There was no statesmanship in proclaiming the "Monroe doctrine," for
the statesman keeps always, as far as possible, his government free to
act according to the exigencies of the case when it comes up,
unembarrassed by previous declarations of principles. Yet the doctrine
only expresses the destiny of the American people, and which nothing
but their own fault can prevent them