ed the situation at last with a dull sense of pain and
despair, and tried to find consolation in devotion to work in the
hospitals which had begun to grow around the army of drilling
volunteers.

Events were moving now with swift march, and her championship of the
President gave her days of excitement which brought unexpected relief
from her gloomy thoughts. She was witnessing the first movements of the
National drama from the inside and its passion had stirred her
imagination. Her father's growing hatred of Abraham Lincoln left her in
no doubt as to whose master hand had guided the assaults on the rear of
his distracted administration.

The fall of Cameron, the Secretary of War, had been the work of her
father, with scarcely a suggestion from without. The Abolitionist had
determined to force Lincoln to free the slaves at once or destroy him
and his administration. They also were whispering the name of their
chosen dictator who would assume the reins of power on his downfall.

The President was equally clear in his determination not to allow his
hand to be forced and lose control of the Border Slave States, whose
influence and power were becoming each day more and more essential to
the preservation of the Union. He had succeeded in separating the
counties of Western Virginia and had created a new State out of them.
His policy of conciliation and forbearance was slowly, but surely,
welding Kentucky, Missouri and Maryland to the Nation.

Any tinkering at this moment with the question of Slavery would imperil
the loyalty of these four States. He held them now and he refused to
listen to any man or faction who asked him to loosen that grip.

The true policy of the Radicals, Senator Winter realized, was to fire
into the President's back through his generals in the field in an
emancipation crusade which would work the North into a frenzy of
passion. He had shrewdly calculated the chances, and he did not believe
that Lincoln would dare risk his career on a direct order revoking such
a proclamation.

General Hunger was the first to accept the mutinous scheme. He issued a
proclamation declaring all slaves within the lines of the Union army
forever free, and a wave of passionate excitement swept the North. The
quiet self-contained man in the White House did not wait to calculate
the force of this storm. He revoked Hunter's order before the ink was
dry on it.

Again Senator Winter invaded the Executive office:

"You dare