Lincoln from the President of the Confederacy." If this were
objectionable as an apparent recognition of Davis as President of
an independent nation, then Mr. Stephens' mission was to forthwith
terminate. Admiral Lee wired to Mr. Lincoln Mr. Stephens' arrival,
his mission, and desire to proceed to Washington. Mr. Lincoln did
not stand on punctilio. He was, at first, inclined to send a long
dispatch refusing Mr. Stephens permission to go to Washington, and
saying nothing would be received "assuming the independence of the
Confederate States, and anything will be received, and carefully
considered by him, when offered by any influential person or persons,
in terms not assuming the independence of the so-called Confederate
States." This was, however, decided to be too much in detail, and
the Secretary of the Navy was ordered to telegraph Admiral Lee:

"The request of A. H. Stephens is inadmissible. The customary
agents and channels are adequate for all needful communication and
conference between the United States and the insurgents."

This ended Mr. Stephens' first plans to secure peace. He, in his
book written since the war, admits or pretends that the ulterior
purpose of his proposed trip to Washington was, through a correspondence
that would be published, "to deeply impress the growing constitutional
(_sic!_) party at the North with a full realization of the true
nature and ultimate tendencies of the war . . . that the surest
way to maintain their liberties was to allow us the separate
enjoyment of ours."( 4)

Great events took place the day Mr. Stephens reached Fortress
Monroe. Vicksburg fell and Lee was, on that memorable Fourth of
July, sending off his wounded, preparatory to a retreat from the
fated field of Gettysburg.

Horace Greeley, a sincere enemy to slavery, who had somehow become
imbued with the notion that the Administration was responsible for
a prolongation of the war, became restless and complaining. He,
at the head of the New York _Tribune_, gave vent to much criticism,
which encouraged those in rebellion, and their friends in the North.
He listened to all sorts of pretenders and, finally, was duped into
the belief that a peace could be made through some Southern emissaries
in Canada. An adventurer calling himself "William Cornell Jewett
of Colorado," from Niagara Falls, July 5, 1864, wrote Mr. Greeley:

"I am authorized to say to you . . . that two ambassadors of Davis
& Co. are now i