, that new forts
are continually erected, that the fear of an attack on Washington is
still paramount, and that to-day--sixty to seventy thousand troops
are kept idle in these old and new forts--when Rosecrans has no
succor, when Texas is lost, and when the whole rebel region
trembles under the tread of savage hordes.

Through one of its clerks, the State Department intends to sue me
for libel, contained, as they say, in the first volume of my
_Diary_. Well, great masters, if you swallow me, you may not digest
me. Let us try.[2]

[Footnote 2: I must here record that Mr. Carlisle, the
eminent lawyer in Washington, although in every respect
opposed to my political and social views, behaved, in this
affair, as a thorough man of honor. I am sorry that on a
similar former occasion, not in Washington, my political
friends showed themselves not Carlisles.]

_February 10._--... mens agitat molem ... oh, could I only believe
that such is the case with Mr. Lincoln, how devoted I could become,
and loyal to him, according to the new theory of the lickspittles
and politicians!

_February 10._--Resolute Senator Grimes did what was the duty of
Sumner to have done long ago. Grimes presented resolutions relative
to the mission of Mercier to Richmond, a mission allowed, almost
authorized by Mr. Seward. Mercier cannot be blamed, and his veracity
is supported by the fact that Lord Lyons was at once informed of the
whole transaction, and Lord Lyons is to be believed. Seward will
play the innocent, and take his refuge in the god of--lies.

_February 12._--In his answer to the Senate, Mr. Seward gives to
Mercier the lie direct. It will be rich if Mercier stands square.

_February 12._--Congress draws to its close. Lincoln accumulates
powers, responsibilities, and hereafter perhaps curses, sufficient
to break the turtle on which stands the elephant that sustains the
Sanscrit world.

_February 13._--The almost imperceptible ripple on the diplomatic pool
of Washington has disappeared. Simple people might have believed that
there was an issue of veracity between Mr. Seward and the French
Minister. But since a long, a very long time, Seward and veracity have
run in different orbits, and diplomats, Talleyrand-like, ought to be
the incarnation of equanimity even if any one--diplomatically--treads
on their toes. Besides, the answer given to the Senate before it
reached its destination _m