, no doubt, intended to help the foes
of the Union, and dishearten or dismay its friends, the really loyal
People, understanding their fell object, paid little heed to them. The
predictions of these Prophets of evil fell flat upon the ears of lovers
of their Country. Conspirators, however much they might masquerade in
the raiment of Loyalty, could not wholly conceal the ear-marks of
Treason. The hand might be the hand of Esau, but the voice was the
voice of Jacob.

On the 8th of June--after a month of terrific and bloody fighting
between the immediate forces of Grant and Lee--a dispatch from Sherman,
just received at Washington, was read to the House of Representatives,
which said: "The Enemy is not in our immediate front, but his signals
are seen at Lost Mountain, and Kenesaw." So, at the same time, at the
National Capital, while the friends of the Union there, were not
immediately confronted with an armed Enemy, yet the signals of his
Allies could be seen, and their fire upon our rear could be heard, daily
and almost hourly, both in the Senate and the House of Representatives.

The fight in the House, upon the Thirteenth Amendment, now seemed
indeed, to be reaching a climax. During the whole of June 14th, until
midnight, speech after speech on the subject, followed each other in
rapid succession. Among the opposition speeches, perhaps those of
Fernando Wood and Holman were most notable for extravagant and
unreasoning denunciation of the Administration and Party in power--whose
every effort was put forth, and strained at this very time to the
utmost, to save the Union.

Holman, for instance, declared that, "Of all the measures of this
disastrous Administration, each in its turn producing new calamities,
this attempt to tamper with the Constitution threatens the most
permanent injury." He enumerated the chief measures of the
Administration during its three and a half years of power-among them the
Emancipation Proclamation, the arming of the Blacks, and what he
sneeringly termed "their pet system of finance" which was to "sustain
the public credit for infinite years," but which "even now," said he,
"totters to its fall!" And then, having succeeded in convincing himself
of Republican failure, he exultingly exclaimed: "But why enumerate?
What measure of this Administration has failed to be fatal! Every step
in your progress has been a mistake. I use the mildest terms of
censure!"

Fernando Wood, in his turn