ffectual
resistance, by lying supinely on our backs and hugging the delusive
phantom of hope, until our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot? Sir,
we are not weak, if we make a proper use of the means which the God of
nature hath placed in our power. Three millions of people, armed in the
holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as that which we possess, are
invincible by any force which our enemy can send against us. Besides, Sir,
we shall not fight our battles alone. There is a just God who presides
over the destinies of nations; and who will raise up friends to fight our
battles for us. The battle, Sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the
vigilant, the active, the brave. Besides, Sir, we have no election. If we
were base enough to desire it, it is now too late to retire from the
contest. There is no retreat, but in submission and slavery. Our chains
are forged! Their clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston! The war
is inevitable--and let it come! I repeat it, Sir, let it come!--It is
vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry peace, peace--but
there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale that sweeps
from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! Our
brethren are already in the field. Why stand we here, idle? Is life so
dear, is peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and
slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take;
but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death.

--Patrick Henry.

The pictures in the American newspapers of the starving reconcentrados are
true. They can all be duplicated by the thousands. I never before saw,
and please God, I may never again see, so deplorable a sight as the
reconcentrados in the suburbs of Matanzas. I can never forget to my dying
day the hopeless anguish in their despairing eyes. Huddled about their
little bark huts, they raised no voice of appeal to us for alms as we went
among them.... Men, women, and children stand silent, famishing with
hunger. Their only appeal comes from their sad eyes, through which one
looks as through an open window into their agonizing souls.

The Government of Spain has not appropriated and will not appropriate one
dollar to save these people. They are now being attended and nursed and
administered to by the charity of the United States. Think of the
spectacle! We are feeding the citizens of Spain; we are nursing their
sick; we are saving