almost against hope to avert the calamities of
war and to effect a reunion and reconciliation with our brethren
of the South. I yet hope it may be done, but I am not able to
point out to you how it may be effected. Nothing short of Providence
can reveal to us the issue of this great struggle. Bloody--calamitous
--I fear it will be. May we so conduct it if a collision must
come, that we will stand justified in the eyes of Him who knows
our hearts and who will judge our every act. We must not yield to
resentments, nor to the spirit of vengeance, much less to the desire
for conquest or ambition.

"I see no path of ambition open in a bloody struggle for triumph
over my own countrymen. There is no path for ambition open for me
in a divided country, after having so long served a united and
glorious country. Hence, whatever we may do must be the result of
conviction, of patriotic duty--the duty that we owe to ourselves,
to our posterity, and to the friends of constitutional liberty and
self-government throughout the world.

"My friends, I can say no more. To discuss these topics is the
most painful duty of my life. It is with a sad heart--with a grief
that I have never before experienced, that I have to contemplate
this fearful struggle; but I believe in my conscience that it is
a duty we owe ourselves and our children and our God, to protect
this Government and that flag from every assailant, be he who he
may."

Of all the members of that joint assembly who listened to the
eloquence of Senator Douglas that evening, forty-nine years ago,
aside from Dr. William Jayne of Springfield, and myself, I do not
know of a single one now living.

After he concluded his address, the joint session of the Legislature
dissolved. He and I remained together in conversation, and I
accompanied him to his hotel. During that talk he expressed to me
the great anxiety which he felt for the safety of the country and
the preservation of the Union. I am satisfied that it was his
ambition to enter the army and possibly lead it in suppressing the
Rebellion. What would have been the result in that case, no one
can tell; but I am inclined to think that he would have made a very
great general.

Senator Douglas's Springfield speech had a tremendous effect on
public opinion. It brought his followers, and they were legion in
all parts of the country, to the support of the Government and the
North.

Senator Douglas went from Springfield