Two-thirds of Virginia were in active rebellion, coerced originally into that position by her dependence for the sale of her slaves on the cotton States. Kentucky was doubtful, and divided. When the Federal troops prevailed, Kentucky was loyal; when the Confederate troops prevailed, Kentucky was rebellious. The condition in Missouri was much the same. These four States, by two of which the capital, with its District of Columbia, is surrounded, might be gained or might be lost. And these four States are susceptible of white labor--as much so as Ohio and Illinois--are rich in fertility, and rich also in all associations which must be dear to Americans. Without Virginia, Maryland, and Kentucky, without the Potomac, the Chesapeake, and Mount Vernon, the North would indeed be shorn of its glory! But it seemed to be in the power of the North to say under what terms secession should take place, and where should be the line. A Senator from South Carolina could never again sit in the same chamber with one from Massachusetts;but there need be no such bar against the border States. So much might at any rate be gained, and might stand hereafter as the product of all that money spent on 600,000 soldiers. But if the Northerners should now elect to throw themselves into a quarrel with England, if in the gratification of a shameless braggadocio they should insist on doing what they liked, not only with their own, but with the property of all others also, it certainly did seem as though utter ruin must await their cause. With England, or one might say with Europe, against them, secession must be accomplished, not on Northern terms, but on terms dictated by the South. The choice was then for them to make; and just at that time it seemed as though they were resolved to throw away every good card out of their hand. Such had been the ministerial wisdom of Mr. Seward. I remember hearing the matter discussed in easy terms by one of the United States Senators. "Remember, Mr. Trollope," he said to me, "we don't want a war with England. If the choice is given to us, we had rather not fight England. Fighting is a bad thing. But remember this also, Mr. Trollope, that if the matter is pressed on us, we have no great objection. We had rather not, but we don't care much one way or the other." What one individual may say to another is not of much moment, but this Senator was expressing the feelings of his constituents, who were the legislature of the State from whence he came. He was expressing the general idea on the subject of a large body of Americans. It was not that he and his State had really no objection to the war.
Such a war loomed terribly large before the minds of them all.
They know it to be fraught with the saddest consequences. It was so regarded in the mind of that Senator. But the braggadocio could not be omitted. Had be omitted it, he would have been untrue to his constituency.
When I left Boston for Washington, nothing was as yet known of what the English government or the English lawyers might say. This was in the first week in December, and the expected voice from England could not be heard till the end of the second week. It was a period of great suspense, and of great sorrow also to the more sober-minded Americans. To me the idea of such a war was terrible.
It seemed that in these days all the hopes of our youth were being shattered. That poetic turning of the sword into a sickle, which gladdened our hearts ten or twelve years since, had been clean banished from men's minds. To belong to a peace party was to be either a fanatic, an idiot, or a driveler. The arts of war had become everything. Armstrong guns, themselves indestructible but capable of destroying everything within sight, and most things out of sight, were the only recognized results of man's inventive faculties. To build bigger, stronger, and more ships than the French was England's glory. To hit a speck with a rifle bullet at 800 yards distance was an Englishman's first duty. The proper use for a young man's leisure hours was the practice of drilling. All this had come upon us with very quick steps since the beginning of the Russian war. But if fighting must needs be done, one did not feel special grief at fighting a Russian. That the Indian mutiny should be put down was a matter of course. That those Chinese rascals should be forced into the harness of civilization was a good thing. That England should be as strong as France--or, perhaps, if possible a little stronger--recommended itself to an Englishman's mind as a State necessity. But a war with the States of America! In thinking of it I began to believe that the world was going backward. Over sixty millions sterling of stock--railway stock and such like--are held in America by Englishmen, and the chances would be that before such a war could be finished the whole of that would be confiscated. Family connections between the States and the British isles are almost as close as between one of those islands and another. The commercial intercourse between the two countries has given bread to millions of Englishmen, and a break in it would rob millions of their bread. These people speak our language, use our prayers, read our books, are ruled by our laws, dress themselves in our image, are warm with our blood. They have all our virtues; and their vices are our own too, loudly as we call out against them. They are our sons and our daughters, the source of our greatest pride, and as we grow old they should be the staff of our age. Such a war as we should now wage with the States would be an unloosing of hell upon all that is best upon the world's surface. If in such a war we beat the Americans, they with their proud stomachs would never forgive us. If they should be victors, we should never forgive ourselves. I certainly could not bring myself to speak of it with the equanimity of my friend the Senator.