The policy which consented temporarily to another route was condemned as an unwise and undignified concession to a brutal mob, itself the tool of the secession leaders. That mob was expected to stay the march of Union troops until Washington should be captured. Its failure was felt to be the first rebel defeat of the campaign.

The other was the course of Senator Stephen A. Douglas, Mr. Lincoln's competitor for the Presidency. They had been political antagonists, and, as we have seen, had represented opposing policies. Mr. Douglas possessed great popular power. He had a commanding will was bold to audacity; as an orator, he had few equals, whether he spoke to the American Senate, or to the masses who gathered on the prairies of his own State. In the great uprising, there were whispers that there were parts of the State whose sympathies, from ancestry, trade and political affinities were with the South, and that they would not go with Mr. Lincoln in the coercion of sovereign States. It was said they would range themselves under another banner, and that the southern counties of Indiana were with them.

These localities had been devoted to Mr. Douglas, and had steadily and enthusiastically supported him. He waited on the Presi dent, and expressed his concurrence in the policy of calling out the troops and maintaining the national honor at all hazards, and on the 18th set his face toward the West.

Reaching Springfield, on the 25th he addressed the two houses of the Illinois Legislature in a style of magical power. He said:

"For the first time since the adoption of the Federal Constitution, a wide-spread conspiracy exists to overthrow the best government the sun of heaven ever shone upon. An invading army is marching upon Washington. The boast has gone forth from the Secretary of War of the so-called Confederate States, that by the first of May the rebel army will be in possession of the National Capital, and, by the first of July, its headquarters will be in old Independence Hall.

"The only question for us is, whether we shall wait supinely for the invaders, or rush, as one man, to the defence of that we hold most dear. Piratical flags are afloat on the ocean, under pretended letters of marque. Our Great River has been closed to the commerce of the Northwest.

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So long as a hope remained of peace, I plead and implored for compromise. Now, that all else has failed, there is but one course left, and that is to rally, as one man, under the flag of Washington, Jefferson, Hamilton, Madison and Franklin. At what time since the government was organized, have the constitutional rights of the South been more secure than now? For the first time since the Constitution

SENATOR DOUGLAS HIS LAST WORK.

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was adopted, there is no legal restriction against the spread of slavery in the territories. When was the Fugitive Slave Law more faithfully executed? What single act has been done to justify this mad attempt to overthrow the Republic? We are told that because a certain party has carried a Presidential election, therefore the South chose to consider their liberties insecure! I had supposed it was a fundamental principle of American institutions, that the will of the majority, constitutionally expressed, should govern! [Applause.] If a defeat at the ballot-box is to justify rebellion, the future history of the United States may be read in the past history of Mexico.

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"It is a prodigious crime against the freedom of the world, to attempt to blot the United States out of the map of Christendom. How long do you think it will be ere the guillotine is in operation? Allow me to say to my former political enemies, you will not be true to your country if you seek to make political capital out of these disasters [applause]; and to my old friends, you will be false and unworthy of your principles if you allow political defeat to convert you into traitors to your national land. [Prolonged applause.] The shortest way now to peace is the most stupendous and unanimous preparations for war, [Storms of applause.]

"Gentlemen, it is our duty to defend our Constitution and protect our flag."

While in Springfield, he and Governor Yates met. Between these two gentlemen there had been bitter feelings, growing out of political contests. But what were past party conflicts to them now, as they stood face to face, each bent on the salvation of his country? Nothing and less than nothing.

The Senator next proceeded to Chicago, where men of all parties hailed his coming with a grand ovation. He again spoke; this time -and the last in the "Republican Wigwam," the building in which was held the Convention which nominated his successful rival, Abraham Lincoln. It was an effort worthy the last public hours of the statesman's life. Its arguments were unanswerable-its appeals irresistible. He closed, returned to his rooms at the Tremont House, to die!

It is scarcely too much to say that those two speeches united the West, and prevented the horrors of civil war on this side of the Mississippi River. They were as the word of the prophets of old, falling upon the public conscience and the public heart. His voice had such power as had no other.

His speeches were transmitted by telegraph; they were copied into

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newspapers; they were read in all homes, and the cry sped from lip to lip-"Douglas sustains Lincoln !" In vain did the emissaries of Davis cry "No coercion." "Douglas sustains Lincoln," not as Lincoln, but as President of an assailed Republic," was too strong for their piping treason.

Lying in his sick-room, he dictated his last letter, on the 10th of May. It was addressed to Virgil Hickox, Chairman of the State Central Democratic Committee. In that he said: "It seems that some of my friends are unable to comprehend the difference between arguments used in favor of an equitable compromise, with the hope of averting the horrors of war, and those urged in support of the government and flag of our country, when war is being woged against the United States, with the avowed purpose of producing a permanent disruption of the Union and a total destruction of its government. In this view of the state of facts, there was but one path of duty left to patriotic men. It was not a party question, nor a question involving partisan policy; it was a question of government or no government; country or no country; and hence it became the imperative duty of every union man, every friend of constitutional liberty, to rally to the support of our common country, its government and flag, as the only means of checking the progress of revolution and preserving the Union.

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I trust the time will never come when I shall not be willing to make any needful sacrifice of personal feeling and party policy for the honor and integrity of the country."

And when the word "Douglas is dead," was flashed along the wires, men of all parties wept. They came from almost every county in Illinois, to look upon his remains as they lay in state in Bryan Hall; and as they passed the pile on which they rested, few looked upon them who did not feel that the last days of his life were incomparably the most glorious. He had crowned his pyramid with a capital of stars! The long procession which followed his body to the quiet grave on the western shore of the grand lake he so much loved, followed not the partisan-not the eloquent Senator-but Stephen A. Douglas, THE PATRIOT! Old strifes were forgotten; old blows forgiven; old feuds buried.

His words completed the majesty of the "Great Uprising;" they completed the prostration of party lines, and the unity of the people.

It is due to his memory that we place in this chapter some extracts from his last speech:

"I beg you to believe that I will not do you or myself the injustice to think that this magnificent ovation is personal to myself. I rejoice to know that it expresses your devotion to the Constitution, the Union, and the flag of our country. I will not conceal gratification at the uncontrovertible test this vast audience presents-that, what political differences or party questions may have divided us, yet you all had a conviction that, when the country should be in danger, my loyalty could be relied on. That the present danger is imminent, no man can conceal. If war must come→→ if the bayonet must be used to maintain the Constitution-I say before God, my conscience is clean. I have struggled long for a peaceful solution of the difficulty. I have not only tendered those States what was theirs of right, but I have gone to the very extreme of magnanimity.

"The return we receive is war; armies marched upon our Capital; obstructions and dangers to our navigation; letters of marque, to invite pirates to prey upon our commerce; a concerted movement to blot out the United States of America from tho map of the globe. The question is, Are we to maintain the country of our fathers, or allow it to be stricken down by those who, when they can no longer govern, threaten to destroy?

"What cause, what excuse do disunionists give us, for breaking up the best Government on which the sun of heaven ever shed its rays? They are dissatisfied with the result of the Presidential election. Did they never get beaten before? Are we to resort to the sword when we get defeated at the ballot box? I understand it that the voice of the people expressed in the mode appointed by the Constitution, must command the obedience of every citizen. They assume, on the election of a particular candidate, that their rights are not safe in the Union. What evidence do they present of this? I defy any man to show any act on which it is based. What act has been omitted to be done? I appeal to these assembled thousands, that so far as the constitutional rights of slaveholders are concerned, nothing has been done, and nothing omitted, of which they can complain.

"There has never been a time from the day that Washington was inaugurated first President of the United States, when the rights of the Southern States stood firmer under the laws of the land than they do now; there never was a time when they had not as good cause for disunion as they have to-day. What good cause have they now that has not existed under every administration?

"If they say the Territorial question-now, for the first time, there is no act of Congress prohibiting slavery anywhere. If it be the non-enforcement of the laws, the only complaints, that I have heard, have been of the too vigorous and faithful fulfillment of the Fugitive Slave Law? Then what reason have they?

"The slavery question is a mere excuse. The election of Lincoln is a mere pretext. The present secession movement is the result of an enormous conspiracy formed more than a year since, formed by leaders in the Southern Confederacy more than twelve months ago.

"But this is no time for the detail of causes. The conspiracy is now known.

Armies have been raised, war is levied to accomplish it. There are only two sides to the question. Every man must be for the United States or against it. There can be no neutrals in this war; only patriots-or traitors.

"Thank God, Illinois is not divided on this question. I know they expected to present a united South against a divided North. They hoped in the Northern States party questions would bring civil war between Democrats and Republicans, when the South would step in with her cohorts, aid one party to conquer the other, and then make easy prey of the victors. Their scheme was carnage and civil war in the North.

"There is but one way to defeat this. In Illinois it is being so defeated by closing up the ranks. War will thus be prevented on our own soil. While there was a hope for peace, I was ready for any reasonable sacrifice or compromise to maintain it. But when the question comes of war in the cotton fields of the South, or the corn fields of Illinois, I say the further off the better.

"I have said more than I intended to say. It is a sad task to discuss questions so fearful as civil war; but sad as it is, bloody and disastrous as I expect it will be, I express it as my conviction before God, that it is the duty of every American citizen to rally around the flag of his country.

"I thank you again for this magnificent demonstration. By it you show you have laid aside party strife. Illinois has a proud position-united, firm, determined never to permit the government to be destroyed."

The uprising of the people tendered to the Government all it wanted of men and means, only asking that there should be a short, sharp, earnest campaign, the speedy suppression of rebellion and the restoration of the Union.

From the outset the people were in advance of the calls of the government. They asked the privilege of going into war. They tendered brigades where the administration only asked for regiments. This uprising, on a scale of such grandeur, and with spirit so intense, was evidently unexpected to secessionists. They had so long vaunted themselves the masters of "Northern mudsills," that they had ended, greatly to their cost, in believing it themselves, and thought they had but to frown and Northern men would fly trembling to their retreats. They further expected Northern divisions to so weaken us as to counterbalance our numerical supremacy.

But instead of these things, they saw an outburst of military enthusiasm. They saw the nation of tradesmen suddenly a nation of soldiers, and a UNITED NORTH ready to do them battle for right of constitutional authority and for the majesty of law. And seeing that, they knew war awaited them, stern and uncompromising war, and they girded themselves to meet it.