There was yesterday no meeting of the Cabinet. This morning the members
were notified to meet at twelve meridian. All were punctually on hand. The
President with Mr. Seward got home this morning. Both speak of the
interview with the Rebel commissioners as having been pleasant and without
acrimony. Seward did not meet or have interview with them until the President
arrived. No results were obtained, but the discussion will be likely to tend to
peace. In going the President acted from honest sincerity and without
pretension. Perhaps this may have a good effect, and perhaps otherwise. He
thinks he better than any agent can negotiate and arrange. Seward wants to do
this.
For a day or two, the naval appropriation bill has been under
consideration in the House. A combination, of which H. Winter Davis is the
leader, made it the occasion for an onset on the Department and the
Administration. The move was sneaking and disingenuous, very much in character
with Davis, who is unsurpassed for intrigue and has great talents for it. He
moved an amendment, having for its object a Board of Admiralty, which should
control the administration of the Department. The grounds of this argument were
that the Department had committed errors and he wanted a board of naval
officers to prevent it. He presents the British system for our guidance and of
course has full scope to assail and misrepresent whatever has been done. But,
unfortunately for Davis, the English are at this time considering the question
of abandoning their system.
Mr. Rice, Chairman of the Naval Committee, a Boston merchant, is reported
to have made a full and ample and most successful reply to Davis, who was voted
down. I have not doubted the result, but there was a more formidable effort
made than was at first apparent. The Speaker, who is not a fair and ingenuous
man, although he professes to be so, and also to be personally friendly to me,
is strictly factious and in concert with the extremists. In preparation for
this contest he had called General Schenck to the chair. Schenck is one of the
Winter Davis clique, and so far as he dare permit it to be seen, and more
distinctly than he supposes, has the sympathy of Colfax. Stevens, Chairman of
the Ways and Means, is of the same stripe. It is a combination of the radicals
prompted and assisted by Du Pont and Wilkes. Hitherto hating each other, and
invidiously drawing in others, the miserable wretched combinations of
malcontents and intriguers, political and naval, had flattered themselves they
should succeed. But they were voted down. I am told, however, that under the
rulings and management of the hypocritically sanctimonious Speaker the subject
is to be reopened.
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