To-night the
telegraph reports the evacuation of Fort Moultrie by the Federal troops by
order of the Executive, and the burning of the fort. There's something of the
"spirit of '76" in the army, surely; South Carolina having declared
herself a foe to the Union, how could those soldiers quietly give up one of the
old strongholds to the enemy, even at the President's command?
But what will the
end be? Is this secessionfarce to end with a tragedy? The South will suffer, by
insurrection and famine; there is every prospect of it; the way of
transgressors is hard, and we must expect it to be so. God grant that, whatever
must be the separate or mutual sufferings of North and South, these convulsions
may prove to be the dying struggles of slavery, and the birththroes of liberty.
It is just about a
year since "Brown of Ossawatomie" was hung in the South, for unwise
interference with slavery. He was not wholly a martyr; there were blood-stains
on his hands, though no murder was in his heart. He was a brave man and a
Christian, and his blood, unrighteously shed, still cries to heaven from the
ground. Who knows but this is the beginning of the answer? But that judicial murder
was not the only wrong for which the slaveholding South is now bringing herself
before the bar of judgment, before earth and heaven. The secret things of
darkness are coming to light, and the question will be decided rightly, I
firmly believe. And the South is to be pitied, as all hardened and blinded
wrong-doers should be! I believe the North will show herself a noble foe, if
foe the South determines to make her.
SOURCE: Daniel
Dulany Addison, “Lucy Larcom: Life, Letters, and Diary,” p. 81-2
No comments:
Post a Comment