I am
speaking now solely of the resources which can be made available for
_carrying on_ the war: these, I think, will be found sufficient for its
probable duration. With the commercial future or national credit of the
Northern States this question has nothing to do; it is not difficult to
foresee how both must inevitably be compromised by the load of debt
which swells portentously with every hour of warfaring. But if we have
been wont to undervalue the strength of Federaldom, latent and
displayed, we have perhaps scarcely realized how very unsubstantial and
slippery are its presumed points of vantage.
First, take the North great battle or, rather,
stalking-horse--Abolition.
Let no reader be here unnecessarily alarmed. On that terrible slave
question, over which wiser brains have puzzled, till they became lost in
a labyrinth of self-contradiction, I purpose to speak only a few cursory
words. It is beyond dispute that a vast extent of the richest land in
the South can only be kept in cultivation by the Africans, who can
thrive and fatten where the white man withers helplessly. No one that
has realized the present state of our own West Indian colonies, will
believe that the enfranchised negro can be depended upon as a daily
laborer for hire. The listless indolence inherent in all tropical races
_will_ assert itself, as soon as free agency begins or is restored.
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