The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No 3, September, 1862

We think that Mr. Trollope fails to appreciate principle when he likens the conflict between the two sections of our country to a quarrel between Mr. and Mrs. Jones, in which a mutual friend (England) is, from the very nature of the case, obliged to maintain neutrality, leaving the matter to the tender care of Sir Creswell. There never yet existed a mutual friend who, however little he interfered with a matrimonial difference, did not, in sympathy and moral support, take violent sides with one of the combatants; and Mr. Trollope would be first in taking up the cudgels against private wrong. The North has never wished for physical aid from England; but does Mr. Trollope remember what Mrs. Browning has so nobly and humanely written? 'Non-intervention in the affairs of neighboring States is a high political virtue; but non-intervention does not mean passing by on the other side when your neighbor falls among thieves, or Phariseeism would recover it from Christianity.' England, the greatest of actual nations, had a part to act in our war, and that part a noble one. Not the part of physical intervention for the benefit of Lancashire and of a confederacy founded upon slavery, which both Earl Russell and Lord Palmerston inform the world will not take place 'at present.' Not the part of hypercriticism and misconstruction of Northern 'Orders,' and affectionate blindness to Southern atrocities. But such a part as was worthy of the nation, one of whose greatest glories is that it gave birth to a Clarkson, a Sharpe, and a Wilberforce. And England has much to answer for, in that she has been found wanting, not in the cause of the North, but in the cause of humanity. Had she not always told us that we were criminals of the deepest dye not to do what she had done in the West-Indies, had she not always held out to the world the beacon-light of emancipation, there could be little censure cast upon the British ermine; but having laid claim to so white and moral a robe, she subjects herself to the very proper indignation of the anti-slavery party which now governs the North.

Mr. Trollope confesses that British sympathy is with the South, and further writes: 'It seems to me that some of us never tire in abusing the Americans and calling them names, for having allowed themselves to be driven into this civil war. We tell them that they are fools and idiots; we speak of their doings as though there had been some plain course by which the war might have been avoided; and we throw it in their teeth that they have no capability for war,' etc., etc. Contact with the English abroad sent us home convinced of English animosity, and this was before the Trent affair. A literary woman writes to America: 'There is only one person to whom I can talk freely upon the affairs of your country. Here in England, they say I have lived so long in Italy that I have become an American.' We have had nothing but abuse from the English press always, excepting a few of the liberal journals. Mill and Bright and Cobden alone have been prominent in their expression of good-will to the North. And this is Abolition England! History will record, that at the time when America was convulsed by the inevitable struggle between Freedom and Slavery, England, actuated by selfish motives, withheld that moral support and righteous counsel which would have deprived the South of much aid and comfort, brought the war to a speedier conclusion, gained the grateful confidence of the anti-slavery North, and immeasurably aided the abolition of human slavery.

It may be said that we of the North have no intention of touching the 'institution,' and therefore England can not sympathize with us. Whatever the theory of the administration at Washington may have been, he is insane as well as blind who does not see what is its practical tendency. In the same length of time, this tendency would have been much farther on the road to right had the strong arm of England wielded the moral power which should belong to it. Mr. Trollope says: 'The complaint of Americans is, that they have received no sympathy from England; but it seems to me that a great nation should not require an expression of sympathy during its struggle. Sympathy is for the weak, not for the strong. When I hear two powerful men contending together in argument, I do not sympathize with him who has the best of it; but I watch the precision of his logic, and acknowledge the effects of his rhetoric. There has been a whining weakness in the complaints made by Americans against England, which has done more to lower them, as a people, in my judgment, than any other part of their conduct during the present crisis.' It is true that at the beginning of this war the North did show a whining weakness for English approbation, of which it is sincerely to be hoped we have been thoroughly cured. We paid our mother-land too high a compliment—we gave her credit for virtues which she does not possess—and the disappointment incurred thereby has been bitter in the extreme. We were not aware, however, that a sincere desire for sympathy was an American peculiarity. We have long labored under the delusion that the English, even, were very indignant with Brother Jonathan during the Crimean war, when he failed to furnish the quota of sympathy which our cousins considered was their due, but which we could not give to a debauched 'sick man' whom, for the good of civilization, we wished out of the world as quickly as possible. But England was 'strong;' why should she have desired sympathy? For, according to Mr. Trollope's creed, the weak alone ought to receive sympathy. It seems to be a matter entirely independent of right and wrong with Mr. Trollope. It is sufficient for a man to prove his case to be 'strong,' for Mr. Trollope to side with his opponent. Demonstrate your weakness, whether it be physical, moral, or mental, and Mr. Trollope will fight your battles for you. On this principle—which, we are told, is English—the exiled princes of Italy, especially the Neapolitan-Bourbon, the Pope, Austria, and of course the Southern confederacy, should find their warmest sympathizers among true Britons, and perhaps they do; but Mr. Trollope, in spite of his theory, is not one of them.

The emancipationist should not look to England for aid or comfort, but it will be none the worse for England that she has been false to her traditions. 'I confess,' wrote Mrs. Browning—dead now a year—'that I dream of the day when an English statesman shall arise with a heart too large for England, having courage, in the face of his countrymen, to assert of some suggested policy: 'This is good for your trade, this is necessary for your domination; but it will vex a people hard by, it will hurt a people farther off, it will profit nothing to the general humanity; therefore, away with it! it is not for you or for me.'' The justice of the poet yet reigns in heaven only; and dare we dream—we who, sick at heart, are weighed down by the craft and dishonesty of our public men—of the possibility of such a golden age?

On the subject of religion as well, we are much at variance with Mr. Trollope. Of course, it is to be expected that one who says, 'I love the name of State and Church, and believe that much of our English well-being has depended on it; I have made up my mind to think that union good, and am not to be turned away from that conviction;' it is to be expected, we repeat, that such an one should consider religion in the States 'rowdy.' Surely, we will not quarrel with Mr. Trollope for this opinion, however much we may regret it; as we consider it the glory of this country, that while we claim for our moral foundation a fervent belief in God and an abiding faith in the necessity of religion, our government pays no premium to hypocrisy by having fastened to its shirts one creed above all other creeds, made thereby more respectable and more fashionable. 'It is a part of their system,' Mr. Trollope continues, 'that religion shall be perfectly free, and that no man shall be in any way constrained in that matter,' (and he sees nothing to thank God for in this system of ours!) 'consequently, the question of a man's religion is regarded in a free-and-easy manner.' That which we have gladly dignified by the name of religious toleration, (not yet half as broad as it should and will be,) Mr. Trollope degrades by the epithet of 'free-and-easy.' This would better apply were ours the toleration of indifference, instead of being a toleration founded upon the unshaken belief that God has endowed every human being with a conscience whose sufficiency unto itself, in matters of religious faith, we have no right to question. And we are convinced that this experiment, with which we started, has been good for our growth of mind and soul, as well as for our growth as a nation. Even Mr. Trollope qualifies our 'rowdyism,' by saying that 'the nation is religious in its tendencies, and prone to acknowledge the goodness of God in all things.'

And now we have done with fault-finding. For all that we hereafter quote from Mr. Trollope's book, we at once express our thanks and sympathy. He is 'strong,' but he is also human, and likes sympathy.

More than true, if such a thing could be, is Mr. Trollope's comments upon American politicians. 'The corruption of the venal politicians of the nation stinks aloud in the nostrils of all men. It behoves the country to look to this. It is time now that she should do so. The people of the nation are educated and clever. The women are bright and beautiful. Her charity is profuse; her philanthropy is eager and true; her national ambition is noble and honest—honest in the cause of civilization. But she has soiled herself with political corruption, and has disgraced the cause of republican government by those whom she has placed in her high places. Let her look to it NOW. She is nobly ambitious of reputation throughout the earth; she desires to be called good as well as great; to be regarded not only as powerful, but also as beneficent She is creating an army; she is forging cannon, and preparing to build impregnable ships of war. But all these will fail to satisfy her pride, unless she can cleanse herself from that corruption by which her political democracy has debased itself. A politician should be a man worthy of all honor, in that he loves his country; and not one worthy of contempt, in that he robs his country.' Can we plead other than guilty, when even now a Senator of the United States stands convicted of a miserable betrayal of his office? Will America heed the voice of Europe, as well as of her best friends at home, before it is too late? Again writes Mr. Trollope: ''It is better to have little governors than great governors,' an American said to me once. 'It is our glory that we know how to live without having great men over us to rule us.' That glory, if ever it were a glory, has come to an end. It seems to me that all these troubles have come upon the States because they have not placed high men in high places.' Is there a thinking American who denies the truth of this? And of our code of honesty—that for which Englishmen are most to be commended—what is truly said of us? 'It is not by foreign voices, by English newspapers, or in French pamphlets, that the corruption of American politicians has been exposed, but by American voices and by the American press. It is to be heard on every side. Ministers of the Cabinet, Senators, Representatives, State Legislatures, officers of the army, officials of the navy, contractors of every grade—all who are presumed to touch, or to have the power of touching, public money, are thus accused.... The leaders of the rebellion are hated in the North. The names of Jefferson Davis, Cobb, Toombs, and Floyd, are mentioned with execration by the very children. This has sprung from a true and noble feeling; from a patriotic love of national greatness, and a hatred of those who, for small party purposes, have been willing to lessen the name of the United States. But, in addition to this, the names of those also should be execrated who have robbed their country when pretending to serve it; who have taken its wages in the days of its great struggle, and at the same time have filched from its coffers; who have undertaken the task of steering the ship through the storm, in order that their hands might be deep in the meal-tub and the bread-basket, and that they might stuff their own sacks with the ship's provisions. These are the men who must be loathed by the nation—whose fate must be held up as a warning to others—before good can come.' How long are the American people to allow this pool of iniquity to stagnate, and sap the vitals of the nation? How long, O Lord! how long?

On the subject of education, Mr. Trollope—though indulging in a little pleasantry on young girls who analyze Milton—does us full justice. 'The one matter in which, as far as my judgment goes, the people of the United States have excelled us Englishmen, so as to justify them in taking to themselves praise which we can not take to ourselves or refuse to them, is the matter of education.... The coachman who drives you, the man who mends your window, the boy who brings home your purchases, the girl who stitches your wife's dress—they all carry with them sure signs of education, and show it in every word they utter.' But much as Mr. Trollope admires our system of public schools, he does not see much to extol in the at least Western way of rearing children. 'I must protest that American babies are an unhappy race. They eat and drink just as they please; they are never punished; they are never banished, snubbed, and kept in the background, as children are kept with us; and yet they are wretched and uncomfortable. My heart has bled for them as I have heard them squalling, by the hour together, in agonies of discontent and dyspepsia.' This is the type of child found by Mr. Trollope on Western steamboats; and we agree with him that beef-steaks, with pickles, produce a bad type of child; and it is unnecessary to confess to Mr. Trollope what he already knows, that pertness and irreverence to parents are the great faults of American youth. No doubt the pickles have much to do with this state of things.

While awarding high praise to American women en masse, Mr. Trollope mourns over the condition of the Western women with whom he came in contact, and we are sorry to think that these specimens form the rule, though of course exceptions are very numerous. 'A Western American man is not a talking man. He will sit for hours over a stove, with his cigar in his mouth and his hat over his eyes, chewing the cud of reflection. A dozen will sit together in the same way, and there shall not be a dozen words spoken between them in an hour. With the women, one's chance of conversation is still worse. 'It seemed as though the cares of this world had been too much for them.... They were generally hard, dry, and melancholy. I am speaking, of course, of aged females, from five-and-twenty, perhaps, to thirty, who had long since given up the amusements and levities of life.' Mr. Trollope's malediction upon the women of New-York whom he met in the street-cars, is well merited, so far as many of them are concerned; but he should bear in mind the fact that these 'many' are foreigners, mostly uneducated natives of the British isles. Inexcusable as is the advantage which such women sometimes take of American gallantry, the spirit of this gallantry is none the less to be commended, and the grateful smile of thanks from American ladies is not so rare as Mr. Trollope imagines. Mr. Trollope wants the gallantry abolished; we hope that rude women may learn a better appreciation of this gallantry by its abolition in flagrant cases only. Had Mr. Trollope once 'learned the ways' of New-York stages, he would not have found them such vile conveyances; but we quite agree with him in advocating the introduction of cabs. In seeing nothing but vulgarity in Fifth Avenue, and a thirst for gold all over New-York City, we think Mr. Trollope has given way to prejudice. There is no city so generous in the spending of money as New-York. Art and literature find their best patrons in this much-abused Gotham; and it will not do for one who lives in a glass house to throw stones, for we are not the only nation of shop-keepers. We do not blame Mr. Trollope, however, for giving his love to Boston, and to the men and women of intellect who have homes in and about Boston.

We are of opinion that Mr. Trollope is too severe upon our hotels; for faulty though they be, they are established upon a vastly superior plan to those of any other country, if we are to believe our own experience and that of the majority of travelers. Mr. Trollope sees no use of a ladies' parlor; but Mr. Trollope would soon see its indispensability were he to travel as an unprotected female of limited means. On the matter of the Post-Office, however, he has both our ears; and much that he says of our government, and the need of a constitutional change in our Constitution, deserves attention—likewise what he says of colonization. We do elevate unworthy persons to the altar of heroism, and are stupid in our blatant eulogies. It is sincerely to be regretted that so honest a writer did not devote two separate chapters to the important subjects of drunkenness and artificial heat, which, had he known us better, he would have known were undermining the American physique. He does treat passingly of our hot-houses, but seems not to have faced the worse evil. Of our literature, and of our absorption of English literature, Mr. Trollope has spoken fully and well; and in his plea for a national copyright, he might have further argued its necessity, from the fact that American publishers will give no encouragement to unknown native writers, however clever, so long as they can steal the brains of Great Britain.

To conclude. We like Mr. Trollope's book, for we believe him when he says: 'I have endeavored to judge without prejudice, and to hear with honest ears, and to see with honest eyes.' We have the firmest faith in Mr. Trollope's honesty. We know he has written nothing that he does not conscientiously believe, and he has given unmistakable evidence of his good-will to this country. We are lost in amazement when he tells us: 'I know I shall never again be at Boston, and that I have said that about the Americans which would make me unwelcome as a guest if I were there.' Said what? We should be thin-skinned, indeed, did we take umbrage at a book written in the spirit of Mr. Trollope's. On the contrary, the Americans who are interested in it are agreeably disappointed in the verdict which he has given of them; and though they may not accept his political opinions, they are sensible enough to appreciate the right of each man to his honest convictions. Mr. Trollope, though he sees in our future not two, but three, confederacies, predicts a great destiny for the North. We can see but a union of all—a Union cemented by the triumph of freedom in the abolition of that which has been the taint upon the nation. If Mr. Trollope's prophecies are fulfilled, (and God forbid!) it will be because we have allowed the golden hour to escape. Pleased as we are with Mr. Trollope the writer—who has not failed to appreciate the self-sacrifice of Northern patriotism—Mr. Trollope the man has a far greater hold upon our heart; a hold which has been strengthened, rather than weakened, by his book. The friends of Mr. Trollope extend to him their cordial greeting, and Boston in particular will offer a hearty shake of the hand to the writer of North-America, whenever he chooses to take that hand again.

UP AND ACT

The man who is not convinced, by this time, that the Union has come to 'the bitter need,' must be hard to convince. For more than one year we have put off doing our utmost, and talked incessantly of the 'wants of the enemy.' We have demonstrated a thousand times that they wanted quinine and calomel, beef and brandy, with every other comfort, luxury, and necessary, and have ended by discovering that they have forced every man into their army; that they have, at all events, abundance of corn-meal, raised by the negroes whom Northern Conservatism has dreaded to free; that they are well supplied with arms from Abolition England, and that every day finds them more and more warlike and inured to war.

Time was, we are told, when a bold, 'radical push' would have prevented all this. Time was, when those who urged such vigorous and overwhelming measures—and we were among them—were denounced as insane and traitorous by the Northern Conservative press. Time was, when the Irishman's policy of capturing a horse in a hundred-acre lot, 'by surrounding him,' might have been advantageously exchanged for the more direct course of going at him. Time was, when there were very few troops in Richmond. All this when time—and very precious time—was.

Just now, time is—and very little time to lose, either. The rebels, it seems, can live on corn-meal and whisky as well under tents as they once did in cabins. They are building rams and 'iron-clads,' and very good ones. They have an immense army, and three or four millions of negroes to plant for it and feed it. Hundreds of thousands of acres of good corn-land are waving in the hot breezes of Dixie. These are facts of the strongest kind—so strong that we have actually been compelled to adopt some few of the 'radical and ruinous' measures advocated from the beginning by 'an insane and fanatical band of traitors,' for whose blood the New-York Herald and its weakly ape, the Boston Courier, have not yet ceased to howl or chatter. Negroes, it seems, are, after all, to be employed sometimes, and all the work is not to be put upon soldiers who, as the correspondent of the London Times has truly said, have endured disasters and sufferings caused by unpardonable neglect, such as no European troops would have borne without revolt. It is even thought by some hardy and very desperate 'radicals,' that negroes may be armed and made to fight for the Union; in fact, it is quite possible that, should the North succeed in resisting the South a year or two longer, or should we undergo a few more very great disasters, we may go so far as to believe what a great French writer has declared in a work on Military Art, that 'War is war, and he wages it best who injures his enemy most.' We are aware of the horror which this fanatical radical, and, of course, Abolitionist axiom, by a writer of the school of Napoleon, must inspire, and therefore qualify the assertion by the word 'may.' For to believe that the main props of the enemy are to be knocked away from under them, and that we are to fairly fight them in every way, involves a desperate and un-Christian state of mind to which no one should yield, and which would, in fact, be impious, nay, even un-democratic and un-conservative.

It is true that by 'throwing grass' at the enemy, as President Lincoln quaintly terms it, by the anaconda game, and above all, by constantly yelling, 'No nigger!' and 'Down with the Abolitionists!' we have contrived to lose some forty thousand good soldiers' lives by disease; to stand where we were, and to have myriads of men paralyzed and kept back from war just at the instant when their zeal was most needed. We beg our readers to seriously reflect on this last fact. There are numbers of essential and bold steps in this war, and against the enemy, which must, in the ordinary course of events, be taken, as for instance. General Hunter's policy of employing negroes, as General Jackson did. With such a step, honestly considered, no earthly politics whatever has any thing to do. Yet every one of these sheer necessities of war which a Napoleon would have grasped at the first, have been promptly opposed as radical, traitorous, and infernal, by those tories who are only waiting for the South to come in again to rush and lick its hands as of old. Every measure, from the first arming of troops down to the employment of blacks, has been fought by these 'reactionaries' savagely, step by step—we might add, in parenthesis, that it has been amusing to see how they 'ate dirt,' took back their words and praised these very measures, one by one, as soon as they saw them taken up by the Administration. The ecco la fica of Italian history was a small humiliation to that which the 'democratic' press presented when it glorified Lincoln's 'remuneration message,' and gilded the pill by declaring it (Heaven knows how!) a splendid triumph over Abolition—that same remuneration doctrine which, when urged in the New-York Tribune, and in these pages, had been reviled as fearfully 'abolition!'

However, all these conservative attacks in succession on every measure which any one could see would become necessities from a merely military point of view, have had their inevitable result: they have got into the West, and have aided Secession, as in many cases they were intended to do. The plain, blunt man, seeing what must be adopted if the war is to be carried on in earnest, and yet hearing that these inevitable expediencies were all 'abolition,' became confused and disheartened. So that it is as true as Gospel, that in the West, where 'Abolition' has kept one man back from the Union, 'Conservatism' has kept ten. And the proof may be found that while in the West, as in the East, the better educated, more intelligent, and more energetic minds, have at once comprehended the necessities of the war, and dared the whole, 'call it Abolition or not,' the blinder and more illiterate, who were afraid of being 'called' Abolitionists, have kept back, or remained by Secession altogether.

As we write, a striking proof of our news comes before us in a remark in an influential and able Western conservative journal, the Nebraska News, The remark in question is to the effect that the proposition made by us in The Continental Monthly, to partition the confiscated real estate of the South among the soldiers of the Federal army is nothing more nor less than 'a bribe for patriotism.' That is the word.

Now, politics apart—abolition or no abolition—we presume there are not ten rational men in the country who believe that the proposition to colonize Texas in particular, with free labor, or to settle free Northern soldiers in the cotton country of the South, is other than judicious and common-sensible. If it will make our soldiers fight any better, it certainly is not very much to be deprecated. To settle disbanded volunteers in the South so as to gradually drive away slave labor by the superior value of free labor on lands confiscated or public, is certainly not a very reprehensible proposition. But it originated, as all the more advanced political proposals of the day do, with men who favor Emancipation, present or prospective, and therefore it must be cried down! The worst possible construction is put upon it. It is 'a bribe for patriotism,' and must not be thought of. 'Better lose the victory,' says Conservatism, 'rather than inspire the zeal of our soldiers by offering any tangible reward!' We beg our thousands of readers in the army to note this. Since we first proposed in these columns to properly reward the army by giving to each man his share of cotton-land, [we did not even go so far as to insist that the land should absolutely be confiscated, knowing well, and declaring, that Texas contains public land enough for this purpose,] the democratic-conservative-pro-slavery press, especially of the West, has attacked the scheme with unwonted vigor. For the West understands the strength latent in this proposal better than the East; it knows what can be done when free Northern vigor goes to planting and town-building; it 'knows how the thing is done;' it 'has been there,' and sees in our 'bribe for patriotism' the most deadly blow ever struck at Southern Aristocracy. Consequently those men who abuse Emancipation in its every form, violently oppose our proposal to give the army such reward as their services merit, and such as their residence in the South renders peculiarly fit. It is 'a bribe;' it is extravagant; it—yes—it is Abolition! The army is respectfully requested not to think of settling in the South, but to hobble back to alms-houses in order that Democracy may carry its elections and settle down in custom-houses and other snug retreats.

And what do the anti-energy, anti-action, anti-contraband-digging, anti-every thing practical and go-ahead in the war gentlemen propose to give the soldier in exchange for his cotton-land? Let the soldier examine coolly, if he can, the next bullet-wound in his leg. He will perceive a puncture which will probably, when traced around the edge and carefully copied, present that circular form generally assigned to a—cipher. This represents, we believe, with tolerable accuracy, what the anti-actionists and reactionists propose to give the soldier as a recompense for that leg. For so truly as we live, so true is it that there is not one anti-Emancipationist in the North who is not opposed to settling the army or any portion of it in the South, simply because to do any thing which may in any way interfere with 'the Institution,' or jar Southern aristocracy, forms no part of their platform!

We believe this to be as plain a fact as was ever yet submitted to living man.

Now, are we to go to work in earnest, to boldly grasp at every means of honorable warfare, as France or England would do in our case, and overwhelm the South, or are we going to let it alone? Are we, for years to come, to slowly fight our way from one small war-expediency to another, as it may please the mongrel puppies of Democracy to gradually get their eyes opened or not? Are we to arm the blacks by and by, or wait till they shall have planted another corn-crop for the enemy? Shall we inspire the soldiers by promising them cotton-lands now, or wait till we get to the street of By and By, which leads to the house of Never? Would we like to have our victory now, or wait till we get it?