The usual panacea of palaver
was tried; Congress did its best to add to the general confusion of
thought; and, as if that were not enough, a Convention of Notables
called simultaneously to thresh the straw of debate anew, and to
convince thoughtful persons that men do not grow wiser as they grow
older. So in the two Congresses the notables talked,--in the one,
those who ought to be shelved, in the other, those who were shelved
already,--while those who were too thoroughly shelved for a seat in
either addressed Great Union Meetings at home. Not a man of them but had
a compromise in his pocket, adhesive as Spalding's glue, warranted to
stick the shattered Confederacy together so firmly, that, if it over
broke again, it must be in a new place, which was a great consolation.
If these gentlemen gave nothing very valuable to the people of the Free
States, they were giving the Secessionists what was of inestimable
value to them,--Time. The latter went on seizing forts, navy-yards, and
deposits of Federal money, erecting batteries, and raising and arming
men at their leisure; above all, they acquired a prestige, and
accustomed men's minds to the thought of disunion, not only as possible,
but actual.
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