And the Christmas piece which the actors were playing proceeded like a piece in a dream.To make the grand comic performance doubly comic, my neighbor presently informed me how one of the best friends I had in America--the most hospitable, kindly, amiable of men, from whom I had twice received the warmest welcome and the most delightful hospitality--was a prisoner in Fort Warren, on charges by which his life perhaps might be risked.I think that was the most dismal Christmas fun which these eyes ever looked on.
Carry out that notion a little farther, and depict ten thousand, a hundred thousand homes in England saddened by the thought of the coming calamity, and oppressed by the pervading gloom.My next-door neighbor perhaps has parted with her son.Now the ship in which he is, with a thousand brave comrades, is ploughing through the stormy midnight ocean.Presently (under the flag we know of) the thin red line in which her boy forms a speck, is winding its way through the vast Canadian snows.Another neighbor's boy is not gone, but is expecting orders to sail; and some one else, besides the circle at home maybe, is in prayer and terror, thinking of the summons which calls the young sailor away.By firesides modest and splendid, all over the three kingdoms, that sorrow is keeping watch, and myriads of hearts beating with that thought, "Will they give up the men?"I don't know how, on the first day after the capture of the Southern Commissioners was announced, a rumor got abroad in London that the taking of the men was an act according to law, of which our nation could take no notice.It was said that the law authorities had so declared, and a very noble testimony to the LOYALTY of Englishmen, Ithink, was shown by the instant submission of high-spirited gentlemen, most keenly feeling that the nation had been subject to a coarse outrage, who were silent when told that the law was with the aggressor.The relief which presently came, when, after a pause of a day, we found that law was on our side, was indescribable.The nation MIGHT then take notice of this insult to its honor.Never were people more eager than ours when they found they had a right to reparation.
I have talked during the last week with many English holders of American securities, who, of course, have been aware of the threat held over them."England," says the New York Herald, "cannot afford to go to war with us, for six hundred millions' worth of American stock is owned by British subjects, which, in event of hostilities, would be confiscated; and we now call upon the Companies not to take it off their hands on any terms.Let its forfeiture be held over England as a weapon in terrorem.British subjects have two or three hundred millions of dollars invested in shipping and other property in the United States.All this property, together with the stocks, would be seized, amounting to nine hundred millions of dollars.
Will England incur this tremendous loss for a mere abstraction?"Whether "a mere abstraction" here means the abstraction of the two Southern Commissioners from under our flag or the abstract idea of injured honor, which seems ridiculous to the Herald, is it needless to ask.I have spoken with many men who have money invested in the States, but I declare I have not met one English gentleman whom the publication of this threat has influenced for a moment.Our people have nine hundred millions of dollars invested in the United States, have they? And the Herald "calls upon the Companies" not to take any of this debt off our hands.Let us, on our side, entreat the English press to give this announcement every publicity.Let us do everything in our power to make this "call upon the Americans" well known in England.I hope English newspaper editors will print it, and print it again and again.It is not we who say this of American citizens, but American citizens who say this of themselves."Bull is odious.We can't bear Bull.He is haughty, arrogant, a braggart, and a blusterer; and we can't bear brag and bluster in our modest and decorous country.We hate Bull, and if he quarrels with us on a point in which we are in the wrong, we have goods of his in our custody, and we will rob him!" Suppose your London banker saying to you, "Sir, I have always thought your manners disgusting, and your arrogance insupportable.You dare to complain of my conduct because I have wrongfully imprisoned Jones.My answer to your vulgar interference is, that I confiscate your balance!"What would be an English merchant's character after a few such transactions? It is not improbable that the moralists of the Herald would call him a rascal.Why have the United States been paying seven, eight, ten per cent for money for years past, when the same commodity can be got elsewhere at half that rate of interest? Why, because though among the richest proprietors in the world, creditors were not sure of them.So the States have had to pay eighty millions yearly for the use of money which would cost other borrowers but thirty.Add up this item of extra interest alone for a dozen years, and see what a prodigious penalty the States have been paying for repudiation here and there, for sharp practice, for doubtful credit.Suppose the peace is kept between us, the remembrance of this last threat alone will cost the States millions and millions more.If they must have money, we must have a greater interest to insure our jeopardized capital.Do American Companies want to borrow money--as want to borrow they will? Mr.Brown, show the gentleman that extract from the New York Herald which declares that the United States will confiscate private property in the event of a war.As the country newspapers say, "Please, country papers, copy this paragraph." And, gentlemen in America, when the honor of YOUR nation is called in question, please to remember that it is the American press which glories in announcing that you are prepared to be rogues.