In August, 1854, President Pierce directed Mr. Buchanan, minister to England, Mr. Mason, minister to France, and Mr. Soule, envoy to Spain, to meet at some convenient place and discuss the question of obtaining possession of Cuba. These distinguished gentlemen met at Ostend on the 9th of October, and adjourned to Aix-la-Chapelle, from which place they issued, on the 18th of October, what is known as the "Ostend Manifesto or Circular," in which they recommended the purchase of Cuba, declaring that, if Spain refused to sell, the United States would be justified "by every law, human and divine," in wresting it from her. This declaration, for which there was no justification whatever, caused angry protest in Europe and in the free States of our country, but was ardently applauded in the South. Nothing came of it, and the country soon became so absorbed in the slavery agitation that it was forgotten. THE "KNOW NOTHINGS." Patriotic men, who feared what was coming, did all in their power to avert it. One of these attempts was the formation of the "Know Nothing" party, which grew up like a mushroom and speedily acquired a power that enabled it to carry many local elections in the various States. It was a secret organization, the members of which were bound by oath to oppose the election of foreign-born citizens to office. The salutation, when one member met another, was, "Have you seen Sam?" If one of them was questioned about the order, his reply was that he knew nothing, from which the name was given to what was really the Native American party. It soon ran its course, but has been succeeded in its cardinal principles by the American Protective Association of the present day. Meanwhile, the slavery question was busy at its work of disintegration. The Democratic party was held together for a time by the Compromise of 1850, to the effect that the inhabitants of the new Territories of New Mexico and Utah should be left to decide for themselves the question of slavery. In a few years the settlements in Nebraska and Kansas made it necessary to erect territorial governments there, and the question of slavery was thus brought before Congress again. The Missouri Compromise forbade slavery forever in those sections, for both of them lie to the north parallel of 36 deg. 30'. Stephen A. Douglas, however, and a number of other Democratic leaders in Congress claimed that the Compromise of 1850 nullified this agreement, and that the same freedom of choice should be given to the citizens of Kansas and Nebraska as was given to those in Utah and New Mexico. This policy was called "Squatter Sovereignty." THE MISSOURI COMPROMISE.