I wish to say a few words about the last election in New York, for it has been widely misrepresented and misunderstood. How did we go into that canvass? Upon what principles was it conducted? What representations were made? I am one of the men who have struggled to meet and oppose this Republican party from the outset--to avert, if possible, the adoption of its pernicious principles by the people of New York. I took my stand upon the Compromise of 1850, and separated myself politically from all men who could not stand with me on that platform. We struggled on until that Compromise was adopted by the Baltimore Convention. The Kansas bill was introduced at a most fatal hour. It was distasteful to the whole country; satisfactory nowhere. In due time the Charleston Convention was assembled, and the Democratic party was broken up forever. What next? Next came the Chicago Convention. It may have been conducted with dignity, and it nominated a candidate. I differ widely from that candidate in my principles and my policy. And yet I believe in him although I opposed his election. I would trust his Kentucky blood to the end, if all else failed. I think he is honest. I have no idea that he will permit the policy of his administration to be controlled by the hotheaded zealots who have been so conspicuous in the last canvass. I expect to see him call to his council board, cool, dispassionate, and conservative men; not men who are driven to the verge of insanity upon this question of slavery. What next? The Baltimore Convention was held. The tragedy was consummated; the contest was ended. The mere scuffle to secure the control of the Convention which ended in its division, has brought the country into all its present difficulties. If that Convention had presented to the people a good conservative Democrat, there were seventy-five thousand good old line Whigs who would have buckled on their armor and would have won the battle for him. When the Southern papers began to threaten disunion because LINCOLN did not suit the South, I was not one who abused or denounced them. I knew the temper of some of the politicians in the free States. I knew the action of the South was not impulsive. I knew there was a reason for it. They said their capital was to be rendered worthless--their property to be destroyed, and their country made desolate. God forbid that I should chide them for thinking so! The Northern mind is in some respects very different from the Southern. It is not started by slight scratches, but strike the rowel deep, and there is a purpose in it that nothing can conquer or restrain. The people of the North will carry that purpose into execution, with a power as fierce as that of the maddest chivalry of South Carolina. The rowel _was_ struck deep and the consequences were not considered.