There immediately followed by the leaders in Charleston, and their agents and spokesmen in Washington, the daily repetition of threats and complaints (thus originated by the latter), which were continued for nearly three and a half months. The purpose was twofold: first, by alternately exciting the fears and hopes of the Government to induce it to withhold reënforcement as a prudential measure of magnanimity and conciliation; secondly, to make it a cloak to hide, as far as might be, their own preparations for war. Had the Federal Government been in a condition of normal health and vigor, the farce would not have been effective for even a single day; but, with capital alarmed, with, parties divided into factions, with three traitors in the Cabinet, and a timid and vacillating Executive, by successive, almost imperceptible, degrees, the farce produced a policy and the policy led to an opening drama of civil war. Leaving out of view anterior political doctrines and discussions, the first false step had been taken by the Administration in its doctrine of non-coercion, announced in the message; the second false step half logically resulting from the first, in its refusal on the first day of December to send Major Anderson the reënforcements he so urgently demanded. The Charlestonians clung to the concession with a tenacity which demonstrated their full appreciation of its value. Immediately there began to flow in upon Mr. Buchanan and his advisers, on the one hand magnified reports of the daily clamors of the Charleston mob, on the other hand encouraging intimations from the Charleston authorities that they, while adhering to their political heresies and demands, were yet averse to disorder and bloodshed, and to this end desired and invoked the utmost forbearance of the Government. Put in truthful language, their request would have been, "Help us keep the peace while we are preparing to break the law. Let the Government send no ships, men or supplies to the forts, in order that we may without danger or collision build batteries to take them. Armament by the Federal sovereignty is war, armament by State authority is peace." And it will forever remain a marvel that a President of the United States consented to this certain process of national suicide. CHAPTER XXIV MR. BUCHANAN'S TRUCE [Sidenote] 1860.