The concession yielded by Mr. Buchanan, instead of tending to conciliate the conspirators only brought upon him additional demands. It so happened that the principal Federal ships of war were absent from the harbors of the Atlantic coast on service in distant waters. But now, as a piece of good fortune amid many untoward occurrences, the steam sloop-of-war _Brooklyn_, a new and formidable vessel of twenty-five guns, which had been engaged in making preliminary surveys in the Chiriqui Lagoon to test the practicability of one of the proposed interoceanic ship canals, unexpectedly returned to the Norfolk navy yard on the 28th of November, less than a week before the meeting of Congress. She had until recently been under the command of Captain Farragut, afterwards famous in the war of the rebellion, and was, with trifling exceptions, ready for sea. In the Cabinet, where the feasibility of collecting the customs revenue at Charleston on shipboard had already been discussed as a possible contingency, and especially where the forcible protection of the public property had also received serious consideration, this sudden appearance of the _Brooklyn_ must have furnished a conclusive reason in favor of both these propositions. Be this as it may, when the President affirmed these duties in his message, the conspirators realized that he held the means of practical enforcement at instantaneous command. With a ship of war ready at Norfolk, with troops at Fortress Monroe, might not a careless _émeute_ at Charleston bring the much-dreaded reënforcements to Moultrie, Sumter, and Pinckney, precipitate a _dénouement_, and prematurely ruin all their well-concocted schemes? There was urgent need to prevent the sailing of the steamer on such an errand. [Sidenote] Buchanan to Burnwell, Adams, and Orr, Dec. 31, 1860. W.R. Vol. I., p. 116. On Saturday, December 8, four of the Representatives in Congress from South Carolina requested an interview of President Buchanan, which he granted them, in which they rehearsed their well-studied prediction of a collision at Charleston. One of their number has related the substance of their address with graphic frankness: [Sidenote] Hon. Wm. Porcher Miles, Statement before the South Carolina Convention, "Annual Cyclopedia," 1861, pp. 649-50. "Mr. President, it is our solemn conviction that if you attempt to send a solitary soldier to these forts, the instant the intelligence reaches our people (and we shall take care that it does reach them, for we have sources of information in Washington so that no orders for troops can be issued without our getting information) these forts will be forcibly and immediately stormed.