To these just and magnificent reforms Mr. Cobden returns in other letters, dwelling on the abolition of blockades, but pressing upon our country the duty of advancing all, and, in the ardor of appeal, exclaiming, “Take high ground with Europe for a complete sweep of the old maritime code, and then take your own time to deal with the Slave States,” and concluding another letter with the words, “Recollect how immensely you would gain in moral power by leading all Europe in the path of civilization. You owe it to yourselves and us.” This correspondence reveals the anxiety of good Englishmen, and also the various reports by which the public mind was perplexed. In one letter Mr. Cobden writes: “Everybody tells me that war is inevitable; and yet I do not believe in war.” In another he mentions “an impression in high quarters that Mr. Seward wishes to quarrel with this country,” which he characterizes as “absurd enough.” In another he alludes to the joint resolution of thanks to Captain Wilkes, adopted by the House of Representatives, as “viewed here by our alarmist journals as almost a declaration of war”; and, after mentioning that “grave men, holding the highest post in your cultivated State of Massachusetts, compliment Captain Wilkes for having given an affront to the British lion,” he says, with point, “It makes it very hard for Bright and me to contend against the British-lion party in this country.” Even in this peculiar atmosphere his clearness of perception did not fail, and Mr. Cobden saw the mistake of principle or policy involved in the “impressment” of the Rebel agents. In the postscript of a letter dated November 27, the very day when the taking was first known in London, he wrote: “We are rather unprepared to find you exercising in a strained manner the right of search, _inasmuch as you have been supposed to be always the opponents of the practice_.” In the same vein his eloquent colleague, Mr. Bright, wrote, under date of December 5: “Our law officers are agreed and strong in their opinion of the illegality of the seizure of the commissioners; _but I cannot make out how or where it exceeds the course taken by English ships of war before the War of 1812_. But all the people here, of course, accept their opinion as conclusive on the law of the case.” Thus directly from the opinions of the law officers, and also from various testimony, including the press, is it apparent that the special objection of England was founded on the forcible taking of “certain individuals” from a British vessel. Naturally, therefore, Mr. Sumner planted himself on the early American postulate, constantly maintained by us and constantly denied by England. In the able note already cited Mr. Dana sums up the result.