By that law, as I understand it, nations are not left to any mere caprice. There is a rule of conduct which they must follow, subject always to just accountability where they depart from it. On ordinary occasions there is no question; for it is with nations as with individuals. It is only where the rule is obscure or precedents are uncertain that doubt arises, as with some persons now. Here I wish to be explicit. Belligerence is a “fact,” attested by evidence. If the “fact” does not exist, there is nothing to recognize. The fact cannot be invented or imagined; it must be proved. No matter what our sympathy, what the extent of our desires, we must look at the fact. There may be insurrection without reaching this condition, which is at least the half-way house to independence. The Hungarians, when they rose against Austria, obtained no such recognition, although they had large armies in the field, and Kossuth was their governor; the Poles, in repeated insurrections against Russia, obtained no such recognition, although the conflict made Europe vibrate; the Sepoys and Rajahs of India failed also, although for a time the English empire hung trembling; nor, in my opinion, were our slave-mad Rebels ever entitled to such recognition,--for, whatever the strength of the Rebellion on land, it remained, as in the case of Hungary, of Poland, of India, without those Prize Courts which are absolutely essential to recognition by foreign powers. _A cruiser without accountability to Prize Courts is a lawless monster which civilized nations cannot sanction._ Therefore the Prize Court is the condition-precedent; nor is this all. If the Cuban insurgents have come within any of the familiar requirements, I have never seen the evidence. They are in arms, I know. But where are their cities, towns, provinces? where their government? where their ports? where their tribunals of justice? and where their Prize Courts? To put these questions is to answer them. How, then, is the “fact” of belligerence? There is another point in the case, which is with me final. Even if they come within the prerequisites of International Law, I am unwilling to make any recognition of them so long as they continue to hold human beings as slaves, which I understand they now do. I am told that there was a decree in May last, purporting to be signed by Cespedes, abolishing slavery; then I am told of another decree in July, maintaining slavery. There is also the story of a pro-slavery constitution to be read at home, and an anti-slavery constitution to be read abroad. Nor is there any evidence that any decree or constitution has had any practical effect. In this uncertainty I shall wait, even if all other things are propitious. In any event there must be Emancipation.