Who are we that we should speak of civil war as in no circumstance possible or permissible? Do we not remember that our own liberties have been secured through every form and variety of civil war? How much blood has been shed in the streets of this ancient capital of Edinburgh! How many gory heads have been nailed up in its streets! How many victims of civil war crowd our churchyards in every portion of the country! How many lie upon our mountains with nothing to mark them but the heath or the cairn! What do we say of these men? Do we consider their course to have been an evil one? Do we not rather turn back to those pages of history with the loving chisel of Old Mortality, to refresh in our minds the recollection of their immortal names? Yes, gentlemen, if it be true--and it is true--that the blood of the martyrs has been the seed of the Church, it is equally true that the blood of the patriots has been the foundation of the liberties of our country. Let us extend, then, to our brethren in America the liberal interpretation which we seek to be given to our own former annals. I, for one, have not learned to be ashamed of that ancient combination of the Bible and the sword. Let it be enough for us to pray and hope that the contest whenever it may be brought to an end, shall bring with it that great blessing to the white race which shall consist in the final freedom of the black. THE BUDGET: EATING THE LEEK (1863). =Source.=--_The Illustrated London News_, May 9, 1863. SKETCHES IN PARLIAMENT.