The month of April, 1865, was curiously eventful in the annals of this country. General Grant moved upon the enemy's works, and Petersburg and Richmond fell. He pursued and fought the retreating army, and the rebel commander-in-chief surrendered. In the very jubilee of a national joy the President was murdered. While yet his body was borne across the country by the reverent hands of a nation, his murderer was tracked, brought to bay, shot, and buried in a nameless spot to protect his corpse from wild popular fury. In the midst of the tragical days General Sherman, whom, only last month, the Easy Chair was celebrating as so skilful and resistless a soldier, instead of summoning Johnston to a surrender upon the terms granted to Lee, allowed himself to sign recognition of the rebel government and to open a future political discord, while he was yet able to prescribe the simple surrender of an army. The shock of disappointment and regret was universal. The authorities unanimously disapproved his convention. The Lieutenant-General went immediately to the front, and the month that had opened with President Lincoln trusted and beloved, with Davis defended by Lee and his army in the rebel capital, and Sherman confronted by Johnston, and Mobile holding out, closed with the rebel capital in possession of the government, Lee a paroled prisoner, his army disbanded, Davis a skulking fugitive, Johnston and his army paroled prisoners, Mobile captured, President Lincoln dead, President Johnson at the head of the government, and the assassin dead and buried. Through such a succession of great events this country had never as rapidly passed. It swept the scale of emotion. From the height of joy triumphant it sank to the very depths of sorrow, from confidence and pride in a military leader it passed to humiliating amazement, yet not for a moment paused in its work or shook in its purpose, and was never so calm, so strong, so grand, as in that tumult of emotion. Every man who has been proud of his country hitherto has now profounder cause for pride. Our system has been tried in every way; it rises purified from the fire. No one man is essential to her, however deeply beloved, however generously trusted. The history of the war from May, 1861, to May, 1865, proves that she cannot be hopelessly bereaved. The sceptics who have sneered, the timid who have feared, the shrewd who have doubted, must now see that the principles of popular government have been amply vindicated. We have only clearly to understand and fearlessly to trust these principles, and the future, like the past, is secure.