But the trials of our popular system of government were not terminated by the simultaneous overthrow of the Rebellion and slavery. It may be, rather, that they have just begun. We were confident before the war that slavery was the source of the only peril which really threatened us. That out of the way, we find ourselves confronted with new dangers, growing out of differences of opinion respecting the extent to which the black race shall be allowed to participate in government. That participation is now practically denied by the Southern States, and the mandate of the Constitution is unhesitatingly set at naught by the employment either of force or fraud. The remedy suggested is an enforcement of that mandate by Federal legislation, which means simply the enforcement of its will by one section against that of the other. This is not democratic government, but the rule of the conquered by the conqueror. The evil is bad enough; and the remedy will probably be worse. We begin to see that the real danger which has at all times menaced us is the presence on our soil of a different race, unequal, for the present, at least, to the great office of self-government. Slavery was not itself the evil, but only one of the methods of dealing with it. Is our substitute, the bestowal upon the race of universal suffrage, a successful device? And, if this must be abandoned, what shall next be tried? These grave problems, already threatening, will assume a graver aspect if the results of the census just taken, when studied and compared, shall be found to show a more rapid rate of increase in the black population at the South than in the white. To meet such perils we need nothing so much as a class of statesmen of which Samuel J. Tilden was the most distinguished example. LETTERS AND LITERARY MEMORIALS OF SAMUEL J. TILDEN 1810-1844 In 1801 President Jefferson appointed Robert R. Livingston, then Chancellor of the State of New York, as Minister to France. On his return, in 1804, Livingston brought with him some sheep from Spain, then the home of the famous Merino breed, developed from races of sheep originally introduced into the peninsula by the Romans. In 1809-10 a flock of 4000 Merino sheep were brought into the United States to meet the demand created by Mr. Livingston's first importation. The following letter from the father of Samuel J. Tilden, written the very season of the larger importation, justifies the presumption that such importation had been made by Mr. Livingston himself or at his behest. The letter of Elam Tilden was sent to his son Samuel by the late Eliphalet Nott Potter in December, 1882, with a note in which he said: "In looking over a package of Livingston letters I find the enclosed, and thinking that possibly it may be of some slight interest to you, I beg that you will accept it with best wishes of the season and for the New Year." This letter was written four years before the writer's son Samuel J. was born.