Why it was that the bombardment, on April 12, 1861, of a Federal _fort_ about to be reenforced "fired the Northern heart" more than the bombardment, on January 9, 1861, of a Federal _war-ship_ attempting to carry reinforcements to that fort, the Northern historians, like the Pharisees, "cannot tell." And they never tell that between the two bombardments sectional monopoly had brooded, and on March 2d hatched a cockatrice egg of sectional advantage; that its beneficiaries had had opportunity to touch noses with the "seven war Governors" and that the inspiration of such a touch accounts for the zeal with which they urged the President to war, when twenty-one States were trying to effect peace; that between the 15th and the 28th of March these Governors had a secret conference with the President in Washington, in which they pledged their States to support him in "collecting the revenues of the Government"; and that, thus assured, he had, to the astonishment of the South and most of his own constituents, suddenly sent the invading expedition to reenforce Fort Sumter! Did this same influence persuade Lincoln to refuse to allow the Supreme Court or even Congress to pass upon the much-mooted constitutional question of the right to secede? Of course it was familiar learning to him that all the States, especially the Northeastern, had from time to time asserted, acted on, or acquiesced in this right. Did the tariff Governors induce this man, reputed to be tender-hearted, to decide, on his own responsibility, a question of law which forced the issue of blood at a cost of a million lives, and a sinister change in the character and conduct of our government? Did they seduce him into fitting out an armament to collect the revenues at Charleston, and, at the same time, leave open for construction and equivocation his doubtful and inconsistent expressions about enforcing the Federal laws and Supreme Court decisions giving protection to Southern property in slaves? Why was it that, in this awful crisis, he refused to call Congress together until he had precipitated war by his invasion and his call for volunteers, unless it was because his extra-constitutional advisers feared to trust a body which passed a conciliatory resolution even after battles had been fought and blood had been shed? Why was it that by the very terms of his war proclamation he put off the assembling of Congress for two months and nineteen days after he had declared war, unless it was because he was willing to forestall its action, and preferred to rely on the conspiring war Governors and their protected constituents to sustain him, rather than on his constitutional advisers and the Representatives of the people? Monopoly could not then trust the Supreme Court, for the Dred Scott decision showed that it might again adhere to the original view of the Constitution; and its best members were zealous to effect compromise and peace. That Lincoln