Americans are likely to dwell for a long time upon the glories of our Centennial of Independence. The year 1876 came and went, and left its impress on the world. Our great Exposition at Philadelphia was happily devised. We celebrated the one-hundredth anniversary of our independence, and invited all nations, _including Great Britain_, to join us in the festival. The Exposition was successful in a high degree. The nation was at its best. The warrior President who had led her armies to victory announced the opening and the close. Great things were seen. One or two great orations were pronounced, and in particular a great Centennial poem was contributed by that gifted son of genius, Sidney Lanier, of Georgia. Nor do we refrain from repeating, after twenty years, one of his poetic passages: "Long as thine Art shall love true love; Long as thy Science truth shall know; Long as thine Eagle harms no Dove; Long as thy Law by law shall grow; Long as thy God is God above, Thy brother every man below, So long, dear Land of all my love, Thy name shall shine, thy fame shall glow!" With the autumnal frost the great Exposition was concluded; and with that autumnal frost came a peril the like of which our nation had not hitherto encountered. The presidential election was held, and ended in a disputed presidency. We had agreed since the beginning of the century that ours should be a government by party. Against this policy Washington had contended stoutly; but after the death of the Father of his Country, the policy prevailed--as it has continued to prevail more and more to the present day. In 1876 a Democratic reaction came on against the long-dominant Republican party, and Samuel J. Tilden, candidate of the Democracy, secured a _popular_ majority. The _electoral_ majority remained in dispute. Both parties claimed the victory. The election was so evenly balanced in its results--there had been so much irregularity in the voting and subsequent electoral proceedings in the States of Florida, Louisiana, South Carolina and Oregon, and the powers of Congress over the votes of such States were so vaguely defined under existing legislation--that no certain declaration of the result could be made. The public mind was confounded with perplexity and excitement, and there began to be heard the threatenings of civil war.