Accordingly they imposed their weight more and more heavily upon the successive administrations from Van Buren down to Buchanan, and were encouraged to find that, in proportion as they pressed harder in their demands, proportionate concessions seldom failed to be made. The reaction at the North was nevertheless steadily progressing. Wisely perceiving that the first part of their _programme_ of action had nearly served its day; that preparation must be made for entering on the second and more desperate part of their conspiracy against free government; they forced on the crisis at the Democratic Convention in Charleston, by demanding terms which, with the fire in the rear now regularly organized and steadily operative at the North, that party could not accede to, without consenting to its own death. A disruption ensued of the unnatural alliance between the Southern oligarchy and the Northern Democracy, and the Southern leaders from that hour availed themselves of their sole remaining lease of power under the administration of Mr. Buchanan to strengthen their position by all means, honorable and dishonorable, for the coming conflict, which by them had been long planned or at least looked forward to, as the probable contingency. Having virtually the entire control of the General Government, they used their power for sending South the arms of the common country, for disposing the army and navy in such ways as to leave them in the least degree effective for opposing their designs; and with all the quietness and deliberation of a dying millionaire making his will, they prepared to begin the conflict which the lazy and confiding North had not even begun to suspect as among the possibilities of the future; and to begin it absolutely upon their own terms.