How much the country was in the dark with regard to some vital matters is revealed by an attack on the Confederate Administration which was made by the Charleston Mercury, in February. The Southern Government was accused of unpardonable slowness in sending agents to Europe to purchase munitions. In point of fact, the Confederate Government had been more prompt than the Union Government in rushing agents abroad. But the country was not permitted to know this. Though the Courier was a government organ in Charleston, it did not meet the charges of the Mercury by disclosing the facts about the arduous attempts of the Confederate Government to secure arms in Europe. The reply of the Courier to the Mercury, though spirited, was all in general terms. "To shake confidence in Jefferson Davis," said the Courier, "is ... to bring 'hideous ruin and combustion' down upon our dearest hopes and interests." It made "Mr. Davis and his defensive policy" objects of all admiration; called Davis "our Moses." It was deeply indignant because it had been "reliably informed that men of high official position among us" were "calling for a General Convention of the Confederate States to depose him and set up a military Dictator in his place." The Mercury retorted that, as to the plot against "our Moses," there was no evidence of its existence except the Courier's assertion. Nevertheless, it considered Davis "an incubus to the cause." The controversy between the Mercury and the Courier at Charleston was paralleled at Richmond by the constant bickering between the government organ, the Enquirer, and the Examiner, which shares with the Mercury the first place among the newspapers hostile to Davis. ¹ ¹ The Confederate Government did not misapprehend the attitude of the intellectual opposition. Its foreign organ, The Index, published in London, characterized the leading Southern papers for the enlightenment of the British public. While the Enquirer and the Courier were singled out as the great champions of the Confederate Government, the Examiner and the Mercury were portrayed as its arch enemies. The Examiner was called the "Ishmael of the Southern press." The Mercury was described as "almost rabid on the subject of state rights." Associated with the Examiner was a vigorous writer having considerable power of the old-fashioned, furious sort, ever ready to foam at the mouth. If he had had more restraint and less credulity, Edward A. Pollard might have become a master of the art of vituperation. Lacking these qualities, he never rose far above mediocrity. But his fury was so determined and his prejudice so invincible that his writings have something of the power of conviction which fanaticism wields. In midsummer, 1862, Pollard published a book entitled The First Year of the War, which was commended by his allies in Charleston as showing no "tendency toward unfairness of statement" and as expressing views "mainly in accordance with popular opinion."