The fact is, the boys around here want watching, or they'll take something. A few days ago I heard they surrounded two of our best citizens because they were named Fort and Sumter. Most of them are so hot that they fairly siz when you pour water on them, and that's the way they make up their military companies here now--when a man applies to join the volunteers they sprinkle him, and if he sizzes they take him, and if he don't they don't! MAJOR CHARLES H. SMITH (_Bill Arp_) April Fifteenth There was but one exception to the general grief too remarkable to be passed over in silence. Among the extreme Radicals in Congress, Mr. Lincoln's determined clemency and liberality towards the Southern people had made an impression so unfavorable that, though they were shocked at his murder, they did not, among themselves, conceal gratification that he was no longer in their way. NICHOLAY AND HAY (_Life of Lincoln_) FORESHADOWING RECONSTRUCTION The Union League of America was organized in Cleveland, Ohio, during the war by friends of Thaddeus Stevens, the Radical leader of Congress. Its prime object was the confiscation of the property of the South. The chief obstacle to this program was Abraham Lincoln. Hence the first work of the League was to form a conspiracy against Lincoln and prevent his renomination for a second term. E. W. R. EWING _Abraham Lincoln dies, 1865_ _Federal Government issues a call for 75,000 volunteers, 1861_ April Sixteenth I have only to say that the militia will not be furnished to the powers at Washington for any such use or purpose as they have in view. Your object is to subjugate the Southern States, and a requisition made upon me for such an object--an object, in my judgment, not within the purview of the constitution or the act of 1795--will not be complied with. You have chosen to inaugurate civil war, and having done so, we will meet it in a spirit as determined as the administration has exhibited towards the South. GOVERNOR LETCHER (_Virginia_) April Seventeenth The scene [in the Virginia State Convention] is described as both solemn and affecting. One delegate, while speaking against the ordinance, broke down in incoherent sobs; another, who voted for it, wept like a child. The sentiment of the people had run ahead of their leaders. S. C. MITCHELL It may be safely asserted that but for the adoption by the Federal Government of the policy of coercion towards the Cotton States, Virginia would not have seceded.... She simply in the hour of danger and sacrifice held faithful to the principles which she had ofttimes declared and which have ever found sturdy defenders in every part of the Republic. BEVERLEY B. MUNFORD _Virginia secedes, 1861_ April Eighteenth Tennessee will not furnish a single man for coercion, but 50,000 if necessary for the defense of our rights or those of our Southern brothers. GOVERNOR HARRIS (Tennessee)