interests as their animus was malignant against Mr. Davis. Hoping to advance themselves by misrepresentations of him, during the war they persistently charged upon him every disaster, and do not scruple to impute to his blame those final failures so largely traceable to themselves. A patriotic regard for the public safety imposed silence upon Mr. Davis while the war continued, and a magnanimity which they have neither deserved nor appreciated, coupled with a proper sense of personal dignity, have impelled him since to refrain from refutation of misstatements utterly scandalous and inexcusable. The distinguished English statesman,[2] who, during the progress of the late war, declared that "Mr. Jefferson Davis had created a nation," stated more than the truth, though he hardly exaggerated the flattering estimate which the intelligent public of Europe places upon the unsurpassed ability and energy with which the limited resources of the South, as compared with those of her enemies, were, for the most part, wielded by the Confederate administration. Nor, indeed, would such an estimate have been too extravagant to be entertained by his own countrymen, had the South achieved her independence by any stroke of mere good fortune, such as repeatedly favored her adversaries at critical moments of the war, when, apparently, the most trifling incidents regulated the balance. More than once the South stood upon the very threshold of the full fruition of her aspirations for independence and nationality. Had Jackson not fallen at Chancellorsville, the Federal Army of the Potomac, the bulwark of the Union in the Atlantic States, would have disappeared into history under circumstances far different from those which marked its dissolution two years later. At Gettysburg the Confederacy was truthfully said to have been "within a stone's-throw of peace." If at these fateful moments the treacherous scales of fortune had not strangely turned, and in the very flush of triumph, who doubts that now and hereafter there would have come from Southern hearts, an ascription of praise to Jefferson Davis, no less earnest than to his illustrious colaborers? At all events, it is undeniable that, as the Confederate arms prospered, so the affection of the people for Mr. Davis was always more enthusiastic and demonstrative. Only in moments of extreme public depression could the malcontents obtain even a patient audience of their assaults upon the chosen President of the Confederacy. The people of the late Confederate States, whose destinies Jefferson Davis directed during four years, the most momentous in their history, are competent witnesses as to the fidelity, ability, and devotion with which he discharged the trust confided to him.