In every instance, and by all classes of citizens, an enthusiastic response was given to the demands of the Government. Individuals and corporations entered into a generous and patriotic rivalry in the tender of aid to the cause. Wealthy citizens donated large sums of money or supplies, while railroad and transportation companies tendered valuable assistance in the conveyance of troops and stores. An enthusiastic desire to enter the public service was manifested in every community. Men decrepit from age, or infirm from disease, were importunate in demanding any service suitable to their condition. Volunteering progressed so actively that a few weeks only sufficed to show that the Confederacy--for the present at least--would not want soldiers. In all the States the responses to the call for volunteers exceeded the quotas. Congress assembled in special session, in obedience to a proclamation of the President, on the 29th of April. The message was an eminently characteristic document, and made a profound impression both in Europe and the United States. Its calm and clear statements were in marked contrast with the wild elements of war convulsing the country. Europe was not less amazed and delighted with its dignity and force, than was the North impressed with the earnest terms in which the purpose of resistance was announced. He reviewed and established the doctrine of secession, detailed the facts showing the bad faith of the Northern government about Fort Sumter, and the necessity for its capture; spoke in terms of keen, yet dignified satire of Lincoln's proclamation, which attempted to treat seven sovereign States united in a confederacy, and holding five millions of people and a half million of square miles of territory, as "combinations," which he proposed to suppress by a _posse comitatus_ of seventy-five thousand men; congratulated the Congress on the probable accession of other slave States; informed them that the State Department had sent three commissioners to England, France, Russia and Belgium, to seek the recognition of the Confederate States; advised legislation for the employment of privateers for measures of defense, and for perfecting the government organization; and concluded with these impressive words: "We feel that our cause is just and holy; we protest solemnly in the face of mankind that we desire peace at any sacrifice save that of honor and independence; we seek no conquest, no aggrandizement, no concession of any kind from the States with whom we were lately confederated. All we seek is to be let alone; that those who never held power over us shall not now attempt our subjugation by arms. This we will, this we must resist to the direst extremity. The moment that this pretension is abandoned, the sword will drop from our grasp, and we shall be ready to enter into treaties of amity and commerce that can not but be materially beneficial. So long as this pretension is maintained, with firm reliance on that divine power