As you are a Senator from _Illinois_, the state of Mr. Lincoln, please be cautious as to your course till I see you. I have such strong regard for you personally that I do not wish either enemies or friends on our side, who would like to supplant you, to get any undue advantage over you. Trumbull believed there was a lack of efficiency in the use made, by the executive branch of the Government, of the means placed at its disposal for putting down the rebellion. That such was his opinion was made clear by his participation in the anti-Seward movements of the previous year. Whether the opinion was justified or not, it was so generally entertained in Washington that if the nomination had rested in the hands of the Senators and Representatives in Congress, Lincoln would have had very few votes in the Baltimore Convention. Albert G. Riddle describes a scene in the White House in February, 1864, illustrative of public sentiment in Washington at that time. The reception room of the Executive Mansion was filled with persons, most of whom were inveighing against Lincoln, who was not present. The one most loud and bitter against the President was Henry Wilson, of Massachusetts. His assaults were so amazing that Riddle cautioned him to choose some other place than the Executive Mansion for uttering them; advised him to make his speeches in the Senate, or get himself elected to the coming National Union Convention and then denounce Lincoln, where his words might have some effect. Wilson replied that he knew the people were for Lincoln and that nothing could prevent his renomination.[67] The opposition was based wholly upon charges of inefficiency and lack of earnestness and vigor in the prosecution of the war. But the feeling, both among the people at home and the soldiers in the field, was so overwhelmingly for Lincoln, that when the delegates came together in convention the opposition in Congress was silenced. After the nominations of both parties had been made, however, the previous distrust reappeared on a larger scale and became so pronounced that Lincoln himself thought that he was about to be defeated and took steps to turn the Government over to McClellan practically before the constitutional period for his own retirement.[68] If Lincoln himself was in despair, other persons who shared his gloom might be excused.