Moreover there had been for several weeks a persistent effort to misrepresent the attitude of the general government. While it was simply endeavoring to defend its property and domain, it had been dinned into the ears of the secessionists, in the most emphatic terms, that the object of the United States was invasion and subjugation; and as true men they must arise and defend their hearths and homes, wives and children against Lincoln’s minions. So our fellow-citizens, who had been devising every possible scheme to secure the secession of Missouri, thought it quite unnecessary for them to put forth any further effort to attain their object, since the incoming of soldiers from other States would produce such a revulsion of feeling against the Federal government, that the people without any further incentive would speedily determine to secede. They began to talk confidently of setting aside the decree of the Convention. But without proposing any further effort, they were quietly awaiting the natural drift of events. They believed that by the force of circumstances the State would be carried out of the Union and into the Southern Confederacy. Their confident expectation was not altogether baseless. Clear-headed Union men saw the danger of introducing troops at that time from other States into our city. The authorities at Washington were induced to take this view of the case into serious consideration. The result was that for the time being they wisely changed their policy. Some regiments that had been ordered from Illinois to St. Louis were sent elsewhere.