Thursday, March 15, 2012

London, March 15, 1862

Times have so decidedly changed since my last letter to you, which was, as I conceive, about three weeks or a month ago, that I hardly know what to write about. My main doubt is about your prospects. I see no reason why Davis and his whole army should n’t be shut up and forced to capitulate in Virginia. If so, you will be spared a summer campaign. But if he is allowed to escape, I shall be disgusted, and God only knows what work may be before you.

Meanwhile it worries me all the time to be leading this thoroughly useless life abroad while you are acting such grand parts at home. You would be astonished at the change of opinion which has taken place here already. Even the Times only this morning says: “The very idea of such a war is American, multitudinous, vast, and as much an appeal to the imagination as the actual brunt of arms.” And again in speaking of the tone of the Southern papers it says in a striking way: “Some of their expressions recall those in which the Roman historians of the later Empire spoke of the Northern tribes.” The truth is, as our swarm of armies strike deeper and deeper into the South, the contest is beginning to take to Europeans proportions of grandeur and perfection like nothing of which they ever heard or read. They call us insane to attempt what, when achieved, they are almost afraid to appreciate. A few brilliant victories, a short campaign of ten days or a fortnight, rivalling in its vigor and results those of Napoleon, has positively startled this country into utter confusion. It reminds me of my old host in Dresden, who, when he heard of the battle of Magenta, rushed into my room, newspaper in hand, and began measuring on the map the distance from the Ticino to Vienna. The English on hearing of Fort Donnelson and the fall of Nashville, seem to think our dozen armies are already over the St. Lawrence and at the gates of Quebec. They don’t conceal their apprehensions and if we go on in this way, they will be as humiliated as the South itself. The talk of intervention, only two months ago so loud as to take a semiofficial tone, is now out of the minds of everyone. I heard Gregory make his long-expected speech in the House of Commons, and it was listened to as you would listen to a funeral eulogy. His attacks on us, on Seward and on our blockade were cheered with just enough energy to show the animus that existed in a large proportion of the members, but his motion, a simple and harmless request for papers, was tossed aside without a division. I saw our friend Mason on the opposite side of the House to where I was sitting with Thurlow Weed. He is unlucky. One of the Bishops who happened to have come in and was seated near the door, heard a “Hear! hear!” behind him, and looking round saw Mason. For a stranger to cheer is a breach of privilege, and the story went all over town creating quite a row. Mr. Mason now denies it, I am told, and says it was some one else who cheered. He maintains now that the South always expected to lose the border States and that now that they are retiring to the cotton region the war has just begun. He coolly talks this stuff to the English people as if they had n’t always asserted that the border States were a vital point with them. We on the other hand, no longer descend to argue such stories, or to answer the new class of lies; but smile blandly and compassionately on those who swallow them and remark that so far as advised, the nation whom we have the honor to represent is satisfied with the progress thus far made, and sees no reason to doubt that the Union will be maintained in its fullest and most comprehensive meaning.

The blockade is now universally acknowledged to be unobjectionable. Recognition, intervention, is an old song. No one whispers it. But the navy that captured Port Royal, Roanoke and Fort Henry, and that is flying about with its big guns up all the rivers and creeks of the South, is talked of with respect. And the legion of armies that are winning victory after victory on every side, until we have begun to complain if a steamer arrives without announcing the defeat of some enemy, or the occupation of some city, or the capture of some stronghold, are a cause of study to the English such as they ‘ve not had since Napoleon entered Milan some seventy years ago. I feel like a King now. I assert my nationality with a quiet pugnacity that tells. No one treads on our coattails any longer, and I do not expect ever to see again the old days of anxiety and humiliation….