February 8.—More woe and sorrow in store for us! The Egyptian will not let us go! Our commissioners have returned unsuccessful! No peace for us without going back to the Union!
“Unite! how will you gather up
The fragments of our broken laws?
Their hands have filled the bitter cup
Of hate; the arm of vengeance draws
Its sword, with a convulsive start,
To smite submission to the heart.
Reunion! yes, when you can raise
Pale thousands from their sleep of death;
When light from sightless eyes shall blaze,
And rotting forms rejoice in breath;
When blood, that flecked a hundred plains,
Shall leap again through living veins.
Submit! to wrongs that needs must send
A shudder through a tyrant’s frame?
To deeds of reeking crime that blend
Their lurid glare, beclouding fame?
Connive at outrage, shame and guilt?
Ignore the blood that freemen spilt?
No! Heaven! like a thunder shout,
Burst from each clotted battle plain,
From every wound mouth gushes out,
A curse that throbs through every vein,
Of timid caitiff who would frame
That fabric of eternal shame!”
What castle-building we have had in the last few days! The thought of such a thing as our enemy asking us back to the Union never once entered our heads. I really did think that they had come to their senses, and resolved to let us go. Well,
“We’ll but to prouder pitch wind up our souls,”
and commence again.
