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people of the United States, is well adapted to be the home of one National family; and it is not well adapted for two or more."*

Our fathers had organized this "national family" under the Constitution, and it became his especial duty, as President, to maintain and perpetuate it. This duty he had endeavored faithfully to discharge. The patriotism of the loyal people embraced every portion of the Republic. Their pride had long dwelt upon the idea of a vast Republic "whose dominion shall be also from the one sea to the other, and from the flood unto the world's end."†

The loyal people had fought the war through, because they would not give up this idea. The vast extent of the country and its future greatness and glory had long been to him a source of national pride. Virginians must learn to substitute in their affections the Nation for the State: they need not love Virginia less, but they must love the Republic

The people have overcome the rebellion, not only because it was their duty under the Constitution, but also because they wanted the aid of the insurgent States to enable them to realize their great destiny. The South is an essential part of, and must help to build up the great Republic.

In reply to a suggestion from the Virginians, that it was difficult to love a country so vast, and that patriotism was always strongest among a people inhabiting a country with a small territory, as illustrated by the Scotch and the Swiss, where every person identifies his own home with his country, and the difficulty of embracing in one's affections a whole continent, the pride and glory of the Roman citizen in the Roman Empire was recalled. But perhaps a better answer to this may be found in Mr. Lincoln's message before referred to, in which he says, speaking of our whole country, "Its vast extent, and its variety of climate and productions, are of advantage, in this age, for one people, whatever they might have been in former ages. Steam, telegraphs, and intelligence have brought these to be an advantageous combination for one united people." The continent is "our

* Annual Message of December, 1862]

† 72 Psalm, v. 8.

national homestead." This, in all "its adaptations and aptitudes, demands union and abhors separation." Now that slavery is eradicated, we shall soon cease to quarrel, and become a homogeneous people. Virginia will again become a leading, possibly, the leading State, and before twenty years, she will thank Mr. Lincoln for the Emancipation Proclamation.

Mr. Lincoln returned to Washington on the 9th of April. He had scarcely reached the White House before the news of Lee's surrender reached him. No language can adequately describe the patriotic joy and deep gratitude to Almighty God which filled the heart of the President and the people. All the usual manifestations of delight, illuminations, processions, with banners and music were given; but beneath all these outward manifestations, there was a deep, solemn, religious feeling, that God had given us these great victories, and that He had in His Providence a great future for our country.

The last battle had been fought, the last victory won, the Union triumph was complete, the rebellion utterly crushed, and slavery overthrown; and now, though not in order in point of time, let us, before dismissing from these pages the Grand Army of the Republic, anticipate that final review of the troops of Grant and Sherman before they, having finished their work, retired to their homes among the people. This review was an event full of moral sublimity. The bronzed and scarred veterans who had survived the battlefields of four years of active war, the hardy frames of those who had marched and fought their way from New England, and the Northwest, to New Orleans and Charleston; those who had withstood and repelled the terrific charges of the rebels at Gettysburg; those who had fought beneath and above the clouds at Lookout Mountain; who had taken Vicksburg, Atlanta, New Orleans, Savannah, Mobile, Petersburg, and Richmond; whose campaigns extended over half a continent; the triumphal entry of these heroes into the National Capital of the Republic which they had saved and redeemed, was deeply impressive. Triumphal arches, garlands, wreaths of flowers, evergreens, marked their pathway.

President and Cabinet, Governors and Senators, ladies, children, citizens, all united to express the nation's gratitude to those by whose heroism it had been saved.

But, there was one great shadow over the otherwise brilliant spectacle. Lincoln, their great-hearted chief, he whom all loved fondly to call their "Father Abraham ;" he whose heart had been ever with them in the camp, and on the march, in the storm of battle, and in the hospital; he had been murdered, stung to death, by the fang of the expiring serpent which these soldiers had crushed. There were many thousands of these gallant men in blue, as they filed past the White House, whose weather-beaten faces were wet with tears of manly grief. How gladly, joyfully would they have given their lives to save his.

And now these grand armies were disbanded, and hastened to the homes which they had voluntarily left, to be welcomed by family and friends, and cheered and cherished for life by the thanks of a grateful people.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

COST OF THE WAR-LINCOLN'S "POLICY”—HIS ASSASSINATIONFUNERAL-THE GRIEF OF THE PEOPLE.

NUMBER OF TROOPS FURNISHED BY THE SEVERAL STATES-COST IN MEN AND MONEY OF THE WAR-COLORED TROOPS-LINCOLN'S "POLICY"-HIS VIEWS OF THE POWERS OF CONGRESS OVER THE REBELLIOUS STATES-NO RIGHT TO VOTE IN THE ELECTORAL COLLEGE-LOYALTY SHOULD BE THE BASIS OF RECONSTRUCTIONLINCOLN'S VIEWS OF NEGRO SUFFRAGE-FAITH MUST BE KEPT WITH THE NEGRO RACE THE ASSASSINATION-FUNERALNATIONAL GRIEF.

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HE military power of the rebellion was now crushed. Looking over the Republic from North to South, from East to West, it is difficult to realize fully the immense cost of this slaveholders' war. A great price, a terrible retribution had been visited upon the people, for the existence of slavery. Perhaps it is not extravagant to say, in the language of Mr. Lincoln's second inaugural, that "the war had continued, until all the wealth piled by the bondman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil had been sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash had been paid by another drawn with the sword."

With the war, the cause of the war disappeared. Some few dry statistics and considerations, will aid in the realization of the magnitude of the conflict. The population of the twenty-three loyal States, and which, during the war, constituted the United States, was 22,046,472. This includes Missouri, Kentucky, and Maryland, which furnished soldiers for the armies on both sides, and which had a population of

3,025,745; and, also, California and Oregon, on the Pacific, and so distant from the scene of conflict, that they contributed comparatively few men, leaving a population from which the soldiers were mainly taken, at 18,588,268. The population of the eleven seceding States was 9,103,333. The war was mainly fought by American citizens, although there were some German and Irish regiments, and many of Irish, German, Norwegian, and other nationalities, in the ranks of the regiments made up mainly of American birth. There was no large accession to the population by emigration during the war. The number of emigrants in 1860 was 153,000, and it decreased during the first two years of the war; and the increase in 1863 and 1864 was to fill up the vacancies in the ranks of laborers. The emigrant was not enrolled nor drafted into the military service. The whole number of Union soldiers mustered into service during the war, was 2,690,401-fourteen and a half per cent. of the whole population.* The number of deaths in battle, and

*The following table shows the number of troops furnished by each State, as reported to Congress by the War Department:

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