Well might one of their own men say, 'This is a rich man's war and a poor man's fight.' They were led into it through their ignorance, and held in it by their fears." "I think," said Captain Sybil, "that if the public school had been common through the South this war would never have occurred.

Now things have reached such a pass that able-bodied men must report at headquarters, or be treated as deserters.

Their leaders are desperate men, of whom it has been said: 'They have robbed the cradle and the grave.'" "They are fighting against fearful odds," said Colonel Robinson, "and their defeat is only a question of time." "As soon," said Robert, "as they fired on Fort Sumter, Uncle Daniel, a dear old father who had been praying and hoping for freedom, said to me: 'Dey's fired on Fort Sumter, an' mark my words, Bob, de Norf's boun' ter whip.'" "Had we freed the slaves at the outset," said Captain Sybil, "we wouldn't have given the Rebels so much opportunity to strengthen themselves by means of slave labor in raising their crops, throwing up their entrenchments, and building their fortifications.

Slavery was a deadly cancer eating into the life of the nation; but, somehow, it had cast such a glamour over us that we have acted somewhat as if our national safety were better preserved by sparing the cancer than by cutting it out." "Political and racial questions have sadly complicated this matter," said Colonel Robinson.

"The North is not wholly made up of anti-slavery people.