Comte de Paris, History of the Civil War in America. Vol. 4.
Henry Coppee , LL.D., Ed.

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[2] victory at Gettysburg and Vicksburg enabled the North to take in the whole extent of the misfortunes that would have befallen them if Lee had planted his flag upon the slopes of Cemetery Hill and Johnston had succeeded in breaking Grant's lines.

In the preceding volume we did not wish to interrupt the long recital of the campaign which led the armies of the Potomac and of Northern Virginia from the Rappahannock to the heart of Pennsylvania, and finally brought them back to their startingpoint.

Near the banks of the Mississippi River, on the contrary, military operations having been interrupted by the annihilation of one of the two contending parties, we discontinued the recital of these operations at the beginning of July. Before resuming our narrative it is necessary to speak of the insurrection which stained with blood the principal cities of the North-east, and also of the invasion which threw consternation into the cities of the Middle States at the very moment when the fortune of arms was declaring in favor of the Federal Government.

Elsewhere we have told how the Peace party, sympathizing with the Southern cause, had seen its ranks swell at every new success achieved by the Confederates. Proportioning their boldness to the assumed weakness of the Federal power, the leaders of the Peace party kept themselves within the limit, at times difficult to be defined, which divides on the one hand open treason, and on the other violent opposition made in time of war to a national government. They had not dared actively to co-operate with Lee, but they waited only for his first victory upon the soil of the free States in order to shake off the authority in the White House, ensure the dismemberment of the Union, and cause the recognition of the independence of the South. Already anticipating such a victory, they were making innumerable harangues at the moment when the rest of the nation were rushing to arms. Their chief adversary, Mr. Lincoln, on the day of his inauguration had made allusion to the mystic ‘chords of memory’ which united all patriotic hearts. One of his predecessors, Mr. Pierce, the most noted among the partisans of peace, anxious, no doubt, to surpass him in the allegorical style, announced to his auditors that, on their side, they would construct ‘a great mausoleum of hearts, ’