ness on landing moved me deeply; but my career is not that of earthly weapons, and I abhor war. Mine are spiritual arms. I humbly offered my poor prayers to heaven that the aroused passions might be soothed and peace come anew to cement the old Union and restore tranquillity and happiness to a country formerly so happy and prosperous.
But " there is no peace." I left New York on the 17th of April and reached St. Louis on the 19th. Throughout that 1,ooo-mile journey nothing was heard save the rattle of arms and cries of war, repeated from one end to the other, in every town, city and village that we passed through, and from every height, steeple and housetop floated the insulted banner.
From the statistics that have thus far been published, it is safe to assume that half a million of men have already been killed or have died in the hospitals. "he property sacked and destroyed on both sides, amounts to a great many millions of dollars. The cost of the war cannot be less than two to three millions a day, and it has been going on for nearly two years. God alone, in his mercy, can put an end to these bloody and deadly combats. Thus far no one is able to see any outcome for it, and the numerous battles
have not had the slightest definite result. They seem urged on by hatred, without seeing that Union by force would be but a whited sepulchre. It is a most deplorable and horrible war, in which brothers are called on to cut each others' throats and battles are often the merest butcheries.
Whence has this war arisen, and in the midst of a prosperity incomparable on earth? The man who answers this question in all its details will have a long and difficult task. I will give you the immediate cause, as it appeared to me at the outbreak of the war.
Two principal causes brought it about. The first is the question of the extension of negro slavery into the new territories. The second is the tariff question. The South has always been more favorable to free trade than the North. I am persuaded that the tariff question counts for little in