South.  Florida may be unwilling to subject herself to the charge of temerity or immodesty by leading off, but will most assuredly cooperate with or follow the lead of any single Cotton State which may secede.  Whatever doubts I may have entertained upon this subject have been entirely dissipated by the recent elections in this State.

Florida will most unquestionably call a convention as soon as it is ascertained that a majority of the electors favor the election of Lincoln, to meet most likely upon a day to be suggested by some other State.

    I leave to-day for the capital, and will write you soon after my
    arrival, but would be pleased in the mean time to hear from you at
    your earliest convenience.

    If there is sufficient manliness at the South to strike for our
    rights, honor, and safety, in God’s name let it be done before the
    inauguration of Lincoln.

    With high regard, I am yours, etc.,

    M.S.  PERRY

    Direct to Tallahassee.

    P.S.  I have written General Gist at Union C.H.

Two agencies have thus far been described as engaged in the work of fomenting the rebellion:  the first, secret societies of individuals, like “The 1860 Association,” designed to excite the masses and create public sentiment; the second, a secret league of Southern governors and other State functionaries, whose mission it became to employ the governmental machinery of States in furtherance of the plot.  These, though formidable and dangerous, would probably have failed, either singly or combined, had they not been assisted by a third of still greater efficacy and certainty.  This was nothing less than a conspiracy in the very bosom of the National Administration at Washington, embracing many United States Senators, Representatives in Congress, three members of the President’s Cabinet, and numerous subordinate officials in the several Executive departments.  The special work which this powerful central cabal undertook by common consent, and successfully accomplished, was to divert Federal arms and forts to the use of the rebellion, and to protect and shield the revolt from any adverse influence, or preventive or destructive action of the general Government.

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[1] As an evidence of the disunion combination which lay like smoldering
embers under the surface of Southern politics, it is instructive to read
an extract from a hitherto unpublished letter from Governor Henry A.
Wise, of Virginia, to a gentleman in Philadelphia, for a copy of which
we are indebted to General Duncan S. Walker.  The other letter of
Wise—­previously quoted—­shows us his part and interest in the proposed
conspiracy against Fremont; but the erratic Governor had, after the
lapse of nearly two years, become an anti-Lecompton-Douglasite, and was
ready to give confidential warning of designs with which he was only
too familiar.  As this was written nearly three weeks before Yancey’s
“Scarlet Letter,” its concurrent testimony is of special significance
as proof of the chronic conspiracy: 

  “RICHMOND, VA., “May 28, 1858. 
  “To WM. SERGEANT, ESQ.: