“I think so, too,” said Captain Sybil.  “But in making his proclamation of freedom, perhaps Mr. Lincoln went as far as he thought public opinion would let him.”

“It is remarkable,” said Colonel Robinson, “how these Secesh hold out.  It surprises me to see how poor white men, who, like the negroes, are victims of slavery, rally around the Stripes and Bars.  These men, I believe, have been looked down on by the aristocratic slaveholders, and despised by the well-fed and comfortable slaves, yet they follow their leaders into the very jaws of death; face hunger, cold, disease, and danger; and all for what?  What, under heaven, are they fighting for?  Now, the negro, ignorant as he is, has learned to regard our flag as a banner of freedom, and to look forward to his deliverance as a consequence of the overthrow of the Rebellion.”

“I think,” said Captain Sybil “that these ignorant white men have been awfully deceived.  They have had presented to their imaginations utterly false ideas of the results of Secession, and have been taught that its success would bring them advantages which they had never enjoyed in the Union.”

“And I think,” said Colonel Robinson, “that the women and ministers have largely fed and fanned the fires of this Rebellion, and have helped to create a public opinion which has swept numbers of benighted men into the conflict.  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.  At the beginning of this war we were not permeated with justice, and so were not ripe for victory.  The battle of Bull Run inaugurated the war by a failure.  Instead of glory we gathered shame, and defeat in place of victory.”