to labor is the only means of giving stability to its social arrangements, or of making their play har

monious.

Besides the amount of strictly warlike energy the army had displayed in the field, it had also performed an enormous amount of productive work. The roads it had constructed, the railroads it had built and kept in order, the fortifications it had thrown up, the intrenchments it had raised, may be estimated from the fact that fifteen thousand miles of military telegraph had been laid during the war. The amount of physical energy expended upon both sides during the war, would have sufficed, had it been valued according to the present standard of wages, and had it been directed in the interest of production, instead of in the interest of destruction, to have purchased, at the highest valuation, the entire negro population of the South, and have set them free, while such an application of the energies of both sections of the country, would have left the South, at the end of the four years, with its railway system perfected, instead of destroyed, with its roads built, its swamps drained, and its lands in a high state of culture, instead of being laid desolate with fire and sword.

It is at present considered utopian to suppose that wars will ever cease; but certainly, if ever reason and a wise self-interest, instead of subverted passions, shall come to govern men's actions, this result will be obtained. Whenever the industry of a country, which produces all its wealth, shall retain in its own possession the wealth it creates, and shall have thus in its own hands the disposition of its own energies, then war, since it is evidently never an aid, but always an injury to pro

ductive industry, will come to be classed among the follies of the world's childhood. That this result must inevitably arrive, and that it will arrive by the diffusion and practical realization of the democratic idea, is as evident, as that the war was inaugurated by the class at the South who lived by the spoliation of industry, and that if the labor of the South had for the last sixty years been treated with justice, slavery would have been abolished long ago, and the war would have become impossible for want of a moving cause.

Thus it is seen that the spread of the democratic idea, and its practical realization in our social arrangements, is the growth of all real conservatism, if this word has the meaning of its derivation,—which is, to preserve,—since justice alone can guarantee that stability and peace, in which society moves forward to its ultimate destiny of freedom, by the gradual and persistent process of development which runs uninterruptedly through all nature. Change is the necessary condition of growth, and growth is the necessity of existence. As the Latin poet says,

Or, expressing the same idea, the quaint old English poet,

"That which is motionless decays;

Only in constant change is length of days."

CHAPTER XLVII.

THE FIRST YEAR OF RECONSTRUCTION, AND GRANT'S COURSE AS HEAD OF THE MILITARY AUTHORITY. - HIS ANSWER TO GENERAL LEE'S PETITION FOR PARDON.—THE TESTIMONIALS GIVEN HIM BY THE PEOPLE.

DURING the summer of 1865, Grant made a tour through the North, and was everywhere received with enthusiasm. Continuing his tour through the West, he visited at Springfield, Illinois, the tomb of Abraham Lincoln, where reposes the body of the President, to whose firm confidence in his ability Grant was indebted for the opportunity for its display, and whose assassination, at the moment when victory came to reward his four years of care and anxiety, turned a nation's rejoicing to tears. At Galena, Illinois, Grant was presented by his fellowtownsmen with a furnished house, situated just out of the town, and commanding a fine view of the river and surrounding country. Early in November, having remained for some time in Washington after his return from the West, Grant paid a visit to New York, and was tendered a splendid reception by the citizens. The banquet was given at the Fifth Avenue Hotel, and the enthusiasm with which his entrance was greeted was such as rarely finds genuine expression in fashionable society, where the conventional restraints of respectability repress the expression of every natural feeling,

on the supposition that such conduct is vulgar. Though he was the centre of attraction, Grant remained as impassive and apparently unconcerned as he always does. Such ovations he receives, as he gains his victories, without surprise and without elation.

On his return to Washington, Grant resolved to pay a visit to the South, and carried out his resolution as quietly and unostentatiously as he had made it. His first stopping-place was Richmond; and though the capture of this place will ever be connected with his name, yet this was the first visit he had paid to it, and now he entered with no flourish or display, but simply as an officer of the government, whose duty led him South on a tour of observation. On the 1st of December, he arrived in Charleston, South Carolina, the cradle of secession, and was received there with enthusiasm. The Union League, composed of colored citizens, honored his presence with a torchlight procession and a serenade.

The object of Grant's tour through the South was to inform himself by personal observation concerning the workings of the military government and of the Freedmen's Bureau, and also to observe the condition, physically and morally, of the people. Though the time devoted to this trip was but short, yet Grant made the best use of it, and by freely conversing with the people he met, and by investigating for himself the workings of the new system of things in the South, was able to report on his return. He arrived at Washington from this southern tour on the 11th of December, 1865, and on the 18th reported to the President the result of his observations. This report was a short one, and the following extract from it will show the result of

his observations concerning the most important matter at this period, which was the harmonious working of the military authority and the Freedmen's Bureau. The evident necessity was to introduce a unity of action between these; and upon the want of this unity Grant writes,

"It seems to me that this could be corrected by regarding every officer on duty with troops in the Southern States as an agent of the Freedmen's Bureau, and then have all orders from the head of the Bureau sent through the department commanders. This would create a responsibility that would cause uniformity of action throughout the South, and cause the orders and instructions from the head of the Bureau being carried out, and would relieve from duty and pay a large number of employees of the government."

It is a pity that this practical suggestion was not then carried out, since it is evident that such an application of common sense to the new condition of affairs in the South could not fail to have produced the effects desired, and which are certainly most necessary. Economy and efficiency- these are the needed reforms; and these would have been secured by the adoption of this common-sense suggestion.

On the 12th of January, 1866, the following order was issued from the War Department:

General Orders, No. 3.

WAR DEPARTMENT, ADJUTANT GENERAL'S OFFICE,

WASHINGTON, January 12, 1866.

Military division and department commanders whose commands embrace or are composed of any of the late rebellious states, and who have not already done so, will at once issue and enforce orders protecting from prosecution or suits, in the state or municipal