tion of our country and the value of its institutions, though chastened in pride and rebuked in feeling, cannot forget these truths. You have come together on this occasion to give expression to your feelings of attachment and respect for the laws and Constitution of your country. It is in good time. Your friends there are now testing the question if you have a country; for a country without a government is no country. It is a habitation without a name a locus in quo for a miserable existence. The world cannot expect, and least of all can England expect, that we shall disgrace our Saxon lineage by permitting a Government which has accomplished so much for humanity within so brief a space, to go out without a struggle, and, if need be, such a struggle as the world has not seen. Our Union cost much, and it is worth all, and more than it cost."

Mr. Clay took occasion to speak of France and England in their relations to the Rebellion, proclaiming their interests to be on the side of the preservation of the Union. "I am accused," said he, in reference to his communication to the London Times, "of threatening England. I am not in the habit of casting about me to see how I may make truth most palatable. Let those who stand in the way of truth look out. If England, after all she has said against slavery, shall draw her sword in its defence, then I say, great as she is, she shall perish by the sword.' For then not only France, but all the world shall cry, 'Perfide Albion!' When she mingles the red crosses of the Union Jack with the piratical black flag of the Confederate States of America,' will not just as certainly the Tricolor and the Stars and

Stripes float once more in fraternal folds? Can France forget who has doggedly hedged in all the fields of her glory? Can Napoleon forget St. Helena? Will he, at her bidding, turn his back upon the East? Shall 'Partant pour la Syrie' be heard no more in France forever? Russia strengthens herself by giving up slave labor for the omnipotent powers of nature, which, by steam, and electricity, and water, and the mechanical forces, share with man the creative omnipotence. Shall England cross half the globe to check the eastern march of her new-born civilization? I have spoken to England, not as an enemy, but a friend. For her own sake, I would have her be true to herself. If England would preserve cotton for her millions of operatives, let her join in putting down the rebellion. Her interference in defence of the rebels of the South will force us to do that which would be a calamity to us as well as to them-at a blow to destroy slavery forever. The interests of England and France lie in the same direction-in the preservation of the Union, and the making of successful rebellion impossible."

Probably the speaker whose remarks were regarded with the most interest on this occasion, was Colonel Fremont. The faces of the others were turned away from home to a protracted residence abroad; he was eagerly looked for to return and take an active part in the field in the preservation of the honor and liberty of his country. In far-off America his words were read with anticipations of the new patriotic career before him. He was introduced by Mr. Burlingame at the close of an earnest speech in these words: "I would that our struggling brothers at home could hear this day our words of lofty cheer,

and know how the American heart in this far land throbs true to them and the cause for which they struggle. We send them with our blessings over the sea; but, what is better, we send with them one known to them, known to us, known to two hemispheres, and one who, in this warlike land of his ancestors, heard the call of his mother (for he is, indeed, a child of the Republic), and casting from him the urgent claims of his private affairs, almost without warning and notice, determined to fly to the defence of the flag he has done so much to exalt. We say to him that he will be welcomed on the western shore by fourteen hundred thousand men, who, but yesterday, hailed his name as a symbol of their faith, and by a countless host who then defeated our hopes, with, if possible, a still warmer enthusiasm-welcomed on the Atlantic slope, and on the Pacific slope, which his valor won for us, and in the Rocky Mountains, from whose loftiest summit he was the first to unfurl the beautiful banner of his country in the beams of the setting sun. We breathe our benison upon him. We know what will follow where he goes before, for 'born and nursed in danger's path, he's tried her worst.' We know his future will be as bright as his past, and that he will enjoy a soldier's triumph, or the sweet tranquillity of an honored soldier's grave. And now, all hail, Fremont, and farewell!"

Upon this Colonel Fremont rose and said: "I am deeply sensible to the warm and flattering expressions of confidence and regard with which I have just been honored, and still more deeply sensible to your kind approval of them. They are very grateful to me, and I thank you very sincerely. But you will

447

be very sure that I do not receive them as due to myself; I am conscious that I owe them to the partiality of friendship, and to that sort of attachment which a soldier always feels for the banner under which he has fought. To him (Mr. Burlingame) and the other friends around me who have spoken to-day, I represent the standard on which old watchwords were inscribed. It is themselves who were the leaders, themselves who bore with you the heat of the day, and who have won their battle gloriously. And they have come among us here, with their habitual eloquence, to convey to our true-hearted countrymen at home the assurance of our unalterable devotedness to the country, and our unbounded admiration of the generous loyalty with which they rallied to its calls. A few days back our honored flag was trailing in the dust at the foot of an insolent foe; at present its stars are refulgent from a thousand heights, swarming with brave hearts and strong arms in its defence. We drink to them to-day, our brave and loyal countrymen. Faithfully, too, have our scattered people responded to them, from Italy, from England, and from France. Well have they shown they, too, can cross the seas and change their skies, and never change their hearts. I am glad that a happy chance has brought me to participate with you here on this occasion. Here, in this splendid capital of a great nation, where near by us the same tombstone records 'the blended names of Washington and Lafayette, I feel that I breathe a sympathetic air."

Mr. Adams, the new minister to England, arrived at Liverpool on the 13th of May, and was met by the intelligence that the affairs of America had a few days before engaged the attention of