Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 14.djvu/224

 218 Southern Historical Society Papers.

But with no other except this adventitious aid, Mr. Davis was able to report to Congress in his message in January, 1863 :

" Our armies are larger, better disciplined, and more thoroughly armed and equipped than at any previous period of the war. The energies of a whole nation devoted to the single object of success in this war have accom- plished marvels, and many of our trials have, by a beneficent Providence, been converted into blessings. The magnitude of the perils which we have encountered have developed the true qualities and illustrated the heroic character of our people, thus gaining for the Confederacy from its birth a just appreciation from the other nations of the earth. The injuries resulting from the interruption of foreign commerce have received some compensa- tion by the development of our internal resources. Cannon crown our fortresses that were cast from the products of mines opened and furnaces built during the war. Our mountain caves yield much of the nitre for the manufacture of powder, and promise increase of product. From our own foundries and laboratories, from our own armories and workshops, we derive in a great measure the warlike materials, the ordnance and ordnance stores which are e.xpended so profusely in the numerous desperate engagements that rapidly succeed each other. Cotton and woolen fabrics, shoes and har- ness, wagons and gun-carriages are produced in daily increasing quantities by the factories springing into existence. Our fields, no longer whitened by cotton that cannot be exported, are devoted to the production of cereals and the growth of stock formerly purchased with the proceeds of cotton. In the homes of our noble and devoted women, without whose sublime sacrifices our success would have been impossible, the noise of the loom and of the spinning wheel may be heard throughout the land. With hearts swelling with gratitude, let us join them m returning thanks to God, and be- seeching Him the continuance of His protecting care over our cause, and the restoration of peace with its manifold blessings to our beloved country."*

This message was written just after the battle of Fredericksburg, when the tide of Confederate success was still in the flood, and our hopes of final victory were high and strong. But the tide reached its full at Gettysburg and turned, and our resources, notwithstanding our skill and valor in the field, gradually failed us, and the end came at Appomattox. Would we now have it otherwise?

I for one, reading again the history of the great questions which divided the sections of the country, recollecting our education and recalling the spirit of the times, think I can say that I regret neither the war nor its results. The questions on which it arose were im- planted in the very Constitution of the United States. What all the


 * Marginalia, page 189.