Page:The Ifs of History (1907).pdf/203

 federacy"; and does any one imagine that the wooden ships of Farragut could have entered the Mississippi, compelled the abandonment of New Orleans, and secured the possession of not only the seacoast but the inland river waters which commanded the Confederacy from the rear, if there had been any good ships to resist him?

The start which these ten ships would have given a Confederate navy would have more than put the South even with the North on the sea. It must be remembered that up to 1862, even as it was, the South could do better in the courts and exchanges of Europe than the Union could. Why? Because the South had the cotton, upon which the mills of Europe depended. The continued chance to market cotton would have saved the situation for the South. Alabamas in any requisite number would have issued from British shipyards.

As it was, several powerful rams