Page:The Presidents of the United States, 1789-1914, v. II.djvu/359

 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 289 admit the possibility of the restoration of the national authority. In July, certain authorized persons in Canada, having persuaded Horace Greeley that negotiations might be opened through them with the Confederate authorities, Mr. Lincoln despatched the great editor to Niagara Falls, and sent an open letter addressed, &quot;To whom it may concern.&quot; It is in the possession of Mr. William H. Appleton, of New York. This document put an end to the negotiation. The Confederate emis saries in Canada and their principals in Richmond made no use of this incident except to employ the president s letter as a text for denunciation of the National government. But, later in the year, the hopelessness of the struggle having become appar ent to some of the Confederate leaders, Mr. Davis was at last induced to send an embassy to Fortress Monroe, to inquire what terms of adjustment were possible. They were met by President Lincoln and the secretary of state in person. The plan proposed was one that had been suggested, on his own responsibility, by Mr. Francis Preston Blair, of Washington, in an interview he had been per mitted to hold with Mr. Davis in Richmond, that the two armies should unite in a campaign against the French in Mexico for the enforcement of the Monroe doctrine, and that the issues of the war should be postponed for future settlement. The president declined peremptorily to entertain this