And Here I May As Well Say
What Further There Is For Me To Say About Those Two Heroes.
I was
in Boston when they were taken, and all Boston was then full of
them.
I was at Washington when they were surrendered, and at
Washington for a time their names were the only household words in
vogue. To me it had from the first been a matter of certainty that
England would demand the restitution of the men. I had never
attempted to argue the matter on the legal points, but I felt, as
though by instinct, that it would be so. First of all there reached
us, by telegram from Cape Race, rumors of what the press in England
was saying; rumors of a meeting in Liverpool, and rumors of the
feeling in London. And then the papers followed, and we got our
private letters. It was some days before we knew what was actually
the demand made by Lord Palmerston's cabinet; and during this time,
through the five or six days which were thus passed, it was clear to
be seen that the American feeling was undergoing a great change - or
if not the feeling, at any rate the purpose. Men now talked of
surrendering these Commissioners, as though it were a line of
conduct which Mr. Seward might find convenient; and then men went
further, and said that Mr. Seward would find any other line of
conduct very inconvenient. The newspapers, one after another, came
round.
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