best to catch the note of
authority in the rumblings of vox populi. For his own part, Lincoln
began with two resolves: to go very cautiously,--and not give something
for nothing. Far from him, as yet, was that plunging mood which in
Seward pushed audacity to the verge of a gamble. However, just previous
to the inauguration, he took a cautious step in Seward's direction.
Virginia, like all the other States of the upper South, was torn by the
question which side to take. There was a "Union" party in Virginia, and
a "Secession" party. A committee of leading Unionists conferred with
Lincoln. They saw the immediate problem very much as Seward did. They
believed that if time were allowed, the crisis could be tided over and
the Union restored; but the first breath of war would wreck their hopes.
The condition of bringing about an adjustment was the evacuation of
Sumter. Lincoln told them that if Virginia could be kept in the Union
by the evacuation of Sumter, he would not hesitate to recall the
garrison.(8) A few days later, despite what he had said in the
inaugural, he repeated this offer. A convention was then sitting at
Richmond in debate upon the relations of Virginia to the Union. If
it would drop the matter and dissolve--so Lincoln told another
committee--he would evacuate Sumter and trust the recovery of the lower
South to negotiation.(9) No results, so far as is known, came of either
of those offers.

During the first half of March, the Washington government marked time.
The office-seekers continued to besiege the President. South Carolina
continued to clamor for possession of Sumter. The Confederacy sent
commissioners to Washington whom Lincoln refused to recognize. The
Virginia Convention swayed this way and that.

Seward went serenely about his business, confident that everything was
certain to come his way soon or late. He went so far as to advise an
intermediary to tell the Confederate Commissioners that all they had
to do to get possession of Sumter was to wait. The rest of the Cabinet
pressed their ears more tightly than ever to the ground. The rumblings
of vox populi were hard to interpret. The North appeared to be in two
minds. This was revealed the day following the inauguration, when a
Republican Club in New York held a high debate upon the condition of the
country. One faction wanted Lincoln to declare for a war-policy; another
wished the Club to content itself with a vote of confidence in the
Administra