y indestructible
Union party. Three months after the close of the year there remained in
the city no trace of Union sentiment. To show how this feeling was
destroyed, sinking slowly, and with many reactions, under influences in
themselves insignificant, and to narrate, as they fell under personal
observation, that short train of events which make up the historic
period of this first capital of the Southern confederacy, will be the
object of the present sketch.

Early in the summer of 1860 it became evident to every dispassionate
observer in the South that the country was swiftly approaching a great
crisis. So dexterously had politicians managed the excitement which
arose on the discovery of the plot of John Brown, that at the very
beginning of the year a small and united party had been formed, having
for its aim the immediate separation of the States. This party,
following this well-defined object, was the only fixed thing in Southern
society during the year. In the midst of all changes it was permanent.
Even before the presidential election, when men's minds wavered about
things so permanent as party lines and party creeds, about old political
dogmas associated with favorite political leaders, it remained
unaffected. The presence of this restless and determined insurrectionary
element in the party politics of the time gave to the struggle preceding
the presidential election a character of unusual intensity. The city of
Montgomery, as the home of Mr. Yancey, and consequently of his warmest
admirers, and most bitter opponents, felt the full influence of this
excitement, and soon became one of the natural centres of the growing
struggle of opinions.

From causes difficult then to trace, there appeared early in the year in
the money market of the South an unusual condition of prostration. Banks
were unaccountably cautious. Money was scarce. Debts of more than a
year's standing were unpaid, and business of all kinds languished. Not
even were the customary advances made by the banks in the East for the
purchase of cotton, nor did the money scattered through the country by
those sales which did take place relieve the financial pressure under
which everything labored. In October capitalists refused to venture
their funds on anything which did not promise the most immediate return.

In these signs, in the inexplicable shrinking of capital to its hiding
places, and in the universal darkening of business, it would seem that
al