nerant agent of a sewing machine, who breakfasts in Brussels with
Leopold, and the same day dines in Paris with Thouvenel, and may
take his supper in h----l, so far as the interest of the cause is
concerned. But Dayton seems not to be in favor with the department.

The admirers of McClellan assert that one parallel digged by him was
sufficient to frighten the rebels and force them to evacuate. Good for
what it is worth for such mighty ignorant brains. The mortars, the
hundred-pounders, frightened the rebels; they break down not before
parallels, strategy, or Napoleon, but before the intellectual
superiority of the North, in the present case embodied in mortars and
other armaments.

Following the retreating enemy, McClellan loses more prisoners than he
makes from the enemy. A new and perfectly original, perfectly _sui
generis_ mode of warfare, but altogether in harmony with all the other
martial performances of the pet of the New York Herald, of Messrs.
Seward and Blair, and of the whole herd of intriguers and imbeciles.

People who approach him say that Mr. Lincoln's conceit groweth every
day. I guess that Seward carefully nurses the weed as the easiest way
to dominate over and to handle a feeble mind.

Since Mr. Mercier judges by his own eyes, and not by those of former
various Washington associations, his inborn soundness and perspicacity
have the upper hand. He is impartial and just to both parties; he is
not bound to have against the rebels feelings akin to mine, but he is
well disposed, and wishes for the success of the Union.

The events are too grand and too rapid for Lincoln. It is impossible
for him to grasp and to comprehend them. I do not know any past
historical personality fully adequate to such a task. Happily in this
occurrency, the many, the people at large, by its grasp and
forwardness, supplies and neutralizes the inefficiency or the
tergiversations, intrigues and double-dealings of the few, of the
official leaders, advisers, etc.

I willingly concede to Mr. Lincoln all the best and most variegated
mental and intellectual qualities, all the virtues as claimed for him
by his eulogists and friends. I would wish to believe, as they do, Mr.
Lincoln to be infallible and impeccable. But all those qualities and
virtues represented to form the residue of his character, all shining
when in private life, some way or other are transformed from positives
into negatives, since Mr. Lincoln's contact with the p