the Union.

Buchanan had agreed to receive the Southern Commissioners, and sent a
message to Congress announcing their presence and their overtures.

The Commissioners found Washington seething with passion and trembling
with excitement. Buchanan had collapsed in terror, fearing each hour to
hear that his home had been sacked and burned at Wheatland.

But the Southern leaders' hope of peaceful settlement was based on a
surer foundation than the shattered nerves of the feeble old man in the
White House. Joseph Holt, the Secretary of War, was a Southern Democrat
born in Kentucky, and from the State of Mississippi. Holt had called on
Davis in Washington and assured him of his loyalty to the South and her
people. The President of the Confederacy knew of his consuming personal
ambitions and had assured him of his influence to secure generous
treatment.

But the Secretary of War had received information from the South. He had
studied the situation carefully. He believed his chances of advancement
in the North a better risk. The new Government had ignored him in the
selection of a Cabinet--and with quick decision he cast his fortunes
with the Union. That he had deceived Davis and Clay, to whom he had
given his pledge of Southern loyalty, was a matter of no importance,
save that these two men, who alone knew his treachery, were marked for
his vengeance.

Little could they dream in this hour the strange end toward which Fate
was even now hurrying them through the machinations of this sullen,
envious Southern renegade.

The Secretary of War placed his big fist on the throat of the trembling
President, and the Peace Commissioners could not reach the White House
or its councils.

They were forced to await the inauguration of Abraham Lincoln.

Jefferson Davis gave himself body and soul to the task of preparing his
over-sanguine, credulous people for the possible tragedy of war.

General Beauregard was ordered to command the forces in South Carolina,
and erect batteries for the defense of Charleston and the reduction of
Fort Sumter in case of an attempt to reenforce it. This grim fort, in
the center of the harbor of the chief Southern Atlantic city, commanded
the gateway of the Confederacy. If it should be reenforced, the
Confederate Government might be strangled by the fall of Charleston, and
the landing of an army even before a blow could be struck.

Captain Raphael Semmes was sent North to buy every gun in the market. H