, patriotic in tone. He set before him the glory of an
Administration which should completely re-establish the union of the
States, and re-unite the hearts of the people, now estranged by civil
conflict. He impressed him with the danger of delay to the Republic
and with the discredit which would attach to himself if he should
leave to another President the grateful task of reconciliation. He
pictured to him the National Constellation no longer obscured but with
every star in its orbit, all revolving in harmony, and once more
shining with a brilliancy undimmed by the smallest cloud in the
political heavens.

By his arguments and his eloquence Mr. Seward completely captivated the
President. He effectually persuaded him that a policy of anger and
hate and vengeance could lead only to evil results; that the one
supreme demand of the country was confidence and repose; that the ends
of justice could be reached by methods and measures altogether
consistent with mercy. The President was gradually influenced by Mr.
Seward's arguments, though their whole tenor was against his strongest
predilections and against his pronounced and public committals to a
policy directly the reverse of that to which he was now, almost
imperceptibly to himself, yielding assent. The man who had in April
avowed himself in favor of "the halter for intelligent, influential
traitors," who passionately declared during the interval between the
fall of Richmond and the death of Mr. Lincoln that "traitors should be
arrested, tried, convicted, and hanged," was now about to proclaim a
policy of reconstruction without attempting the indictment of even one
traitor, or issuing a warrant for the arrest of a single participant in
the Rebellion aside from those suspected of personal crime in
connection with the noted conspiracy of assassination.

In this serious struggle with the President, Mr. Seward's influence
was supplemented and enhanced by the timely and artful interposition
of clever men from the South. A large class in that section quickly
perceived the amelioration of the President's feelings, and they used
every judicious effort to forward and develop it. They were ready to
forget all the hard words of Johnson, and to forgive all his harsh
acts, for the great end to be gained to their States and their people
by turning him aside from his proclaimed policy of punishing a great
number of rebels with the utmost severity of the law. Johnson's wrath
w