e a nucleus about which the
conspirators in other parts of Illinois could gather; and, being joined
by the prisoners liberated from other camps, and members of the order
from other States, would form an army a hundred thousand strong. So
fully had everything been foreseen and provided for, that the leaders
expected to gather and organize this vast body of men within the space
of a fortnight! The United States could bring into the field no force
capable of withstanding the progress of such an army. The consequences
would be, that the whole character of the war would be changed; its
theatre would be shifted from the Border to the heart of the Free
States; and Southern independence, and the beginning at the North of
that process of disintegration so confidently counted on by the Rebel
leaders at the outbreak of hostilities, would have followed.

What saved the nation from being drawn into this whirlpool of ruin?
Nothing but the cool brain, sleepless vigilance, and wonderful sagacity
of one man,--a young officer never read of in the newspapers,--removed
from field-duty because of disability, but commissioned, I verily
believe, by Providence itself to ferret out and foil this deeper-laid,
wider-spread, and more diabolical conspiracy than any that darkens the
page of history. Other men--and women, too--were instrumental in
dragging the dark iniquity to light; but they failed to fathom its full
enormity, and to discover its point of outbreak. He did that; and he
throttled the tiger when about to spring, and so deserves the lasting
gratitude of his country. How he did it I propose to tell in this paper.
It is a marvellous tale; it will read more like romance than history;
but, calling to mind what a good man once said to me, "Write the truth;
let people doubt, if they will," I shall narrate the facts.

There is nothing remarkable in the appearance of this young man. Nearly
six feet high, he has an erect, military carriage, a frank, manly face,
and looks every inch a soldier,--such a soldier as would stand up all
day in a square hand-to-hand fight with an open enemy; but the keenest
eye would detect in him no indication of the crafty genius which
delights to follow the windings of wickedness when burrowing in the
dark. But if not a Fouche or a Vidocq, he is certainly an able man; for,
in a section where able men are as plenty as apple-blossoms in June, he
was chosen to represent his district in the State Senate, and, entering
t