a good deal of truth in this belief. For the British and
French governments dreaded the growing power of the American republic
and would gladly have seen it broken to pieces. But events fell out far
otherwise than the Southern leaders had calculated. Before the supply of
American cotton in England was used up, new supplies began to come in
from India and from Egypt. The Union armies occupied portions of the
cotton belt early in 1862, and American cotton was again exported. But
more than all else, the English mill operatives, in all their hardships,
would not ask their government to interfere. They saw clearly enough
that the North was fighting for the rights of free labor. At times it
seemed, however, as if Great Britain or France would interfere.

[Sidenote: Southern agents sent to Europe.]

[Sidenote: Removed from the _Trent_.]

[Sidenote: Lincoln's opinion.]

[Sidenote: Action of Great Britain.]

405. The Trent Affair, 1861.--As soon as the blockade was
established, the British and French governments gave the Confederates
the same rights in their ports as the United States had. The Southerners
then sent two agents, Mason and Slidell, to Europe to ask the foreign
governments to recognize the independence of the Confederate states.
Captain Wilkes of the United States ship _San Jacinto_ took these agents
from the British steamer _Trent_. But Lincoln at once said that Wilkes
had done to the British the very thing which we had fought the War of
1812 to prevent the British doing to us. "We must stick to American
principles," said the President, "and restore the prisoners." They were
given up. But the British government, without waiting to see what
Lincoln would do, had gone actively to work to prepare for war. This
seemed so little friendly that the people of the United States were
greatly irritated.

[Sidenote: The war powers of the President.]

[Sidenote: Lincoln follows Northern sentiment.]

406. Lincoln and Slavery.--It will be remembered that the
Republican party had denied again and again that it had any intention to
interfere with slavery in the states. As long as peace lasted the
Federal government could not interfere with slavery in the states. But
when war broke out, the President, as commander-in-chief, could do
anything to distress and weaken the enemy. If freeing the slaves in the
seceded states would injure the secessionists, he had a perfect right to
do it. But Lincoln knew that public opinion in th