llions and a half of white inhabitants in the slave
States, whose lives and property are menaced and endangered_ by this
ill-considered, misnamed, and disorganizing philanthropy. They
should be informed of the full length and breadth and depth of this
storm which is gathering over their heads, before it breaks in its
desolating fury. Christians and civilized, they are _now_
industrious, prosperous, and happy; but should your schemes of
abolition prevail, it will bring upon them overwhelming ruin, and
misery unutterable. The two races cannot exist together upon terms
of equality--the extirpation of one and the ruin of the other _would
be inevitable_. This humanity, conceived in wrong and born in civil
strife, would be baptized in a people's blood. It was, that our
people might know, in time to guard against the mad onset, the full
extent of this gigantic conspiracy and crusade against their
institutions; and of necessity upon their lives with which they must
sustain them; and their fortunes and prosperity, which _exist only
while these institutions exist_, that I was induced to enter into a
correspondence with you, who by your official station and
intelligence were known to be well informed on these points, and
from your well established character for candor and fairness, would
make no statements of facts which were not known or believed by you
to be true. To a great extent, my end has been accomplished by your
replies to my inquiries. How far, or whether at all, your answers
have run, beyond _the facts inquired for_, into theories, arguments,
and dissertations, as erroneous as mischievous, is not a matter of
present consideration. We differed no wider than I expected, but
that difference has been exhibited courteously, and has nothing to
do with the question of publication. Your object, or rather the
object of your Committee, is to publish; and I, having no reason to
desire it, as you have put me in possession of the facts I wished,
and no reason not to desire it, as there is nothing to conceal, will
leave yourself and the Committee to take your own course, neither
assenting nor dissenting, in what you may finally decide to do.

Very respectfully,

Your obedient servant,

F.H. Elmore."

[This letter of Mr. Elmore contains but little more than a reiteration
of alarming cries on t