tience.

That a Copperhead, who from his own account richly deserves the halter,
should have the impudence to publish a complaint of being simply
_imprisoned_, is indeed amusing. But could the mass of vindictiveness,
sophistry, and vulgarity which these pages contain be simply submitted
to impartial and intelligent men, we should have little dread of any
great harm resulting from them. Unfortunately this Copperhead poison,
with its subtle falsehoods and detestable special pleading, its habeas
corpus side-issues and Golden-Circle slanders, is industriously
circulated among many who are still frightened by the old bugbear of
'Abolition,' and who, like the majority in all wars whatever, have
accustomed themselves to grumble at those who conduct hostilities. Such
persons do not reflect that a great crisis requires great measures, and
that in a war involving such a tremendous issue as the preservation of
the Federal Union and the development of the grandest phase which human
progress has ever assumed, we are not to give up everything to our foes
because Mr. Mahoney and a few congenial traitors have, justly or
unjustly, been kept on crackers and tough beef. When a city burns and it
is necessary to blow up houses with gunpowder, it is no time to be
talking of actions for trespass.

If we had ever had a doubt of the rightfulness of the course which
Government has taken in imprisoning Copperheads, it would have been
removed on reading this miserable book. A man who holds on one page that
every private soldier is to be guided by his own will as regards obeying
orders, and on another sneers at our army as demoralized,--who calls
himself a friend of the Union, and is yet a sympathizer with the enemies
of the Union,--who abuses in the vilest manner our Government and its
officers in a crisis like the present, is one who, according to all
precedents of justice, should be richly punished under military law, if
the civil arm be too weak to grasp him. It was such Democrats as
Mahoney, who yelled out indignantly in the beginning at every measure
which was taken to protect us against the enemy, who, when they had
nearly ruined our cause by their efforts, attributed the results of
their treason to the Administration, and who now, changing their cry,
instead of clamoring for more vigor against the rebels, boldly hurrah
for the rebellion itself. It is strange that they cannot see that they
are now bringing themselves out distinctly as torie