lected sometimes where one who has been caught in
the very act of thinking, and had it proved on him, might be defeated.

Chief Justice Taney now stated that slaves could be taken into any State
of the Union by their owners without forfeiting the rights of ownership.
This was called the Dred Scott decision, and did much to irritate
Abolitionists like John Brown, whose soul as this book goes to press is
said to be marching on. Brown was a Kansas man with a mission and
massive whiskers. He would be called now a crank; but his action in
seizing a United States arsenal at Harper's Ferry and declaring the
slaves free was regarded by the South as thoroughly representative of
the Northern feeling.

The country now began to be in a state of restlessness. Brown had been
captured and hanged as a traitor. Northern men were obliged to leave
their work every little while to catch a negro, crate him, and return
him to his master or give him a lift towards Canada; and, as the negro
was replenishing the earth at an astonishing rate, general alarm broke
out.

Douglas was the champion of squatter sovereignty, John C. Breckinridge
of the doctrine that slaves could be checked through as personal baggage
into any State of the Union, and Lincoln of the anti-slavery principle
which afterwards constituted the spinal column of the Federal Government
as opposed to the Confederacy of the seceded States.

[Illustration: OBLIGED TO LEAVE THEIR WORK EVERY LITTLE WHILE TO CATCH A
NEGRO.]

Lincoln was elected, which reminded him of an anecdote. Douglas and
several other candidates were defeated, which did not remind them of
anything.

South Carolina seceded in December, 1860, and soon after Mississippi,
Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas followed suit.

The following February the Confederacy was organized at Montgomery,
Alabama, and Jefferson Davis was elected President. Long and patient
effort on the part of the historian to ascertain how he liked it has
been entirely barren of results. Alexander H. Stephens was made
Vice-President.

Everything belonging to the United States and not thoroughly fastened
down was carried away by the Confederacy, while President Buchanan
looked the other way or wrote airy persiflage to tottering dynasties
which slyly among themselves characterized him as a neat and cleanly old
lady.

Had Buchanan been a married man it is generally believed now that his
wife would have prevented the war. Then she