ce. Far be it
from me to say that the English nation at large, or Englishmen
individually, brood gloomily over that defeat, or, with active and
conscious malignity, long for the desolation of their brothers in blood,
language, and a common history. To say that would be as strained and
exaggerated, and as contrary to British practicality and freedom from
vengefulness, as to deny that some degree of soreness and distance
remains would seem to me uncandid. Englishmen are quite ready to
believe, and to light upon the casual evidences, that Frenchmen remember
Waterloo, and would have no objection to wipe out the reminiscence upon
occasion; and Frenchmen and Americans may probably perceive that like
causes lead to like results in the Englishmen's own case, although the
latter are less quick-sighted regarding that. There is, I apprehend,
quite enough soreness on the subject to lead us to watch the career of
the United States with jealousy, to take offence easily where the
relative interests of both countries are concerned, to put the less
favorable of two possible constructions upon American doings, and to
feel as if, in any reverse which may happen to the States, a certain
long-standing score of our own, which we did not clear off quite
satisfactorily to ourselves, were in a round-about course of settlement.

It may perhaps be rejoined, "Even admitting what you have said as to
British conservatism and soreness, and consequent dislike of Americans,
this furnishes no reason why the more influential classes in England
should have sided with Southern rather than Northern Americans." But I
cannot acknowledge the force of the rejoinder. The United States are,
like any other nation, represented by their Government, with which the
Northern and Union section was in harmony, the Southern and Disunion
section in conflict; indeed, the very fact of secession divided the
South from the obnoxious entity, the United States, and so far ranged
the South under the same banner with all other antagonists of the States
and their Government. The anti-American might with perfect consistency
plead for his Southernism, "Not that I disliked Carolina less, but that
I disliked Massachusetts more." Besides, there was a very prevalent
impression that the Southern Confederacy would be an essentially
aristocratic commonwealth, as contrasted with the democratic Northern
Union,--an impression which the peculiar conditions of society in the
South would hardly h