us. The sole objection to this promiscuous introduction is, that every one you are introduced to asks you to drink as a matter of politeness. Happily, American whisky is very weak, and as you are allowed to help yourself from the bottle, you can take as little as you please. I was struck then, by the way, as I had often been before, at the great liberality in standing treat, to use a common word, of the ordinary Americans. Men to whom, from their dress and air, money must really be a matter of consequence, will spend many shillings in paying for drinks for perfect strangers; and if any friend's friend is standing by, will press him to join him as a matter of course. There is no ostentation, as far as I can see, about this custom, but a simple feeling of rough hospitality, not over refined, perhaps, but still creditable in itself. I was struck, too, as I was frequently, with the extraordinary freedom with which, in the midst of this civil war, men of all opinions expressed their sentiments in public. We had many Union soldiers on board, several Government officials, and a good sorting of Secessionists. We had various political discussions, but all in perfect good humour and frankness; and the only opinion I did not hear expressed was Abolitionist, either because there were no Abolitionists in the party, or because Abolitionist doctrines are too unpopular in these border Slave States to be freely expressed. There was one old Kentucky farmer I was introduced to, who was just going home,

after having been kept in prison at Columbus as a Secessionist. He confessed openly that he was in favour of secession, but declared, whether truly or not, that he had taken no part for or against it, and that his imprisonment had been due to a malicious information given against him by the Union doctor of the village, whose conduct he had had to censure for immorality. 66 The only thing, sir," he said, "I thought was hard, was, that "I was arrested on the very spot of ground where our regiment was encamped in 1812, when we were drawn "out to fight the Britishers, begging your pardon, sir." Yet this old man was conversing in the most friendly way with another old Kentucky backwoodsman, who had sent three sons to fight in the Federal army, and was asking everybody if they could tell him whether his boys' regiment had been in the battle of Pittsburgh Landing, and who, when he was assured that the regiment had not been under fire, made the comment"Well, I should have liked my boys to have been in "at the battle." A gentlemen, by the way, who had just returned from the field of battle, assured me, that amongst all the dead bodies lying scattered over that hard-fought field, he saw but one, rebel or loyal, who had been shot in the back.

KENTUCKY.

IT was in Kentucky that Secession received its first important check. Had Kentucky passed a vote in favour of seceding, the whole of the border Slave States would have gone with the South, and the suppression of the insurrection would have been indefinitely, if not permanently, postponed. The sentiments of Kentucky, being, as she is, an offshoot of Virginia, were all with the South, but her interests were all with the North. In this conflict of opposing forces she stood neutral. In all insurrections it is an invariable rule that whosoever is not with you is against you. So it proved here. The famous declaration of neutrality, issued by the State Government of Kentucky, proved of no service to the South, and was disregarded by both parties alike. In utter defiance of their favourite doctrine of State rights, the Confederates resolved to force Kentucky into active co-operation, and it was for this purpose, according to his own confession, that General Sidney Johnston, the ablest, perhaps, of the

Confederate Generals, whose death at Pittsburgh Landing proved a heavy blow to the South, invaded Kentucky. His motive in so doing, as he stated in his report to Jefferson Davis, was political rather than military. Happily for the North, the Union feeling of Kentucky was roused at this attempt at coercion. Troops enough were raised in the State itself to check the Confederate advance until the Federal Government had time to form its armies. The result was that the Confederates were never able to establish themselves in any force farther than Bowling Green, which lies only a few miles north of the Tennessee frontier.

By a sort of moral retribution, the only State in the Union which proposed to remain neutral, has in reality suffered most from the effects of the war. I recollect, at the time of the annexation of Savoy, reading a statement in one of the imperialist Savoyard papers, to the effect that where their rivers run, there their hearts turned also. The saying might be far more truly applied to the Western States. Their very life flows with the course of their rivers. Mississippi, and the streams which flow into it, is absolute death to the trade of the West. Free access to the Gulf of Mexico is essential to its development. Thus Kentucky, though up to this time it had been saved from much actual war, experienced more loss than all the other States. In the country districts, the actual suffering was not perhaps so great. Wheat and corn

The stoppage of the

and maize had fetched unusually good prices, while the demand for Government supplies created an artificial market for cattle. In the towns, however, there was nothing to neutralize the paralysing effects of the war, and the complete stoppage of the Southern trade. Louisville, the virtual though not the nominal capital of the State (for in Kentucky, as in most other States of the Union, the actual seat of government is placed purposely in some town of small importance), has suffered terribly. Out of seventy jobbing houses which carried on business here before the war broke out, only two are left standing. The others have failed or have moved elsewhere. The pork trade with the South, which was one of the staples of Louisville commerce, has completely fallen off. The carrying trade on the Ohio river came altogether to an end, except for Government stores. The iron and metal factories had all suspended work. There has not been any absolute distress amongst the working classes. The country is so fertile that absolute want was a thing still unknown, but there was a total stoppage of the growth of Louisville, or rather an actual retrogression in its career. Within forty years Louisville had grown from a city of four thousand souls to one numbering upwards of seventy thousand inhabitants; but during the first year since the outbreak of the war, the population had diminished by some ten thousand persons.

The aspect of the city bore out these statements,