[685] huzzas; the inspiration ended with the voices and ceremonies that invoked it; and it was found that the spirit of the people of the Confederacy was too weak, too much broken to react with effect, or assume the position of erect and desperate defiance. A few days before this popular convocation in Richmond, and just on the return of the commissioners, President Davis himself had addressed a popular audience in the African Church. He was attended to the stand by the Governor of Virginia. He made a powerful and eloquent address; but in parts of it he fell into weak and bombastic speech, and betrayed that boastfulness characteristic of almost all his oral utterances in the war. As a writer, Mr. Davis was careful, meditative, and full of dignity; but as a speaker, he was imprudent, and in moments of passion, he frequently blurted out what first came into his mind. On this occasion he was boastful, almost to the point of grotesqueness. He declared that the march which Sherman was then making would be “his last,” and would conduct him to ruin; he predicted that before the summer solstice fell upon the country it would be the North that would be soliciting peace; he affirmed that the military situation of the Confederacy was all that he could desire; and drawing up his figure, and in tones of scornful defiance, heard to the remotest parts of the building, he remarked that the Federal authorities who had so complacently conferred with the commissioners of the Confederacy, “little knew that they were talking to their master!” Such swollen speeches of the President offended the sober sense of the Confederacy; and it was frequently said that he attempted to blind the people as to the actual condition of affairs, and never dealt with them in a proper spirit of candour. But this estimate of President Davis is probably a mistaken one. He was not insincere; in all his strange and extravagant utterances of confidence he probably believed what he spoke; and to the last he appears never to have apprehended the real situation. He was blinded by his own natural temper; in the last moment he was issuing edicts, playing with the baubles of authority, never realizing that he was not still the great tribune; he was sustained by a powerful self-conceit, and a sanguine temperament; and he went down to ruin with the fillet of vanity upon his eyes.
This text is part of:
[685] huzzas; the inspiration ended with the voices and ceremonies that invoked it; and it was found that the spirit of the people of the Confederacy was too weak, too much broken to react with effect, or assume the position of erect and desperate defiance. A few days before this popular convocation in Richmond, and just on the return of the commissioners, President Davis himself had addressed a popular audience in the African Church. He was attended to the stand by the Governor of Virginia. He made a powerful and eloquent address; but in parts of it he fell into weak and bombastic speech, and betrayed that boastfulness characteristic of almost all his oral utterances in the war. As a writer, Mr. Davis was careful, meditative, and full of dignity; but as a speaker, he was imprudent, and in moments of passion, he frequently blurted out what first came into his mind. On this occasion he was boastful, almost to the point of grotesqueness. He declared that the march which Sherman was then making would be “his last,” and would conduct him to ruin; he predicted that before the summer solstice fell upon the country it would be the North that would be soliciting peace; he affirmed that the military situation of the Confederacy was all that he could desire; and drawing up his figure, and in tones of scornful defiance, heard to the remotest parts of the building, he remarked that the Federal authorities who had so complacently conferred with the commissioners of the Confederacy, “little knew that they were talking to their master!” Such swollen speeches of the President offended the sober sense of the Confederacy; and it was frequently said that he attempted to blind the people as to the actual condition of affairs, and never dealt with them in a proper spirit of candour. But this estimate of President Davis is probably a mistaken one. He was not insincere; in all his strange and extravagant utterances of confidence he probably believed what he spoke; and to the last he appears never to have apprehended the real situation. He was blinded by his own natural temper; in the last moment he was issuing edicts, playing with the baubles of authority, never realizing that he was not still the great tribune; he was sustained by a powerful self-conceit, and a sanguine temperament; and he went down to ruin with the fillet of vanity upon his eyes.
1866.
Tufts University provided support for entering this text.
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.