tian." Such a "change of heart" has not been heard of
since the conversion of St. Ananias and Sapphirs.
I have no fondness for fighting ; not the average "instinct of destruction," I should suffer a great while before I struck a blow. But there are times when I would take down the dreadful weapon of war: this is one of them for the men in Kansas.
It is not easy for the border ruffians alone to put down Kansas; not possible for them to break up the popular organization, destroy the new Constitution, and hang the officers. Will the President send the United States soldiers to do this? No doubt his heart is good enough for that work. We remember what he did with United States soldiers at Boston, in 1854: the only service they ever rendered in that town for more than forty years was to kidnap Anthony Burns. But the President falters: there is a North; all last winter there was a North, — Northern ice in the Mississippi ; Banks, of the North, at Washington, in the speaker's chair.
Kansas and Nebraska are "the Children in the Wood." They had a fair inheritance; but the parents, dying, left them to a guardian uncle,—the President. I heard the Northern mother say to him,—
"You must be father and mother both,
And uncle, all in one."
"You are the man must bring our babes
To wealth or misery.
And, if yon keep them carefully,
Then God will you reward;
But, if you otherwise should deal,
God will your deeds regard."
It is still the old story: the Executive uncle promises well enough: yet—
"He had not kept these pretty babes
But twelve months and a day.
Before he did devise
To make them both away.
He bargained with two ruffians strong
[That is, Straightwhig and Democrat,]
Which were of furious mood.
That they should take these children young.
And slay them in a wood."
