.. I am loath to close. We are not enemies, but friends. We
must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break
our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from
every battle-field and patriot grave to every living heart and
hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the
Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels
of our nature."
But the peaceful policy here outlined was already more difficult to
follow than Mr. Lincoln was aware. On the morning after inauguration the
Secretary of War brought to his notice freshly received letters from
Major Anderson, commanding Fort Sumter in Charleston harbor, announcing
that in the course of a few weeks the provisions of the garrison would
be exhausted, and therefore an evacuation or surrender would become
necessary, unless the fort were relieved by supplies or reinforcements;
and this information was accompanied by the written opinions of the
officers that to relieve the fort would require a well-appointed army of
twenty thousand men.
The new President had appointed as his cabinet William H. Seward,
Secretary of State; Salmon P. Chase, Secretary of the Treasury; Simon
Cameron, Secretary of War; Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy; Caleb
B.
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