The winter broke up and late in May Penhallow left home on business. He
wrote from Philadelphia:
"My dear Ann: Trade is dead, money still locked up, and the railways
hesitating to give orders for much-needed rails. I have one small order,
which will keep us going, but will hardly pay.
"I never talk of the political disorder, but now you will feel as I do a
certain dismay at the action of the Vicksburg Convention in the interest
of the slave States. Not all were represented--Tennessee and Florida
voted against the resolution that all State and Federal laws prohibiting
the African slave trade ought to be repealed. South Carolina to my
surprise divided its vote; there were forty for, nineteen against this
resolution. It seems made to exasperate the North and build up the
Republican party. I who am simply for the Union most deeply regret this
action.
"I want Leila to meet me here to-day week. We will take the steamer and
go to West Point, let her see the place, and bring John home for his
month of furlough.
"I have talked here to the Mayor and other moderate Union men, and find
them more hopeful than I of a peaceful ending.
"Yours always,
"JAMES PENHALLOW."
CHAPTER XVII
When Leila sat upon the upper deck of the great Hudson River steamer, she
was in a condition of excitement natural to an imaginative nature unused
to travel.
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