We have heard much of the tyranny of the present Government of the United States, and of the tyranny also of the people. They have both been very tyrannical. The "habeas corpus" has been suspended by the word of one man. Arrests have been made on men who have been hardly suspected of more than secession principles. Arrests have, I believe, been made in cases which have been destitute even of any fair ground for such suspicion. Newspapers have been stopped for advocating views opposed to the feelings of the North, as freely as newspapers were ever stopped in France for opposing the Emperor. A man has not been safe in the streets who was known to be a Secessionist. It must be at once admitted that opinion in the northern States was not free when I was there. But has opinion ever been free anywhere on all subjects? In the best-built strongholds of freedom have there not always been questions on which opinion has not been free; and must it not always be so? When the decision of a people on any matter has become, so to say, unanimous,--when it has shown itself to be so general as to be clearly the expression of the nation's voice as a single chorus,--that decision becomes holy, and may not be touched. Could any newspaper be produced in England which advocated the overthrow of the Queen? And why may not the passion for the Union be as strong with the northern States, as the passion for the Crown is strong with us? The Crown with us is in no danger, and therefore the matter is at rest. But I think we must admit that in any nation, let it be ever so free, there may be points on which opinion must be held under restraint. And as to those summary arrests, and the suspension of the "habeas corpus," is there not something to be said for the States' Government on that head also? Military arrests are very dreadful, and the soul of a nation's liberty is that personal freedom from arbitrary interference which is signified to the world by those two unintelligible Latin words. A man's body shall not be kept in duress at any man's will; but shall be brought up into open court, with uttermost speed, in order that the law may say whether or no it should be kept in duress. That I take it is the meaning of "habeas corpus," and it is easy to see that the suspension of that privilege destroys all freedom, and places the liberty of every individual at the mercy of him who has the power to suspend it. Nothing can be worse than this; and such suspension, if extended over any long period of years, will certainly make a nation weak, mean-spirited, and poor. But in a period of civil war, or even of a widely-extended civil commotion, things cannot work in their accustomed grooves. A lady does not willingly get out of her bedroom-window with nothing on but her nightgown; but when her house is on fire she is very thankful for an opportunity of doing so. It is not long since the "habeas corpus" was suspended in parts of Ireland, and absurd arrests were made almost daily when that suspension first took effect. It was grievous that there should be necessity for such a step, and it is very grievous now that such necessity should be felt in the northern States. But I do not think that it becomes Englishmen to bear hardly upon Americans generally for what has been done in that matter. Mr. Seward, in an official letter to the British Minister at Washington--which letter, through official dishonesty, found its way to the press--claimed for the President the right of suspending the "habeas corpus" in the States whenever it might seem good to him to do so. If this be in accordance with the law of the land, which I think must be doubted, the law of the land is not favourable to freedom. For myself, I conceive that Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Seward have been wrong in their law, and that no such right is given to the President by the Constitution of the United States. This I will attempt to prove in some subsequent chapter. But I think it must be felt by all who have given any thought to the constitution of the States, that let what may be the letter of the law, the Presidents of the United States have had no such power. It is because the States have been no longer united that Mr. Lincoln has had the power, whether it be given to him by the law or no.