Wizard Lewis overhears the sigh, and questions it. At this the General explains his disappointment.
“It would have been better,” says he, “had we shed a little blood. This is not the end, Major; the serpent of treason is only bruised, not slain. Had Calhoun run his course, a handful of hundreds might have died. As affairs stand, however, the country must one day wade knee-deep in blood to save itself. These men are not honest. Their true purpose is the downfall of the Union. Their present pretext is tariff; next time it will be slavery.”
By way of bringing the iniquity of “Nullification” before the people, together with his views concerning it, the General seizes his big iron pen, and scratches off a proclamation.
“I consider,” says he, “the power to annul a law of the United States, assumed by one State, incompatible with the existence of the Union, contradicted expressly by the Constitution, unauthorized by either its letter or its spirit, inconsistent with every principle upon which it was founded, and destructive of the great object for which it was formed.”
The country, reading the General's exposition of the Union and its Gibraltar-like character, breaks into bonfires, oratory, dinners, barbecues, parades, and what other schemes of jubilation are practiced by a free people. That is to say the country breaks into these sundry jubilant things, if one except the truant State of South Carolina. In that Palmetto-rattlesnake-ridden commonwealth there prevails a sulky silence. No bonfires blaze, no barbecues scorch, no dinners smoke, no parades march. Baffled in its would-be treasons, afraid to stretch forth its nullifying hand lest the sword of retribution strike it off at the wrist, it comports itself like a spoiled child thwarted, and upholds its little dignity with a pout. No one heeds, however; and, beyond an occasional baleful glance from the General, the rest of the world leaves it to recover from that pout in its own time and way.
When Congress reconvenes, Statesman Calhoun creeps back to his Senate place. But the perils through which he has passed have left their furrowing traces, and now he offers nothing, says nothing, does nothing. His heart is water; his evil potentialities have oozed away. Haunted of that hangman fear which still hag-rides him, he abides mute, motionless, impotent, like some Satan in chains.