The Sun.
London, England, 1865-11-17 00:00:00

Sir Morton Peto on American Affairs.

Sir M. Peto, who has just returned from America,
addressed his constituents at the Colston Festival, at Bris-
tol, on the 14th inst., Mr. L. Leonard in the chair.
Sir MORTON PETO, whose health was drank amidst great
enthusiasm, replied as follows :—Sir, on rising to return
thanks for the kind manner in which I have been received
this night, I cannot but recollect that it was on a similar
occasion last year that I had the honour of first addressing
the electors of Bristol. On that occasion I was a stranger
almost to you, but I feel that upon the present occasion I
am a friend among you. I must say that I was gratified at
the result of the election, because while it proved that the
Liberal party could accomplish all it desired, it showed also
that you had those who could and did work to produce
the glorious result. Shortly after that election I left this
country. I said so much to you during the long summer
evenings in the last election, that 1 am sure you will not
expect or require of me that I should enter into a general
statement of politics on the present occasion, but I will
for a few minutes take you in imagination across the At-
lantic, to that country from which I have so recently re-
turned. And, in the first place, let me say that my visit to
America was not one made with a view to politics at all.
I went there simply as a man of business. I went there
purely and simply to see certain things in which my in-
terest and my duty were alike concerned, and I had not
the slightest idea of the magnificent reception with which
I and my party were greeted. Let me also add another
thing, that I went to that country as a perfectly indepen-
dent observer, not with the idea of flattering our American
friends. (Hear, hear.) I never flattered any one. I told
them what I believed to be right. On no public occasion
in addressing them did I admit that the Government of
this country had done other than maintain the most per-
fect independence and neutrality ; but that they had from
the first to the last done what they conceived to be justice
to those whom they had represented, and they had taken
the greatest care never to infringe on the independence of
America. (Cheers.) Before, however, I speak of America,
let me say a word on Canada. I went through the whole
of that province, and I had the most ample opportunity of
witnessing its loyalty to the mother country, and I assure
you there is no part of this island in which the feeling of
loyalty towards the Queen, or the affection for British in-
stitutions, is stronger than it is in Canada. (Cheers.) I
may also add, that in my visit to that province, not only
was I delighted with the great public hospitals, especially
in Toronto, but with the general spread of education, as
manifested by the number of excellent schools in which
education was offered indiscriminately to all classes of the
community. That shows the advance which is making
in the intelligence of that province, and the growth of
education will but keep pace with the progress of industry.
In America I received the most unbounded hospitality.
and kindness without precedent. I had the amplest op-
portunity given me of knowing everything I could desire
to know, and every desire was more than gratified. What
did I find ? I went to America at an important and inte-
resting epoch of its history. I went there at the close of
one of the most tremendous struggles known in modern
times, and when I certainly did expect to find the country
exhausted and society disorganised. I declare to you that I
saw nothing in that portion of that great country through
which we passed which could for a moment remind us that
such a struggle had arisen ; and I was still more aston-
ished when I came to learn the advance which had been
made in the Western States of America, within the last
ten years. Why, sir, within that period 25,145,000 ad-
ditional acres of ground have been brought into cultivation;
on the average 240,000,000 bushels of wheat were grown,
and the population of those eight Western States had ad-
vanced 3,450,000. It may be interesting to my Lord
Ducie, as an agriculturist, to know that more than
3,000,000 of the population in the Western States are
employed in the cultivation of land ; but it may be
equally interesting to you to hear that Chicago, which a
few years since was a mere village, a dot upon the map,
has now a population exceeding a quarter of a million,
and public buildings finer than any that I know of in
any provincial city in this country—(hear, hear)—while
its public works, its bridges, and its roads, its universi-
ties, its hospitals, are all on a most magnificent scale. But
not to confine myself to the Western States I went to Bos-
ton, and what did I find there ? I found that ever since
the commencement of the war five millions sterling had
been spent in that city in the extension of public build-
ings. Gentlemen, surely that was no sign of exhaustion.
Well, then we went to New York, and there we found
one of the most magnificent parks in the world, the
greater part of the works connected with which had been
actually constructed during the war, and on referring to
statistics we found that the interest on the debt, and the
whole of the municipal taxes, only amounted to something
like 3 per cent on the rental. Gentlemen, I say fearlessly
that no young man who intends to enter life as a man of
business ought to consider his education complete without
paying a visit to America, and without mentioning names
I can assure you that one of• the largest merchants of my
acquaintance, a man who does an immense business, dates
his success in life from the time he visited America. No
person who has the least information on the subject can
doubt the ability of the Americans to pay their national
debt, and any one who expressed a doubt of their willing-
ness to do so would be treated with merited contempt. I
now come to the question of slavery, which, after all, was
at the bottom of the late struggle, and which was inti-
mately connected with it from the first commencement to
its final termination. Now, sir, there is an extract from a
letter by President Lincoln, to which I wish to call your
attention, and it really appears to me that the qualities of
that great man have never thoroughly been appreciated in
this country. It seems to me that the question of the
abolition of slavery having been once brought forward,
Providence itself had not permitted it to stop until slavery
was finally abolished. President Lincoln, in a letter dated
4th April, said:—

" I attempt no compliment to my own sagacity, I claim
not to have controlled events, but confess plainly that
events have controlled me. Now, at the end of three
years' struggle the nation's condition is not what either
party or any man desired or expected. God alone can
claim it. Whither it is tending seems plain. If God now
wills the removal of a great wrong, and wills also that we
of the North as well as you of the South shall pay fairly
for our complicity in that wrong, impartial history will
find therein new causes to attest and revere the justice and
goodness of God."

Now, sir, there has been an impression in England that
the war in America has been fought by mercenaries ; but
facts, which cannot be questioned, prove that 90 per cent.
of those who declared themselves for war engaged in it,
and that two-thirds only of the remainder were Germans
or Irish. That shows that the country itself engaged in
hostilities ; and if further proof were wanting, it is to be
found in the fact that almost every family with whom we
were brought in contact were mourning for some friend or
relative. Let me say a word about the railways in this
great country. (Hear, hear.) I remember meeting General
M'Cullum, who conducted the commissariat department,
and who, I am glad to say, is coming here next as a guest
of mine, and I went intD the whole question of the railways
with him. I found that on the termination of this great
struggle there were actually connected with the supply of
the armies 2,500 miles of railway, 387 engines, 6,000 cars,
and 70,000 employes. I ascertained also that when the
Southerners destroyed the bridges throughout 150 miles of
country, General Sherman only allowed General M'Cullum
seven days to reconstruct them; that one 1,200 ft. long
and 15 ft. wide was constructed in three and a half days ;
and that General Sherman was moving his army over the
whole of them in six days. (Hear, hear.) Let me say a
word respecting another matter that occurred in the
course of the war. When the news reached Philadelphia
by telegraph of what was taking place before Petersburgh
a subscription was raised, and no less than 120 ministers,
under the organisation of an eminent philanthropist—
George Stewart —went thither, and with Christian bravery
in the midst of the carnage administered the consolations
of religion to the wounded and the dying. Well, sir, my
friend George Stewart told me that on one occasion they
found that their funds were coming to an end, so he
went to Boston, to Philadelphia, and to New York, and
iu four days returned with a sum equal to £92,000.
(Cheers.) Now, let me ask what has been the result of
this war ? I will tell you what the General said who fired
the first gun at Fort Sumter, a man who knows more
with regard to the army of the South than any other—l
refer to General Anderson. I met him at the house of a
friend in New York, where he met with a reception which
as a Southerner I am sure he did not expect. He had
been to the President and had taken the oath of loyalty,
and coming North was treated as a friend and brother.
I asked him what was the feeling of his friends in the
South. He said "You may go home and tell your friends
in England from me that we made a good fight and did
our best. We appealed to the argument of the sword, that
has decided, and now we are loyal men to the North,
' because having taken the oath, feeling that to be our duty
after the decision to which we have appealed, as men of
honour, wo feel that is our course, and we never again
wish to disturb the Union." In fact now there is a
feeling of confidence throughout. the North which never
existed before—confidence in their almost unlimited
resources. They feel that the dark spot which hindered
everything in the shape of good legislation is now and for
ever at an end. I believe that will affect the whole South
as well as the North in the future, not only in their deal-
legs with each other, but with every other nation of the
world. The next point to which I will refer is the wonderful
power which they have shown of absorbing into the in-
dustrial occupations of the country their enormous army.
Four months before I reached the country the army of
the United States was nearly 1,200,000 men. General
Grant told me when I saw him in St. Louis that ho had
mustered out 875,000 men up to that day, and he said,
"We do not mean to have more than an army of 50,000
men; and if our friends of the South are sincere we intend
to bring it down to 30,000 men." I say that such a nation
which has such confidence in itself, which, instead of keeping
a standing army to tax the energies of the people, can at
once sent them back to the ranks of industry, set an
example which European nations would do well to imitate.
(Cheers.) It is something wonderful to see the way in
which the men have been absorbed into private life. When
at Chicago I went over a large printing establishment
belonging to a gentleman who was for some years secretary
to the Embassy in London. Talking to me about the war,
he said that forty-seven of their compositors were soldiers