Daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, Va. [W. Va.]) 1859-1865, 1865-02-22
FROM THE SOUTH.
Jefr. Davls-A sketch or Persona
ChRraeterIstics.
Rrnnn tha NJ Y..E M. ----- =

ChRraeteriSttcs.
-. Prom the New York Times.
1t is now little. more than six years age
that 6rst saw Mr.. Jefferson Davis, then
United States Senator from Mississipui.
now the head and leader of this great re-
bellion. We were fellow passengers on
one of those magnificent packets that, in
the palmy days of union and peace, piled
lucrative trade between New Orleans and
the towns on the Mississippi river. His
time was apparently unoccupied, and after
dinner We tell into conversation on the
state of the nation and general politics,
which lasted, with great interest to me.
till sundoWn. In conversation, JEFF. DaE
Wis is the most engaging and instructive of
all rebels. Upon introduction his man
ners have tinge Of military exactnsss
and formal courtesy, but once engaged in
talk upon his fayorite themes, no public
man could be more lavish of his mental
wealth or more agreeable in his mode of
displaying it, II was plain even then, in a
time of profound peace and great national.
prosperity, the South never so flourishinp,
and his OWN party in undisputed power,
that his heart was set ON the establishment
of separate republic, and that he had
contemplated and loved to contemplate all
the advantages which the South might
hope to derive from such step, and anti
cipsted all the difficulties in the way of
successful secession.
He held me for hours an attentive, but
not always an assenting, listener, as he
sketched in full detail, and with glowing
pencil, the splendid future of an indepen.
dent South.
He believed it would at once give a pow
ertul stimulus to domestic manufactures
and local commerce; that as much cotton,
i tobacco, rice and sugar would be raised in
The South after separation as before, and
besides all the wealth to be realized by ex.
tPorting these staples, she would be'Able to
manufacture for herself and conduct her
own vast commerce; that Charleston would
Esurpass- Boston and New Orleans, vie with
New York as great importing cities, and
IcomPuls0ry labor thus rendered secure and
permanent, would develop and utilize with
i out sexhapstipg, the slluviaI soils. of her
I magnificent utriVer. bottoms. Serious Oppo.
sidon, from the North he did not anticipate,
bu. in case of armed collision, which he
did not deprecate, he relied for military
success upon the alleged superiority of the
Southern in horsemanship and the use of
firesrms. afeE
Ia person, Mr.sDavis ia of medium size
aud slight proportions, but with great ca.
pscity for enduring fatigue, and sustaining
or ignoring fragility of the body by perth
nacity and frmness of will. There is not
in the Confederacy another man 80 thor.
oughly self poised and self. possessed as its
Presdeut. i
While there is nothing inflated or self
conscious in his language or bearing, he
never reEaxes into leVity,' he is never sur
prise4 by passion. The predominant ex-
ptesa5n Of his face is of mind active up
Ion matters of fact rather than of theory, on
statlsiies rather than on projects, yet in
fused with and made formidable by love
of poRler, for there is lacking inhis features
that hPk of Pr9bityl IN the absence of
which mental power and bad ambition
such ss we see in the heroic lineaments Of
Jpa 3essar. -f F--.
Th : is nothiug remarkable in the voice
orfestures of Ief. Davis, unless it5be the
general saiF of, the public man that
hangs about him, and the light of steady
purpose and uniform, self impelled mental
activity that shines in his clear grey eye.
l saw bin several times after that inter-
view, and once upon the eve of that great
revolt. 1 never heard him speak Eve min
utes without Recurring TO the great move.
: ment. He spoks qf ID as a foregone con-
clusioI, "a fat GGnoglPIi, and was even
dwelling on It's certainty, its success and
It's man fest Rdyantages. There were nc
original thinker. He never sounded with
long-liued pIammet in the deep waters oi
enlarged STATE policy. hs.
The Political philosophy and the intense
sectional zsal of Calhoun sank down into
his brain sud took strong rootthere.
Thus osi6g by nature q practical man
land by profession q soldier, he sought at
oucs the means of carrying ont the seces-
} sion policy. This Was done BY. sys.
tematic policy of paFading before the South
, ern peOPls, Ill thsphostile utterances ol
j the North agaiDssslaVsry, and urging them
70 make az indignanI and personal protest
: against such abuse%b breaking up the
Union. Fhs election of Nr. Lincoln was
: made the Prete1e, the prHetum SOljens, the
! e. overt, act TO justify revolt, ~
/ Ha4 not the progress and contamination
of the reballiou set Mr.. Davis on SO high g
place and deIolyed upon him the execu-
tive Of military despotism, he might
have hid is weaker parts from history
nor infict adfsGppointmeut so bitter and
his reputs ioa within the words of Tacitus:
" 0ntatEs sszse8SW eaPdz imperis, nisi m
i psFG&Set.H
he Wou q not then have been discovered
to the world ss . man of bitter prejudi'
cea. and the disciplsF OF an obsOlete snt
Gothic school Of political philosophy.
: But when, n s misguided people, in a.
. honr OF polit'.al madness, he had beer
i. raIsed TO the eadershiP of the iusurtec-
4 ton, he Vas seed where the narroWnes
!, OF his heart q ia be felt and seen as per
!, cePibly as Il obstinaey of his will.
Fortunately no doubt, for the final sta