It may well be doubted whether the United States, with all its braggadocio, can ever raise again such armies as those which have already taken the field. The half-million draft of last year yielded only seventy thousand effectives, and it is the opinion of the most intelligent Northern men that a resort to conscription would break down the war. If our own affairs are wisely conducted, and our resources of men and material judiciously husbanded, we have no reason for discouragement. If we are conquered, it will not be by the Yankees, but by ourselves. Most of the misfortunes we now suffer are the results of our own faults and blunders. It would be a miserable fate enough to be overwhelmed and subjugated by sheer force; but to perish by our own folly and mismanagement is too horrible to think of. Every public man, every official, high and low, in every branch of the service, should realize the fearful weight of responsibility that now rests upon those to whom the country has entrusted the success of its cause.
