CHAPTER VIII.
Excited Condition of the South .-- The John Brown Raid at Harper's Ferry .-- Character of Brown .-- Governor Wise .-- Hot Temper .-- Course of Republicans in Regard to John Brown .-- Misunderstanding of the Two Sections .-- Assembling of the Charleston Convention .-- Position of Douglas and his Friends .-- Imperious Demands of Southern Democrats.
-- Caleb Cushing selected for Chairman of the Convention .-- The South has Control of the Committee on Resolutions .-- Resistance of the Douglas Delegates .-- They defeat the Report of the Committee .-- Delegates from Seven Southern States withdraw .-- Convention unable to make a Nomination .-- Adjourns to Baltimore .-- Convention divides.
-- Nomination of both Douglas and Breckinridge .-- Constitutional Union Convention .-- Nomination of Bell and Everett .-- The Chicago Convention .-- Its Membership and Character .-- Mr.Seward's Position.
-- His Disabilities .-- Work of his Friends, Thurlow Weed and William M.Evarts .-- Opposition of Horace Greeley .-- Objections from Doubtful States .-- Various Candidates .-- Nomination of Lincoln and Hamlin .-- Four Presidential Tickets in the Field .-- Animated Canvass .-- The Long Struggle over .-- The South defeated .-- Election of Lincoln .-- Political Revolution of 1860 complete.
The South was unnaturally and unjustifiably excited.

The people of the slave States could not see the situation accurately, but, like a man with disordered nerves, they exaggerated every thing.
Their sense of proportion seemed to be destroyed, so that they could no longer perceive the intrinsic relation which one incident had to another.

In this condition of mind, when the most ordinary events were misapprehended and mismeasured, they were startled and alarmed by an occurrence of extraordinary and exceptional character.
On the quiet morning of October, 1859, with no warning whatever to the inhabitants, the United-States arsenal, at Harper's Ferry, Virginia, was found to be in the possession of an invading mob.
The town was besieged, many of its citizens made prisoners, telegraph wires cut, railway-trains stopped by a force which the people, as they were aroused from sleep, had no means of estimating.

A resisting body was soon organized, militia came in from the surrounding country, regular troops were hurried up from Washington.
By the opening of the second day, a force of fifteen hundred men surrounded the arsenal, and, when the insurgents surrendered, it was found that there had been but twenty-two in all.

Four were still alive, including their leader, John Brown.
JOHN BROWN AT HARPER'S FERRY.
Brown was a man of singular courage, perseverance, and zeal, but was entirely misguided and misinformed.