36/58 He inherited the blood of two strong elements of its population,--the German and the Scotch-Irish,--and he united the best characteristics of both in his own person. He had always looked upon Pennsylvania as the guardian of the Federal Union, almost as the guarantor of its safety and its perpetuity. He spoke of her as the break-water that protected the slave States from the waves of radicalism which were threatening to ingulf Southern institutions. The success of the Republican party in 1860 he regarded as a portent of direst evil, -- indeed, as a present disaster, immeasurably sorrowful. The excitement in the Southern States over the probability of Mr. |