28 cations at home ? [Cries of " No, No."] Surely not ; it cannot be ! [Cries of "Never! Never! 1 '] Let us resolve here, once for all, that we will support our brothers in the field that we will put everything at hazard to conquer the Rebellion and re-establish the Union. [Cheers.] We have heretofore lacked in earnestness of purpose in the conduct of the war. We have dealt too mildly with those whom but a little while ago we regarded as our friends. They are no longer friends, but deadly enemies. They make war in earnest. They omit no means of strengthening their hands and weakening ours. Ihey fight with no remembrance that we were once brothers. Why, then, should we remember it ? They fight us like incarnate fiends ; let us, at least, meet them as our deadliest foes. [Applause.] Let us now go forth and make the war as fierce and bloody as it is possible for a civilized nation to make it. No moderation is shown to us ; let us show none to them. We are far more powerful in numbers, and better prepared than our enemies. We have heretofore acted too much on the defensive ; let us now act on the offensive. [Cheers.] Let us henceforth strike rapid and constant blows blows that shall tell. Let us no longer hear that the Army of the Potomac is " safe." Safe ! Great God ! The army should be triumphant. [Loud applause.] We have no criticism to make. I only speak common-sense when I say that war is a fierce game ; that they only prevail who wage it in earnest. War cannot be waged in silken gloves. When we send forth our armies, it must be understood that they go to battle. Gentlemen, I speak to you as a citizen of New- York, older than any one that I look upon here, quite as much interested in everything that concerns the city and the country as any of you. Indeed, I have done almost everything that a man of my age can do to give success to the war. I have sent sons and grandsons to it, and I am ready, if necessary, to go myself [Loud cheers.] And I promise you that neither of those sons will ever dishonor the name he bears or the education he received. [Cheers.] They are false friends and pernicious counselors who, in so great a cause as this, would interpose side issues, and would seek to advance mean and miserable personal or party aims and ambitions, by sowing the seeds of discord and jealousy among our public men, whether in civil or military life. Let all such discussion all intermediate questions or discussion^ which of necessity must be subordinate to the great and vital question of our National existence, which is now in the debate of arms be postponed till the battle is won. Then there will be a great nation calm in conscious strength, to judge and to determine all political questions. Now, let there be only a nation of soldiers, resolved upon trampling treason in the dust, and eager and earnest for aggressive war. Aggressive, I repeat, in every form that the laws of war permit. Now our armies in the field are made the special guardians for the benefit of rebel women and children of the property which the husbands and fathers have abandoned in order to join the rebel army and upon many a bloody field our wounded and dying have been obliged to put up with such wayside fare and nourishment as the chance of battle left for them, while hard by, rebel houses, and rebel gardens, and rebel granaries, abounding in comforts which might have saved life, and certainly would have mitigated suffering, are sacredly guarded by our troops for the benefit of the rebel families. This may be magnanimous, but it is not war. I would have all this changed. [Cheers.]
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