Note 394 — Chapter VI
Reading edition
"The Americans certainly seem inclined to pick a quarrel with us; but I doubt their going far enough even to oblige us to recognize the Southern States. A step further would enable us to open the Southern ports, but a war would nevertheless be a great calamity." (Maxwell, Clarendon, II, 245. Granville to Clarendon. No exact date is given but the context shows it to have been in October, 1861.)