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GOOD BYE, JOHN BELL.
The Nashville papers contain an abstract of the recent speech of John Bell, which shows that he is not only a rank secessionist, but a traitor and a coward. In his speech he declared that “Tennessee had, in effect, dissolved her relations with the Federal Union, and though he had hoped and labored to the last to preserve the Union first, and second, if separation was inevitable, to make it peaceable, he now abandoned all such hope, and his voice was clear and loud to every Tennessean – to arms! to arms!”
The Louisville Journal, in referring to Mr. Bell’s defection, cuttingly says:
When, with the vivid recollection of all that we said of John Bell during the Presidential canvas, we look at his present position and read the language he utters, we cannot but recall the striking advice given by some prudent sage – “Never praise a man till he is dead.”
And the Louisville Democrat thus refers to the same gentleman:
John Bell never had brains enough to stand up in a storm. He has been only consistent as a [partisan?], and can [take?] any inconsistent positions his party will assume. His conduct only shows which way he thinks his party are going, and his opinion on that subject is not worth much.
And thus John Bell has sunk without a ripple to mark the place where he went down. – As the Judge always says when he sentences a murderer, “May the Almighty have mercy on your soul.”
