already had in mind this same notion, that a victory would be an
excellent companion for the proclamation. In July Mr. Boutwell had said
to him that the North would not succeed until the slaves were
emancipated, and Mr. Lincoln had replied: "You would not have it done
now, would you? Had we not better wait for something like a victory?"
This point being accordingly settled to the satisfaction of all, the
meeting then dissolved, with the understanding that the secret was to be
closely kept for the present; and Mr. Lincoln again put away his paper
to await the coming of leaden-footed victory.

For the moment the prospects of this event were certainly sufficiently
gloomy. Less than three weeks, however, brought the battle of Antietam.
As a real "military success" this was, fairly speaking, unsatisfactory;
but it had to serve the turn; the events of the war did not permit the
North to be fastidious in using the word victory; if the President had
imprudently been more exacting, the Abolitionists would have had to wait
for Gettysburg. News of the battle reached Mr. Lincoln at the Soldiers'
Home. "Here," he says, "I finished writing the second draft. I came to
Washington on Saturday, called the cabinet together to hear it, and it
was published on the following Monday, the 22d of September, 1862."

The proclamation was preliminary or monitory only, and it did not
promise universal emancipation. It stated that, on January 1, 1863, "all
persons held as slaves within any State or designated part of a State,
the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United
States, shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free;" also, that "the
Executive will, on the first day of January aforesaid, by proclamation,
designate the States and parts of States, if any, in which the people
thereof respectively shall then be in rebellion against the United
States."