Boston, July 2, 1861
There is little news politically, for I am no longer in the way of getting it. There is a marked improvement in the general feeling and in the tone of the press towards England and my apprehensions of trouble would have entirely subsided but that I cannot but fear future trouble on account of this blockade. I fear that it is not effective and that some blundering British admiral will undertake to raise it for that reason, and this will surely lead to trouble. Neither do I believe that our blockade is likely to be effective in less than a hundred days. There are rumors, and pretty well authenticated, that Seward is losing ground in Washington and in New York very fast. Sumner has been here fiercely denouncing him for designing, as he asserts, to force the country into a foreign war, and Mr. George Morey tells me that to checkmate this, Sumner intends on the opening of Congress to make a speech on our foreign relations in which he will declare his entire satisfaction with the position of England and France. .. .