We must expect reverses; and, with public opinion on the question in its present state, the first disaster would break down the purchase system like a pack of cards; and then—whether we gave compensation at the current prices of the day, or whether, in a fit of National Wrath and Injustice Such a Great Crisis is apt to bring, we refused to pay any compensation at all — those who hate purchase, without ceasing to feel pride in our Army, would reflect with pain that the system had been abolished at the cost of the private fortunes of those men who were actually at that moment defending us in the field.