advantages: their credit was never questioned, and their enormous
purchases were never doubtful ventures for the European sellers.
In some cases their superior credit enabled them to overbid the
Confederate agents and to appropriate large contracts which the
Confederates had negotiated but which they could not hold because
of the precariousness of their credit. And yet, all things
considered, the Confederate agents made a good showing. In the
report of the Secretary of War in February, 1862, the number of
rifles contracted for abroad was put at 91,000, of which 15,000
had been delivered. The chief reliance of the Confederate
Treasury for its purchases abroad was at first the specie in the
Southern branch of the United States Mint and in Southern banks.
The former the Confederacy seized and converted to its own use.
Of the latter it lured into its own hands a very large proportion
by what is commonly called "the fifteen million loan"--an issue
of
eight percent bonds authorized in February, 1861. Most of this
specie seems to have been taken out of the country by the
purchase of European commodities. A little, to be sure, remained,
for there was some gold still at home when the Confederacy fell.
But the sum was small.

In addition to this loan Memminger also persuaded Congress on
August 19, 1861, to lay a direct tax--the "war tax," as it was
called--of one-half of one per cent on all property except
Confederate bonds and money. As required by the Constitution this
tax was apportioned among the States, but if it assumed its
assessment before April 1, 1862, each State was to have a
reduction of ten per cent. As there was a general aversion to the
idea of Confederate taxation and a general faith in loans, what