New growth

 New growth. That was my photographic assignment today on my afternoon walk. Buds are bursting all over, or just about to. Here's what I came up with.

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A walk this morning. When South Carolina seceded from the union in 1861 and other southern states soon followed, Frederick Douglas, who often said he had no country because the country of his birth denied his natural rights, suddenly became a proud nationalist who staunchly defended the federal government and urged it not to compromise with or try to appease the "traitors." 

Douglass was afraid the North would cave in to the South to resolve the secession crisis. And Abe Lincoln's inauguration speech in which he promised to honour the rights of slave holders and uphold the Fugitive Slave Act did nothing to allay his fears. Douglass did not foresee - and feared to hope - that things could change. But they did, and very quickly.

With the shelling by Confederate forces of Fort Sumter in Charleston harbour on April 12, 1861, the "secession crisis" abruptly ended and the American Civil War began. The war was the great transformative cataclysm Douglass had prayed for and, while he would not fight, he was an enthusiastic supporter.

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Not much time for my other photographic project today. I got up late, watched a hockey game recorded the night before, did my exercise, then had an unexpected Portal call with Caitlin, Bob and Louis before preparing our mid-day meal. But I did work on these pictures, taken on the day we trained to Caiscais and rode one of Lisbon's iconic trams home.