teries of sixteen heavy guns were opened upon the advance columns of General Hill. Our troops, pressing heroically forward, had no sooner got within, musket range, than the enemy, forming several lines of battle, poured upon them from his heavy masses a devouring fire of musketry. The conflict became terrible, the air being filled with missiles of death, every moment having its peculiar sound of terrour, and every spot its sight of ghastly destruction and horrour. It is impossible that in any of the series of engagements which had taken place within the past few days, and had tracked the lines of Richmond with fire and destruction, there could have been more desperate fighting on the part of our troops. Never was a more glorious victory plucked from more desperate and threatening circumstances. While exposed to the double fire of the enemy's batteries and his musketry, we were unable to contend with him with artillery. But although thus unmatched, our brave troops pressed on with unquailing vigour and a resistless courage, driving the enemy before them. This was accom plished without artillery, there being but one battery in Gen. Hill's command on the spot, and that belonged to Longstreet's division, and could not be got into position. Thus the fight continued with an ardour and devotion that few battle-fields have ever illustrated. Step by step the enemy were driven back, his guns taken, and the ground he abandoned strewn with his dead. By half past eight o'clock we had taken all his cannon, and, continuing to advance, had driven him a mile and a half from his ground of battle.

Our forces were still advancing upon the retreating lines of the enemy. It was now about half-past nine o'clock, and very dark. Suddenly, as if it had burst from the heavens, a sheet of fire enveloped the front of our advance. The enemy had made another stand to receive us, and from the black masses of his forces, it was evident that he had been heavily reinforced, and that another whole corps d'armee had been brought up to contest the fortunes of the night. Line after line of battle was formed. It was evident that his heaviest columns

were now being thrown against our small command, and it might have been supposed that he would only be satisfied with its annihilation. The loss here on our side was terrible.

The situation being evidently hopeless for any further pursuit of the fugitive enemy, who had now brought up such overwhelming forces, our troops retired slowly.

At this moment, seeing their adversary retire, the most vociferous cheers arose along the whole Yankee line. They were taken up in the distance by the masses which for miles and miles beyond were supporting McClellan's front. It was a moment when the heart of the stoutest commander might have been appalled. The situation of our forces was now as desperate as it well could be, and required a courage,and presence of mind to retrieve it, which the circumstances which surrounded them were not well calculated to inspire. They had fought for five or six hours without reinforcements. All our reserves had been brought up in the action. Wilcox's brigade, which had been almost anmihilated, was re forming in the rear.

Riding rapidly to the position of this brigade, General Hill Brought them by great exertions, up to the front, to check the advance of the now confident, cheering enemy. Catching the spirit of their commander, the brave, but jaded men, moved up to the front, replying to the enemy's cheers with shouts and yells. .At this demonstration, which the enemy, no doubt, supposed signified heavy reinforcements, he stopped his advance. It was now about half-past ten o'clock in the night. The enemy had been arrested; and the fight-one of the most remarkable, long-contested and gallant ones that had yet occurred on our lines-was concluded with the achievement of a field under the most trying circumstances, which the enemy, with the most overpowering numbers brought up to reinforce him, had not succeeded in reclaiming.

General Magruder's division did not come up until eleven o'clock at night, after the fight had been concluded. By orders from Gen. Lee, Magruder moved upon and occupied the battleground; General Hill's command being in such a condition of

prostration from their long and toilsome fight, and suffering in killed and wounded, that it was proper they should be relieved by the occupation of the battle-ground by a fresh corps d'armee.

THE BATTLE OF MALVERN HILL.

Early on Tuesday morning, the enemy, from the position to which he had been driven the night before, continued his retreat in a southeasterly direction towards his gunboats in James river.

General Magruder was directed to proceed by the Quaker road, and to form on the right of Jackson. On account of a misunderstanding as to which was the Quaker road, the wrong route was taken by General Magruder; and the direction of his movement was subsequently changed, so as to place his troops on the right of Huger, who, in the meantime, had formed on the right of Jackson.

The enemy had now placed himself in communication with his gunboats in the river. He was strongly posted on the crest of a hill, commanding an undulating field, which fell to our right into a plain or meadow. His batteries of artillery were numerous, and were collected into two large bodies, strongly supported by infantry, and commanded perfectly the meadow on our right and the field in our front, except the open ravines formed by the undulations of the ground.

. An order was dispatched by General Magruder to bring up from all the batteries thirty rifle pieces, if possible, with which he hoped to shatter the enemy's infantry. While delay was thus occasioned, he was ordered to make the attack. Returning rapidly to the position occupied by the main body of his troops, he gave Brigadier General Jones the necessary orders for the advance of his division. While this was being done, a heavy and crushing fire was opened from the enemy's guns, of great range and metal.

General Armistead having repulsed, driven back and fol lowed up a heavy body of the enemy's skirmishers, an, order was received from General Lee by Magruder, directing him

"to advance rapidly, press forward his whole line, and follow up Armistead's successes, as the enemy were reported to be getting off." In the meantime Mahone's and Ransom's brigades of Huger's division having been ordered up, General Magruder gave the order that Wright's brigade,, supported by Mahone's, should advance and attack the enemy's batteries on the right, and that Jones' division, expected momentarily, should advance on the front, and Ransom's brigade should attack on the left. The plan of attack was to hurl about fifteen thousand men against the enemy's batteries and supporting infantry-to follow up any successes they might obtain; and if unable to drive the enemy from his strong position, to continue the fight in front by pouring in fresh troops; and in case they were repulsed, to hold strongly the line of battle where we stood.

At about 5 o'clock P. M., the order was given to our men to charge across the field and drive the enemy from their position. . Gallantly they sprang to the encounter, rushing into the field at a full run. Instantly, from the line of the enemy's breastworks, a murderous storm of grape and canister was hurled into their ranks, with the most terrible effect. Officers and men went down by hundreds; but yet, undaunted and unwavering, our line dashed on, until two-thirds of the distance across the field was accomplished. Here the carnage from the withering fire of the enemy's combined artillery and musketry was dreadful. Our line wavered a moment, and fell back to the cover of the woods. Twice again the effort to carry the position was renewed, but each time with the same result.

The hill was bathed with flames. Towards sunset the earth quivered with the terrific concussion of artillery and huge explosions. Shells raced athwart the horizon, exploding into deadly iron hail. The forms of smoke-masked men; the gleam of muskets on the plains, where soldiers were disengaged; the artistic order of battle; the wild career of wilder horsemen plunging to and fró across the field, formed a scene of exciting grandeur. In the forest, where eyes did not penetrate, there

was nothing but the exhilarating and exhausting spasm of

battle.

As the night fell, the battle slackened. We had- not carried the enemy's position, but we occupied the field, and during the night posted our pickets within one hundred yards of his guns. The brigades of Mahone and Wright slept on the battle-field in the advanced positions they had won, and Armistead's brigade and a portion of Ransom's also occupied the battle-field.

The battle of Tuesday, properly known as that of Malvern Hill, was perhaps the most sanguinary of the series of bloody conflicts which had taken place on the lines about Richmond. Although not a defeat, it broke the chain of our victories, It was made memorable by its melancholy monument of carnage, which was probably.greater than General Magruder's estimate, which states that cur loss fell short of three thousand. But it had given the enemy no advantage, except in the unfruitful sacrifice of the lives of our troops; and the line of his retreat was again taken up, his forces toiling towards the.river through mud, swamp and forest.

The skill and spirit with which McClellan had managed to retreat was, indeed, remarkable, and afforded no mean proofs of his generalship. At every stage of his retreat he had confronted our forces with a strong rear guard, and had encountered us with well organized lines of battle, and regular dispo sitions of infantry, cavalry and artillery. His heavy rifled cannon had been used against us constantly on his retreat. A portion of his forces had now effected communication with the river at points below City Point. The plan of cutting off his communication with the river, which was to have been executed by a movement of Holmes' diyision between him and the river, was frustrated by the severe fire of the gun-boats, and since then the situation of the enemy appeared to be that of a division or dispersion of his forces, one portion resting on the river, and the other, to some extent, involved by our lines.

It had been stated to the public of Richmond, with great pre