form upon the bare ground, and slept in the old coat; and it seemed to have brought away with it no little of the dust of the Valley. A holiday soldier would have disdained to wear such a garb; but the men of the Stonewall Brigade, with their comrades, loved that coat, and admired it and its owner more than all the holiday uniforms and holiday warriors in the world. The remainder of the General's costume was as much discolored as the coat; he wore cavalry boots reaching to the knee, and his head was surmounted by an old cap, more faded than all; the sun had turned it quite yellow, indeed, and it tilted forward so far over the wearer's forehead, that he was compelled to raise his chin in the air in order to look under the rim. His horse was not a "fiery steed," pawing, and ready to dart forward at "thunder of the captains and the shouting," but an old raw-boned sorrel, gaunt and grim-a horse of astonishing equanimity, who seemed to give himself no concern on any subject-would quietly lie down to doze in the pauses of the firing, and calmly moved about, like his master, careless of cannon-ball or bullet, in the hottest moments of battle.

The General rode in a peculiar fashion, leaning forward somewhat, and apparently unconscious that he was in the saddle. His air was singularly abstracted; and, unless aware of his identity, no beholder would have dreamed that this plainlyclad and absent-looking soldier was the leader of a Corps d'Armée. The glittering eye beneath the yellow cap would have altered somewhat the impression that this man was a nobody;" but beyond this there was absolutely nothing in the appearance of General Jackson to indicate his great rank or genius as a soldier.

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Such was the outward man of the General, as he appeared soon after the campaign of the Valley; and this plainness of exterior had in no small degree endeared him to his soldiers. His habits were still greater claims on the respect and regard of the best men of his command. He was known to be wholly free from all those vices which are the peculiar temptation of a military life. He lived as plainly as his men, and shared all

their hardships, never for a moment acting upon the hypothesis that his rank entitled him to any luxury or comfort which they could not share. His food was plain and simple; his tent, when he had one, which was seldom, no better than those of the men ; he would wrap himself in his blankets and lie down under a tree or in a fence corner, with perfect content, and apparently from preference; for to fight hard and live hard seemed to be his theory of war. He rarely allowed passion to conquer him; when he yielded, it was on exciting occasions, and when great designs were thwarted by negligence or incapacity on the part of those to whom their execution was intrusted. Such occasions seldom occurred, and Jackson's habitual temper of mind was a gentle and childlike sweetness; a simplicity and purity of heart, which proved that he had indeed become "as a little child,” walking humbly and devoutly before his God. Prayer was like breathing with him-the normal condition of his being. Every morning he read his Bible and prayed; and the writer will not soon forget the picture drawn by one of his distinguished associates, who rode to his headquarters at daylight in November, 1862, when the army was falling back to Fredericksburg from the Valley, and found him reading his Testament, quietly in his tent—an occupation which he only interrupted to describe, in tones of quiet simplicity, his intended movements to foil the enemy. Before sitting down to table, he raised both hands and said grace. When he contemplated any movement, his old servant is said to have always known it by his "wrestling in prayer" for many hours of the night; and on the battle-field thousands noticed the singular gesture with the right arm, sometimes both arms, raised aloft. Those who looked closely at him at such moments saw his lips moving in prayer.

This, however, is not the place for a personal delineation of Jackson, which is reserved for a subsequent page. Our desire in presenting the foregoing brief sketch was to place before the reader's eye, so to speak, the figure of the chief actor in the stirring scenes which we now approach. The present writer

first saw General Jackson on the field of Cold Harbor, and the above is a correct transcript of his appearance.

It seemed hard to realize that the plainly-dressed, awkwardlooking person on the gaunt sorrel horse, with the faded cap and the abstracted air, was the soldier who had foiled every adversary, and won at Port Republic those laurels which time cannot wither.

PART III.

FROM PORT REPUBLIC TO CHANCELLORSVILLE.

CHAPTER I.

"GENERAL T. J. JACKSON, SOMEWHERE.”

IN the latter part of June, 1862, the writer of these pages was intrusted, for delivery to a confidential messenger, with a despatch addressed "General T. J. Jackson, somewhere."

"Somewhere" was at that moment, as it had been on many other occasions, the only known address of the rapidly-moving and reticent commander of the Army of the Valley. When he was executing one of his great movements, his operations were conducted with such secrecy that the troops used to say, "Jackson is lost." Let us tell how he became "lost" upon this occasion, and how he reached the unknown address of "somewhere."

The battle of Port Republic was fought on the 9th of June, and on the 12th Jackson recrossed South River and encamped near Weyer's Cave. "For the purpose of rendering thanks to God for having crowned our arms with success," he says in his report, "and to implore His continual favor, divine service was held in the army on the 14th."

The troops were resting; Jackson was dreaming of an advance into Pennsylvania. We have said that, in spite of his dis

appointment in the autumn of 1861, the project of invading the North recurred to him after every great success of the Southern army; and a remarkable proof of the truth of this statement was at this time presented. So strong was his feeling on the subject now, that he, the most reticent and cautious of commanders, could not withhold some intimation of his views. To a confidential friend, on whose prudence he knew he could rely, he said at this time: "If they will only give me 60,000 men now, I will go right on to Pennsylvania. I will not go down. the Valley; I do not wish the people there to be harassed. I will go with 40,000 if the President will give them to me, and my route will be along east of the Blue Ridge. I ought not to have told even you that; but in two weeks I could be at Harrisburg."

The route here indicated was nearly identical with that which General Lee afterward followed in advancing to Gettysburg. It is left to the military student to determine whether a column of 40,000 men penetrating toward the heart of the North, and threatening Washington, would not have induced a withdrawal of the forces before Richmond for the defence of the Federal capital. But this policy, if it was urged upon the Confederate authorities, was not adopted. It was determined to concentrate all the troops near Richmond for a sudden attack upon General McClellan, and the movements looking to this object had already begun. On the 11th of June Whiting's division was embarked on the cars of the Danville Railroad at Richmond, and moved across the James to Manchester, opposite Belle Isle, where, at that moment, a large number of Federal prisoners were confined, but about to be released. The train remained opposite the island until the forenoon of the next day; and the public were much exercised upon the subject of this extraordinary blunder, as the Federal prisoners about to be sent down the river would unquestionably inform General McClellan of this reënforcement of Jackson. The train at last departed, however, and the troops reached Lynchburg, where they remained until the 15th, when they were moved to Charlottesville, and thence on the 18th to Staunton. On the 20th they were moved back to Charlottesville.