Simon Brodie, of Warchester, was the chief advocate of the three counties.  He had studied law with the late Senator Sprague, and, at his death, from partner succeeded to his lucrative law practice.  He came at once to Washington at Mrs. Sprague’s summons, and set about learning the status of the case.  The affair was no easy matter to trace, but, after inconceivable delays and persistent misleading, he found that Jack was in the military archives charged with desertion, murder, and treason:  desertion in quitting his company and regiment without orders, treason in consorting with armed rebels, and murder in joining with the enemies of the country to take the life of his commanding officer.  Meanwhile, Mrs. Sprague and Merry had returned to Acredale, and the lawyer sent letters to Richmond setting forth the case to Jack—­letters which, by some mysterious jugglery, never reached their address, as we have seen.  Nothing could be done until Jack was either exchanged or until his advocate had made out a documentary case that could be presented to the military authorities.  As he surmised, every one in authority had been prejudiced against Jack.  The Congressman from Warchester dared not work against Boone, who was potent as a Cabinet minister in the councils of the Government.  One of Senator Sprague’s old friends, still in the Senate, advised Brodie to let Jack remain at Richmond till the peace came, “for,” said he, “no Democrat nor any one identified with that party can hope for impartial justice here.”

“But what am I to do?  I can get no assistance here.  Every bureau containing documents bearing on the poor boy’s case is either closed to me, or the officials so hostile that I can not work with or through them.”

“You must go about the affair as if it were a State matter.  You must go to McClellan.  He is a young man of the most spotless honor, the most generous sympathies.  He is as rigid as a Prussian in discipline, but his methods are enlightened and above board.  He is the only man in authority that has any real conception of the magnitude of the struggle the North has entered upon.  He is, however, miserably hampered.  The new rulers have come down to Washington very much in the spirit of the Goths when they captured Rome.  Every one is on the make.  The contract system is something beyond the wildest excesses I ever read of in pillage and chicanery.  Shoes by the million have been accepted that melt as soon as they are wet; garments are stacked mountain-high in the storehouses that blow into rags so soon as the air goes through them.  Food, moldy, filthy, is accumulated on the wharves of Washington, Baltimore, and Alexandria that would be forbidden as infectious in any carefully guarded port in the world.  Contracts for vessels have been signed where steamships are called for, and the contractor sends canal-boats.  Lines of ships are paid for to run to ports not known in navigation; and the chief men in the great departments share the money with the rings—­”