These were the last words uttered during the interview.  General Lee pressed the dying man’s hand, released it, stood for several minutes by the bedside motionless and in perfect silence, and then went out of the room.

On the next morning Bishop Meade expired.

[Illustration:  Environs of Richmond.]

PART II.

IN FRONT OF RICHMOND.

I.

PLAN OF THE FEDERAL CAMPAIGN.

The pathetic interview which we have just described took place in the month of March, 1862.

By the latter part of that month, General McClellan, in command of an army of more than one hundred thousand men, landed on the Peninsula between the James and York Rivers, and after stubbornly-contested engagements with the forces of General Johnston, advanced up the Peninsula—­the Confederates slowly retiring.  In the latter part of May, a portion of the Federal forces had crossed the Chickahominy, and confronted General Johnston defending Richmond.

Such was the serious condition of affairs in the spring of 1862.  The Federal sword had nearly pierced the heart of Virginia, and, as the course of events was about to place Lee in charge of her destinies, a brief notice is indispensable of the designs of the adversaries against whom he was to contend on the great arena of the State.

While the South had been lulled to sleep, as it were, by the battle of Manassas, the North, greatly enraged at the disaster, had prepared to prosecute the war still more vigorously.  The military resources of the South had been plainly underestimated.  It was now obvious that the North had to fight with a dangerous adversary, and that the people of the South were entirely in earnest.  Many journals of the North had ridiculed the idea of war; and one of them had spoken of the great uprising of the Southern States from the Potomac to the Gulf of Mexico as a mere “local commotion” which a force of fifty thousand men would be able to put down without difficulty.  A column of twenty-five thousand men, it was said, would be sufficient to carry all before it in Virginia, and capture Richmond, and the comment on this statement had been the battle of Manassas, where a force of more than fifty thousand had been defeated and driven back to Washington.

It was thus apparent that the war was to be a serious struggle, in which the North would be compelled to exert all her energies.  The people responded to the call upon them with enthusiasm.  All the roving and adventurous elements of Northern society flocked to the Federal standard, and in a short time a large force had once more assembled at Washington.  The work now was to drill, equip, and put it in efficient condition for taking the field.  This was undertaken with great energy, the Congress cooeperating with the Executive in every manner.  The city of Washington resounded with the wheels of artillery and the tramp of cavalry; the workshops were busy night and day to supply arms and ammunition; and the best officers devoted themselves, without rest, to the work of drilling and disciplining the mass.