with their fierce shouts pealing high above the tumult, the 2nd and 4th Virginia, supported by the 5th, charged forward across the hill.  At the same moment that the enemy’s centre was thus unexpectedly assailed, Kirby Smith’s fresh brigade bore down upon the flank,* (* General Kirby Smith being severely wounded, the command of this brigade devolved upon Colonel Elzey.) and Beauregard, with ready judgment, dispatched his staff officers to order a general advance.  The broken remnants of Bee, Hampton, and Evans advanced upon Jackson’s right, and victory, long wavering, crowned the standards of the South.  The Federals were driven past the guns, now finally abandoned, past the Henry House, and down the slope.  McDowell made one desperate endeavour to stay the rout.  Howard’s brigade was rapidly thrown in.  But the centre had been completely broken by Jackson’s charge; the right was giving way, and the Confederates, manning the captured guns, turned them on the masses which covered the fields below.

Howard, although his men fought bravely, was easily repulsed; in a few minutes not a single Federal soldier, save the dead and dying, was to be seen upon the plateau.

(Map.  The field of bull run.  Showing West:  Sudley Springs, North:  Centreville, South:  Manassas Junction and East:  Old Ox Road.)

3.30 P.M.

A final stand was made by McDowell along Young’s Branch; and there, at half-past three, a line of battle was once more established, the battalion of regular infantry forming a strong centre.  But another Confederate brigade, under General Early, had now arrived, and again the enemy’s right was overthrown, while Beauregard, leaving Jackson, whose brigade had lost all order and many men in its swift advance, to hold the plateau, swept forward towards the Matthews Hill.  The movement was decisive.  McDowell’s volunteers broke up in the utmost confusion.  The Confederate infantry was in no condition to pursue, but the cavalry was let loose, and before long the retreat became a panic.  The regular battalion, composed of young soldiers, but led by experienced officers, alone preserved its discipline, moving steadily in close order through the throng of fugitives, and checking the pursuing troopers by its firm and confident bearing.  The remainder of the army dissolved into a mob.  It was not that the men were completely demoralised, but simply that discipline had not become a habit.  They had marched as individuals, going just so far as they pleased, and halting when they pleased; they had fought as individuals, bravely enough, but with little combination; and when they found that they were beaten, as individuals they retreated.  “The old soldier,” wrote one of the regular officers a week later, “feels safe in the ranks, unsafe out of the ranks, and the greater the danger the more pertinaciously he clings to his place.  The volunteer of three months never attains this instinct