the flash of steel at the end of some woodland vista betrayed the presence of scouting party or vedette.  But there were no symptoms of unusual excitement, no sign of working parties, of reinforcements for the advanced posts, of the construction of earthworks or abattis.  Pope’s camps were scattered over a wide tract of country, his cavalry was idle, and it seemed absolutely certain that he was unconscious of the near neighbourhood of the Confederate army.

The inference was correct.  The march to Pisgah Church had escaped notice.  The Federals were unaware that Lee had arrived at Gordonsville, and they had as yet no reason to believe that there was the smallest danger of attack.

Between Raccoon and Locustdale fords, and stretching back to Culpeper Court House, 52,500 men—­for Reno, with two divisions of Burnside’s army, 8000 strong, had arrived from Fredericksburg—­were in camp and bivouac.  The front was protected by a river nearly a hundred yards wide, of which every crossing was held by a detachment, and Pope had reported that his position was so strong that it would be difficult to drive him from it.  But he had not made sufficient allowance for the energy and ability of the Confederate leaders.  His situation, in reality, was one of extreme danger.  In ordering Pope to the Rapidan, and bidding him “fight like the devil’* (* O.R. volume 12 part 2 page 67.  “It may have been fortunate for the Confederates,” says Longstreet, “that he was not instructed to fight like Jackson.”) until McClellan should come up, Halleck made the same fatal error as Stanton, when he sent Shields up the Luray Valley in pursuit of Jackson.  He had put an inferior force within reach of an enemy who held the interior lines, and had ordered two armies, separated by several marches, to effect their concentration under the fire of the enemy’s guns.  And if Pope’s strategical position was bad, his tactical position was even worse.  His left, covering Raccoon and Somerville Fords, was very weak.  The main body of his army was massed on the opposite flank, several miles distant, astride the direct road from Gordonsville to Culpeper Court House, and he remained without the least idea, so late as the morning of the 18th, that the whole Confederate army was concentrated behind Clark’s Mountain, within six miles of his most vulnerable point.  Aware that Jackson was based on Gordonsville, he seems to have been convinced that if he advanced at all, he would advance directly on Culpeper Court House; and the move to Pisgah Church, which left Gordonsville unprotected, never entered into his calculations.  A sudden attack against his left was the last contingency that he anticipated; and had the Confederates moved as Lee intended, there can be no question but that the Federal army, deprived of all supplies, cut off from Washington, and forced to fight on ground where it was unprepared, would have been disastrously defeated.