Nevertheless, as events went far to prove, Mr. Davis would have done wisely had he accepted the advice of the soldiers on the spot.  His strategical glance was less comprehensive than that of Lee and Jackson.  In the first place, they knew that if Burnside proposed going into winter quarters, he would not deliberately place the Rappahannock between himself and his base, nor halt with the great forest of Spotsylvania on his flank.  In the second place, there could be no question but that the Northern Government and the Northern people would impel him forward.  The tone of the press was unmistakable; and the very reason that Burnside had been appointed to command was because McClellan was so slow to move.  In the third place, both Lee and Jackson saw the need of decisive victory.  With them questions of strategic dispositions, offering chances of such victory, were of more importance than questions of supply or internal politics.  They knew with what rapidity the Federal soldiers recovered their morale; and they realised but too keenly the stern determination which inspired the North.  They had seen the hosts of invasion retire in swift succession, stricken and exhausted, before their victorious bayonets.  Thousands of prisoners had been marched to Richmond; thousands of wounded, abandoned on the battle-field, had been paroled; guns, waggons and small arms, enough to equip a great army, had been captured; and general after general had been reduced to the ignominy that awaits a defeated leader.  Fremont and Shields had disappeared; Banks was no longer in the field; Porter was waiting trial; McDowell had gone; Pope had gone, and McClellan; and yet the Army of the Potomac still held its ground, the great fleets still kept their stations, the capture of Richmond was still the objective of the Union Government, and not for a single moment had Lincoln wavered from his purpose.

It will not be asserted that either Lee or Jackson fathomed the source of this unconquerable tenacity, They had played with effect on the fears of Lincoln; they had recognised in him the motive power of the Federal hosts; but they had not yet learned, for the Northern people themselves had not yet learned it, that they were opposed by an adversary whose resolution was as unyielding as their own, who loved the Union even as they loved Virginia, and who ruled the nation with the same tact and skill that they ruled their soldiers.

In these pages Mr. Lincoln has not been spared.  He made mistakes, and he himself would have been the last to claim infallibility.  He had entered the White House with a rich endowment of common-sense, a high sense of duty, and an extraordinary knowledge of the American character; but his ignorance of statesmanship directing arms was great, and his military errors were numerous.  Putting these aside, his tenure of office during the dark days of “61 and “62 had been marked by the very highest political sagacity; his courage and his patriotism had sustained the nation