Between the soldiers of the North and South there was little difference.  Neither could claim a superiority of martial qualities.  The Confederates, indeed, at the beginning of the war possessed a larger measure of technical skill; they were the better shots and the finer riders.  But they were neither braver nor more enduring, and while they probably derived some advantage from the fact that they were defending their homes, the Federals, defending the integrity of their native land, were fighting in the noblest of all causes.  But Northerner and Southerner were of the same race, a race proud, resolute, independent; both were inspired by the same sentiments of self-respect; noblesse oblige—­the noblesse of a free people—­was the motto of the one as of the other.  It has been asserted that the Federal armies were very largely composed of foreigners, whose motives for enlisting were purely mercenary.  At no period of the war, however, did the proportion of native Americans sink below seventy per cent.,* (* See Note at end of chapter.) and at the beginning of 1863 it was much greater.  As a matter of fact, the Union army was composed of thoroughly staunch soldiers.* (* “Throughout New England,” wrote the Special Correspondent of an English newspaper, “you can scarcely enter a door without being aware that you are in a house of mourning.  Whatever may be said of Irish and German mercenaries, I must bear witness that the best classes of Americans have bravely come forth for their country.  I know of scarcely a family more than one member of which has not been or is not in the ranks of the army.  The maimed and crippled youths I meet on the highroad certainly do not for the most part belong to the immigrant rabble of which the Northern regiments are said to consist; and even the present conscription is now in many splendid instances most promptly and cheerfully complied with by the wealthy people who could easily purchase exemption, but who prefer to set a good example.”  Letter from Rhode Island, the Times, August 8, 1863.) Nor was the alien element at this time a source of weakness.  Ireland and Germany supplied the greater number of those who have been called “Lincoln’s hirelings;” and, judging from the official records, the Irish regiments at least were not a whit less trustworthy than those purely American.  Moreover, even if the admixture of foreigners had been greater, the Army of the Potomac, for the reason that it was always superior in numbers, contained in its ranks many more men bred in the United States than the Army of Northern Virginia.* (* John Mitchell, the Irish Nationalist, said in a letter to the Dublin Nation that there were 40,000 Irishmen in the Southern armies.  The Times, February 7, 1863.) For the consistent ill-success of the Federals the superior marksmanship and finer horsemanship of the Confederates cannot, therefore, be accepted as sufficient explanation.