to cross the border, and “carry the war into Africa.”  Nor when he joined Lee before Richmond was the restraint removed.  In the campaign against Pope, and in the reduction of Harper’s Ferry, he was certainly entrusted with tasks which led to a complete severance from the main body, but the severance was merely temporary.  He was the most trusted of Lee’s lieutenants, but he was only a lieutenant.  He had never the same liberty of action as those of his contemporaries who rose to historic fame—­as Lee himself, as Johnston or Beauregard, as Grant, or Sherman, or as Sheridan—­and consequently he had never a real opportunity for revealing the height and breadth of his military genius.

The Civil War was prolific of great leaders.  The young American generals, inexperienced as they were in dealing with large armies, and compelled to improvise their tactics as they improvised their staff, displayed a talent for command such as soldiers more regularly trained could hardly have surpassed.  Neither the deficiencies of their material nor the difficulties of the theatre of war were to be lightly overcome; and yet their methods displayed a refreshing originality.  Not only in mechanical auxiliaries did the inventive genius of their race find scope.  The principles which govern civilised warfare, the rules which control the employment of each arm, the technical and mechanical arts, were rapidly modified to the exigencies of the troops and of the country.  Cavalry, intrenchments, the railway, the telegraph, balloons, signalling, were all used in a manner which had been hitherto unknown.  Monitors and torpedoes were for the first time seen, and even the formations of infantry were made sufficiently elastic to meet the requirements of a modern battle-field.  Nor was the conduct of the operations fettered by an adherence to conventional practice.  From first to last the campaigns were characterised by daring and often skilful manoeuvres; and if the tactics of the battle-field were often less brilliant than the preceding movements, not only are parallels to these tactics to be found in almost every campaign of history, but they would probably have escaped criticism had the opponent been less skilful.  But among the galaxy of leaders, Confederate and Federal, in none had the soldiers such implicit confidence as in Stonewall Jackson, and than the Southern soldiers, highly educated as many of them were, no better judges of military capacity were ever known.

Nevertheless, the opinion of the soldiers is no convincing proof that Jackson was equal to the command of a large army, or that he could have carried through a great campaign.  Had Lee been disabled, it might be asked, would Jackson have proved a sufficient substitute?