surrounding country in a tangle of bayous and a vast expanse of unwholesome, impassable swamp; the high ridges which lay inland around the place were intersected by frequent long, deep, and precipitous ravines, so that by this side also hostile approach had apparently been rendered impossible.  Nevertheless, that one of the Northern generals to whom nothing ever seemed impossible, having cast the eye of desire upon this especial spot, now advanced upon it, and began operations in his silent, enduring, pertinacious way, which no men and no intrenchments could permanently withstand.  His lieutenant, Sherman, made one desperate assault,—­not, as it seemed, because there was a possibility of taking the place, but rather to demonstrate that it could not be taken.  Then slower and more toilsome methods were tried.  It was obvious that a siege must be resorted to; yet it was not easy to get near enough even to establish a siege.

General Grant had early decided that the city would remain impregnable until by some means he could get below it on the river and approach it from the landward side.  Ingenious schemes of canals were tried, and failed.  Time passed; the month of April was closing, and all that had been done seemed to amount to nothing better than an accumulation of evidence that the Confederacy had one spot which the Federals could never touch.  At last ingenuity was laid aside for sheer daring.  The fleet, under Admiral Porter, transported the army down-stream, athwart the hostile batteries, and set it ashore on the east bank, below the fortifications.  Yet this very success seemed only to add peril to difficulty.  The Confederates, straining every nerve to save the place, were gathering a great force in the neighborhood to break up the besieging army.  With a base of supplies which was substantially useless, in a hostile country, with a powerful army hovering near him, and an unapproachable citadel as his objective, Grant could save himself from destruction only by complete and prompt success.  Desperate, indeed, was the occasion, yet all its exorbitant requirements were met fully, surely, and swiftly by the commander and the gallant troops under him.  In the task of getting a clear space, by driving the Confederates from the neighborhood for a considerable distance around, the army penetrated eastward as far as Jackson, fighting constantly and living off the country.  Then, returning westward, they began the siege, which, amid hardship and peril and infinite difficulty, was pushed with the relentless vigor of the most relentless and most vigorous leader of the war.  At last, on July 3, General Pemberton, commanding within the city, opened negotiations for a surrender.  He knew that an assault would be made the next day, and he knew that it must succeed; he did not want to illustrate the Fourth of July by so terrible a Confederate loss, so magnificent a Federal gain.  Yet he haggled over the terms, and by this delay brought about a