resolution, which meant, if anything, war with France, was passed on the motion of one Henry Winter Davis.  It was of course the business of Lincoln and of Seward, now moulded to his views, to avoid this disaster, and yet, with such dignity as the situation allowed, keep the French Government aware of the enmity which they might one day incur.  They did this.  But they apprehended that the French, with a footing for the moment in Mexico, had designs on Texas; and thus, though the Southern forces in Texas were cut off from the rest of the Confederacy and there was no haste for subduing them, it was thought expedient, with an eye on France, to assert the interest of the Union in Texas.  General Banks, in Louisiana, was sent to Texas with the forces which would otherwise have been sent to Mobile.  His various endeavours ended in May, 1864, with the serious defeat of an expedition up the Red River.  This defeat gave great annoyance to the North and made an end of Banks’ reputation.  It might conceivably have had a calamitous sequel in the capture by the South of Admiral Porter’s river flotilla, which accompanied Banks, and the consequent undoing of the conquest of the Mississippi.  As it was it wasted much force.

Before Grant could safely launch his forces southward from Chattanooga against Johnston, it was necessary to deal in some way with the Confederate force still at large in Mississippi.  Grant determined to do this by the destruction of the railway system by which alone it could move eastward.  For this purpose he left Thomas to hold Chattanooga, while Sherman was sent to Meridian, the chief railway centre in the Southern part of Mississippi.  In February Sherman arrived there, and, though a subsidiary force, sent from Memphis on a similar but less important errand somewhat further north, met with a severe repulse, he was able unmolested to do such damage to the lines around Meridian as to secure Grant’s purpose.

There was yet a further preliminary to the great final struggle.  On March 1, 1864, pursuant to an Act of Congress which was necessary for this object, Lincoln conferred upon Grant the rank of Lieutenant-General, never held by any one else since Washington, for it was only brevet rank that was conferred on Scott.  Therewith Grant took the command, under the President, of all the Northern armies.  Grant came to Washington to receive his new honour.  He had taken leave of Sherman in an interchange of letters which it is good to read; but he had intended to return to the West.  Sherman, who might have desired the command in the West for himself, had unselfishly pressed him to return.  He feared that the dreaded politicians would in some way hurt Grant, and that he would be thwarted by them, become disgusted, and retire; they did hurt him, but not then, nor in the way that Sherman had expected.  Grant, however, could trust Sherman to carry out the work he wanted done in the West, and he now saw that, as Lincoln might have told him and