The ensuing events proved that McClellan’s great need was not the reinforcements for which he so constantly clamored, but decision and energy of character.  Had he possessed these qualities he could have won for himself, from the fortuitous order which fell into his hands, a wreath of unfading laurel, and perhaps have saved almost countless lives of his fellow-countrymen.  As it was, if he had only advanced his army a little faster, the twelve thousand Union soldiers, surrendered by the incompetent and pusillanimous Gen. Miles, would have been saved from the horrors of captivity and secured as a valuable reinforcement.  To the very last, fortune appeared bent on giving him opportunity.  The partial success won on the 17th of September, at the battle of Antietam, might easily have been made a glorious victory if McClellan had had the vigor to put in enough troops, especially including Burnside’s corps, earlier in the day.  Again, on the morning of the 18th, he had only to take the initiative, as did Grant after the first day’s fighting at Shiloh, and Lee could scarcely have crossed the Potomac with a corporal’s guard.  But, as usual, he hesitated, and the enemy that robbed him of one of the highest places in history was not the Confederate general or his army, but a personal trait,—­indecision.  In the dawn of the 19th he sent out his cavalry to reconnoitre, and learned that his antagonist was safe in Virginia.  Fortune, wearied at last, finally turned her back upon her favorite.  The desperate and bloody battle resulted in little else than the ebb of the tide of war southward.  Northern people, it is true, breathed more freely.  Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington were safe for the present, but this seemed a meagre reward for millions of treasure and tens of thousands of lives, especially when the capture of Richmond and the end of the Rebellion had been so confidently promised.

If every village and hamlet in the land was profoundly stirred by these events, it can well be understood that the commercial centre of New York throbbed like an irritated nerve under the telegraph wires concentring there from the scenes of action.  Every possible interest, every variety of feeling, was touched in its vast and heterogeneous population, and the social atmosphere was electrical with excitement.

From her very constitution, now that she had begun to comprehend the nature of the times, Marian Vosburgh could not breathe this air in tranquillity.  She was, by birthright, a spirited, warm-hearted girl, possessing all a woman’s disposition towards partisanship.  Everything during the past few months had tended to awaken a deep interest in the struggle, and passing events intensified it.  Not only in the daily press did she eagerly follow the campaign, but from her father she learned much that was unknown to the general public.  To a girl of mind the great drama in itself could not fail to become absorbing, but when it is remembered that those who had the strongest hold upon her heart were imperilled actors in the tragedy, the feeling with which she watched the shifting scenes may in some degree be appreciated.  She often saw her father’s brow clouded with deep anxiety, and dreaded that each new day might bring orders which would again take him into danger.