the soldiers marching along laboriously in the mud, with remnants of shoes worn down at the heels, cracked open, and almost soleless. Some were barefooted; but they marched on, endeavoring not to be left behind.

The night was really glacial. Happily, fuel was plentiful. The great fires lighted on all sides continued to blaze until morning. Then the snow began to fall, at first in light flakes and soon in a thick whirlwind, whipped by continual squalls. The trees groaned, the ground trembled, and the men shivered. In the midst of the storm, General Stoneman sent for me, and, looking like a snow man, I entered the country church. where he was quite comfortably installed with his staff. When I had warmed myself a little, he told me that the first two brigades of the division were camped in a forest of tall pines, which the road passed through a short distance away.

"You can also go there and choose a place for your regiments," he added. "They will be better protected than in this position, where you are now."

I mounted my horse, accompanied by an officer of my staff, and we found, without much trouble, a place with the desired conditions. But the snowstorm did not abate, and, the day being nearly spent, I concluded to see the general again on my return, to ask him to let me put off the changing of camp for my brigade until morning.

He consented immediately, with an air which made me think that our advance movement was suspended. Why? I could not imagine; but there was something new in the air, and something indefinable in the manner of the general and his staff, which struck me.

The enigma was explained the next morning, when, while laying out our new camp, the news came: McClel

lan had been relieved from command, and replaced by Burnside.

At first we could hardly believe it. We had so many times received news as true one day, only to be denied the next! But for once the rumor was true. The evening before, a general officer had brought from Washington the following order, dated November 5 :

"It is ordered by the President of the United States that MajorGeneral McClellan be relieved from the command of the Army of the Potomac, and that Major-General Burnside take command of that army."

It was finished. The military career of General McClellan had come to an end.

We may well believe that this removal was deserved. But, to tell the truth, although too late, it was not opportune. Really it is not always enough to do a thing. good in itself, it should also be done at the proper time. Now, the suitable occasion for removing General McClellan from the command of the army had twice presented itself: the first, in the month of July, after the disastrous failure of his campaign against Richmond, and the sending of an unbecoming communication to the President on the general policy of the government; the second, in the month of October, in view of his manifest ill-will, when he refused to move his army, disobeying positive orders. Now that he had started to execute his plans, whatever they were, the time was badly chosen to supersede him, unless the army was in danger of being compromised, which was not the case. This was the general judgment. The Copperheads of the North, it is true, made great hue and cry, but on the other hand the Southern rebels poorly disguised their vexation at a change which might be ruinous to them. As to the army, sentiments and opinions were divided. McClellån had there a great number of partisans, who were still ignorant of his share of the

responsibility for the defeat of Pope, and his refusal to pursue and finish up Lee after the battle of Antietam. And they did not hesitate to express their disappointment. This, without doubt, is what has given rise to the too generally received idea that McClellan was the idol of his army, and that his dismissal had given a great blow to the confidence and energy of his soldiers.

This may have been true as to some generals and a few officers whose promotion was more dependent upon the favor of the general-in-chief than upon their own merits. But this idea was very incorrect as to the great body of the army, in which the popularity of McClellan, great in the beginning, was dimmed before Richmond, eclipsed after the retreat of the seven days, was only regained afterwards by the counteraction of Pope's misfortunes, and had blazed up at Antietam only to become clouded over during the long inaction which followed that victory.

The Army of the Potomac, animated by a better spirit, did not make its patriotism depend on the retaining of a chief who had contributed to its reverses more than to its successes. The truth is that, with some grumbling, interested mostly, the army accepted the change as a man does a wife: "for better or for worse."

Thus the general who had up to this time played the first rôle disappeared from the scene. His misfortune and that of the country was his sudden elevation to a position to which his ability was not equal. If he had remained at a post in accordance with his military abilities, for instance the command of the defences of Washington, it is probable that he would have filled the place with honor. As he was essentially an officer of engineers, he would have found there the best field for his special talents. But the success of a small affair well carried out, at Laurel Hill, was the means of bring

ing to him such high fortune that he was dazzled, and, as it were, overwhelmed by it. So great is the distance between the command of a small body of troops, and that of a great army.

Aside from his military ability, McClellan had not the burning ardor which was necessary to put an end to the rebellion. He wanted zeal and conviction in the strife. His ultra conservative opinions were full of sentimentality toward the erring brothers.

The enemy was to him only an enemy in the military acceptance of the term. Aside from that, he appeared, in combating the rebellion, to be always afraid of hurting the rebels too much, while they, for their part, thought they never could injure us enough. Thus he showed himself overflowing with consideration for them, even to the point of professing a respect, badly timed, for slavery, which had in his eyes the character of an inviolable institution. We are forced to believe that he deceived himself, even to the point of hoping to bring them back to the Federal Union by mild measures; but, with that system, the war would still be unfinished, or the Confederation would be definitely established at this time.

Aside from his military and political rôle, the excommander of the Army of the Potomac is a gentleman, courteous in his manners, dignified in his bearing, and reserved in speech. For those who, at a later date, supported him for the Presidency, in order to have in the White House an accomplished gentleman, he filled, without doubt, that part of the programme. But the people, who wished, above all things, the safety of the Republic and the triumph of the government, demanded at the head of the army a general who had higher merits than the qualities of a gentleman and the talents of an engineer.

CHAPTER XVII.

FREDERICKSBURG.

Ambrose Burnside, general commanding - Organization of grand divisions - Mrs. L.'s honey-State elections - General Burnside's plan - The delay of the pontoons - Effect of snow — - Passage of the Rappahannock - Doctor C.'s nerves Battle of FredericksburgAttack of the enemy's positions on the left-Tragical episode — Whose fault was it? - Disasters on the right - General Burnside's obstinacy - Dead and wounded - Return to our camp.

GENERAL Ambrose Burnside was but little known by the army the command of which had devolved upon him. He had achieved his reputation as commander of a fortunate expedition on the coast of North Carolina, where he had remained during our entire Peninsular campaign. When Pope, menaced by the greater part of the Confederate army, awaited the reënforcements which McClellan delayed sending him day after day, it was Burnside who was the first to hasten to Alexandria, at the head of the Ninth Corps, to his assistance, and who immediately sent Reno's division to the banks of the Rapidan. So that he had belonged to the Army of the Potomac but two months, during which, as we have seen, he had commanded the right wing at South Mountain, and the left wing at AntieHe was a man of fine character, honest, upright, full of patriotism, incapable of stooping to any intrigue, and always subordinating his ambition to his duty; but too much inclined to be obstinate.

tam.

A friend of McClellan, not only had he done nothing to supersede him, but he had already twice refused the honor which had just been conferred upon him rather