But the Lord gave and the Lord has taken away: blessed be the name of the Lord. In the quiet hours of night, when there is nothing to lighten the full weight of my grief, I feel as if I should be overwhelmed. I had always counted, if God should spare me a few days of peace after this cruel war was ended, that I should have her with me. But year after year my hopes go out, and I must be resigned."

One of Lee's first cares, during the enforced rest of winter, was to give his artillery a better organization, to partly replace his batteries by others taken from the enemy, and to get the Confederate Government to recast a great number of guns. Thanks to these measures, the Southern army, in the spring of 1863, was better provided with artillery than it had ever been.

In the course of January, 1863, Burnside, burning to take his revenge, conceived the plan of crossing the Rappahannock above Fredericksburg, and turning the Confederate right wing, thus obliging Lee to abandon his line of defence, or see himself cut off from Richmond. The weather was beautifully dry, and everything at the beginning went well. The grand secret was jealously kept. On the 20th, the whole army was ranged at different points on the north bank, ready to cross the river. During the night the pontoons were to be fixed. But a frightful tempest happened shortly before nightfall; torrents of rain caused a considerable rise, and the clayey soil, sodden by the water, reduced the general's plans to nothing. Lee's vigilance had not blundered. Notwithstanding the strife of the elements, the Confederate general had massed his troops opposite the points of passage. On the Federal side the roads were in a most deplorable state; the pontoons, buried in the mud, resisted all efforts to move them. All day, on the 24th, and the night following, the tempest and rain continued without ceasing. A chaos of pontoons, carriages, ammunition waggons, and guns, impossible to describe, encumbered all the roads: tumbrils upset, pieces of cannon stuck in the mud, trains of war-material engulfed in a sewer, thousands of horses and mules

immersed in yellow masses of slush-such was the spectacle offered to the view on all sides. There was no further thought of an advance—it was necessary to consider how best to get out of this plight. The three days' rations, brought by the soldiers, were exhausted; there was no means of bringing up supplies of victuals. The whole army was compelled to be occupied in remedying the roads, thus, they cut down trees, and laid them symmetrically across the roads, so as to create a solid bottom, one which did not sink. Thanks to these efforts, next day, most of the army could gradually re-enter their cantonments. Such are some of the difficulties on which an army must reckon in a winter-season in Virginia.

If, however, the Federal general had succeeded in crossing the river, Lee was ready to receive him, and, as he sent word to Richmond: "Nothing was more fortunate for the Federals than not to cross the Rappahannock." Shortly after, Burnside sent in his resignation. He was replaced by one of the most distinguished of his division generals-Hooker.

The Confederate soldiers had sometimes to suffer this winter from scarcity of provisions. The country was little prepared for a war of so long duration, and those who were charged with providing for the wants of the army were not always able to fulfil satisfactorily their arduous and complicated duties.

Another subject which gave much cause for anxious reflection to the Confederate general-in-chief, was that of recruitment. The population bent with difficulty to this new law, so full of antipathy to the American nature. General Lee proposed to the Government to make the governors of each state responsible for a certain number of soldiers; the conscription would thus have been worked through the local authorities, and perhaps by that means would have ceased to be odious.

But the Richmond Cabinet did not judge it advisable to give effect to this proposition, and no change was made in the method of enlistment.

Nothing was done for some time, except that Longstreet's corps

was detached in February, and sent to the south of the James to oppose the attempts at revictualling there made by the enemy along the coasts and in the most exposed counties of Southern Virginia and North Carolina.

Lee took all precautions against the enemy's passing the Rappahannock. All the fords were guarded. His army was so disposed that it could easily be concentrated, if necessary, on a given point. Earthworks and redoubts were raised in places most easily accessible to the enemy, and the time was passed in watching the spots most in danger, and in getting ready to repulse the first offensive movement of which the spring would necessarily be the signal.

CHAPTER XI.

EXASPERATION IN THE NORTH.-GENERAL HOOKER CROSSES THE RAPPA

HANNOCK.-BATTLE OF CHANCELLORSVILLE, MAY, 1863.-VICTORY OF THE CONFEDERATES.-DEATH OF JACKSON.

BURNSIDE'S defeat, and his unfortunate efforts to cross the Rappahannock, exasperated the people of the North to the last degree, but only rendered them more than ever determined to push on the war with vigour till final triumph was assured. In order to make a diversion, and excite troubles in the interior of the Confederacy, which, for their suppression would necessitate the employment of troops detached from the army, President Lincoln, on January 1st, 1863, published a proclamation in which he declared all the slaves of the South free. But it did not produce

the effect expected; the blacks did not stir.

As General Hooker had severely criticised his two predecessors, MacClellan and Burnside, the country expected him to prove his superiority over them, and justify the choice the President had just made. So the new Federal commander put himself to work and tried at first to restore the confidence of the army of the Potomac, so much disturbed. His first care was, by severe measures, to stop the desertions which for some time had been very frequent. He reorganized his army, and particularly applied himself to combine the cavalry, which hitherto had been dispersed among the different divisions of the army, into a single corps; this would permit it to act with greater unity and vigour. From this time the Federal cavalry, being better mounted and better

equipped, rendered the greatest services, while the Southern cavalry, exhausted by fatigues, and having no further facilities for remounting, owing to the impoverishment of the country, no longer contended with advantage against its enemy, possessing, as the latter did, all that was wanting to the Confederates. The Northern Government refused Hooker nothing; it was but for him to ask and have; thus, at the approach of spring, he was at the head of an army of 120,000 men (infantry and artillery), with a corps of 12,000 cavalry, perfectly equipped, and 400 guns. This fine army, divided into seven corps, inspired such confidence in its commander, that he looked upon the destruction of Lee's army

as certain.

On the 16th of March, General Averill for the Federals reconnoitred in force; with six regiments of cavalry and a battery of artillery he started in the direction of Gordonsville. A telegram from Lee warned Stuart to watch the fords of the upper Rappahannock. In spite of this, however, on the morning of the 17th Averill surprised the Confederate sentries, crossed briskly, and continuing his road, was suddenly arrested by Fitz-Lee's cavalry brigade. A long and eager conflict lasted all the afternoon, nor did the Federals retire till they had themselves sustained, and inflicted on the Confederates, heavy loss. A period of repose followed this alarm. It was not till the middle of April that the roads appeared dry and hard enough for military operations.

The Southern army, not having at its disposal the millions of the North, and the inexhaustible resources of America and Europe, was far from presenting a flourishing aspect. Lee had been compelled, at the urgent direction of the Richmond Government, to detach from his army 24,000 men under Longstreet, and send them to the south of the James River, which reduced the forces at his disposal on the Rappahannock to 47,000 men. Hooker, perfectly aware of the great numerical inferiority of his adversary (he himself had just three times as many soldiers as Lee), wished to attack before the reinforcements, urgently asked for by Lee,