ree days to join
my command on the march to Cold Harbor, we were absorbed in the larger
army operating against McClellan, and I saw but little of Jackson.

I have written that he was ambitious; and his ambition was vast,
all-absorbing. Like the unhappy wretch from whose shoulders sprang the
foul serpent, he loathed it, perhaps feared it; but he could not escape
it--it was himself--nor rend it--it was his own flesh. He fought it with
prayer, constant and earnest--Apollyon and Christian in ceaseless
combat. What limit to set to his ability I know not, for he was ever
superior to occasion. Under ordinary circumstances it was difficult to
estimate him because of his peculiarities--peculiarities that would have
made a lesser man absurd, but that served to enhance his martial fame,
as those of Samuel Johnson did his literary eminence. He once observed,
in reply to an allusion to his severe marching, that it was better to
lose one man in marching than five in fighting; and, acting on this, he
invariably surprised the enemy--Milroy at McDowell, Banks and Fremont in
the Valley, McClellan's right at Cold Harbor, Pope at second Manassas.

Fortunate in his death, he fell at the summit of glory, before the sun
of the Confederacy had set, ere defeat, and suffering, and selfishness
could turn their fangs upon him. As one man, the South wept for him;
foreign nations shared the grief; even Federals praised him. With Wolfe
and Nelson and Havelock, he took his place in the hearts of
English-speaking peoples.

In the first years of this century, a great battle was fought on the
plains of the Danube. A determined charge on the Austrian center gained
the victory for France. The courage and example of a private soldier,
who there fell, contributed much to the success of the charge. Ever
after, at the parades of his battalion, the name of Latour d'Auvergne
was first called, when the oldest sergeant stepped to the front and
answered, "Died on the field of honor." In Valhalla, beyond the grave,
where spirits of warriors assemble, when on the roll of heroes the name
of Jackson is reached, it will be for the majestic shade of Lee to
pronounce the highest eulogy known to our race--"Died on the field of
duty."

I reached Richmond, by Charlottesville and Lynchburg, the day after
leaving camp, and went to the war office, where I found letters from my
family. My wife and children had left New Orleans on a steamer just as
Farragut's fleet arrived, a