a poor trick to gather by telegraph the signatures of the
governors for an offer of troops to the President. It was done for
effect in Europe; but events seem to have a grudge against Mr. Seward;
the same steamer carried over the Atlantic the news of our defeats in
the Chickahominy swamps.

To attempt a change of such an extensive basis as was occupied by our
army under the eyes of a daring, able, skilful enemy, in a country
wooded and marshy, and without roads! This movement was perhaps
necessary, and could not be avoided; but why at the start had such a
basis been selected? Such a selection made disasters inevitable, and
they followed.

All kinds of accounts pour in from these cursed fields of the
Chickahominy. Foreign officers--whose veracity I can believe--speak
enthusiastically of the undaunted bravery of the volunteers and of
their generals; _but a general generalship_ was not to be found during
those titanic fightings. What I gathered from the _suite_ of the
Orleans is, that Gen. McClellan was totally confused, was totally
ignorant of the condition of the corps, was never within distance to
give or to be asked for orders, and was the first to reach the banks
of the James and to sleep on board the gunboat Galena. At Winchester,
Banks in person covered the retreat.

The Orleans left. I pity them; they will be hooted in Europe. They
shared some of McClellan's fallacious and petty notions, and very
likely they have been gulled by the McClellan-Seward expectations of
taking Richmond before July 4th.

Gen. Hunter's letter about fugitive slaves, and rebels fugitive from
the flag of the Union, is the noblest contra distinction. No rhetor
could have invented it. Hang yourselves, oh rhetors!

_July 4th._--The gloomiest since the birth of this republic. Never was
the country so low, and after such sacrifices of blood, of time, and
of money; and all this slaughtered to that Juggernaut of strategy, and
to the ignoble motley of his supporters.

Oh you widows, bereaved mothers, sisters, and sweethearts, cry for
vengeance! Cry for vengeance, you shadows of the dead of the malaria,
or fallen in the defence of your country's honor. Stupidity has
stabbed in the back more deadly wounds than did the enemy in front.
This is the 4th of July. Oh! my old heart and my, not weak, mind are
bursting with grief.

The people, the masses, sacrifice their blood, their time, their
fortune. What sacrifice the official leaders and pilots?