brilliant advocate, the
skillful surgeon, the man of letters and the smooth-faced pet of the
Mayday gathering--all that made the pride, the boast and the love of,
Richmond!

The beacon had been lighted on the mountain top, and had gleamed by her
river sides! The sturdy hunter from the West, and the dashing horseman
from the East; the merchant at his till, and the farmer, with hard hand
on the plough-handle--all heard the voice of the bugle and answered
with a shout!

Men of all classes--from the highest-born and richest to the humblest
and poorest--from the grandsire with his flint-lock to the sunny-haired
stripling scarcely in his teens--with one accord

"----Came forth at the call
With the rush of their rivers when tempests appall,
And the torrents their sources unseal!"

Thus, when the Government first felt that Virginia was to be the
battle-ground and decided to lash its fortunes to hers amid the black
billows that were surging around it, an army was already in the field;
partially armed, already somewhat proficient in drill and learning, by
the discipline of camp and bivouac, to prepare for the stern realities
of war.

In many instances, the posting of their regulars by the respective
state governments had been considered so judicious, that the War
Department made no change; as, for instance, in garrisoning the forts
in Charleston harbor by the South Carolina Regular Artillery, and those
at New Orleans by the 1st and 2d Louisiana Regulars. But after the
necessary garrison had been left in the most exposed points, every
available man was ordered to Virginia. Here the work of organization
went on with a smoothness and regularity scarcely to have been looked
for. Occasionally a hitch occurred that threatened to get the threads
of preparation into an ugly knot; but it was ever unraveled without the
Gordian treatment.

Fresh troops from every quarter were collecting rapidly. First came
Gregg's regiment of South Carolinians; and they were met with open arms
by the Virginians, soldiery and citizens. They received the first gush of
the new brotherhood of defiance and of danger; and their camp--constantly
visited by the ladies and even children of Richmond--had more the air of
a picnic than of a bivouac. Many of the men and most of the officers in
the First Carolina bore

"Names,
Familiar in their mouths as household words."

They