ling was, if possible, increased, and the greatest uneasiness
caused in all quarters, by Burnside's capture of Newbern, North
Carolina, on the 4th of March. Its defenses had just been completed at
heavy cost; but General Branch, with a garrison of some 5,000 men, made
a defense that resulted only in complete defeat and the capture of even
his field artillery. Here was another point, commanding another supply
country of great value to the commissariat, lost to the South. But
worse still, its occupation gave the Federals an easy base for striking
at the Weldon railroad.

Nowhere was the weakness of the South throughout the war shown more
fully than in her utterly inefficient transportation. Here were the
demands of the army of Virginia and of a greatly-increased population
in and around Richmond, supplied by one artery of communication!
Seemingly every energy of the Government should have been turned to
utilizing some other channel; but, though the Danville branch to
Greensboro'--of only forty miles in length--had been projected more
than a year, at this time not one rail had been laid.

It is almost incredible, when we look back, that the Government should
have allowed its very existence to depend upon this one line--the
Weldon road; running so near a coast in possession of the enemy, and
thus liable at any moment to be cut by a raiding party. Yet so it was.
The country was kept in a state of feverish anxiety for the safety of
this road; and a large body of troops diverted for its defense, that
elsewhere might have decided many a doubtful battle-field. Their
presence was absolutely necessary; for, had they been withdrawn and the
road tapped above Weldon, the Virginia army could not have been
supplied ten days through other channels, and would have been obliged
to abandon its lines and leave Richmond an easy prey.

Meanwhile the North had collected large and splendidly-equipped armies
of western men in Kentucky and Tennessee, under command of Generals
Grant and Buell. The new Federal patent, "the Cordon," was about to be
applied in earnest. Its coils had already been unpleasantly felt on the
Atlantic seaboard; General Butler had "flashed his battle blade"--that
was to gleam, afterward, so bright at Fort Fisher and Dutch Gap--and
had prepared an invincible armada for the capture of New Orleans; and
simultaneously the armies under Buell were to penetrate into Tennessee
and divide the systems of communication between Richm