,
unhappily, Government would not re-enforce Johnston--even to the very
limited extent it might; and Mr. Davis promoted Pemberton to a
lieutenant-generalcy and sent him to Vicksburg. But this is no place to
discuss General Pemberton's abilities--his alleged disobedience of
orders--the disasters of Baker's creek and Big Black; or his shutting
up in Vicksburg, hopeless of relief from Johnston. Suffice it, the
dismal echo of falling Vicksburg supplemented the gloom after
Gettysburg; and the swift-following loss of Port Hudson completed the
blockade of the Mississippi; and made the trans-river territory a
foreign land!

The coast of Maine met the waters of the Ohio, at the mouth of the
Mississippi; and two sides of the blockade triangle were completed,
almost impervious even to rebel ingenuity and audacity. It needed but
careful guard over the third side--the inland border from river to
coast--to seal up the South hermetically, and perfect her isolation.

That perfection had long been attempted. Fleets of gunboats ploughed
the Potomac and all inland water-approaches to the southern frontier. A
shrewd detective system, ramifying from Washington, penetrated the
"disaffected" counties of Maryland; spying equally upon shore and
household. The borders of Tennessee and Kentucky were closely picketed;
and no means of cunning, or perseverance, were omitted to prevent the
passage of anything living, or useful, into the South. But none of this
availed against the untiring pluck and audacity of the inland
blockade-breakers. Daily the lines were forced, spies evaded, and bold
"Johnny Reb" passed back and forth, in almost guaranteed security.

Such ventures brought small supplies of much-needed medicines, surgical
instruments and necessaries for the sick. They brought northern
newspapers--and often despatches and cipher letters of immense value;
and they ever had tidings from home that made the heart of exiled
Marylander, or border statesman sing for joy, even amid the
night-watches of a winter camp.

Gradually this system of "running the bloc." systematized and received
governmental sanction. Regular corps of spies, letter-carriers and
small purchasing agents were organized and recognized by army
commanders. Naturally, these also made hay while the sun shone; coming
back never--whatever their mission--with empty hands. Shoes, cloth,
even arms--manufactured under the very noses of northern detectives
and, possibly, with their conni