already his own reports have told.

March came, and with it, orders to remove all government property that
could possibly be spared from daily need. First the archives and papers
went; then the heavier stores, machinery and guns, and supplies not in
use; then the small reserve of medical stores was sent to Danville, or
Greensboro. And, at last, the already short supplies of commissary
stores were lessened by removal--and the people knew their Capital was
at last to be given up!

The time was not known--some said April, some the first of May; but the
families of the President and Cabinet had followed the stores; the
female Department clerks had been removed to Columbia--and there was no
doubt of the fact. After four years of dire endeavor and unparalleled
endurance, the Capital of the South was lost!

In their extremity the people said little, but hope left them utterly.
In the army or out, there were few, indeed--and no Virginians--but
believed the cause was lost when the army marched away.

Richmond was Virginia--was the cause!

With Sherman already in possession of Charleston and Savannah, and the
army unable to do aught but retreat sullenly before him--with Virginia
gone, and the Confederacy narrowed down to North Carolina, a strip of
Alabama and the trans-Mississippi--what hope was left?

After General Johnston had been relieved at Atlanta, the Department had
managed, on one reason or another, to shelve him until now. The public
voice was loudly raised against the injustice done the man they admired
most of all the bright galaxy of the South; and even Congress woke from
its stupor long enough to demand for the great soldier a place to use
his sword. This was in January; but still the government did not
respond, and it was not until the 23d February that he was restored to
command. Then--with the shattered remnant of his army, augmented, but
not strengthened by the fragments of flying garrisons--he could only
fall back before the victorious progress of that "Great March" he might
effectually have checked, on its threshold at Atlanta.

Deep gloom--thick darkness that might be felt--settled upon the whole
people. Hope went out utterly, and despair--mingled with rage and
anguish as the news from the "Great March" came in--took its place in
every heart. But in every heart there was bitter sorrow,
humiliation--but no fear. As Richmond became more and more empty, and
the time to abandon her drew nearer and nearer, h