d to retaliate, sarcastically reminding him of a
recent scene of riot and disorder which proved that martial law, in
any effective form, did not exist in Virginia. He alluded to a riot,
ostensibly for bread, in which an Amazonian woman had led a mob to the
pillaging of the Richmond jewelry shops, a riot which Davis himself had
quelled by meeting the rioters and threatening to fire upon them. But
sarcasm proved powerless against Foote. His climax was a lurid tale of
a soldier who while marching past his own house heard that his wife was
dying, who left the ranks for a last word with her, and who on rejoining
the command, "hoping to get permission to bury her," was shot as a
deserter. And there was no one on the Government benches to anticipate
Kipling and cry out "flat art!" Resolutions condemning martial law were
passed by a vote of 45 to 27.

Two weeks later the Mercury preached a burial sermon over the Barksdale
Bill, which had now been rejected by the House. Congress was about to
adjourn, and before it reassembled elections for the next House would
be held. "The measure is dead for the present," said the Mercury, "but
power is ever restive and prone to accumulate power; and if the war
continues, other efforts will doubtless be made to make the President
a Dictator. Let the people keep their eyes steadily fixed on their
representatives with respect to this vital matter; and should the effort
again be made to suspend the Habeas Corpus Act, demand that a recorded
vote should show those who shall strike down their liberties."

Chapter V. The Critical Year

The great military events of the year 1863 have pushed out of men's
memories the less dramatic but scarcely less important civil events. To
begin with, in this year two of the greatest personalities in the South
passed from the political stage: in the summer Yancey died; and in the
autumn, Rhett went into retirement.

The ever malicious Pollard insists that Yancey's death was due
ultimately to a personal encounter with a Senator from Georgia on
the floor of the Senate. The curious may find the discreditable story
embalmed in the secret journal of the Senate, where are the various
motions designed to keep the incident from the knowledge of the world.
Whether it really caused Yancey's death is another question. However,
the moment of his passing has dramatic significance. Just as the battle
over conscription was fully begun, when the fear that the Confederate
Gov