will be satisfactory, no matter how gifted and learned may
be the historian. When all the actors of that famous tragedy, both great
and small, have passed away, new light will appear, and poetry will add
her charms to what is now too hideous a reality, glorious as were the
achievements of heroes and statesmen.

After the Battle of Bull Run, July 21, 1861, won by the Confederate
General Beauregard over General McDowell, against all expectation, to
the dismay and indignation of the whole North,--the result of
over-confidence on the part of the Union troops, and a wretchedly
mismanaged affair,--the attention of the Federal government was mainly
directed to the defence of Washington, which might have fallen into the
hands of the enemy had the victors been confident and quick enough to
pursue the advantage they had gained; for nothing could exceed the panic
at the capital after the disastrous defeat of McDowell. The
demoralization of the Union forces was awful. Happily, the condition of
the Confederate troops was not much better.

But the country rallied after the crisis had passed. Lincoln issued his
proclamation for five hundred thousand additional men. Congress
authorized as large a loan as was needed. The governors of the various
States raised regiment after regiment, and sent them to Washington, as
the way through Maryland, at first obstructed by local secessionists,
was now clear, General Butler having intrenched himself at Baltimore.
Most fortunately the governor of Maryland was a Union man, and with the
aid of the Northern forces had repressed the rebellious tendency in
Maryland, which State afterward remained permanently in the Union, and
offered no further resistance to the passage of Federal troops.
Arlington Heights in Virginia, opposite Washington, had already been
fortified by General Scott; but additional defences were made, and the
capital was out of danger.

With the rapid concentration of troops at Washington, the government
again assumed the offensive. General George B. McClellan, having
distinguished himself in West Virginia, was called to Washington, at the
recommendation of the best military authorities, and intrusted with the
command of the Army of the Potomac; and soon after, on the retirement of
General Scott, now aged and infirm, and unable to mount a horse,
McClellan took his place as commander of all the forces of the
United States.

At the beginning of the rebellion McClellan was simply a ca