n at last imperatively commanded to move,
some-whither,--at any rate to move,--he left Washington not sufficiently
defended, which necessitated the withdrawal of McDowell's corps from him
to secure the safety of the capital. Without enumerating or describing
the terrible battles on the Peninsula, and the "change of base," which
practically was a retreat, and virtually the confession of failure, it
may be said in defence or palliation of McClellan that it afterwards
took Grant, with still greater forces, and when the Confederates were
weakened and demoralized, a year to do what McClellan was expected to do
in three months.

The war had now been going on for more than a year, without any decisive
results so far as the Army of the Potomac was concerned, but on the
contrary with great disasters and bitter humiliations. The most
prodigious efforts had been made by the Union troops without success,
and thus far the Confederates had the best of it, and were filled with
triumph. As yet no Union generals could be compared with Lee, or
Johnston, or Longstreet, or Stonewall Jackson, while the men under their
command were quite equal to the Northern soldiers in bravery and
discipline.

The times were dark and gloomy at the North, and especially so to the
President, as commander-in-chief of the army and navy, after all the
energies he put forth in the general direction of affairs. He was
maligned and misrepresented and ridiculed; yet he opened not his mouth,
and kept his soul in patience,--magnanimous, forbearing, and modest. In
his manners and conduct, though intrusted with greater powers than any
American before him had ever exercised, he showed no haughtiness, no
resentments, no disdain, but was accessible to everybody who had any
claim on his time, and was as simple and courteous as he had been in a
private station. But what anxieties, what silent grief, what a burden,
had he to bear! And here was his greatness, which endeared him to the
American heart,--that he usurped no authority, offended no one, and
claimed nothing, when most men, armed as he was with almost unlimited
authority, would have been reserved, arrogant, and dictatorial. He did
not even assume the cold dignity which Washington felt it necessary to
put on, but shook hands, told stories, and uttered jokes, as if he were
without office on the prairies of Illinois; yet all the while resolute
in purpose and invincible in spirit,--an impersonation of logical
intellect