der and more
hardened soldiers than those of the Army of the Potomac. The early
conscription acts of the Confederacy had made it difficult for men once
inured to the steady bearing and rough life of the soldier, and to the
hard fare of camp-life, to withdraw from the ranks.

In Hooker's testimony before the Committee on the Conduct of the War
occurs this tribute to the Confederate infantry: "Our artillery had
always been superior to that of the rebels, as was also our infantry,
except in discipline; and that, for reasons not necessary to mention,
never did equal Lee's army. With a rank and file vastly inferior to our
own, intellectually and physically, that army has, by discipline alone,
acquired a character for steadiness and efficiency, unsurpassed, in my
judgment, in ancient or modern times. We have not been able to rival
it, nor has there been any near approximation to it in the other rebel
armies."

The cavalry force was small, but energetic and enterprising to a degree
as yet by no means equalled by our own. The artillery was neither as
good, nor as well equipped or served, as ours, but was commanded with
intelligence, and able to give a good account of itself.

V. DIFFICULTY OF AN ATTACK.

An attack of Lee's position in front, even had Burnside's experience
not demonstrated its folly, seemed to promise great loss of life without
corresponding success.

To turn his right flank required the moving of pontoon trains and
artillery over the worst of roads for at least twenty miles, through a
country cut up by a multitude of streams running across the route to
be taken, and emptying into either the Potomac or Rappahannock; all
requiring more or less bridging.

Lee's spy system was excellent. It has been claimed in Southern reports,
that his staff had deciphered our signal code by watching a station at
Stafford. And Butterfield admits this in one of his despatches of May
3. He would speedily ascertain any such movement, and could create
formidable intrenchments on one side the river, as fast as we could
build or repair roads on which to move down, upon the other. Moreover,
there was a thousand feet of stream to bridge at the first available
place below Skenker's Neck.

There remained nothing to do but to turn Lee's left flank; and this
could only be accomplished by stratagem, for Lee had strengthened every
part of the river by which Hooker could attempt a passage.

But this problem was, despite its dif