of Arlington, where his
eyes first opened upon the light, he learned at his father's knee and by
his father's daily walk and conversation the great lesson of duty which
steered his course and pointed out his pathway in life.

He was born, as has been said, on the 31st day of May, 1837. In 1857 he
was appointed a second lieutenant in the Sixth Regiment of United States
Infantry, and served in 1858 in the then far West under Albert Sidney
Johnston, whose fame Shiloh echoes and reechoes along the banks of the
Tennessee. In 1859 he resigned his commission in the Army and returned
to Virginia and located on his estate in the county of New Kent. In
1861, when the Southern tocsin sounded and Virginia's voice was heard
calling for troops, he raised a cavalry company and joined the Army of
Northern Virginia. He rose gradually from captain to major-general of
cavalry; was wounded in the terrific engagement between the Confederate
and Federal cavalry at Brandy Station on the 9th day of June, 1863; was
captured at Hanover Court-House, and was confined at Fort Monroe and
Fort Lafayette until March, 1864, when he was exchanged, and repaired to
his command, and served until the flag which he loved was furled forever
at Appomattox.

From that time forward he cultivated his large estate with much care,
serving one term in the senate of his State, declining a renomination.
In 1886 he was elected to the Fiftieth Congress from the Eighth
Congressional district of Virginia, and again in 1888 to the Fifty-first
Congress, and still again in 1890 to the present Congress.

It was my privilege and pleasure to form his acquaintance in the army
and to watch his flashing blade amid the carnage of battle, observe his
cool courage and intrepid bearing and the love and confidence of his men
upon more than one sanguinary field. He was as calm when the leaden hail
was rattling and as cool when the shells were shrieking and bursting as
he was upon this floor. He was a leader, not a follower of his men; if
they went into the jaws of death, he was at their head. He fared as his
men fared; if their haversacks were empty, his was empty; if they laid
down in the mud, he laid there too; if they sweltered in the summer heat
or shivered in the winter blast, he sweltered or shivered too; and thus
it was he kindled in the breasts of his men intense love for himself and
secured their implicit confidence in his leadership.

The promotions he received, rising from