and, as the days wore on, it was more and more
apparent that somewhere in the vicinity of Dinwiddie Court-House the
last great wrestle of the opposing armies must take place.

To that conclusive trial of strength we shall advance with as few
interruptions as possible. The operations of the two armies at
Petersburg do not possess, for the general reader, that dramatic
interest which is found in battles such as those of Chancellorsville
and Gettysburg, deciding for the time the fates of great campaigns.
At Petersburg the fighting seemed to decide little, and the bloody
collisions had no names. The day of pitched battles, indeed, seemed
past. It was one long battle, day and night, week after week, and
month after month--during the heat of summer, the sad hours of autumn,
and the cold days and nights of winter. It was, in fact, the siege
of Richmond which General Grant had undertaken, and the fighting
consisted less of battles, in the ordinary acceptation of that word,
than of attempts to break through the lines of his adversary--now
north of James River, now east of Petersburg, now at some point in
the long chain of redans which guarded the approaches to the coveted
Southside Railroad, which, once in possession of the Federal
commander, would give him victory.

Of this long, obstinate, and bloody struggle we shall describe only
those prominent incidents which rose above the rest with a species
of dramatic splendor. For the full narrative the reader must have
recourse to military histories aiming to chronicle the operations of
each corps, division, and brigade in the two armies--a minuteness of
detail beyond our scope, and probably not desired by those who will
peruse these pages.

VIII.

LEE THREATENS WASHINGTON.

The month of July began and went upon its way, with incessant fighting
all along the Confederate front, both north of James River and south
of the Appomattox. General Grant was thus engaged in the persistent
effort to, at some point, break through his opponent's works, when
intelligence suddenly reached him, by telegraph from Washington, that
a strong Confederate column had advanced down the Shenandoah Valley,
crossed the Potomac, and was rapidly moving eastward in the direction
of the Federal capital.

This portentous incident was the result of a plan of great boldness
devised by General Lee, from which he expected much. A few words will
explain this plan.

A portion of General Grant's plan of