dent may appear singular to those who have been accustomed to
regard General Lee as a cold, reserved, and even stern human being--a
statue, beneath whose chill surface no heart ever throbbed. But,
instead of a marble heart, there lay, under the gray uniform of the
soldier, one of warm flesh and blood--tender, impressible, susceptible
to the quick touches of all gentle and sweet emotion, and filling, as
it were, with quiet happiness, at the sight of children and the sound
of their voices. This impressibility has even been made the subject
of criticism. A foreign writer declares that the soldier's character
exhibited a "feminine" softness, unfitting him for the conduct of
affairs of moment. What the Confederacy wanted, intimates the writer
in question, was a rough dictator, with little regard for nice
questions of law--one to lay the rough hand of the born master on the
helm, and force the crew, from the highest to the lowest, to obey his
will. That will probably remain a question. General Lee's _will_
was strong enough to break down all obstacles but those erected by
rightful authority; that with this masculine strength he united an
exquisite gentleness, is equally beyond question. A noble action
flushed his cheek with an emotion that the reader may, if he will,
call "feminine." A tale of suffering brought a sudden moisture to his
eyes; and a loving message from one of his poor old soldiers was seen
one day to melt him to tears.

This poor and incomplete attempt to indicate some of the less-known
traits of the illustrious commander-in-chief of the Southern armies
will now be brought to a conclusion; we approach the sorrowful moment
when, surrounded by his weeping family,[1] he tranquilly passed away.

[Footnote 1: General Lee had three sons and four daughters, all of
whom are living except one of the latter, Miss Anne Lee, who died in
North Carolina during the war. The sons were General G.W. Custis Lee,
aide-de-camp to President Davis--subsequently commander of infantry in
the field, and now president of Washington and Lee College, an officer
of such ability and of character so eminent that President Davis
regarded him as a fit successor of his illustrious father in command
of the Army of Northern Virginia--General W.H.F. Lee, a prominent and
able commander of cavalry, and Captain Robert E. Lee, an efficient
member of the cavalry-staff. These gentlemen bore their full share
in the perils and hardships of the war, from i