innumerable lights shining, some thick and countless as stars,
indicating an encampment; others isolated upon the outskirts; here
and there the glowing furnace of a bakery; the whole land as far as
the eye could see looking like another heaven wherein some
ambitious archangel, covetous of creative power, had attempted to
rival the celestial splendors of the one above us. There was no
sound of drum or fife or bugle; the sweet notes of the 'good-night'
call had floated into space and silence a half hour before; only on
the still air were heard the voices of a hand of negroes chanting
solemnly and slowly, to a familiar sacred tune, the words of some
pious psalm.'

We may realize the effect of the armed occupation upon economical and
social life by a few facts noted after a successful raid:

'In the counties visited there were but few rebels found at home,
except the very old and the very young. In nine days' travel I did
not see fifty able-bodied men who were not in some way connected
with the army. Nearly every branch of business is at a standstill.
The shelves in stores are almost everywhere empty; the shop of the
artisan is abandoned and in ruins. The people who are to be seen
passively submit to all that emanates from Richmond without a
murmur; they are for the most part simple minded, and ignorant of
all that is transpiring in the great theatre about them. An
intelligent-looking man in Columbia laughed heartily when told that
Union troops occupied New Orleans--Jefferson Davis would let them
know it were such the fact; and I could not find a man who would
admit that the Confederates had ever been beaten in a single
engagement. These people do not even read the Richmond papers, and
about all the information they do obtain is what is passed about in
the primitive style, from mouth to mouth. Before this raid they
believed that the Union soldiers were anything but civilized
beings, and were stricken with terror when their approach was
heralded. Of six churches seen in one day, in only one had there
been religious services held within six months. One half at least
of the dwelling houses are unoccupied, and fast going to decay.'

Not all the land is ill adapted to cool actions and strategy; there are
sections naturally fortified, and these have been the scenes of milita