efore the grey
skirmishers. So thickly grew the Wilderness that it was somewhat like
Indian fighting, and no man saw a hundred yards in front of him.
Stonewall Jackson's eyes glinted under the forage cap; perhaps he saw
more than a hundred yards ahead of him, but if so he saw with the eyes
of the mind. He was moving very slowly, more like a tortoise than a
thunderbolt. The men said that Old Jack had spring fever.

Grey columns, grey artillery, grey flanking cavalry, all came under
slant sunrays to within a mile or two of that old house called
Chancellorsville set north of the pike, upon a low ridge in the
Wilderness. "Open ground in front--open ground in front--open ground in
front! Let Old Jack by--Let Old Jack by! Going to see--Going to see--"
_Halt_!

The beat of feet ceased. The column waited, sunken in the green and gold
and misty Wilderness where the shadows were lengthening and the birds
were at evensong. In a moment the evensong was hushed and the birds flew
away. The same instant brought explanation of that "Don't-care.
-On-the-whole-quite-ready-to-retreat.-Merely-following-instructions"
attitude for the past two hours of the blue skirmish line. From
Chancellorsville, from Hooker's great entrenchments on the high roll of
ground, along the road, and on the plateau of Hazel Grove, burst a
raking artillery fire. The shells shrieked across the open, plunged into
the wood, and exploded before every road-head. Hooker had guns a-many;
they commanded the Wilderness rolling on three sides of the formidable
position he had seized; they commanded in iron force the clearing along
his front. He had breastworks; he had abattis. He had the 12th Corps,
the 2d, the 3d, the 5th, the 7th, the 11th; he had in the Wilderness
seventy thousand men. His left almost touched the Rappahannock, his
right stretched two miles toward Germanna Ford. He was in great
strength.

Jeb Stuart with his cavalry, waiting impatiently near Catherine Furnace,
found beside him General Jackson on Little Sorrel. "General Stuart, I
wish you to ride with me to some point from which those guns can be
enfiladed. Order Major Beckham forward with a battery."

This was the heart of the Wilderness. Thick, thick grew the trees and
the all-entangling underbrush. Stuart and Stonewall Jackson, staff
behind them, pursued a span-wide bridle path, overarched by dogwood and
Judas tree. It led at last to a rise of ground, covered by matted
growth, towered above by a fe