wever, for anything but the morning edition of
Tuesday, but the paper wired all over New England the story it would
have, and the edition finally run off was a large one.

"I locked myself in a room and wrote steadily until the paper went to
press, seeing no one but the men handling the copy, and, when the last
sheet was done, threw myself on a pile of papers, thoroughly
exhausted, and got a few hours' sleep. I went to my home in the
suburbs, the next day, but my townspeople wouldn't let me rest. They
came after me with a band and wagon, and I had to get out and tell the
story in public again.

"The next day I left for the front again, riding forward from
Westminster, where I had left my horse, and thus covering about 100
miles on horseback, and 800 miles by rail, from the time I left the
army until I got back again.

"Coffee was all that kept me up during that time, but my nerves did
not recover from it for a long time. In fact, I don't think I could
have gone through the war as I did, had I not made it a practice to
take as long a rest as possible after a big battle or engagement."

In his letter written after the decisive event of 1863, Carleton pays
a strong tribute of praise to the orderly retreat which Lee made from
Pennsylvania. He was bitterly disappointed that the defeated army
should have been allowed to escape. With the soldiers, he looked
forward with dread to another Virginia campaign. Nevertheless, he was
all ready for duty. Having found his horse and resumed his saddle, he
spent a day revisiting the Antietam battle-field. It was still strewn
with the debris of the fight: old boots, shoes, knapsacks, belts,
clothes all mouldy in the dampness of the woods. He found flattened
bullets among the leaves, fragments of shells, and, sickening to the
sight, here and there a skull protruding from the ground, the
bleaching bones of horses and men. The Dunkers' church and the houses
were rent, shattered, pierced, and pitted with the marks of war.

Even until July 15th, when he sent despatches from Sharpsburg, he
nourished the hope that Lee's army could still be destroyed before
reaching Richmond. This was not to be. Like salt on a sore, and rubbed
in hard, Carleton's sensibilities were cut to the quick, when, on
again coming home, he found the people in Boston and vicinity debating
the question whether the battle of Gettysburg had been a victory for
the Union army or not. Some were even inclined to consider it a