light." About
daybreak I heard him tramping down the stairs. I alone went out to
meet him. All the rest were asleep. He addressed me in stern tones:
"Major, how is it that this staff never will be punctual?" I replied:
"I am in time; I cannot control the others." Jackson turned in a rage
to the servant: "Put back that food into the chest, have that chest
in the waggon, and that waggon moving in two minutes." I suggested,
very humbly, that he had better at least take some food himself. But
he was too angry to eat, and repeating his orders, flung himself into
the saddle, and galloped off. Jim gave a low whistle, saying: "My
stars, but de general is just mad dis time; most like lightnin'
strike him!""

July 4.

With the engagement on the Evelington Heights the fighting round
Richmond came to an end. When Lee came up with his advanced divisions
on the morning of the 4th, he found the pickets already engaged, and
the troops formed up in readiness for action. He immediately rode
forward with Jackson, and the two, dismounting, proceeded without
staff or escort to make a careful reconnaissance of the enemy's
position. Their inspection showed them that it was practically
impregnable. The front, facing westward, was flanked from end to end
by the fire of the gunboats, and the Evelington Heights, already
fortified, and approached by a single road, were stronger ground than
even Malvern Hill. The troops were therefore withdrawn to the forest,
and for the next three days, with the exception of those employed in
collecting the arms and stores which the Federals had abandoned, they
remained inactive.

July 8.

On July 8, directing Stuart to watch McClellan, General Lee fell back
to Richmond.

The battles of the Seven Days cost the Confederates 20,000 men. The
Federals, although defeated, lost no more than 16,000, of whom
10,000, nearly half of them wounded, were prisoners. In addition,
however, 52 guns and 35,000 rifles became the prize of the
Southerners; and vast as was the quantity of captured stores, far
greater was the amount destroyed.

But the defeat of McClellan's army is not to be measured by a mere
estimate of the loss in men and in materiel. The discomfited general
sought to cover his failure by a lavish employment of strategic
phrases. The retreat to the James, he declared, had been planned
before the battle of Mechanicsville. He had merely manoeuvred to get
quit of an inconvenient line of supply, and to place hi