n both sides of the Potomac. By a blow
Hooker could cut Lee's army, break it, and retrieve what he lost at
Chancellorsville. Oh, how I wish he may do it. But since Hooker has
refused to mend his staff, all hope is lost. Stanton sees the
condition very clearly, but Butterfield is in good odor in the White
House.

_June 26._--Lee's movements and invasion puzzle me more and more.
The raid into Pennsylvania is the move of a desperate commander,
almost of a madman, playing his whole fortune on one card. If Lee
comes safe out of it, then doubtless he is the best general of our
times, and we the best nincompoops that ever the sun looked upon and
blushed for.

_June 26._--The reports give to Lee an army of two hundred thousand
men. Impossible! Where could the rebels scrabble together such a
number? The old trick to frighten us. If, however, Lee should have
even only from one hundred to one hundred and fifty thousand, then
relying on the high capacity of our various head-quarters, the rebel
chiefs may have gathered what they could take from Charleston and
from Bragg, and massed it to try a decided blow on Washington. But
this cloud, this dust cannot last long; whatever be our
head-quarters, light must come, and the cloud burst with blood and
thunder.

One meets in Washington individuals praising sky-high Mr. Lincoln's
military capacity, and saying that he alone embraces all the
extensive line of military operations, combines, directs them, etc.
Pretty well has all this succeeded, and why cannot the younger
generation seize the helm in this terrible crisis? How I ardently
wish to see there an Andrew, Boutwell, Coffey, and more, more of
those new men.

_June 27._--From a very reliable, honest, and _not conspiring_
secessionist in Washington, I learn that a Northern Copperhead
visited Jeff Davis in Richmond, and stimulated the rebel chief to
carry into the north a war of retaliation by fire and sword, but
that Jeff Davis refused to instruct Lee for devastation. I instantly
told Stanton my news; and now I doubt not in the least that the
invasion is concerted with Northern Copperheads.

_June 28._--The following is this morning the military condition of
the city with the forts and defences: Hooker took all he could and
all he met on his way. To defend the works around Washington
Heintzelman has six thousand infantry, and not two hundred cavalry.
The rebels have cavalry all around, within six or eight miles. A
dash of twenty