ion. Since Titus encompassed Jerusalem and the Aurelian shook
the east with his fierce legions, a more stubborn, desperate and lavish
resistance has not been witnessed against attack so resolute, systematic
and overwhelming. The Roman eagle never presaged a wider, more thorough
desolation than that of which the flag of the Union was the harbinger.
For four years the struggle was maintained against this mighty power.
When in the spring of 1865, one hundred and thirty-four thousand
wretched, broken-down rebels stood, from Richmond to the Rio Grande,
confronting one million fifteen thousand veteran soldiers, trained to
all the vicissitudes, equal to all the shocks of war--is it wonderful
that when this tremendous host moved all at once, resistance at length,
and finally ceased. And this struggle had worn down the people as well
as the soldiery. Four years of such bitter, constant, exhausting strife,
racking the entire land, until the foot of the conqueror had tracked it
from one end to the other, accomplished its objects in time. Even the
women, whose heroism outshone any ever displayed upon the battlefield,
whose devoted self-sacrificing charity and benevolence can never be
justly recorded, whose courage had seemed dauntless, were at last
overcome by the misery which surrounded them, and a power which seemed
resistless and inexorable.

While we were marching to join General Lee, and after the news of the
evacuation of Richmond had been confirmed, we heard of an event which
was as ominous as it was melancholy. We learned that a man had been
killed, whose name had so long been associated with the army of Northern
Virginia and its victories, that it almost seemed as if his life must be
identified with its existence. The officer who was the very incarnation
of the chivalry, the big-souled constancy, the glorious vigor of that
army--General A.P. Hill--was dead. He _was a hero_, and he died like
one. When the lines around Richmond were forced--his gallant corps
overpowered, he was slain in the front still facing the enemy. His
record had been completed, and he gave his life away, as if it were
worthless after the cause to which he had pledged it was lost.

[Illustration: Map of Route of General B.W. Duke, _Commanding Gen.
Morgan's Cavalry from S.W. Virginia to Gen. J.E. Johnston's army at
Charlotte, N.C., April, 1864, and Route while with President Davis, from
Charlotte to the South Carolina Line_.]

While General Echols was