ttle regardless of any proprietorship
in the same ankles, other than that vested in the actual owner, and
splendidly indifferent as to either the time or the mode of his death,
whenever that death should become a matter of necessity.

The letters of such soldiers as these are the best recruiting-sergeants
that can be sent abroad among any people; just as the letters of
whining, lugubrious or dissatisfied men, who have gone into war without
expecting any of its dangers or discomforts--who are satisfied with no
fare less luxurious than that served up at Delmonico's or the Maison
Doree, and who protest against any sleeping which is not done upon
spring-mattresses strown with rose-leaves,--cannot do otherwise than
discourage and unnerve the whole immediate community in which they fall.
Whether the growlers through the press and in general society, have done
most to discourage and demoralize the army, or whether the grumblers in
the army have wrought more effectually in discouraging enlistments and
weakening the national cause, certain it is that the two evil influences
have worked together, and that those who have displayed the contrary
spirit are entitled to full credit from the whole loyal community.

John Crawford, the Zouave, has not yet made his appearance upon the
scene; but it will now become necessary to turn attention to events and
incidents in which he was engaged, and to discover what influence his
action may have produced on the after events of this story. In this
change of scene, too, we pass away for the time from the outside actions
and influences of the war--the examination of recruiting officers, their
camps and their Broadway parades, with the domestic and social
entanglements in which they were involved by the struggle,--to the
theatre of the war itself and the sights and sounds involved in one of
the deadliest conflicts that ever shook the earth with the thunder
created by the blood-shedding descendants of Cain.

It is with the battle of Malvern Hill that we have to do--a battle as
yet misunderstood and underrated by many who think themselves thoroughly
conversant with the events of the war--one of those marvellous
_victories in retreat_ which often more fully than successes in advance
illustrate the genius of those who achieve them. When the history of the
War for the Union comes to be written at a later day, and when the petty
jealousies and misunderstandings are discarded which now embarrass all
con