and marching power. All the sick were sent back. Non-combatants were driven off from the camp. All impediments, such as horses, tents, chairs, tables, were left behind. Gustavus in Pomerania, Napier in Seinde, was not more peremptory than Sherman in Georgia. But the great general never asked a soldier to put up with worse fare and worse lodging than he reserved for himself. He slept in his blanket on the ground. He fed on hard tack; and when the Secretary-at-War, his guest, dined with him at Savannah, he apologized for the appearance of potted meats and fruits on his table as luxuries unbecoming a soldier's mess. The troops had that undoubting faith in his genius which Napoleon inspired in his army and Nelson in his fleet. When he ordered things to be done which they could scarcely understand, they merely said, "Well, he can't make a mistake," and then they did it. All the posts were drawn in, all the positions abandoned, all the communications cut. A last message, the three words "All is well," was sent to General Thomas and the North, and then the great army, severed from its base, became a gigantic moving column; a thing with a new piece of history to make for itself. It might be a glorious surprise of victory; it might be a terrible tragedy of ruin; but in either case it was sure to be a story in which the human element of interest would be great. Except the squadrons which charged at Worcester and Naseby, no army was ever set in the field like that of Sherman. Many of the rank and file were gentlemen; poets, writers, advocates, preachers, bankers, landlords: such men as would mix in London society and be members of Pall Mall clubs. Many of the cavalry rode their own mares; many of the infantry had bought their own arms. They were persons of estate, accustomed to good houses and rich living. They had friends in high places, and luxurious homes awaiting their return. Some of the best regiments of Massachusetts and the Western States were in the camp. And they were strong in number as in spirits; 70,000 fighting men of the best blood in America, counted after all the non-effectives had been left behind. What were they going to do? One thing was clear; they were going to defy all military rules, and at the risk of their lives to enlarge the art of war. Nothing like this flinging of an army of 70,000 men from their base into a vague field of operation had ever been seen. A movable column is at best a perilous trial, even when formed on a small scale and sent into the territories of such foes as France encounters in Algiers and England in India. The nearest approach to Sherman's movement was the famous flank march after the Alma, when the allies broke up their camp and passed from their base at Old Fort and set off in search of a new one at Balaclava. It was a dangerous feat, contrary to rule, Yet and has been sternly condemned. this change of base was an affair of a day; the French and English ships were at hand; and the materials of war were all on board. Sherman had no supplies to fall back on. between him and the sea lay three hundred miles of savannah, swamp, and sand. A hundred watercourses crossed his path. He would have roads to make, morasses to turn, rivers to bridge and cross. Where was he to find food for that mighty host? "Does manna grow on the beach and in the pine woods?" asked one of his aides-de-camp. With thirty days' rations in stock, he was going in search of his enemy and his supplies. It was an original and daring adventure; one to have puzzled a martinet like Raglan, and enough to have driven Aulic Councillors mad. But the officers and men of the Northern army put their trust in the man who in their belief could not make a mistake. "Where he puts us," they would say to each other, "we are going in, and we are dead sure to whip the rebs It is the spirit in which battles are won and republics saved. sure." As he rides out of Gaylesville on this desperate seeming enterprise we catch a glimpse of Sherman. A tall, slim, ironbuilt figure, all nerve and sinew, with not an ounce of flesh to spare from his long limbs and body; a large head, long and conical, with slanting brow, crossed and cut by furrows; eyes of a dark brown colour; hair of the same hue, cropped close to the skull; a sandy beard and moustache, trimmed close and short; a big mouth, and lips pressed firmly on the stump of a cigar; an expression of countenance kindly and even humourous; but also, at the same time, keen, anxious, vigilant, suspicious:—such is the outward, visible hero of the Great March. He is forty-seven years old. He rides a powerful, but uncanny brute. His staff is smaller than that of any brigade commander in the service. He denies himself and his staff the luxury of a house. He has fewer servants, fewer horses, than the regulations allow. He has just refused the commission of Major-General in the regular army on the ground that such exalted rank should be kept in reserve by the authorities until the war is over, when the Government will be able to compare and judge men's Slocum entered the streets. On the 13th services with greater coolness. As he of December he stormed Fort M'Allister, comes plunging along, we see the man's and a week later, he entered the evacuated character in the way in which he rides. city of Savannah. About this time clever The road is occupied by a brigade in mo- critics began to see that, instead of Sherman tion; he turns into the fields dashing through being lost, he had really and finally conbrush and briar, wading through streams, quered the South. floundering into swamps, so long as these will yield a way; and when forced to take the road again, you see that he pulls up his horse and halts until the brigade has passed. The smooth path, he says, is for the man on foot. Men with rifles and kits, not the general and his staff, have the first right to the road. Can we wonder at the trust in which sharp lawyers and solid farmers follow such a man? One day, looking back, the men saw a line of bridges in their rear in flames. "Guess, Charley," says a trooper, "Sherman has set the river on fire." To which Charley answers, "Well, if he has, reckon it's all right." As we have ventured to hint just now, the human interest of this story is greater than the military, and the best merit of a book like Major Nichols's is, that it offers us a glimpse of the daily life of men in the camp, as well as a record of great events. We like to sit by the pine-log, and see how the Boston poet and the western farmer play at the game of war; catching, mayhap, at pictures which help us to understand the camp life of our own great Civil Wars. We hear the halt called, and watch the divisions take up their ground. Tents are pitched for the night near a spring or watercourse; a few sticks, two or three logs of pine, are gathered; a fire is lighted; the kettle is soon bubbling for tea; then come books, music, long yarns, cockfights, negro dances, and the nine o'clock bugle. Every one is early abed, if a roll of flan The first stage from Gaylesville was Atlanta; now become useless to Sherman, and doomed to be by him abandoned and destroyed. The railways had made it; the factories had ruined it. In Sherman's plans it was an obstacle to be removed, -a rest-nel on the grass can be called a bed,- for ing-place on his way to Savannah, to Columbia, and to Richmond. Having served its purpose, it was given up to the flames, that its workshops might never again be employed in casting shot and shell for the destruction of Northern lives. The rails had been torn up, the people sent away, and torches were now applied to the stores and magazines. A space of two hundred acres was soon on fire, and as the army marched away from it gaily towards Savannah, the most prosaic minds were touched with wonder and sadness at the calamity which had overtaken a city once the pride of Georgia, and only recently transformed from a rose-garden into a magazine of arms. A New-England brigade was left in the place until the fires had spread beyond the power of man to arrest their work, and then these Puritan troops marched out of the doomed and burning city with solemn tread, their band playing the wild anthem of "John Brown's soul goes marching on." The army was divided for the march into two wings, General Howard commanding the right, General Slocum the left. General Kilpatrick handled the cavalry under Sherman's orders. On the 13th of November Sherman's communications with the North ceased; eleven days later he had captured Milledgeville, capital of Georgia, from which the Legislature had only just time to fly before every one knows that the army will be in motion before the sun is well up. “At three o'clock," we read, "the watch-fires are burning dimly, and but for the occasional neighing of horses, all is so silent that it is difficult to imagine that twenty thousand men are within a radius of a few miles. The ripple of the brook can be distinctly heard as it breaks over the pebbles, or winds petulantly about the gnarled roots. The wind sweeping gently through the tall pines overhead only serves to lull to deeper repose the slumbering soldier, who in his tent is dreaming of his far-off Northern home. But in an instant all is changed. From some commanding elevation the cleartoned bugle sounds out the réveillé, and another and another responds, until the startled echoes double and triple the clarion calls. Intermingled with this comes the beating of drums, often rattling and jarring on unwilling ears. In a few moments the peaceful quiet is replaced by noise and tumult, arising from hill and dale, from field and forest. Camp-fires, hitherto extinct or smouldering in dull gray ashes, awaken to new life and brilliancy, and send forth their sparks high into the morning air. Although no gleam of sunrise blushes in the east, the harmless flames on every side light up the scene, so that there is no disorder or confusion. The aesthetic aspects of this sudden change do not, however, occupy much of the soldier's time. He is more practically their muskets, and taking their rest at ease, engaged in getting his breakfast ready. released from their knapsacks. These short The potatoes are frying nicely in the well- halts are of great benefit to the soldier. larded pan; the chicken is roasting deli- He gains a breathing-spell, has a chance to cately on the red-hot coals, and grateful wipe the perspiration from his brow and fumes from steaming coffee-pots delight the the dust out of his eyes, or he pulls off his nostrils." It is the old story in a new form. shoes and stockings to cool his swollen, Romance is the condition of youth, and the heated feet, though old campaigners do not offspring of exalted passions. Haidee has feel the need of this. He munches his bit no eyes except for the sunset and for Juan's of hard bread, or pulls out a book from his face; but Zoe, knowing that youth has a pocket, or oftener a pipe, to indulge in that sharp appetite, bethinks her of frying eggs greatest of luxuries to the soldier, a soothand taking bread and butter from her ing, refreshing smoke. Here may be seen basket. Foragers go off to right and left; one group at a brookside, bathing their seizing all ducks, geese, pigs, sheep, calves, heads and drinking; and another, crowded poultry, they can find. Mostly these fora- round an old song-book, are making very gers get in advance of the moving column, fair music. One venturesome fellow has and wait by the road until their brigades kindled a fire, and is brewing a cup of cofcome up, the subject of endless jokes to the fee. All are happy and jolly; but when marching. "Wall, you there! Whar did the bugle sounds "Fall in " and "Forward," you steal them pigs?" says the funny man of in an instant every temporary occupation the passing company. "Steal!" retorts is dropped, and they are on the road again." the sentinel; "perhaps you would like to By these lights we see the army on its have one of them pigs yourself," and the march. Then comes the halt, the camping, line moves on, to a burst of laughter. the night's amusements, the early tattoo, There is a halt in the column. "The officer and the taps - Lights out! The fires burn in charge of the pioneer corps, which follows low, and the soldiers are asleep. "Around the advance guard, has discovered an ugly the slumbering host the picket-guards kept place in the road, which must be 'cordu- quiet watch, while constant, faithful hearts royed' at once, before the waggons can in Northern and Western homes pray that pass. The pioneers quickly tear down the the angels of the Lord may encamp around fence near by, and bridge over the treach- the sleeping army." erous place, perhaps at the rate of a quarter of a mile in fifteen minutes. If rails are not near, pine saplings and split logs supply their place." These faults in the road occur very often, and the mending goes on from day to day. Col. Poe, of the Engineers, reported to his chief in Washington, that between Atlanta and Savannah he had to corduroy four hundred miles of bad road. No account was kept of such trifling as the erection of trestle-bridges; but the pontoonbridges measured 7,720 feet-a length of one mile and a quarter! Such works could hardly have been made on march, in front of an active enemy, in so short a time, except for the fact, that almost every American is more or less of a mechanic, born to the forest and the swamp, accustomed to deal with rough roads, and handy with the spade, the hammer, and the saw. So far as possible the troops were spared from unusual labour, halted behind the workmen, and kept in the easiest fighting trim. "The soldiers, during the temporary halt, drop out of line on the roadside, lying upon their backs, supported by their still unstrapped knapsacks. If the halt is a long one the different regiments march by right file, one behind the other, into the fields, stacking But love and oyster-suppers were not to One of Sherman's objects in the Great March was to destroy all warlike stores and means of transport, including railways, bridges and canals. Everything that could serve an army in the field was set on fire; but nothing else was harmed save only dogs. On these instruments of tyranny the soldiers had no mercy. Mastiffs, bloodhounds, terriers, every class of dogs that could be used for hunting negroes and for tracking Federal fugitives were shot. When they had taken possession of Savannah the troops were soon at home. Very few of the citizens left their houses, and the troops, with the ready wit which characterizes all Americans, built themselves wooden huts in the public squares, and took to oysters, flirting, capons, and champagne with the alacrity of men who had been used for weeks to hard tack, male society, and muddy streams. Lots of them were soon in love. The people fraternized with the blue-coats, treated the war of Georgia as finally closed, and begged their new friends to pay the South Carolinians the wages of their crimes. In less than a fortnight Major Nichols says the army was acclimatized in Savannah. power would be stronger for the loss. Their strength lay inland. Well, Sherman marched inland; shutting up one Confederate general in Augusta, another in Branchville, a third in Charleston, and a fourth in Columbia. These generals never knew where the blow would fall, and it never fell where they thought it likely to leaving Charleston on his right, Beauregard was confident that he would have to assault Branchville, a great railway centre, and a post from which he could equally menace Charleston and Augusta. Branchville was, accordingly, strengthened with works, and occupied in force. But Sherman cut the railway lines, turned the place, and compelled the enemy to abandon their works and guns. Branchville passed, and Columbia gained, Charleston fell of itself, — as Sherinan had foretold in Savannah. Wilmington followed suit, as the army pushed on northward to Cheraw, to Golds borough, to Raleigh, near which proud and beautiful city the war was closed by the surrender of Johnston's forces to Sherman. last beyond their little month. In the third The ports might be given up, and their week of January the army began to move once more. No one knew by what route it would march; whether by way of Charleston, Branchville, or Augusta, into each of which a large Confederate force was thrown by Beauregard; but every one comprehended that its goal was Richmond. New York writers inferred that the first stage would be Charleston, and this was the first impres- do. As Sherman moved up northward, sion of Sherman's staff. Capture of Charleston was the daily hope and nightly prayer of the North; and by keeping close to the sea the army would be always near its base of supply and support. But Sherman, a min of original strategy, surprised his staff by saying he could take Charleston by operating a hundred miles from its walls more easily than by direct assault. It was to be done by flanking. Sherman is a real discoverer in this branch of military art. Most of his great achievements, including all his bloodless victories, were the results of his profound mastery of flank movement. His plan was to conquer without sacrificing life. Fighting generals like Hood affected to treat such soldiership with scorn, and Confederate ladies had their little jokes about a man who never faced his enemy in a fair field. A Georgian lady thought she was crushing one of his staff officers when she said to him with her curling lip, “Well, I suppose you are going to flank us." They were, indeed, going to flank the South. Sherman's guiding rule was that every place could be turned, and that when a place is turned it is taken. And he certainly proved his rule by his success. Johnston was rarely beaten out of a position; he was hustled out of it, so to say. A felicitous example of this strategy occurred at the Charleston Railway, near Savannah, where a strong Sherman's genius comes out brightly in Confederate force had thrown up works. the war. He was not one of the fighting Gen. Foster had sent a corps against these Generals. When it was necessary to hit works, and lost fifteen hundred men without dislodging the enemy. Sherman turned the position; the Confederates fell back; and the Northerners occupied the important post of Pocotaligo, with a loss of only ten men killed and wounded. The consternation in Richmond was supreme. By marching through the heart of South Carolina, instead of skirting the sea, Sherman pierced the State in its most vital part. It was the boast of Davis and Breckenridge hat the sea was not necessary to the South. Into that singular episode of the Great March the treaty with Johnston, which the Government in Washington set aside, this is not the place to enter, except so far as it illustrates Sherman's character. The treaty was not ratified in Washington, and Sherman was ordered to resume his task. The great General instantly obeyed. He neither resigned his commission nor disputed the orders which he had received. That he was deeply hurt in his pride he let the world know, very promptly; but it never occurred to his mind to contend with the civil power. hard, as at Averysborough and Bentonville, no Hooker, no Hood could strike more vigorously than he; but the peculiarity of his march is, that it was a great campaign conducted without a great battle. If it be the highest praise of genius that it produces magnificent results with trifling perturbations, Sherman well deserves that praise. It is doubtful whether the long history of war affords an example of such splendid military achievements at so slight a cost of life. From the Spectator. A PEEP INTO BRIGANDAGE. [From our Special Correspondent.] ROME, September 23, 1865. on monastery of Trisulti, like a highland citadel in a forlorn nook, embosomed in a mighty forest, flanked on one side by a beetling wall of crags such as goats alone are at home on, and on the other by a ravine. Here at I HAVE no pretensions to furnish you Alatri we immediately found that we had with stirring stories of brigandage that can got into a different latitude from Rome. take the flavour off the narrative we may Brigandage was no more a vague metaphor; expect from Mr. Moens. That gentle- men spoke of it with a knowledge that man has been looking upon the epic scenes comes from personal and daily experience. of brigandage- brigandage making A French garrison lies at Alatri, and I rewhat may be considered its grande guerre member the sensation created when it was - while I can boast of no more than of hav- sent there. This measure was adopted a ing succeeded in peeping a little into the couple of years ago, when the French auback-slums of this mode of life-in getting thorities obtained damning evidence that a glimpse of brigandage when waiting in here was the regular point of passage for undress within its hiding-place for an occa- convoys of men and stores up to the bands sion to sally forth. My brigandage was in then led by Chiavone. The occupation gave barrack, and not on a war footing, but rise to angry altercations with the Pope's what I think I got a shrewd glimpse at, is a Government, but the French persisted, and matter that has often been debated, and has they said much about the fatal blow they as often puzzled people, namely, the man had dealt to brigandage by seizing this key ner how this same institution lived when at to its camping-grounds. Well, the first thing home, how it contrived to defy all repres- that struck me in the replies I got to sion, how it existed in those seasons when, my inquiries about the means for prosecutlike the marmot, it went apparently to ing the proposed journey up to Trisulti, was sleep, suddenly to surprise its pursuers by the tone of common-place indifference with jumping to life again when least expected. which people spoke to the fact of brigands All this, which heretofore seemed so myste- being on the mountains, just as if they were rious, is now quite intelligible to me since I about as insignificant appendages as the have been favoured with this peep at brig- beggars who beset the high roads, and of andage at home. But to get this insight no equally general assurance that if we only amount of questioning in Rome will suffice. kept clear of French uniforms we had You never will learn there anything posi- no molestations to fear from them. Against tive on this head: all your inquiries in that the French all agreed the brigands were quarter will only bewilder you with contra-violently exasperated, and to go in company dictory statements. To learn the truth you with their soldiers would be, we were told, must wander about the mountains, and this to provoke disagreeable adventures. can be done with certain arrangements in the very heart of Brigand Land, without being necessarily victimized like Mr. Moens. I have just returned from such an excursion, during which I visited the convents of Trisulti and Casamari, and what I have seen appears to me sufficiently curious to be worth recounting. We were two who left Rome in a broiling heat a few days ago, on an expedition which we were told was one of madmen, although no one could tell us exactly the precise perils we were about to rush upon. The first point we made for was the curious old town of Alatri, famous for its Cyclopean citadel, and rich in choice bits of mediæval architecture. The town lies seven miles from Frosinone, at the opening of a wild glen, which runs up the mountains separating the Papal from the Neapolitan provinces, and at the upper end of which, some two thousand feet above the level of the sea, is nestled the great Carthusian But accompanied by Pontifical gensdarmes, it was Furnished by favour with an escort of three Papal gensdarmes, we accordingly started for Trisulti. They were picked men, and had been stationed for some time in these parts. I found them intelligent, and during three days' intercourse satisfied my |