h to
settle any important questions that might arise, if an offer of
surrender should be made by the Confederate commander. On the day
before his inauguration he had directed the Secretary of War to
say to General Grant that he wished him to "have no conference with
General Lee unless for the capitulation of his army or for some
purely military matter." The President did "not wish General Grant
to decide, discuss or confer upon any political question." He
would not submit such questions "to military conferences or
conventions." He returned to Washington on the 8th of April and
on the succeeding day the Army of Lee surrendered to General Grant.

THE SURRENDER OF GENERAL LEE.

The rejoicing throughout the Loyal States cannot be pictured.
Congratulation was universal. The end had come. Sympathy with
the South in her exhausted and impoverished condition mingled
largely with the exultant joy over a restored Union, a triumphant
flag, an assured future of National progress. Admiration was not
withheld from the soldiers of the Confederacy, who had borne their
banner so bravely against every discouragement on a hundred fields
of battle. The bearing of General Grant and General Lee at the
final surrender was marked by a spirit of chivalric dignity which
was an instructive lesson to all their countrymen--alike to the
victor and to the vanquished.

General Grant's active service in the field closed with the surrender
of Lee. All the commanders of Confederate forces followed the
example of their General-in-Chief, and before the end of the month
the armed enemies of the Union had practically ceased to exist.
The fame of General Grant was full. He had entered the service
with no factitious advantage, and his promotion, from the first to
the last, had been based on merit alone,--without the aid of
political influence, without the interposition of personal friends.
Criticism of military skill is but idle chatter in the face of an
unbroken career of victory. General Grant's campaigns were varied
in their requirements and, but for the fertility of his resources
and his unbending will, might often have ended in disaster. Courage
is as contagious as fear, and General Grant possessed in the highest
degree that faculty which is essential to all great commanders,--
the faculty of imparting throughout the rank and file of his army
the same determination to win with which he was himse