about the affair as if it were a State matter. You must go
to McClellan. He is a young man of the most spotless honor, the most
generous sympathies. He is as rigid as a Prussian in discipline, but his
methods are enlightened and above board. He is the only man in authority
that has any real conception of the magnitude of the struggle the North
has entered upon. He is, however, miserably hampered. The new rulers
have come down to Washington very much in the spirit of the Goths when
they captured Rome. Every one is on the make. The contract system is
something beyond the wildest excesses I ever read of in pillage and
chicanery. Shoes by the million have been accepted that melt as soon as
they are wet; garments are stacked mountain-high in the storehouses that
blow into rags so soon as the air goes through them. Food, moldy,
filthy, is accumulated on the wharves of Washington, Baltimore, and
Alexandria that would be forbidden as infectious in any carefully
guarded port in the world. Contracts for vessels have been signed where
steamships are called for, and the contractor sends canal-boats. Lines
of ships are paid for to run to ports not known in navigation; and the
chief men in the great departments share the money with the rings--"

"But why don't you expose it?"

"Expose it? A word in the Senate against these villainies is set down as
disloyalty. All that a rascal needs to gain any scope he pleases, is to
say 'rebel sympathizer,' and Fort Warren or Lafayette is held up as
a menace."

Among the confidential aides of McClellan Brodie knew intimately a young
officer, the son of a distinguished lady, whose writings delighted
cultivated people fifty years ago. This young man, Captain Churchland,
had often been a guest at the Spragues, and to him Brodie went for
advice. Inheriting a great deal of his mother's intellect, with a droll
sense of humor, not then so well understood as the lighter school of
writers have since made it, Churchland was the delight of the
headquarters. He listened to the melancholy story of Jack's
compromising plight.

"It's a bad fix--no mistake," he said, gravely; "but I suggest that your
fiery young friend come home and shoot the father, marry the daughter,
and, as a wife can't testify against the husband, your client
is secure."

"Ah, captain, it's not a matter for joking. Think of his wretched
mother."

"That's just what I do think of--murder's no joke, though it's more of a
fine art than i