developing
intelligence in regard to larger military movements. History has shown
that Lincoln's judgment in regard to the essential purpose of a
campaign, and the best methods for carrying out such purpose, was in a
large number of cases decidedly sounder than that of the general in the
field. When he emphasised with McClellan that the true objective was the
Confederate army in the field and not the city of Richmond, he laid down
a principle which seems to us elementary but to which McClellan had been
persistently blinded. Lincoln writes to Hooker: "We have word that the
head of Lee's army is near Martinsburg in the Shenandoah Valley while
you report that you have a substantial force still opposed to you on the
Rappahannock. It appears, therefore that the line must be forty miles
long. The animal is evidently very slim somewhere and it ought to be
possible for you to cut it at some point." Hooker had the same
information but did not draw the same inference.

Apart from Lincoln's work in selecting, and in large measure in
directing, the generals, he had a further important relation with the
army as a whole. We are familiar with the term "the man behind the
gun." It is a truism to say that the gun has little value whether for
offence or for defence unless the man behind it possesses the right kind
of spirit which will infuse and guide his purpose and his action with
the gun. For the long years of the War, the Commander-in-chief was the
man behind all the guns in the field. The men in the front came to have
a realising sense of the infinite patience, the persistent hopefulness,
the steadiness of spirit, the devoted watchfulness of the great captain
in Washington. It was through the spirit of Lincoln that the spirit in
the ranks was preserved during the long months of discouragement and the
many defeats and retreats. The final advance of Grant which ended at
Appomattox, and the triumphant march of Sherman which culminated in the
surrender at Goldsborough of the last of the armies of the Confederacy,
were the results of the inspiration, given alike to soldier and to
general, from the patient and devoted soul of the nation's leader.

In March, 1862, Lincoln received the news of the victory won at Pea
Ridge, in Arkansas, by Curtis and Sigel, a battle which had lasted three
days. The first day was a defeat and our troops were forced back; the
fighting of the second resulted in what might be called a drawn battle;
but on the