ce as he listened. With a voice broken with emotion he bade me
say to General Jackson that the victory was his, and that the
congratulations were due to him. I know not how others may regard this
incident, but, for myself, as I gave expression to the thoughts of his
exalted mind, I forgot the genius that won the day in my reverence for
the generosity that refused its glory.

"There is one other incident to which I beg permission to refer, that
I may perfect the picture. On the 3d day of July, 1863, the last
assault of the Confederate troops upon the heights of Gettysburg
failed, and again General Lee was among his baffled and shattered
battalions as they sullenly retired from their brave attempt. The
history of that battle is yet to be written, and the responsibility
for the result is yet to be fixed. But there, with the painful
consciousness that his plans had been frustrated by others, and that
defeat and humiliation had overtaken his army, in the presence of his
troops he openly assumed the entire responsibility of the campaign and
of the lost battle. One word from him would have relieved him of this
responsibility, but that word he refused to utter until it could be
spoken without fear of doing the least injustice.

"Thus, my fellow-soldiers, I have presented to you our great commander
in the supreme moments of triumph and defeat. I cannot more strongly
illustrate his character. Has it been surpassed in history? Is there
another instance of such self-abnegation among men? The man rose
high above victory in one instance; and, harder still, the man rose
superior to disaster in the other. It was such incidents as these that
gave General Lee the absolute and undoubting confidence and affection
of his soldiers. Need I speak of the many exhibitions of that
confidence? You all remember them, my comrades. Have you not seen a
wavering line restored by the magic of his presence? Have you not seen
the few forget that they were fighting against the many, because he
was among the few?

"But I pass from the contemplation of his greatness in war, to look to
his example under the oppressive circumstances of final failure--to
look to that example to which it is most useful for us now to refer
for our guidance and instruction. When the attempt to establish the
Southern Confederacy had failed, and the event of the war seemed to
have established the indivisibility of the Federal Union, General Lee
gave his adhesion to the new order