, and even the ordinary
means of communication by horse, wheel, and boat. Carleton, at short
notice to the young man, chose for his assistant his nephew, Edmund
Carleton, now a veteran surgeon and physician in New York, but then in
the freshness and fullness of youth, health, and strength. Alert and
vigorous, fertile in resource, courageous and persevering, young
Carleton became the fleet messenger of the great war correspondent. He
assisted to gather news, and soon learned the art of winning the
soldier's heart, and of extracting, from officers and privates, scraps
and items of intelligence. Even as the hunter becomes expert in noting
and interpreting signs in air and on earth which yield him spoil, so
young Carleton, trained by his uncle, quickly learned how to secure
news, and to make a "beat." He kept himself well supplied to the
extent of his ability with tobacco,--always welcome to the veterans,
for which some "would almost sell their souls;" and with newspapers,
for which officers would often give what was worth more than
gold,--items of information, from which letters could be distilled,
and on which prophecies could be based. Very appropriately, Carleton
dedicates his fourth book on the war, "Freedom Triumphant," to his
fleet messenger.

Carleton's first letter in the last long campaign is dated May 4,
1864, from Brandy Station. There four corps were assembled: the
Second, Hancock's; the Fifth, Warren's; the Sixth, Sedgwick's; the
Ninth, Burnside's. With Sheridan's riders, these made a great city of
tents. The cavalry was not the cavalry of Scott's day, but was in its
potency a new arm of the service. From this time forth, the
Confederate authorities, by neglecting this arm of their service,
furnished one chief cause of final failure, while those in Washington
steadily increased in generous recognition of the power of union of
man and horse. In equal ability of brute and rider to endure fatigue,
the Union cavalryman under Sheridan was a veritable centaur.

While the great army lay waiting and expectant at Brandy Station, it
was significant to Carleton when the swift-riding orderlies suddenly
left headquarters carrying sealed packages to the corps commanders.
First began the tramping of the cavalry. Next followed the movement of
two divisions of the Fifth Corps. All night long was heard the rumble
of artillery. Carleton wrote: "Peering from my window upon the shadowy
landscape at midnight, I saw the glimmerin