ine, lasting
until midnight, in which all the corps were engaged. On Wednesday, the
11th, skirmishing and picket firing formed the order of the day along
the whole front. On Thursday, the 12th, at daybreak, the Second Corps
began its attack, capturing twenty-three guns and several thousand
prisoners. Sunday, the 13th, was a time of rain, hard work, hunger,
and fatigue. In a word, within twelve days there had been four great
pitched battles, with heavy fighting, mainly in the woods, and hard
pounding on both sides, with many thousands of dead and wounded.

During the war Carleton had seen no such fighting, suffering,
patience, determination. General Grant freely admitted that the
fighting had been without a parallel during the war. There was little
work done by the artillery. Swords and bayonets were but ornaments or
emblems. Only lead had the potency of death in it. Even the cavalry
dismounted, sought cover, shooting each other out of position with
their carbines. Bullets, which do the killing, were the fixed forces.
In war it is musketry that kills, and it was a question which side
could stand murder the longest.

At the end of the Wilderness episodes, Carleton, after first answering
those critics far in the rear, who, to all the noble tenacity of Grant
and his army, queried "_Cui bono_" wrote: "I confidently expect that
he [Grant] will accomplish what he has undertaken, because he is
determined, has tenacity of purpose, measures his adversary at his
true value, expects hard fighting, and prepares for it." It was trying
almost to discouragement, to this brave, honest, patient seeker after
truth, to find with what chaff and husk of imaginary news,
manufactured in Washington and elsewhere, the editors of newspapers
had to satisfy the hungry souls of the waiting ones at home.

In one of the engagements, when our right wing had been forced by the
Confederates; when the loud rebel yells were heard so near that the
teamsters of the Sixth Corps were frightened into a panic, and,
cutting the traces, ran so far and wide that it was two days before
they were got together again; when, to many army officers, it seemed
the day had been lost,--as lost it had been, save for the stubborn
valor of the Sixth Corps; when many a face blanched, Carleton looked
at Grant. There was the modern Silent One, tranquil amid the waves of
battle. Sitting quietly, with perfect poise, eyes on the ground, and
steadily smoking, he whittled a stick, n