ourt House and returning, the army
was transferred to Fortress Monroe and moved to Yorktown, where some
weeks were passed in the trenches; it then proceeded up the Peninsula,
and laid a month before Richmond; retreated to Harrison's Landing, and
laid another month; returned to Fortress Monroe, and was shipped to the
vicinity of Washington, marched for about a month, fought at Antietam,
and then laid in camp a month; moved to Warrenton and remained a
fortnight; proceeded to Fredericksburg and continued in camp all winter,
except making the short movements which led to the battle of December,
and the ineffective attempt to turn the rebel left, known as the 'mud
march.' In all this long campaign, from March to December, a period of
nearly nine months, spent in various operations, more than five months
were passed in stationary camps--most of the time occupied, it is true,
in picketing, entrenching, and other duties incident to positive
military operations in proximity to an enemy, but very different from
the duties connected with marching and fighting. The campaign of 1863
comprised a still smaller period of active movements. Commencing in
April with the battle of Chancellorsville, it continued till the march
to Mine Run in October--seven months; but considerable more than half
the time was spent in camps at Falmouth, Warrenton, and Culpepper. The
great campaign now in progress has consumed (at the time this article is
written) three months, commencing after a six-months' interval of
inaction, and already half the time has been spent in the trenches at
Petersburg.

Since so large a portion of the time of an army is passed in camps, that
branch of military science which governs the arrangement of forces when
stationary, is one of considerable importance. It is in camps that
armies are educated, that all the details of organization are
systematized, that the _morale_ of troops is cultivated, that a round of
laborious though monotonous duties is performed. Nothing is so trying to
the temper of the individuals composing an army as a long season in a
stationary camp; nothing has more effect for good or for evil upon the
army in the aggregate, than the mode in which the time, at such a
season, is occupied. The commander who does not exercise care to have
his camps pitched in the proper localities, to insure the observance of
hygienic rules, and to keep his men employed sufficiently in military
exercises, will have discontented,