ll as time and training, to its usefulness. It was sadly deficient
in all the munitions and materials of war--the mere skeleton of an army,
thin in numbers, and in a melancholy state of nakedness. "Were you to
arrive," says Greene, in a letter to Lafayette, dated December 29,
"you would find a few ragged, half-starved troops in the wilderness,
destitute of everything necessary for either the comfort or convenience
of soldiers." The department was not only in a deplorable condition, but
the country was laid waste. Such a warfare as had been pursued among the
inhabitants, beggars description. The whole body of the population
seems to have been in arms, at one time or another, and, unhappily, from
causes already discussed, in opposite ranks. A civil war, as history
teaches, is like no other. Like a religious war, the elements of a
fanatical passion seem to work the mind up to a degree of ferocity,
which is not common among the usual provocations of hate in ordinary
warfare. "The inhabitants," says Greene, "pursue each other with savage
fury.... The Whigs and the Tories are butchering one another hourly.
The war here is upon a very different scale from what it is to the
northward. It is a plain business there. The geography of the country
reduces its operations to two or three points. But here, it is
everywhere; and the country is so full of deep rivers and impassable
creeks and swamps, that you are always liable to misfortunes of a
capital nature."

The geographical character of the country, as described by Greene, is at
once suggestive of the partisan warfare. It is the true sort of warfare
for such a country. The sparseness of its settlements, and the extent of
its plains, indicate the employment of cavalry--the intricate woods and
swamps as strikingly denote the uses and importance of riflemen. The
brigade of Marion combined the qualities of both.

General Greene, unlike his predecessor, knew the value of such services
as those of Marion. On taking command at Charlotte, the very day after
his arrival, he thus writes to our partisan: "I have not," says he, "the
honor of your acquaintance, but am no stranger to your character and
merit. Your services in the lower part of South Carolina, in awing the
Tories and preventing the enemy from extending their limits, have been
very important. And it is my earnest desire that you continue where you
are until farther advice from me. Your letter of the 22d of last month
to General