practical
common sense would speedily suppress the Rebellion. Where are our old
fighting stock of Generals? our Hookers, Heintzelmans, Hancocks, and men
of like kidney? Why must their fiery energies succumb to a cold-blooded
strategy, that wastes the materiel of war, and what is worse, fills our
hospitals to no purpose? Those men have learned how to command from
actual contact with men. The art of being practical, adapting one's self
to emergencies, is not taught in schools. With some it is doubtless
innate; with the great mass, it is a matter of education, such as is
acquired from moving among men."

"We have the Pyrrhic dance as yet;
Where is our Pyrrhic phalanx gone?
Of two such lessons why forget
The nobler and the manlier one?"

broke in our Poetical Lieutenant.

"D--n your Pyrrhics," retorted the Adjutant, snappishly. "For the
Pyrrhics of past days we have Empirics now. Our phalanxes of old have
been led to victory by militia Colonels, who sprang from the thinking
head of the people, glowing with the sacred fire of their cause. Do you
not believe," continued he enthusiastically, "that the loyal masses who
sprang into ranks at the insult upon Sumter would have found a leader
long ere this worthy of their cause, whose rapid and decisive blows
would have saved us disgraceful campaigns, had the nation been
unencumbered by this ruin of a Regular Army, that has given us little
else than a tremendous array of officers, many of them of the
Pigeon-hole and Paper order,--beggarly lists of Privates,--Routine that
must be carried out at any cost of success,--and Red Tape that
everywhere represses patriotism? And then to think, too, of the
half-heartedness and disaffection. How long must these sneaking
Catilines in high places abuse our patience? But what can be expected
from officers who are not in the service from patriotic motives, but
rather from prospects of pay and position? End the war, and you will
have men who are now unworthy Major and Brigadier Generals, subsiding
into Captains and Lieutenants. Their movements indicate that _they_
realize their position fully; but when will the country realize that
'strategy' is played out?"

"The whiskey at Division Head-quarters is played out, any way," said a
Sergeant on duty in the Commissary Department, who had entered the tent
while the Adjutant was speaking.

"'And not a drop to drink,'"

rejoined the Lieutenant