ing in from the placid James.
Still the Union troops were resting on their arms, weary but undaunted,
awaiting the approach of the Confederates, then (at five o'clock)
reported as advancing to the attack. The line was formed as follows: the
remnants of Porter's and Sumner's corps on the right; Franklin and
Heintzelman in the centre; and Couch's division of Keyes' corps on the
left. In position, on the left, were two New York batteries, Robertson's
United States battery of six pieces, Allen's Massachusetts and Kern's
Pennsylvania batteries. Griffin's United States battery, Weeden's Rhode
island, and three from New York, held positions in the centre. On the
right were Tidball's, Weed's and Carlisle's regular batteries, a German
battery of twenty-four pounders, a battery belonging to the Pennsylvania
reserve, and one New York battery--in all about eighty pieces.

Within a few minutes of five the signal officers at the various stations
waved their telegraphic bunting, announcing the approach of the rebels
under Magruder, and immediately afterwards they appeared in sight, in
large dense masses reaching apparently quite across the country to the
West, North-west and West-south-west,--with cavalry on either flank and
artillery thickly scattered at various points, all along their line.
Stretching away from the foot of Malvern Hill, in the hostile direction,
lay a large open space known as Carter's Field--a field destined that
day to be more thickly sown with dead than almost any historic spot on
the globe except some portions of the field of Waterloo or that of
Grokow. It was a mile long by three quarters of a mile in breadth,
enclosed by thick woods on the three distant sides, while that towards
the Hill was open. On the two sides flanking the enemy's approach our
sharp-shooters were principally concealed. Entirely across Carter's
Field stretched the rebel line, while in depth their columns extended so
far back that the eye of the signal officer lost them in a wavering line
far away in the thick woods extending beyond the scene of the morning's
battle.

The Union forces rose up wearily but steadily, and awaited the approach
of the Confederate host, known to be at least twice or thrice their own
number, and led on by that sanguinary commander otherwise described by a
writer who accompanied him through all his battles in the United States
service and thoroughly knows his habits of speech and action,[13]--as
"the flowery and eve