as even McClernand's
were by being driven back. He decided to use Smith's fresh division
for an assault in rear, while McClernand's, stiffened by Wallace's,
should re-form and hold fast. Before leaving the excited officers and
men, who were talking in groups without thinking of their exhausted
ammunition, he called out cheerily "Fill your cartridge boxes quick,
and get into line. The enemy is trying to escape and he must not
be permitted to do so." McClernand's division, excellent men, but
not yet disciplined soldiers, responded at once to the touch of a
master hand; and as Grant rode off to Smith's he had the satisfaction
of seeing the defenseless groups melt, change, and harden into
well-armed lines.

Smith, ready at all points, had only to slip his own division from
the leash. Buckner, who was to have covered the Confederate escape,
was also ready with the guns of Fort Donelson and the rifles of
defenses that "looked too thick for a rabbit to get through." Smith,
knowing his unseasoned men would need the example of a commander
they could actually see, rode out in front of his center as if
at a formal review. "I was nearly scared to death," said one of
his followers, "but I saw the old man's white moustache over his
shoulder, and so I went on." As the line neared the Confederate
abatis a sudden gust of fire seemed to strike it numb. In an instant
Smith had his cap on the point of his sword. Then, rising in his
stirrups to his full gigantic height, he shouted in stentorian
tones: "No flinching now, my lads! Here--this way in! Come on!"
In, through, and out the other side they went, Smith riding ahead,
holding his sword and cap aloft, and seeming to bear a charmed life
amid that hail of bullets. Up the slope he rode, the Confederates
retiring before him, till, unscathed, he reached the deadly crest,
where the Union colors waved defiance and the Union troops stood
fast.

Floyd, being under special indictment at Washington for misconduct
as Secretary of War, was so anxious to escape that he turned over
the command to Pillow, who declined it in favor of Buckner. That
night Floyd and Pillow made off with all the river steamers; Forrest's
cavalry floundered past McClernand's exposed flank, which rested on
a shallow backwater; and Buckner was left with over twelve thousand
men to make what terms he could. Next morning, the sixteenth, he wrote
to Grant proposing the appointment of commissioners to agree upon
terms of surr