immediately stopped the salutes which some of his enthusiastic
soldiers were already beginning to fire. "The war is over," he
told his staff, "the rebels are our countrymen again, and the best
sign of rejoicing after the victory will be to abstain from all
demonstrations in the field."

In the meantime Lee had returned to his own lines, along which he
now rode for the last time. The reserve with which he had steeled
his heart during the surrender gave way completely when he came
to bid his men farewell. After a few simple words, advising his
devoted veterans to become good citizens of their reunited country,
the tears could no longer be kept back. Then, as he rode slowly
on, from the remnant of one old regiment to another, the men broke
ranks, and, mostly silent with emotion, pressed round their loved
commander, to take his hand, to touch his sword, or fondly stroke
his splendid gray horse, Traveler, the same that had so often carried
him victorious through the hard-fought day.

North and South had scarcely grasped the full significance of Lee's
surrender, when, only five days later, Lincoln was assassinated. "It
would be impossible for me," said Grant, "to describe the feeling
that overcame me at the news. I knew his goodness of heart, and
above all his desire to see all the people of the United States
enter again upon the full privileges of citizenship with equality
among all. I felt that reconstruction had been set back, no telling
how far." "Of all the men I ever met," said Sherman, "he seemed to
possess more of the elements of greatness, combined with goodness,
than any other."

On the very day of the assassination Sherman had written to Johnston
offering the same terms Grant had given Lee and Lincoln had most
heartily approved. Three days later, on the seventeenth, just as
Sherman was entering the train for his meeting with Johnston, the
operator handed him a telegram announcing the assassination. Enjoining
secrecy till he returned, Sherman took the telegram with him and
showed it to Johnston, whom he watched intently. "The perspiration
came out on his forehead," Sherman wrote, "and he did not attempt to
conceal his distress. He denounced the act as a disgrace to the age
and hoped I did not charge it to the Confederate Government. I told
him I could not believe that he or General Lee or the officers of the
Confederate army could possibly be privy to acts of assassination."
When Sherman got back to Raleigh he