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general will lead you! Jackson will lead you! Follow me!" The fugitives reeled round at the wellknown voice, faced their pursuers, and turned the whole tide of the battle. As the encounter deepened with varying fortunes, Jackson, with an enthusiasm remarkable even in him, did deadly work with his left wing, and eventually in concert with his other commanders, drove their opponents into full retreat.

When night settled down, the Federals had been driven two miles. Jackson, eager as ever to follow up the victory, wished to continue the pursuit. The sound of cannonading in the distance, however, convincing him that Pope had been recruited, he abandoned the idea.

Gathering his wearied staff about him, now that the terrible work was over, he rode back over the battle-field in quest of repose. The darkness, for there was no moon to relieve it, veiled the horrors of the scene, but could not veil the groans of the wounded and the dying. Full of sympathy and anguish, he applied at house after house for shelter, leaving, with his usual unselfishness, on learning that each was full of sufferers. At length he lay down. on the damp grass, and was soon in a deep sleep.

The work of the ensuing morning was the burial of the dead. Pope, under flag of truce, applied for permission to perform the same sorrowful task. Leave was readily granted, and Early was appointed commandant of the field during the operation. The

REPORT OF CEDAR RUN.

173

Federals were unanimous in their eulogies of Jackson, declaring that with such generals they too could conquer. "See old Early," they said, " riding everywhere, without a single guard, among his enemies of yesterday."

The battle of Cedar Run was pronounced by Jackson as "one of the most successful of his exploits." But his official intimation of it to Lee was couched in his usual modest and reverent language.

"On the evening of the 9th, God blessed our arms with another victory. The battle was near Cedar Run, about six miles from Culpepper Court House." The despatch goes on to furnish statistical information as to the forces on both sides, laments the slain, pays another touching tribute to General Winder, and recounts the spoils.

To his wife he writes more freely.-" On last Saturday our God again crowned our arms with victory. All glory be to God for His unnumbered blessings!"

"I can hardly think of the fall of Winder without tearful eyes. Let us all unite more earnestly in imploring God's aid in fighting our battles for us. The thought that there are so many of God's people praying for His blessing upon the army, which, in His Providence, is with me,-greatly strengthens me. If God be for us, who can be against us? . . . . Whilst we attach so much importance to being free from temporal bondage; we must attach far more, to being free from the bondage of sin."

According to his invariable custom, he appointed a day of public thanksgiving in his army, acknowledging this and other past victories, and imploring the Divine favour in the future.

CHAPTER XIV.

FURTHER STRUGGLES.

A SHARPER struggle was to follow on the battle of Cedar Run; and Manassas, again a theatre of conflict, was to witness it. Jackson had scarcely returned to Gordonsville when the increase of the enemy's force became decidedly manifest.

Pope's forces were now stationed along the line of the Orange Railroad, while Jackson's base was evidently the course of the Rapidan. This relative position gave the Confederates an advantage which he was not slow to secure. As soon, therefore, as troops arrived from Richmond, he left Gordonsville and marched to the eastern base of Clarke's mountain. The object of this and other dispositions made, was to cut off Pope's retreat, attack his left wing, and thus effect his discomfiture.

But delay, enabling the Federal to become aware of the designs against him, proved fatal to the execution of this plan. Pope quietly withdrew, placing the Rappahannock between himself and his adversaries. A new plan of attack had now to be devised, the first attempt in the execution of which was made

on the 21st August. The two armies were to be seen on the opposite banks of the river, contesting with each other every available crossing, and attempting such attacks as the occasion admitted. Jackson, passing a tributary of the Rappahannock, near its mouth, pressed on to secure a bridge leading from Culpepper to Warrenton. On his arrival, however, he found it destroyed, and other evidence around of the nearness of the enemy. The river being fordable at that moment, he sent Early's brigade over to occupy the side opposite, known, on account of its mineral waters, as the Warrenton Springs. They had no sooner crossed, however, than darkness set in with a violent storm, which soon rendered the stream impassable, and placed them, thus cut off from their brethren, and with the enemy hovering round them, in extreme peril. But Jackson's genius proved more than a match for the emergency. Early having masked his forces, as far as practicable, in the adjoining woods, and defended his position with artillery ; a temporary bridge was meanwhile constructed, and Lawton's brigade sent over to his relief.

This and other occurrences served to delude Pope into the idea that the run up the Rappahannock was at an end, and that all he had to do was to hold this point against Jackson. A bold project, however, was occupying the mind of the Confederate general, which was to separate his command from the main army, pass round his antagonist to the west, and intercept him at Manassa's Junction.

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