This fact, attributed chiefly to the character of the country, enabled General McClellan skilfully to conceal his retreat, and to add much to the obstruction with which Nature had beset the way of our pursuing columns.

But regret that more was not accomplished, gives way to gratitude to the Sovereign Ruler of the Universe for the results achieved." The reader will form his own opinion whether Lee was or was not to blame for this want of accurate information, which would seem, however, to be justly attributable to the War Department at Richmond, rather than to an officer who had been assigned to command only three or four weeks before.

Other criticisms of Lee referred to his main plan of operations, and the danger to which he exposed Richmond by leaving only twenty-five thousand men in front of it, when he began his movement against General McClellan's right wing, beyond the Chickahominy.

General Magruder, who commanded this force of twenty-five thousand men left to guard the capital, expressed afterward, in his official report, his views of the danger to which the city had been exposed.

He wrote: "From the time at which the enemy withdrew his forces to this side of the Chickahominy, and destroyed the bridges, to the moment of his evacuation, that is, from Friday night until Saturday morning, I considered the situation of our army as extremely critical and perilous.