Tramp, tramp o'er the greensward
That quivers below,
Scarce held by the curb bit
The fierce horses go!
And the grim-visaged colonel,
With ear-rending shout,
Peals forth to the squadrons
The order, "Trot Out"!
--Francis A. Durivage.


THE CHARGE AT GETTYSBURG

The battle of Chancellorsville marked the zenith of Confederate
good fortune. Immediately afterward, in June, 1863, Lee led the
victorious army of Northern Virginia into Pennsylvania. The South
was now the invader, not the invaded, and its heart beat proudly
with hopes of success; but these hopes went down in bloody wreck
on July 4, when word was sent to the world that the high valor of
Virginia had failed at last on the field of Gettysburg, and that
in the far West Vicksburg had been taken by the army of the
"silent soldier."

At Gettysburg Lee had under him some seventy thousand men, and
his opponent, Meade, about ninety thousand. Both armies were
composed mainly of seasoned veterans, trained to the highest
point by campaign after campaign and battle after battle; and
there was nothing to choose between them as to the fighting power
of the rank and file. The Union army was the larger, yet most of
the time it stood on the defensive; for the difference between