without his possessing any positive qualities of a great general, just
as a literary critic may show the profoundest acquaintance with the
principles of epic poetry without being able to produce a single
stanza of an epic poem. Nevertheless, I shall not give up my faith in
General McClellan's soldiership until he is defeated, nor in his
courage and integrity even then.

Another of our excursions was to Harper's Ferry,--the Directors of the
Baltimore and Ohio Railroad having kindly invited us to accompany
them on the first trip over the newly laid track, after its breaking up
by the Rebels. It began to rain, in the early morning, pretty soon
after we left Washington, and continued to pour a cataract throughout
the day; so that the aspect of the country was dreary, where it would
otherwise have been delightful, as we entered among the hill-scenery
that is formed by the subsiding swells of the Alleghanies. The latter
part of our journey lay along the shore of the Potomac, in its upper
course, where the margin of that noble river is bordered by gray,
overhanging crags, beneath which--and sometimes right through them--the
railroad takes its way. In one place the Rebels had attempted to arrest
a train by precipitating an immense mass of rock down upon the track,
by the side of which it still lay, deeply imbedded in the ground, and
looking as if it might have lain there since the Deluge. The scenery
grew even more picturesque as we proceeded, the bluffs becoming very
bold in their descent upon the river, which, at Harper's Ferry,
presents as striking a vista among the hills as a painter could desire
to see. But a beautiful landscape is a luxury, and luxuries are thrown
away amid discomfort; and when we alighted into the tenacious mud and
almost fathomless puddle, on the hither side of the Ferry, (the
ultimate point to which the cars proceeded, since the railroad bridge
had been destroyed by the Rebels,) I cannot remember that any very