On
the thirteenth day, towards evening, I found myself in the familiar
Adelphi, at Liverpool, savoring some "clear" turtle, not with a less
relish because, in the accurately pale face of the waiter who brought in
the lordly dish, there was not the faintest yellow tinge nor a ripple of
"wool" in his hair.
All of my personal narrative that could possibly interest the most
indulgent public is told now; if the few words I have left to say should
bore you--O patient reader!--they will at least be free of egotism.
CHAPTER XII.
A POPULAR ARMAMENT.
It was ordained that the navy should reap all the boys and the men that
were to be gathered in the warfare of this spring. The amphibious
failures in the southwest involved no graver consequences than a vast
futile expenditure of Northern time, money, and men; such waste has been
too common, of late, to excite much popular disgust or surprise. In
other parts, the keenest correspondent has been put to great straits for
memorable matter; for a skirmish, or a raid, even on a large scale, can
hardly carry much beyond a local interest.
On the last day of April, the summer land-campaign began in earnest,
when its truculent commander led the "finest army on the planet" across
the Rappahanock, unopposed.
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