away. With an intense selfishness and love of notoriety he could not let his mind get beyond the limits of his vision, and therefore all was brilliant about him and dark and suspicious beyond. My style is the reverse. I am somewhat blind to what occurs near me, but have a clear perception of things and events remote. Grant possesses the happy medium, and it is for this reason I admire him. I have a much quicker perception of things than he, but he balances the present and remote so evenly that results follow in natural course." CHAPTER XV VICKSBURG SHERMAN'S rebuff near Vicksburg revived the storm of criticism and stirred the Northern press to new attacks on Grant, as well as on other Union generals East and West. The story in Virginia had been one of procrastination and defeat and now the gleam of hope in Mississippi seemed to have vanished too. McClernand's advocates were vocal. But there was nothing in it now for Grant except to feel his way. He could not force his troops through the net of creeks and bayous swollen with winter's freshets, but transferring his army to the west bank of the river he encamped at Milliken's Bend and utilized the time till spring in testing schemes to get boats and supplies around the Vicksburg batteries to help the army later operate below; cutting canals to change the river's winding course; breaking levees, uniting lakes, hunting for channels; and all the time attending to the disagreeable details of army management. Dishonest and disloyal traders from the North infested his department, drawn by the lure of cotton speculation, and at last in desperation he ordered the expulsion of "Jews as a class" a drastic step which raised a storm of protest in Congress and the press till Lincoln countermanded it-Lincoln, who knew Grant's feeling toward the traders in necessities of war, his old friend Leonard Swett, of Springfield, having once been ordered out of Cairo on pain of being shot because he tried to force on Grant a questionable deal in hay. When Swett sought Lincoln at the White House with his protest, Lincoln said, "Well, Swett, if I were in your place, I should keep out of Ulysses Simpson's bailiwick, for to the best of my knowledge and belief Grant will keep his promise if he catches you in Cairo." Amid distractions such as these Grant worked out his daring plans for seizing Vicksburg. He was on trial at Washington. Discontent was spreading through the North, discouraged by the months of dreary waiting. It was a dark hour for the Union cause. Stanton, hard pressed on every side, was moved in his impatience to do a foolish thing. He thought to bribe his generals into action and sent a letter to Grant, Rosecrans, and Hooker promising to make the victor of the first important battle a majorgeneral in the regular army. Rosecrans, commanding the Army of the Cumberland in Tennessee, wrote a petulant reply. Hooker promptly led the Army of the Potomac to humiliating defeat at Chancellorsville. Grant ignored the letter; he did not let it hasten him or influence his course. |