stacked, and turned over to the officers appointed by me to receive them. This will not embrace the side-arms of the officers, nor their private horses or baggage. This done, each officer and man will be allowed to return to his home, not to be disturbed by United States authority so long as they observe their paroles and the laws in force where they reside.

"U. S. GRANT, Lieutenant-General." To this memorandum General Lee responded as follows:

"HEADQUARTERS ARMY OF NORTHERN VIRGINIA, Į April 9, 1865. "GENERAL:-I received your letter of this date, containing the terms of the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia, as proposed by you. As they are substantially the same as those expressed in your letter of the 8th inst., they are accepted. I will proceed to designate the proper officers to carry the stipulations into effect. "R. E. LEE, General."

No pen can describe the exultation of the men of both armies. For miles the hills and forests rang with the loud acclamations. Grant at once issued twenty thousand rations to the starving Confederates, and as fast as paroled they were furnished food and transportation to their homes by the government they had sought to destroy.

Johnston was in a hopeless condition in North Carolina. With Sherman and Schofield in his front and the victorious army of Grant in his rear, he could be instantly crushed beneath the Union forces. On April 14 he asked for a cessation of hostilities, preparatory to surrender. General Sherman accepted terms that were rejected by the Government, and Grant proceeded to Raleigh with full power to act in the premises. Arriving on the 24th, he acquainted Sherman with the views of the Government. Sherman at once communicated with Johnston, and the second day after Grant's arrival Johnston surrendered to Sherman on the same terms which were accorded to General Lee by Gen

eral Grant. On the 28th General Grant returned to his headquarters at Washington.

General Kirby Smith, who commanded. the Rebel forces west of the Mississippi, surrendered his entire force to Major-General Canby on May 26. Thus the last Rebel band surrendered or dispersed to their homes, and the war was terminated. The number of Confederate prisoners surrendered was 174,223; the number of pris

oners in the hands of the Federal army was Confederate Flag. 98,802. The whole Union force under command of General Grant was 1,000,516.

The Rebel President Davis at the time of the fall of Richmond, fled, with other members of the government, to Danville; thence, accompanied by a small cavalry force, he endeavered to escape to some Southern seaport, and take ship for foreign lands. He was caught at Irwinsville in Georgia, on the morning of May 10.

On the 22d and 23d of May, the Union armies were reviewed at Washington by the President of the United States and his Cabinet and the Lieutenant-General. The splendid pageant was witnessed by the members of the diplomatic corps, and by numbers of citizens from all parts of the Union, who had assembled to unite in this ovation to the volunteer soldiers of the Republic.

On the 2d of June General Grant took leave of all of the armies which had been so long guided by his genius. This address will be found in the Appendices to this volume.

THE CIVIL WAR had ended. The Commanding General advised the reduction of the great armies,-a

work which was at once begun, and more fully noted in the succeeding chapter.

We cannot better close this record of General Grant than by quoting from the author of "Grant and his Campaigns," who says:

"Of General Grant's talents and character it is unnecessary to add a single word. Sagacious, brave, skillful, his strongest elemer.t subsidizing all the rest, is that tenacity of purpose, that iron will which was the characteristic of Wellington, and which won the Waterloo of the Great Rebellion.

'Closely connected with this is his moral courage. He dares to do right, without respect of persons or opinions. His reports are full of clear criticisms of his generals. Courteous and kind, he never regards private feelings where great public interests are at stake.

"Joined to these qualities is a modesty which displays itself in an unostentatious demeanor, and in great reticence at all times.

"He is an admirable judge of men. In this he is like the great Emperor. Grant's generals have been judiciously chosen, each for his specific work,-Sherman for Atlanta, Thomas for Nashville, Sheridan for the Shenandoah and Five Forks, Meade for the Army of the Potomac. And when they did well, no spice of envy ever kept him from rejoicing in their success, and awarding them the highest praise."

CHAPTER XVII.

THE WORKS OF PEACE.

The most tragic event of the war occurred a few days subsequent to the surrender of Lee, and on the night of the very day that Johnston asked Sherman for an armistice. This event caused the profoundest grief throughout the whole country and the nations of the world,-the cowardly assassination of President Lincoln. On the night of April 14 he was shot by J. Wilkes Booth, while attending a theatrical entertainment at Ford's Theatre, Washington, dying before morning. Secretary of State Seward narrowly escaped being killed by a co-conspirator. The shock was terrible, and the loss incomparable.

General Grant was at the time in Washington, and it had been announced that he would attend the theatre in company with the President; but he was unavoidably detained, and was absent at the time. In the trial of the conspirators it was shown in evidence that it was the intention to have murdered General Grant at the same time and place.

Gilbert, in his "History of the World," says of the loss of President Lincoln: "A great statesman, one who would have harmonized the nation, and restored the reign of law at the South satisfactorily to both sections-gave place to a politician singularly unsuited to the great task in hand. The passions of the war had not had time to

cool when that assassination occurred; but it was evident that the South sincerely deprecated the great crime." Ridpath, in his "History," says: "So ended in darkness, but not in shame, the career of Abraham Lincoln. He was one of the most remarkable men of any age or country -a man in whom the qualities of genius and common sense were strangely mingled. He was prudent, farsighted and resolute; thoughtful, calm and just; patient, tender-hearted and great. The manner of his death consecrated his memory. From city to city, in one vast funeral procession, the mourning people followed his remains to their last resting-place at Springfield. From all nations rose the voice of sympathy and shame-sympathy for his death, shame for the dark crime that caused it."

General Grant now addressed himself with great energy to the works of peace. By the 22d of August he had succeeded in mustering out of the army 719,338, and by November 15 there had been returned to their homes 800,963 men. This was rapidly followed every month, until 1,023,021 had been discharged.

Nothing in all the history of the Republic was more creditable than the good behavior of the soldiers after disbandment. More than a million men were released from the discipline of military duty and remanded to the walks of civil life. Though long accustomed to the camp and field, they resumed the duties of peace in a quiet, orderly manner, absorbed into the general mass of the population, without any of the horrors usually attending in such cases in other lands.

The records of the War Department show that by November 15, 1865, there had been sold horses and mules to the value of $15,269,000, barracks and hospitals