He was an old West Pointer, and had planned the first battle of Bull Run, when our troops were overwhelmingly defeated, the capital put in peril, and the nation humiliated at home and abroad. There is no doubt now that McDowell's plans were excellent, but the troops were raw volunteers, with little knowledge of their officers and less confidence in them; and, as a result, when, like the men in the ``Biglow Papers,'' they found ``why bagonets is peaked,'' there was a panic, just as there was in the first battles of the French Revolution. Every man distrusted every other man; there was a general outcry, and all took flight. I remember doing what I could in those days to encourage those who looked with despair on the flight from the battle-field of Bull Run, by pointing out to them exactly similar panics and flights in the first battles of the soldiers who afterward became the Grande Arm<e'>e and marched triumphantly over Europe. But of one thing the American people felt certain in those days, and that was that at Bull Run ``General McDowell was drunk.'' This assertion was loudly made, widely spread, never contradicted, and generally believed. I must confess now with shame that I was one of those who were so simple-minded as to take this newspaper story as true. On this occasion, sitting next General McDowell, I noticed that he drank only water, taking no wine of any sort; and on my calling his attention to the wines of our host as famous, he answered, ``No doubt; but I never take anything but water.'' I answered, ``General, how long has that been your rule?'' He replied, ``Always since my boy- hood. At that time I was sent to a military school at Troyes in France, and they gave us so much sour wine that I vowed that if I ever reached America again no drink but water should ever pass my lips, and I have kept to that resolution.'' Of course this was an enormous surprise to me, but shortly afterward I asked various army officers regarding the matter, and their general answer was: ``Why, of course; all of us know that McDowell is the only officer in the army who never takes anything but water.'' And this was the man who was widely believed by the American people to have lost the battle of Bull Run because he was drunk! Another remembrance of this period is a dinner with Mr. George Jones, of the ``New York Times,'' who gave me a full account of the way in which his paper came into possession of the documents revealing the Tammany frauds, and how, despite enormous bribes and bitter threats, the ``Times'' persisted in publishing the papers, and so brought the Tweed r<e'>gime to destruction.