Grant may easily be excused if, while as yet hardly warm in the saddle, he hesitated to revoke orders that he must have known to be those of the President himself; yet, since a door must be either open or shut it would have been far better to revoke the orders than to trammel their execution with conditions so hard that Banks might well have thrown up the campaign then and there. However, Banks on his part had good reason to know the wishes of the government and not less the consequences of disregarding them; moreover, as the case must have presented itself to him, there was an off chance that Kirby Smith might not be able to concentrate in time to save Shreveport; another, still more remote, that he might give up the place without a fight; and a third, more unlikely than either, that Steele might join Banks in time to make short work of it, or at all events to make Banks strong enough to spare A. J. Smith by the appointed time. Two weeks remained until the earliest date set for A. J. Smith to be at Vicksburg; twenty-nine days to the latest day allowed for the taking of Shreveport. In his dilemma Banks decided to run these chances. After seeing the first of the gunboats safely over the falls, on the 26th of March Banks set his column in motion. A. J. Smith marched on Cotile Landing to wait for his boats. On the 28th Lee, with the main body of the cavalry, preceded Smith to Henderson's Hill, in order to hold the road and the crossing of Bayou Jean de Jean. Franklin with Emory and Ransom and the main supply trains followed on the same day. Twenty miles above Cotile Landing the Red River divides, and, for sixty miles, until Grand Ecore is reached, the waters flow in two unequal channels; the most southerly of these, along which the road runs, is known as Cane River, or Old Red River. This was formerly the main stream, but the more northerly branch, at once deeper and less tortuous, now forms the only navigable channel, and is called the Rigolets du Bon Dieu, or more familiarly the Bon Dieu. Lee crossed Cane River at Monett's Ferry, and, recrossing above Cloutierville, entered Natchitoches on the 31st of March. At Monett's Ferry on the 29th, Cloutierville on the 30th, and again at Natchitoches he encountered slight opposition from the enemy's skirmishers. Franklin, marching by the same road, encamped at Natchitoches on the 2d of April. Embarking on his transports as they came, A. J. Smith set out from Cotile Landing on the 2d of April in company with Porter's fleet, and landed at Grand Ecore on the 3d.