“The face was one I should never rest upon in a crowd, simply because, to my eye, there was nothing remarkable in it save the nose, which organ was high, thin, and planted with a curve as vehement as the curl of a Malay cutlass. The face and neck were rough and covered with reddish hair, the eye light in color and animated; but, though restless and bounding like a ball from one object to another, neither piercing nor brilliant; the mouth well closed but common, the ears large, the hands and feet long and thin, the gait a little rolling, but firm and active. In dress and manner there was not the slightest trace of pretension. He spoke rapidly, and generally with an inquisitive smile. To this _ensemble_ I must add a hat which was the reverse of dignified or distinguished—a simple felt affair, with a round crown and drooping brim—and you have as fair a description of General Sherman’s externals as I can pen. “Seating himself on a stick of cordwood hard by the fence, he drew a bit of pencil from his pocket, and spreading a piece of note paper on his knee, he wrote with great rapidity. Long columns of troops lined the road a few yards in his front, and beyond the road, massed in a series of spreading green fields, a whole division of infantry was waiting to take up the line of march, the blue ranks clear cut against the verdant background. Those who were near their general looked at him curiously; for in so vast an army the soldier sees his commander-in-chief but seldom. Page after page was filled by the general’s nimble pencil, and despatched. “For a half hour I watched him, and, though I looked for and expected to find them, no symptoms could I detect that the mind of the great leader was taxed by the infinite cares of a terribly hazardous military _coup de main_. Apparently it did not lay upon his mind the weight of a feather. A mail arrived. He tore open the papers and glanced over them hastily, then chatted with some general officers near him, then rode off with characteristic suddenness, but with fresh and smiling countenance, filing down the road beside many thousand men, whose lives were in his keeping.” The truly great mind is magnanimous in the hour of victory; a selfish, narrow one is arrogant and oppressive. We ought to be devoutly grateful to God for leaders in this second life-struggle of freedom, who in general character emulate our unrivalled Washington, and do not tarnish the cause he loved by revengeful or unworthy deeds. CHAPTER XXI. The Events which followed the Truce—General Hood’s Army in Motion —Battle at Allatoona Pass—He is left to the care of the gallant Thomas—The New and Magnificent Campaign of General Sherman—The Field of his Operations—Burning of Rome—The Advance—Atlanta partially Burned—The Rebel Fears and Hopes— The March.