“We are progressing well in this quarter. Though I have not changed my opinion that we may soon assume the existence of our National Government, yet years will pass before ruffianism, murder, and robbery will cease to afflict this region of our country. “Truly, your friend, W. T. SHERMAN, Major-Gen. Commanding.” As it was at the beginning of the war, so in this earnest declaration of views, the great commander keeps in advance of the popular and ruling ideas of the conflict. Like Napoleon in military genius and sublimely daring marches, he is vastly his superior in principles of human progress, and the foundations of true national prosperity. CHAPTER XVIII. A New Expedition—Its Wise Design—Cause of its Failure in the Main Purpose—The Hero of Vicksburg is created Lieutenant-General—The New Order of Things—Two Grand Lines of March and of Conquest—From Chattanooga to Kenesaw Mountain. THE holidays of the season which introduced the year 1863 had scarcely passed, and your gifts of affection, young reader, were still in your hands, or in a snug corner of your home, when the untiring chief, who was and is defending that home from the hosts of rebellion, was planning a grand expedition into Central Mississippi. The map will show you the town of Meridian, where important railroads have their junction, more than a hundred miles from Vicksburg. To this centre of the empire, claimed by the usurper Davis, around which lay the richest corn and cotton fields of the South, and swarmed the toiling slaves, General Sherman determined to lead his battalions. You must recollect, he would have to cut loose from his “base of supplies,” and, with a long wagon-train carrying rations for twenty days, conduct his “movable column”—that is, the entire army in motion, and with no communications open—over the enemy’s country, where well-disciplined troops were not very far from his path. It was a most daring adventure, but just like the brave commander who conceived it. Comprehending the gigantic revolt, and the vital points in the Confederacy, he has had but one view of the means to suppress the infamous rebellion. Had his plan been adopted, the war might have been ended now. Large armies, bold and rapid movements into the home of secession, sparing nothing that affords it any nourishment, has been the war-creed of General Sherman. February found the campaign complete in preparation. On the 3d the commander left the streets of Vicksburg, reining his steed toward Meridian.