"This bright May morning I saw Thomas and Sherman together. Sherman, now that things were in motion, appeared happy and confident. With a map before him, he gave us briefly the entire situation. Here is Dalton,--there your force--on this side Schofield. Down there McPherson, soon to pass the Snake Gap and strike Johnston's line. Thomas in his quiet way put forth then the bolder view, viz: send at once the larger force, not the smaller, through the gap. Sherman shook his head, and signified that he was not yet ready to exchange bases with Johnston. But there was no jar, only confidence in each other and strong hope in our hearts as we separated that day. "Early the next morning was another meeting, out in the open field. Stanley with his strong build, fine face and long beard. T. J. Wood of smaller stature, grayish hair and decisive, caustic ways; and Newton with his handsome figure and keen sensitive looks, never thoroughly contented till the conflict was actually joined. These Division Commanders of the fourth corps stood near each other intently gazing upon the crest of Tunnel Hill. Our troops were already deployed and advancing in the beautiful morning light--arms were never brighter--and the Confederate cavalry, in full array, coming up from beyond the ridge, with skirmish interval, added interest and emotion to the parade. A battery or so, hastening to place, only deepened the feeling in the breasts of our experienced veterans. "At a word of command and a bugle call the outer line took up the run, and soon cleared the whole front. A few zip, zips of the foremost rifles, a few cannon salutes, a few screeches of shells, a few men wounded to the death or maimed for life! and that was all! When I took my stand by Stanley's side on the crest of the hill just gained, and thence sought to reconnoitre Tailor's craggy mountain range which still sheltered the bulk of Johnston's host, Stanley cried out: General, the ball is opened! And so it had. It was a curious ball, a long dance, for more than one hundred days. And it was a terrible dance, wilder at times than comes to foresters amid the bending and falling of trees in a hurricane; it was fearfully suggestive of the savage war-dance of the red men that ends in death to white men and desolation to homes.