It may be proper to add that among those indebted in some degree to my instruction or training were several who captured Yale's highest prize for rhetorical excellence (the hundred dollar gold medal of which I was the first recipient): one college president; six college professors; three university presidents; two governors of states; two United States Senators; and many others eminent as clergymen, authors, judges, editors, and business men. [16] The higher death-rate (if that be conceded) of southern soldiers is easily accounted for. The northern soldiers had been carefully selected by competent surgeons. They were physically perfect, or nearly so. They were in the bloom of early manhood or the strength of middle age--not an old man among them, not a diseased man among them, not a broken-down constitution among them. But multitudes of the southern, enrolled by conscription, were physically unfit. Many were much too old or too young. Said our General Grant, "To fill their ranks, they have robbed the cradle and the grave!" [17] The exchange is said to have been stopped in 1862-63 by the refusal of the Confederates to give up captured negro soldiers in return for southern captives in the North, the United States properly insisting upon perfect equality in the treatment of black and white. But early in 1864, if not previously, the Confederates yielded the point and were anxious to surrender man for man. APPENDIX (From the original record. See p. 88.) Proceedings of a Court Martial convened at Danville Mil. Pris. by virtue of the following Order: DANVILLE MIL. PRISON, Oct. 29, 1864. General Order No. 1. Pursuant to the Regulations adopted by the Union Officers of the 2d Floor Military Prison, Danville, Va., Oct. 26, 1864, a Court Martial is hereby appointed to convene at 10 o'clock A.M. on the 29th inst. or as soon thereafter as may be practicable, for the Trial of Captain [I omit from the record the name of the accused], 104th N. Y. Vols., and such other officers as may be brought before it. Detail for the Court. Lt. Col. W. A. LEACH, [Here follow the names 90th P. V. of Captains Bryant, Lt. Col. THEO. GREGG, Black, Clapp, Burkart, 45th P. V. Weiss (?), Reilly (?), Major J. W. BYRON, Moody, and the name 88th N. Y. V. of the Judge Advocate, Capt. G. M. DICKERMAN, Lt. and Adjt. James A. 26th Mass. V. Clark, 17th Pa. Cav.] By order of the Officers of the 2d Floor, JAMES CARLE, Col. 190th Pa. Vols., Senior Officer. DANVILLE MIL. PRISON, VA., 10 o'clock A.M., 31st, Oct. 1864. The Court met pursuant to the foregoing order. Present all the members. The Court then proceeded to the trial of Capt. [we again omit the name of the accused], 104th N. Y. Vols.