If Hooker's military career be examined critically, it will be found that his success as a leader has been due to the impetuosity, boldness, and energy with which he fights. His presence on a battle-field may be said to be calculated to supply all deficiencies in the discipline of the troops. His presence and demeanor inspired his troops with the qualities of courage and daring which distinguished himself, and restored morale to broken columns with the same success as that which ever marked the presence of Philip Sheridan. As commander of the Army of the Potomac, General Hooker never met with brilliant success. He assumed command at a time when the bitter jealousies which disgraced that army most impaired its energies and retarded its action. He had little of the love or admiration, and, consequently, little of the genuine support of his subordinate commanders; while he was, by reason of his promotion, farther removed from immediate direction of his troops, and the inspiration of his presence was lost on those who had learned to believe in him. Success with Hooker depended upon his immediate presence with his troops, and to remove him from close intimacy with them was to impair his effectiveness. No one will attempt to deny that Hooker held such an inspiring control over his men, and that his presence among his troops in battle had much to do with their effectiveness. He was what has been called "a powerful presence." He was destined for a leader, not a director of troops, and hence his great success has been as the leader of fractional corps of great armies. His battles on the Peninsula; his vigorous pursuit of the rebels from Yorktown; his conduct throughout the "battle-week on the Chickahominy," and his engagement at Malvern Hill, were the deeds which are familiarly known throughout the country. His success as the commander of a _corps_ in the West has become not less familiar to the public; and his achievements at Lookout Mountain, Resaca, and before Atlanta, will be the basis for the establishment of his true character as a military man. I do not mean by this to say that Hooker can not command with success a great army. I have no personal knowledge of his career as a commanding general, but from his mental organization it is evident that he is greater as a leader than as a director of men. My personal recollections of Hooker's battles are confined to a few, the most remarkable of which was the battle of Lookout Mountain. The "battle above the clouds," as the assault of Lookout Mountain was called, was one of the most remarkable operations of the war. The mountain which was carried is fourteen hundred feet above the Tennessee River, and was held by a force of at least six thousand rebels strongly fortified. It is not a regular slope from the summit of Lookout to the foot, but the first twenty-five or thirty feet of the descent is perpendicular rocks, or what is generally understood