There was concentration everywhere. General Gillmore, with what troops could be spared from the department of the South, joined his forces to those already on the Peninsula and at Suffolk; Sigel had several thousand in the Shenandoah; Crook and Averell had a small army in Western Virginia; while at Chattanooga, under Sherman and Thomas, was gathered a large army of Western troops. The _dramatis personae_ were known to the public, but the part assigned to each was kept profoundly secret. There was discussion and speculation whether Burnside, from his encampment at Annapolis, would suddenly take transports and go to Wilmington, or up the Rappahannock, or the James, or the York, uniting his forces with Butler's. Would Meade move directly across the Rapidan and attack Lee in front, with every passage, every hill and ravine enfiladed by Rebel cannon? Or would he move his right flank along the Blue Ridge, crowding Lee to the seaboard? Would he not make, rather, a sudden change of base to Fredericksburg? None of the wise men, military or civil, in their speculations, indicated the line which General Grant adopted. The public accepted the disaster at Chancellorsville and the failure at Mine Run as conclusive evidence that a successful advance across the Rapidan by the middle fords was impossible, or at least improbable. So well was the secret kept, that, aside from the corps commanders, none in or out of the army, except the President and Secretary of War, had information of the line of march intended. We know now how General Burnside marched to Washington, contrary to the expectations of the public; how his troops passed in review before the President,--a few veterans, with Roanoke, Newbern, all the seven days before Richmond, Antietam, Fredericksburg, Vicksburg, and Knoxville on their tattered ensigns; how they were cheered by the crowd; how, following them, came a division for the first time shouldering a musket for their country,--who till a year ago never had a country,--who even now, although Americans, are not citizens,--disfranchised, yet fighting for the flag,--beholding now for the first time the careworn, yet benevolent face of their benefactor, and rending the air with their hurrahs. There was swinging of hats, waving of handkerchiefs and banners. They marched to victory or certain death. For them there was no surrender, after the massacres of Milliken's Bend, Plymouth, and Fort Pillow. We know how Butler went up to White House, and then suddenly down the York and up the James to Bermuda Hundred. We know of the movements of Sigel and Crook and Averell,--minor, yet important in the general plan. We have had the victorious march of Sherman, flanking and defeating Johnston. All these movements were parts of the well-considered plan of operations.