European critics have generally been loth to acknowledge the military excellence displayed during the War of Secession; and, even when giving full credit for the valor exhibited by our soldiers, have too often regarded our veteran armies as mere “armed mobs.” Chesney, Adams, Trench and Maude have recognized the value of the lessons taught by the American armies, and Lord Wolseley has recently developed an appreciation of such American generalship and soldierly worth as he can see through Confederate spectacles. But European military writers generally, and those of the Continent especially, still fail to recognize in the developments of our war the germ, if not the prototype, of military features which are regarded as new in Europe. The remarks of Colonel Chesney still hold true: “There is a disposition to regard the American generals, and the troops they led, as altogether inferior to regular soldiers. This prejudice was born out of the blunders and want of coherence exhibited by undisciplined volunteers at the outset--faults amply atoned for by the stubborn courage displayed by both sides throughout the rest of the struggle; while, if a man’s claims to be regarded as a veteran are to be measured by the amount of actual fighting he has gone through, the most seasoned soldiers of Europe are but as conscripts compared with the survivors of that conflict. The conditions of war on a grand scale were illustrated to the full as much in the contest in America, as in those more recently waged on the Continent.” But it is not only among European critics that the military excellence displayed by our armies has been depreciated. There is a small class among the professional soldiers in our own country, who are wont to bestow all possible admiration upon the military operations in recent European wars, not because they were excellent, but because they were European; and to belittle the operations in our own war, not because they were not excellent, but because they were American. To this small class, whose humility in regard to our national achievements is rarely combined with individual modesty, this book is not addressed. It is to the true American soldier that this little volume is offered, with the hope that the views expressed may meet with his approval and be sanctioned by his judgment. A. L. W. THE CAMPAIGN OF KÖNIGGRÄTZ. THE MILITARY STRENGTH OF THE OPPOSING NATIONS.