In the latter days of September, 1864, the Confederate Army of Tennessee lay in the vicinity of Macon, Georgia. It was a dispirited body of men, homesick and discouraged. For four long months, first under one leader and then under another, it had opposed, step by step, Sherman's advance toward Atlanta, and now that important strategic point was in the hands of the Federal forces. About the middle of July the President of the Confederacy had seen fit to remove Joseph E. Johnston from the command and replace him with John B. Hood. The latter's habit of mind and methods of action led the Richmond authorities to believe that he would proceed very differently from Johnston, and in this he did not disappoint them. The results showed that Johnston's Fabian policy was by far the better one under the circumstances. Sherman had the stronger army, but he was compelled constantly to detach portions of it in order to guard his lengthening line of supplies. The one thing he desired most was that his opponent should assume an aggressive attitude. Hood's idea was precipitation rather than patience, and in consequence on the 2d of September General Slocum entered the coveted city. On the 22d of that month President Davis visited the Southern Army, and made a memorable address to the troops. He promised them--and they were delighted at the news--that they would soon be back in Tennessee, for a fresh invasion of that State had been planned. This would, declared the speaker, place Sherman in a worse predicament than that in which Napoleon found himself at Moscow. But the Federal general had at least the advantage of learning what was going to happen to him, for the President's words were reported verbatim in the Southern papers, and he prepared to meet his antagonists. Thomas, with the Army of the Cumberland, was sent to Nashville while Schofield, with his smaller force known as the Army of the Ohio, returned to Knoxville where he had spent the previous winter, to await Hood's advance. By the 1st of October the latter was across the Chattahoochee in the hope of drawing Sherman from Atlanta. There was a brave fight at Allatoona where General Corse "held the fort," but Sherman, although he followed the Confederate army, was unable to bring on a general engagement.