The War for the Union has been unlike all other great struggles, throughout, in nearly every characteristic that can be named. Unnatural in its inception, the rebellion has seemed to have the power of making unnatural many of the details through which and in spite of which it has been carried forward--of changing character and subverting all ordinary conditions. There have been anomalies in the field: still more notable anomalies in society. Unflinching bravery and stubborn devotion to the fighting interests of the country have been found blended, in the same man, with pecuniary dishonesty which seemed capable of pillaging a death-chamber. The greatest military ability has been found conjoined with such inactivity and tardiness as to paralyze action and destroy public patience. Rapidity of movement has been discovered to be wedded to such Utopian want of understanding or such culpable recklessness as to make movement not seldom a blunder instead of a stroke of policy. Times which threatened disaster have brought triumph; and the preparations made to celebrate a victory have more than once been employed in concealing a defeat. All things have been mixed in estimation. The Copperhead, detestable on account of his view of the national duty, has yet compelled some portion of respect by his real or affected reverence for a perilled Constitution; the Radical, worthy of all credit for his active spirit and uncompromising position, has yet deserved contempt for a narrowness of view which made him almost as dangerous as disloyalty could have done; and the Conservative, that man of the golden mean, that hope of the nation in many regards, has bargained for a part of the abuse which he has received from either extreme, by faulting the active measures of both and offering meanwhile no active, practical course to supply their stead.