The place, West Philadelphia, half a mile or more beyond the Schuylkill, not far from the line traversed beyond the bridge by the Market Street cars, and near the intersection of that branch of the main artery known as the Darby Road,--in the outer edge of that beautiful little section with its tall trees and plats of natural green, out of and into which the shrieking monsters of the Pennsylvania Central Railroad dart every hour in the day with freight and passengers to and from the Great West. The time, late in June, 1863, a few days before Gettysburg, when the long-threatened invasion of the North by the rebels had become for the moment an accomplished fact, when Lee and Ewell had crossed the Potomac, swept on through Upper Maryland, entered Pennsylvania, devastated the farms and carried away the stock of the farmers on the border, laid York under a contribution, burned the barracks at Carlisle, and threatened every hour to capture Harrisburgh and force the passage of the Susquehanna. When women and children, and by far too many of the able-bodied inhabitants who should have shown more pride if they indeed possessed no courage, had fled away from the Seat of Government of the Keystone State, and the public records were following them to prevent their falling into the hands of an enemy known to be destructive and revengeful, and for the moment believed to be irresistible. When the rebels themselves boasted that they were about to teach the North all the horrors of war that had fallen upon the South in the long contest,--and that in a few days they would water their cavalry-horses in the Delaware, if they did not achieve the same success at the very banks of the Hudson; and when the newspapers of New York and Philadelphia, for the moment completely discouraged, gave up the line of defence of the Susquehanna, and gravely debated, whether a check could indeed be made at the Delaware, with the loss of the Quaker City, or whether the great struggle must at last be transferred to the Hudson hills of New Jersey. When the Reserves were mustering in Philadelphia, and the Coal Regiments forming in the haunts of the sturdy miners. When the Pennsylvania coal-mines were to be set on fire by the invader, and left to burn on until all the fuel of the nation was destroyed, if the "great conflagration" of the whole earth did not follow as a result. When more placards calling for the defence of the State, were exhibited in the neighborhood of old Independence Hall, than had ever shown there, inviting the idle to amusement, in the most prosperous seasons of opera, theatre and concert-saloon--drums beating at every corner, brass bands blowing on every square, patriotic appeals and efforts to recruit on every hand, and yet the people apparently lying under bodily apathy or mental paralysis. When Governor Seymour, of New York, and Governor Parker, of New Jersey, waiving the political question for the moment, were calling out the troops of those