Much discussion has been held concerning the occupation of Arlington by the Federal authorities, but it was claimed that this was a justifiable act, in view of the commanding position of the property. The White House and the department buildings near it were only two miles and a half from the highest point on the Arlington grounds; the Capitol only three and a half miles away, and Georgetown less than a mile. A battery established on the heights would have had the whole of Washington at its mercy. General Scott saw the importance of this position, and, reluctant as he was to turn Mrs. Lee from the lovely home where he had so often received her hospitality; deeply grieved as he must have been to humiliate by his first move one who had been his cherished friend and trusted aide, he sent General Mansfield to take it. “It is quite probable,” wrote the latter in his report, “that our troops assembled at Arlington will create much excitement in Virginia; yet, at the same time, if the enemy were to occupy the ground there a greater excitement would take place on our side.” Without going into particular details of the four years of fighting, I wish to quote Lord Wolseley’s beautiful tribute to Lee:[5] It is my wish to describe him as I saw him in the autumn of 1862, when, at the head of proud and victorious troops, he smiled at the notion of defeat by any army that could be sent against him. I desire to make known to the reader not only the renowned soldier, whom I believe to have been the greatest of his age, but to give some insight into the character of one whom I have always considered the most perfect man I ever met.... Outsiders can best weigh and determine the merits of the chief actors on both sides.... On one side I can see, in the dogged determination of the North, persevered in to the end through years of recurring failure, the spirit for which the men of Britain have always been remarkable. It is a virtue to which the United States owed its birth in the last century.... On the other hand, I can recognize the chivalrous valor of those gallant men whom Lee led to victory, who fought not only for fatherland and in defense of home, but for those rights most prized by free men. Washington’s stalwart soldiers were styled rebels by our king and his ministers, and in like manner the men who wore the gray uniform were denounced as rebels from the banks of the Potomac to the headwaters of the St. Lawrence.... As a looker-on, I feel that both parties in the war have so much to be proud of that both can afford to hear what impartial Englishmen or foreigners have to say about it. Describing Lee’s appointment to the command of the State Militia, he says: