When Davis gazed on the white, cold, rugged features, the tears were streaming down his hollow checks. He bent low and the tears fell on the face of the dead. When an officer of the Government came to the President's Mansion where the body lay in state to consult him on a matter of importance, the Confederate Chieftain stared at his questioner in a dazed sort of way and remained silent. Lifting his haggard face at last he said in pathetic tones: "You must excuse me, my friend, I am staggering from a dreadful blow--I cannot think--" Three days and nights the endless procession passed the bier and paid their tribute of adoration and love. And when he was borne to his last resting place through the streets of the city, the sidewalks, the windows and the housetops were a throbbing mass of weeping women and men. Jefferson Davis was perhaps the only man in the South in a position to realize the enormous loss which the Confederacy had sustained in the death of Lee's great lieutenant. The Southern people who gloried in Jackson's deeds had as yet no real appreciation of the services he had rendered. They could not realize their loss until events should prove that no man could be found to take his place. The brilliant victory of Chancellorsville, following so closely on Fredericksburg, had lifted the Confederacy to the heights. In the West the army had held its own. The safety of Vicksburg was not seriously questioned. General Bragg confronted Rosecrans with an army so strong he dared not attack it and yet not strong enough to drive Rosecrans from Tennessee. Two campaigns were discussed with Davis. The members of his Cabinet, who regarded the possession of Vicksburg and the continued grip on the Mississippi River vital to the life of the Confederacy, were alarmed at Grant's purpose to fight his way to this stronghold and take it. They urged that Lee's army be divided and half of it sent immediately to reenforce Bragg. With this force in the West Rosecrans could be crushed and Grant driven from his design of opening the Mississippi. Lee, flushed with his victories, naturally objected to the weakening of his army by such a division. He proposed a more daring and effective way of relieving Vicksburg. He would raise his army to eighty-five thousand men, clear Virginia of the enemy and sweep into Pennsylvania, carry the war into the North, forage on its rich fields, capture Harrisburg and march on Washington. Davis did not wish to risk this invasion of Northern soil. But his situation was peculiar. His relations with Lee had been remarkable for their perfect accord. They had never differed on an essential point of political or military strategy. Davis' pride in Lee's genius was unbounded, his confidence in his judgment perfect.