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CHAPTER III.

HANCOCK'S GENIUS FOR SEIZING THE OPPORTUNITY.

T will be perceived that Hancock had to fight

IT

his way to fame. Older officers were in command when he came, burning to win the laurel, and even the brilliant success he had already achieved, his individual courage and unprompted inspiration were not always visible through the conflicts of others; and therefore, not having much patronage at court, so to speak, and never electioneering among the busy partisans of the capital, he was impelled to that isolated policy which made what he did so marked and so original that it could not escape notice, and rapidly won the admiration of the impartial public, and all judicial observers.

The invasion of Pennsylvania was the idea of General Robert E. Lee himself, the confederate chief; and Hancock's part in repelling it, after his brave record in McClellan's army, was one of those opportunities which never come to any but brave and bold men. He was still subordinate, but the death of General John F. Reynolds, on the first

day of the battle of Gettysburg, gave Hancock one supreme command, and enabled him to decide the fortunes of a desperate struggle.

Here let me for a moment dwell upon the new argument of the enemies of General Hancock, the partisans who insist that Hancock deserves none of the high consideration claimed for him, because he did nothing more than his duty, and because also General Garfield did the same! It is the evil practice of these times, that men at one interval, spontaneous in awarding unspeakable honors to those who serve them, soon fall from this generous tone and begin the work of depreciation and contrast. Hence it is, that whereas the whole body of the people of Pennsylvania unconditionally awarded to General Hancock the praise of having saved the stricken field on the 3d of July, 1863, since his name has been associated with the presidency, they not only boast of their desire to forget that he ever fought for the government at all, or if he did that the only effect of his behavior was to lose his citizenship in his native state, but finally that he did nothing but his duty and that others had done better or as well. These men seem to forget that opportunity, after all an incalculable advantage, is nothing unless instantly improved, unless genius sees the vital point and knows exactly where to strike. Fortunately for Hancock, to use General Grant's very last remark in reference to him, he was not only a gallant

fighter but he made few mistakes and encountered rare defeats: "He was a man who never faltered in the performance of his duty, and seldom, if ever, made a blunder."

History shows that Hancock always improved his opportunity, in what seemed to be the fatal hour. He always struck when the enemy seemed about to win. Mark his decisive and prompt action, when he quietly directed his men to "fix bayonets" and as swiftly rushed them forward as the enemy were shouting what they supposed their resistless cry of triumph, and mark again other opportune moments on other historic fields. He had to win his spurs very slowly. He was rarely the favorite of party or administration. He preserved his subordination to his superiors, and maintained the kindliest relations to his men. He had little else to help him but his own courage, his experience, patriotism, and the steady friendship of Abraham Lincoln.

Many opportunities are presented to public men, soldiers and statesmen, and often neglected. Henry Clay was the victim of lost opportunities; if he had been nominated for President in 1840, he would have won the day. Daniel Webster was another victim of lost opportunities; if he had identified himself bravely with the Democratic party in 1830, when for a moment he stood by Andrew Jackson, on the proclamation against

nullification, he would probably have been the democratic president, and elected instead of Martin Van Buren, in 1836. Daniel S. Dickinson would have been nominated as the democratic candidate in 1852, in place of Franklin Pierce, had he not, at the critical moment, magnanimously declined the honor tendered to him. William H. Seward would have been nominated as the republican candidate for president in 1860, but for his quarrel with Horace Greeley. James Buchanan himself, could have saved the country from the terrible catastrophe of civil war, if, in 1858, he had bravely repudiated the Lecompton fraud, and trusted himself to the support of the proud and chivalric men of the South. Hundreds of similar instances could be found in history. Hancock seemed to have the intuitive gift of appearing at the right moment, or striking at the crisis, and of being called for when every one else seemed to have failed or fallen. It remains for unjust and malignant politicians, themselves, at the time he rendered the vital and the saving service to his country, clamorous to be first to approve and applaud, now to show how bad, busy, and brutal they can be! forgetting not only their selfish justice to him in July of 1863, but trying to show that the people were as ungrateful as themselves. How utterly illogical such malignity! These men not only forgot the most conspicuous bravery, and the most unspeakable unselfish

ness, but they possess that dangerous art given to small minds, the art of finding the most trifling excuses for the most appalling treachery. In one breath they swept away the whole of Grant's record, on the foolish pretext that he wanted to be chosen President for a third term. And in satisfying themselves with this pretext, they really secure. a large degree of party sympathy, and at the same time carry their own malignity so far, as before the close of the contest in Chicago, in 1880, to induce many people, the same now who clamor against Hancock, to believe that Grant had done nothing more for his country than any other man could have done!

The great dramatic philosopher, Shakspeare, while illustrating the vice of ingratitude, refers, in better phrase than I can use, to the ease with which, when a man desires to do a mean and unmanly thing, he can provide himself with a philosophy to justify his guilt. Reasons for wrong are as plenty in his path as blackberries.

THE LOST OPPORTUNITY OF THE LOST CAUSE.

But no men engaged in a great movement ever lost so many opportunities as the authors and leaders of the Lost Cause. Tracing their emotions in the light of their successes and defeats, there is something inexpressibly sad in the overthrow of the great expectations with which they entered upon their stupendous attempt to sever the

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