“Ah, Muse!  You dare not claim
      A nobler man than he—­
  Nor nobler man hath less of blame,
  Nor blameless man hath purer name,
  Nor purer name hath grander fame,
      Nor fame—­another Lee.”

The late Benjamin H. Hill, of Georgia, in an address delivered at the time of General Lee’s death, thus beautifully describes his character:  “He was a foe without hate; a friend without treachery; a soldier without cruelty; a victor without oppression, and a victim without murmuring.  He was a public officer without vices; a private citizen without wrong; a neighbor without reproach; a Christian without hypocrisy, and a man without guile.  He was Caesar without his ambition; Frederick without his tyranny; Napoleon without his selfishness, and Washington without his reward.  He was as obedient to authority as a servant, and royal in authority as a true king.  He was gentle as a woman in life, and modest and pure as a virgin in thought; watchful as a Roman vestal in duty; submissive to law as Socrates, and grand in battle as Achilles!”

Forty-four years ago last June, I found myself in the presence of Colonel Lee, who was then Superintendent of the Military Academy at West Point.  I have never in all my life seen another form or face which so impressed me, as embodying dignity, modesty, kindness, and all the characteristics which indicate purity and nobility.  While he was then only a captain and brevet-colonel, he was so highly regarded by the Army that it was generally conceded that he was the proper officer to succeed General Scott.

His wonderful career as leader of the Army of Northern Virginia, as its commander, is so familiar to all of you that any comment would seem to be unnecessary.  But to give some of the younger generation an idea of the magnitude of the struggle in which General Lee was the central and leading figure, I will call attention to the fact that in the battles of the Wilderness and Spottsylvania (which really should be called one battle), the killed and wounded in General Grant’s army by the army under General Lee, was far greater than the aggregate killed and wounded in all the battles of all the wars fought by the English-speaking people on this continent since the discovery of America by Columbus.

To be more explicit:  take the killed and wounded in all the battles of the French and Indian War, take the aggregate killed and wounded in the Revolutionary War, take the aggregate killed and wounded in the War of 1812, take the aggregate killed and wounded in the Mexican War, take the aggregate killed and wounded in all our wars with the Indians, and they amount to less than the killed and wounded in Grant’s army in the struggle from the Wilderness to Spottsylvania.

In order further to appreciate the magnitude of the struggle, let us make a comparison between the losses in some of the great battles of our Civil War, and those of some of the most famous battles of modern Europe.  The official reports give the following as the losses in killed and wounded of the Federal Army in seven, out of nearly a thousand severely contested struggles during the four years’ of war:  Seven Days fight, 9,291; Antietam, 11,426; Murfreesboro, 8,778; Gettysburg, 16,426; Chickamauga, 10,906; Wilderness and Spottsylvania, 24,481.