---------------------
BY J. W. DE FOREST



_ John William De Forest (born March 36, 1826, in Seymour, Ct.) at the
outbreak of the Rebellion abandoned a promising career as a historian
and writer of books of travel to enlist in the Union army. He served
throughout the entire war, first as captain, then as major, and so
acquired a thorough knowledge of military tactics and the psychology of
our war which enabled him, on his return to civil life, to write the
best war stories of his generation. Of these "The Brigade Commander" is
Mr. De Forest's masterpiece. Solidly grounded on experience, and
drawing its emotive power from our greatest national cataclysm, like a
Niagara dynamo the story sends us a thrill undiminishing with the
increasing distance of its source._



THE BRIGADE COMMANDER
BY J. W. DEFOREST
[Footnote: By permission of "The New York Times."]


The Colonel was the idol of his bragging old regiment and of the
bragging brigade which for the last six months he had commanded.
He was the idol, not because he was good and gracious, not because he
spared his soldiers or treated them as fellow-citizens, but because he
had led them to victory and made them famous. If a man will win battles
and give his brigade a right to brag loudly of its doings, he may have