repeatedly in the middle of a storm. Simon Cameron, then
Secretary of War, was good enough as a party politician, but all
thumbs when fumbling with the armies in the field. The other
members of the Cabinet had war nostrums of their own; and every
politician with a pull did what he could to use it. Behind all
these surged a clamorous press and an excited people, both
patriotic and well meaning; but both wholly ignorant of war, and
therefore generating a public opinion that forced the not
unwilling Government to order an armed mob "on to Richmond"
before it had the slightest chance of learning how to be an army.

The Congress that met on the Fourth of July voted five hundred
thousand men and two hundred and fifty million dollars. This
showed that the greatness of the war was beginning to be seen.
But the men, the money, and the Glorious Fourth were so blurred
together in the public mind that the distinction between a vote
in Congress and its effect upon some future battlefield was never
realized. The result was a new access of zeal for driving
McDowell "on to Richmond." Making the best of a bad business,
Scott had already begun his preparations for the premature
advance.

By the end of May Confederate pickets had been in sight of
Washington, while McDowell, crossing the Potomac, was faced by
his friend of old West Point and Mexican days, General
Beauregard, fresh from the capture of Fort Sumter. By the
beginning of July General Patterson, a veteran of "1812" and
Mexico, was in command up the Potomac near Harper's Ferry. He was
opposed by "Joe" Johnston, who had taken over that Confederate
command from "Stonewall" Jackson. Down the Potomac and Chesapeake