and then returning took up his station on Prospect Hill, where he waited
with the singular calmness that was always his, for the fit time to open
fire.

The leader of the Army of the Potomac was watching from the other side
of the Rappahannock with a terrible eagerness. The man who had not
wished the command of the splendid Union army, who had deemed himself
unequal to the task, was now proving the correctness of his own
intuitions. He had taken up his headquarters in a fine colonial
residence on one of the highest points of the bank. He was surrounded
there by numerous artillery, and the officers of his staff crowded the
porches, many of them already sad of heart, although they would not
let their faces show it.

But Burnside, now that his men had forced the river in such daring
fashion, began to glow with hope. Such magnificent troops as he had,
having crossed the deep, tidal Rappahannock in the face of an able and
daring foe, were bound to win. He swept every point of the field with
his glasses, and from his elevated position he and his officers could
see what the troops in the plain below could not see, the long lines of
the Confederates waiting in the trenches or in the woods, their cannon
posted at frequent intervals.

But Burnside hoped. Who would not have hoped with such troops as his?
Never did an army, and with full knowledge of it, too, advance more
boldly to a superhuman task. He saw the gallant advance of the
Pennsylvanians and he saw them drive off Pelham. Hope swelled into
confidence. With an anxiety beyond describing he watched the further
advance of Meade and his Pennsylvanians.