veterans in the first engagement, and the battle of Bull Run might have been re-enacted on many fields.
But what the effect might have been of an offensive war, pushed boldly into the Northern States, when their people were divided in sentiment, and before their armies had been trained and prepared for battle, I leave to the student of military operations to discuss and decide. If I were called on to describe in brief our conflict, I should write thus: the North succeeded because law and constitution were made to bend to every military necessity, while time and West Point discipline made of Northern men the best soldiers in the world. The South failed because the most pressing military necessities were diregarded when in conflict with constitution and law, while West Point discipline chilled the ardor and time destroyed the advantages of the best natural soldiers that ever lived. But I am not here to mourn over what might have been.
LIEUTENANT-GENERAL N. B. FORREST AND HIS CAMPAIGNS.
I have selected as my subject on this occasion the campaigns of Lieutenant-General N. B. Forrest, who was my immediate commander during the last year and a half of the war, and who, if not the greatest military genius, was certainly the greatest revolutionary leader on our side. He was restrained by no knowledge of law or constitution. He was embarrassed by no preconceived ideas of military science. His favorite maxim was, "war means fighting, and fighting means killing." Without the slightest knowledge of them, he seemed by instinct to adopt the tactics of the great masters of the military art, if there be any such art.
Hamley says "nothing is more common than to find in writings on military matters reference to 'the rules of war,' and assertions such as some general 'owed his success to knowing when to dispense with the rules of war.' It would be difficult to say what these rules are or in what code they are embodied." Colonel T. W. White, a clear-headed officer of my command, expressing the same idea more quaintly, said: "It all consists in two words—luck and pluck." Forrest possessed both of these in an eminent degree; and his successes, many of which were achieved with men who had never been drilled one hour together, illustrated what might have been accomplished by untrained Southern soldiers.
HIS LIFE BEFORE THE WAR.
In February, 1841, when I was but ten years of age, I remember well a small company of volunteers who marched out of the town of Holly Springs, Mississippi, for the relief of Texas, then threatened by invasion from Mexico. In that little band stood Bedford Forrest, a tall, black haired, gray eyed, athletic youth, scarce twenty years of age, who then gave the first evidence of the military ardor he possessed. The company saw no fighting, for the danger was over before it arrived, and the men received no
