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Also in reading the many interesting personal accounts of the campaign it most be remembered that opinions about the chance of success in a defensive struggle are apt to warp with the observer's position, as indeed General Grant has remarked in answer to criticisms on his army's state at the end of the first day of the battle of Shiloh or 'Pittsburg Landing.
We have Biblical authority for the story that the angel in the path was visible to the ass, though unseen by the seer his master; but suppose, instead of smiting the honest, stupid animal, Balaam had caressed him and then been kicked by him, how would the story read? And thus much concerning Gettysburg. Shiloh was a great misfortune.
Then, as he turned to go, his heart stood still, for he heard Shiloh say in her little piping child voice, but, oh, so distinctly, and so sweetly, like a bird in the forest: "Pap, sech a sweet dream an' I went right up to the gate of heaven an' the angel smiled an' kissed me an' sed: "'Go back, little Shiloh not yet not yet!" Then Bud slipped off in the dawn of the coming light.
And the ark of God was taken; and the two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, were slain. And there ran a man of Benjamin out of the army, and came to Shiloh the same day with his clothes rent, and with earth upon his head. And when he came, lo, Eli sat upon a seat by the wayside watching: for his heart trembled for the ark of God.
She listened a while with a half-amused smile on her lips: "Well, don't you think his spindles need oilin', Pap?" There was little but machinery in her life. Another hour found the old man tired, but still holding the sleeping child in his arms: "If I move her she'll wake," he said to himself. "Po' little Shiloh." He was silent a while and thoughtful.
In the more inaccessible parts of Benjamin, indeed, a few Israelites still maintained a fitful independence, and Samuel, the representative of the traditions of Shiloh, was allowed to judge his own people, and preside over a Naioth or "monastery" of dervish-like prophets under the eye of a Philistine garrison. Israel seemed about to disappear from among the nations of the world.
Richmond had heard of the great battle of Shiloh, the failure to destroy Grant and the death of Albert Sidney Johnston. New Orleans, the largest and richest city in the Confederacy, had been taken by the Northern fleet the North was always triumphant on the water and the mighty army of McClellan had landed on the Peninsula of Virginia for the advance on Richmond.
He had, it is true, been assigned to high command in the West when Halleck was ordered to Washington, but the battle of Shiloh had prejudiced the authorities against him and his troops were gradually transferred to other commanders, leaving him with an army barely sufficient to guard the territory it already held.
I'd tell 'em how you dared the bullets of our own men, after the battle of Shiloh, to cut down an' carry off a measley little Yankee they'd hung up as a spy 'cause he had onct saved yo' father's life. You shot two of our boys then, Jack." "They was a shootin' me, too," he said quietly. "I caught two bullets savin' that Yankee.
He was of the type of Sidney Johnston, who fell at Shiloh, and of McPherson, who fell at Kennesaw all Californians; all Americans, true soldiers, who had a sword for the foe in fair fight in the open field, and a shield for woman, and for the noncombatant, the aged, the defenseless.
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