form and papers again. But I 'd like to leave them with him for always." 69 Beside which should be put Stiles's striking account, well-paralleled by another instance in Fremantle, 70 of the behavior of the officers at the time of Longstreet's wound: "The members of his staff surrounded the vehicle, some on one side and some on the other, and some behind. One, I remember, stood upon the rear step of the ambulance, seeming to desire to be as near him as possible. I never on any occasion during the four years of the war saw a group of officers and gentlemen so deeply distressed. They were literally bowed down with grief. All of them were in tears. One, by whose side I rode for some distance, was himself severely hurt, but he made no allusion to his wound and I do not think he felt it. It was not alone the general they admired who had been shot down—it was rather the man they loved." 71
To inspire devotion like that a leader must, indeed, have noble qualities; and, morever, it confirms one in the belief that a round self-confidence, backed by tried capacity, is a trait men cling to, as much as to anything, in the hour of trouble.
Towards the end of his life Longstreet joined the Catholic Church. This forms such a remarkable close to his career that it cannot be passed over. Mrs. Longstreet, with another of those shrewd blows that come most stingingly from those we love, says he did it because his former Episcopal associates would not sit in the same
