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to be piloted to Nance's Shop. Arriving there, he inquired how far it was to Bradley's Store, near the church, and learning that the dis- tance was nearly the same as from the starting to his objective point, he asked why he had not carried him the nearest way; the guide, a blunt, plain man, replied: " You told me to bring you to Nance's Shop, and I have done so." The neighborhood road was not laid down. The general made no inquiries of his obedient j^uule, andjost five miles in his line of march. The same difficulties a> to roads have attended armies in older and more open and culti- vated countries than Eastern Virginia, and have been the instruments of winning or losing many battles.
MALVERN HILL AND WATERLOO.
A most original and graphic writer, delineating the battle of Waterloo, remarked: "Here a general of division fell; near by, brigades with their commanders perished; soon the grand old Impe- rial Guard, that had never known defeat, hurled its front ranks into a yawning chasm of earth that its rear might pass over to meet, upon the fixed bayonets of the hollow squares of Wellington, a no less certain fate. And all this, why ? A cowboy said to a general on one bright Sunday morning: 'Sire, take this road.' ' Blucher, seventy-three years old, fired with the spirit of war and revenge, falling from his horse, but mounting again with the alacrity of youth, presses upon the scene, while Wellington prays that he or night would come. Waterloo was won by the accident of a well-directed route. Malvern Hill was doubtless a drawn battle because the Quaker road was misunderstood.
It was a fearful ordeal to pass from under the cover of the hills that fringed the Crew field, and face the enemy. I could easily give you examples of personal valor and heroism unsurpassed in war. Of many such, probably none exceeded the gallantry of Captain Martin, of the 53rd Virginia Infantry, Armistead's brigade. And Thomas Fletcher Harwood, of Co. K (Charles City Southern Guard), color-bearer in his regiment, who lost a leg there, and is to- day one of the many maimed survivors of that fight, has a record in the archives at Washington that will carry his name to the latest posterity. A century hence the Daughters of the Confederacy will be establishing their right to membership upon these records, as many of Virginia's fair daughters to-day are building their claims upon the imperfectly kept records of our Revolutionary fathers.
