War Pictures from the South. By Colonel B. Estvan. (Routledge.)—
We have, after considerable study, abandoned the idea of reviewing this book at length, for we can form no conclusive opinion as to its authority. It is full of isolated pictures of interest, but there is nothing to prove whether the writer is relating his own experience in each case or simply his own belief. The best chapter is one describing the Confederate army after the victory of Bull Run, which contains an intelligible and obviously vraisemblant statement of the reasons which made Beauregard decline to follow up his success. " Beauregard and the other generals were fairly bewildered by the victory they had achieved. They already pictured to their fancy the Confederate Government safely seated at Washington, issuing decrees from the Capitol to the vanquished North. But where the army was that had to effect all this no one know. A great portion of it lay dead on the field of battle, while the more un- fortunate wounded were abandoned heartlessly to their fate. No hospital accommodation had been provided ; but little surgical attend- ance had been prepared for the wretched sufferers. With the greatest difficulty the quartermasters managed to find room for some 1,500 to 2,000 of our own wounded, while those of the enemy, in still greater number, required accommodation. But whose business was this ? The greater portion of the army was busied in plundering ; from which occupation many repaired joyfully homewards, refusing obedience to their officers, and inflated with pride at the valiant deeds they had performed." There is a very remarkable account also of the secret police which, under Colonel F. Winter, of Baltimore, kept up, the author says, a reign of terror in Richmond.
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