George Meade, The Life and Letters of George Gordon Meade, Major-General United States Army
George Gordon Meade, Ed.

I hope you will not be very much put out at not receiving a letter earlier from me, but I have really been very much occupied, and yesterday, in addition to other duties, we had a grand division review for the Prince de Joinville¹ and others. I was so sorry you and Sergeant² had gone. The review passed off very well, pretty much the same as you saw, except that, having been advised of the arrival of the distinguished strangers only the night before, Gauttier did not have the privilege of sticking McCall for a fine collation. McClellan, however, took the Frenchmen over to the Chain Bridge and by Ball's Cross-Roads.

I felt very sad when you drove off, and could hardly shake off the idea that I was looking on you perhaps for the last time—at any rate, for a long while; but I trust matters will be more favorable to us, and that it will please a just and merciful Providence to permit us to be happy once more, united, and free from immediate trouble. There has been nothing new since you left. We have daily the usual announcement that the enemy have been seen somewhere above us, on the opposite side; but they confine their operations to letting us see them. What they are going to do, no one without the gift of second sight can possibly imagine. In the meantime we are becoming better prepared to meet them, and after awhile if they don't show themselves, I presume we shall have to hunt them up. I find camp life agrees very well with me, and the active duties I have entered on are quite agreeable. Sometimes I have a little sinking at the heart, when I reflect that perhaps I may fail at the grand scratch; but I try to console myself with the belief that I shall