Page:Memoirs of Henry Villard, volume 1.djvu/196

170 I saw him repeatedly, and he fairly groaned at the inexplicable delay in the advent of help from the loyal States. I heard him say, too, when he reviewed the men of the Sixth Massachusetts, the very words that Nicolay and Hay quote: “I begin to believe there is no North. The Seventh New York Regiment is a myth. The Rhode Island troops [reported to be on the way up the Potomac] are another. You are the only real thing.” But the “myth” proved to be a reality, after all, on Thursday, the 25th. By a very hard march of twenty-four hours from Annapolis, the Seventh New York and Eighth Massachusetts managed to reach Annapolis Junction on the morning of that day. A train was waiting, and in the course of a few hours the whole of the Seventh Regiment reached its destination. I cannot express the revival of hope and confidence, the exultation, that I felt and that filled all loyal hearts as that crack body of New York Volunteers, nearly a thousand strong, marched up Pennsylvania Avenue, preceded by a magnificent band. After being reviewed by the President and Cabinet, it took possession of Willard's Hotel and occupied it till it moved into camp. The Seventh was immediately followed by the Eighth Massachusetts and by two Rhode Island regiments, accompanied by the youthful Governor Sprague. After that, further reënforcements continued to arrive daily from different loyal States, and, within a month, more than the full call of 75,000 men had reached the capital. But it took until the middle of May to restore railroad communication with the North completely.

From that time on, Washington assumed a most animated aspect. Including the regulars and the three months' men, fully eighty thousand soldiers were added to its population. To the north and east an almost unbroken girdle of military camps extended around the city. The pomp and circumstance of actual war were constantly visible in the public thoroughfares in marching columns of infantry, troops of cavalry, and batteries of artillery.