Page:Reminiscences of Sixty Years in Public Affairs (Volume One).djvu/144

Rh resentatives. His associates in that House gave him rank next to Mr. Clay, and through tradition that rank is still accorded to him.

During his administration as Governor of the State, from 1858 to 1861, he made military preparations for that contest of arms, which even then was thought by some not to be improbable and by a few thought to be inevitable. It was during that period that he delivered the address at the dedication of the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Cambridge. The address met most fully the expectations of the authorities at Cambridge, and it gave General Banks standing as an orator when Massachusetts had orators—Everett, Choate, Phillips, Hillard—and when Harrison Gray Otis and Webster had not been forgotten.

At the opening of the war Mr. Lincoln tendered to General Banks a commission of the first rank, and a command of corresponding importance. He had not received a military education, and he was without experience in military life. His selection was due to a general and well founded opinion that he possessed military qualities, courage and decision, and that he was inspired by a deep devotion to the Union. General Banks was a firm believer in the justice of our cause, and he was animated by an unbounded confidence in our success,—a confidence which was not impaired in the darkest days of the Civil War. After the passing of a third of a century, a review of the entire field on the Civil side does not reveal a character more worthy than General Banks of high military command. In all the vicissitudes of his military career, and success did not always wait upon his undertakings, he never lost the confidence of Mr. Lincoln, nor Mr. Stanton, who was the most exacting of men, whenever an officer failed in his duties.

General Banks’ military career may be considered in three parts. As to the campaigns of 1861 and 1862, on the Poto-