Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 13.djvu/325

 324 Southern Historical Society Papers.

From that time, Jackson's was known as the Stonewall Brigade a name henceforth immortal, and belonging to all the ages; for the christening was baptized in the blood of its author; and that wall of brave hearts was on every battlefield, a steadfast bulwark of their country."

The letter written to his pastor in Lexington on the day following that battle gives the key-note to his character. Nor on any occasion was he the herald of his own fame ; never save by the conscientious discharge of duty, did he aid in the dissemination of that fame. Never did he perform an act for the sake of what men might say of it; and while he felt all the respect for public opinion to which it is justly entitled, he was not thinking of what the public verdict might be, but of what it was right to do. The attainment of no personal ends could satisfy aspirations like his. To ascertain what was true, to do what was best, to fill up the narrow measure of life with the largest posssible usefulness, was his single-hearted purpose. In such a career, if enjoyment should come, or well-earned fame, or augmented influence, or the power which accompanies promotion, they must all come as incidents by the way, as satellites which gather around a central orb, and not as the consummation toward which he ever tended. This singleness of aim was inseparable from a soul so sincere. A nature like his was incapable of employing the mere- tricious aids by which some men seek to heighten or advance their reputation.

Hence he never affected mystery. His reticence was not the as- sumption of impenetrability of purpose. His reserve was not the artifice of one who seeks to awe by making himself unapproachable. He hedged himself about with no barrier of exciusiveness. He assumed no airs of portentous dignity. He studied no dramatic effects. On the field, so far from condescending to those histrionic displays of person, or theatrical arts of speech, by which some com- manders have sought to excite the enthusiasm of their armies, when his troops caught the sight of his faded uniform and sun-burnt cap, and shook the air with their shouts as he rode along the lines, he quickened his gallop and escaped from view. When among the mountain pyramids, older than those to which the first Napoleon pointed, he did not remind his men that the centuries were looking down on them. When on the plain, he drilled no eagles to perch on his banners, as the third Napoleon was said to have done. But one thing he did, he impressed his men with such an intense conviction of his unselfish and supreme consecration to the cause for which he