When an officer of the Government came to the President's Mansion where the body lay in state to consult him on a matter of importance, the Confederate Chieftain stared at his questioner in a dazed sort of way and remained silent.
Lifting his haggard face at last he said in pathetic tones:
"You must excuse me, my friend, I am staggering from a dreadful blow—I cannot think—"
Three days and nights the endless procession passed the bier and paid their tribute of adoration and love. And when he was borne to his last resting place through the streets of the city, the sidewalks, the windows and the housetops were a throbbing mass of weeping women and men.
Jefferson Davis was perhaps the only man in the South in a position to realize the enormous loss which the Confederacy had sustained in the death of Lee's great lieutenant.
The Southern people who gloried in Jackson's deeds had as yet no real appreciation of the services he had rendered. They could not realize their loss until events should prove that no man could be found to take his place.
The brilliant victory of Chancellorsville, following so closely on Fredericksburg, had lifted the Confederacy to the heights.
In the West the army had held its own. The safety of Vicksburg was not seriously questioned. General Bragg confronted Rosecrans with an army so strong he dared not attack it and yet not strong enough to drive Rosecrans from Tennessee.
Two campaigns were discussed with Davis.