Sumter; but Fort Wagner and Fort Gregg were at the mercy of the Federals, who possessed themselves without a blow of Cummings Point, from which they could plainly see Charleston, at a distance of three thousand five hundred or four thousand metres.*

The squadron of iron-clads and monitors, under Admiral Dahlgren, had not yet played a very brilliant part in the work of the siege. They dared not venture far up the harbor past Fort Ripley and within range of the immediate defences of the city.

The land-forces manifested some discontent at this inaction and want of co-operation, which left them all the fatigue and all the danger. The Confederates said with confidence that not one of the gunboats would be able to escape the destructive defences. and infernal machines with which the passes were blockaded. Admiral Dahlgren fears the destruction of a fleet which had cost so much sacrifice. He has, however, received two new monitors, which brought at the same time a new park of siegecannons for General Gillmore, of which two were three-hundredpounders, with carcasses of Greek fire, supplied with improved percussion fuses.

If General Gillmore had been able to throw incendiary shells into Charleston at a distance of six or seven thousand metres from the battery which he had raised on the mud-flat between James and Morris Islands, may he not now, with an excellent position,-only four thousand metres distant,-say, without boasting, as he has done in his last despatch, that Charleston is under his cannon,-that is to say, that he can reduce and burn the city at his pleasure, without General Beauregard being able to oppose more resistance than the commandant of Fort Wagner? And this result could be obtained without even the dangers of an assault, without even the assistance of the Federal fleet.

It is said that in the foundries of New York they are occupied in casting and forging pieces of artillery capable of throwing projectiles weighing three hundred, and even one thousand, pounds. If this be true, the military and maritime Powers of Europe must no longer delay the fabrication of similar engines of war. But is it not deplorable to see so much power and genius expended in perfecting the means of destruction, while there is so much to be done to diminish the miseries and sufferings of humanity?

LA PRESSE, du 30 Octobre, 1863.

EUGENE CHATARD.

*Two and one-fifth to two and a half miles. The author underestimates the distance, which is fully four miles to the nearest part of Charleston.-TR. The 20-inch Rodman gun, recently cast at Pittsburg, verifies this statement.

THE BATTLE OF THE DEAD CID.

This fine old legend, from the Cronica del Cid, holds a thought for to-day. The city of Valencia is besieged by thirty Moorish kings from the African shore, just after Rodrigo's death; he is fastened on his war-horse Bavieca; as his body cannot bear his iron armor, a helmet of parchment is made for him; and, with a thousand knights, he routs the enemy at midnight.

SILENT sleeps the tented city; only rings the sentry's tread;
Stand I long in frosty starlight, dreaming back the stately dead:
And I cry, with restless longing, Might to-day some elder ghost
From the cloudland of the heroes wake to lead the bannered host!
Then, as clang of answering trumpet, thro' the hollow gorge of yore,
Comes the legend of the battle of the dead Campeador.

Sternly frown Valencia's turrets. Close the Moorish pennons fly,
As the white caps of the billows when the storm-wind dashes high:
In his gilded mail, King Bucar mid his swarthy thousands lay,
Laughing wild in dreams of triumph with the breaking of the day.
Sleep was none in leaguered city; thro' the street stole faces white;
At St. Mary's half-lit altar masses sighed that sable night;
Chieftains prayed on naked cross-hilt, women knelt in moaning fear;
For the Cid, the sword of battle, voiceless slumbered on the bier.
Then they heard his parting summons: "Let no Moor my dying know;
Place me upright in the saddle, go ye forth to smite the foe;
Lift my banner, brave Bermudez; go ye dauntless, for I wis

I shall win my mightiest battle: God the morrow grants me this!"

Sate in ivory chair the hero; silently they gazed and feared;
Beamed his calm black eyes wide open; manly fell the fleecy beard;
Firm his flesh and passing comely, by the Soldan's balsam kept;
Smiling sate my Cid, as sweetly on the bloody field he slept.
Then in sendal green they robed him, on the greaves and cuisses prest,
Rich he shone in blazoned surcoat, with the red cross on his breast;
On his head a parchment helmet, cunning veined like gleaming steel.
God! my Cid uprose undying, stark and grim from head to heel!
Royally pranced Bavieca, with the old delight he neighed;
Joyous danced the conquering banner; lit the dark Tizona's blade.
Silent mount the knights around him, thro' Valencia's gate they stream,
Silent where the white tents glisten, sweeping like a ghastly dream;
Silent as the frost of midnight falls upon the flowery brake:

Hark! the tambour! hark the terror! 'tis the Cid! the Cid! awake!

Vainly leaps the maddened Bucar, vain the awestruck army flies,
Thro' the morning mist as sunbeams, smite those stern, pursuing eyes:
And beside him, see! a chieftain on a snow-white courser came,
In his hand a snow-white banner, and a sword of scorching flame.
Santiago! Santiago! lo! the glorious day is won;

On the drifting wreck of battle bursts the red, exulting sun,
Gold and jewels, tents and corpses;—and afar King Bucar's pride,
As a flock of screaming sea-gulls, dips below the ebbing tide.

Lift thy lids to-day, Mount Vernon! where our Greatest rests no more,
But within his marble coffin starts to hear the cannon's roar,
Dreaming of his broken country, dreaming in heroic pain;

For methinks his voice is calling, Raise my palsied bones again:
Plant me upright in the saddle, bare my sword within my hand,
Let these ashes lead the battle to redeem a noble land!

O my country! God through trial brings the Man as pure, as strong!
O blind giant, shorn and fettered by thy little masters long;
Grinding still for greedy factions, groping dim thro' years of sleep,
Long enow the lazy currents thro' thy drowsy veinlets creep,
Long enow thine iron manhood eaten hangs with selfish rust.
Wakes to-day that hero-spirit, stands erect that hero-dust!

LITERARY INTELLIGENCE

AND

NOTES ON NEW BOOKS.

FROM Mr. D. Van Nostrand, of New York, we have copies of the new editions of several valuable works, already received with great favor by the army and navy.

Among these we are struck with the practical character of "Gunnery Instructions simplified for the Volunteer Officers of the United States Navy, with Hints to Executive and Other Officers," by Lieutenant-Commander EDWARD BARRETT, U. S. N. This is the fourth edition, revised and enlarged. The duties are clearly defined; the guns are described, with diagrams; the call to quarters and clearing for action, with all the details of preparation, are explained. The manual exercise, or drill, for various guns differing in carriage and calibre, is laid down; and the watch and quarter bills, stating the rank, posts, and duties of all seamen, are very valuable. This book should be in the hands of every naval officer. 12mo, 93 pp.

Captain R. F. HUNTER'S "Manual for Quartermasters and Commissaries" gives valuable and lucid instructions in preparing vouchers, abstracts, returns, &c., and presents all the modified regulations on that subject. An appendix of sixty-eight pages contains all the prescribed forms. 12mo, 119 pp.

Dr. JOHN ORDRONAUX's "Manual of Instructions for Military Surgeons" comprises the modes of examining recruits and discharging soldiers. He classifies the diseases, and gives minute directions for detecting them. Armed with this knowledge, no educated surgeon can be easily deceived by a designing man. Dr. Ordronaux is the distinguished Professor of Medical Jurisprudence in Columbia College, New York; and his book strikes us quite as favorably as any of the numerous treatises on the same subject called forth by the great war. 12mo, 234 pp.

From the same pen we have a little 16mo of one hundred and thirty-nine pages, containing "Hints on Health in Armies." The hints are upon barrack and camp life, marches, food and clothing, and, without pretension to being a complete treatise, it is a valuable little book of most excellent "hints."

We need say little beyond announcing the title of Captain C. C. ANDREWS'S "Hints to Company Officers on their Military Duties." Captain Andrews is in the Third Minnesota Regiment, and wrote this treatise while a prisoner of war in Georgia. It contains a few excellent platitudes with not very apt historical illustrations. But it is only "a little one," being a 16mo of sixtyeight pages.

Last of Mr. Van Nostrand's present list we have Dr. FRANCIS LIEBER'S "Instructions for the Government of the Armies of the United States in the Field," a kind of constitutional, semi-international system principally designed for the conduct of our troops in this war. Revised by a board of officers, it was issued

from the Adjutant-General's Office as General Order No. 100. The last section (the tenth) treats of insurrection, civil war, and rebellion, and touches the delicate questions with tact and discretion. It makes a duodecimo pamphlet of thirty-six pages. As a literary paper, it is well written; as a general order, it might have been condensed to half its size.

Our thanks are due to Captain HENRY A. WISE, of the Naval Bureau of Ordnance at Washington, for his report of the condition of that bureau to the Honorable Secretary of the Navy, in October last. Although not very recent, it is quite to our purpose to place on record several of its interesting statements for future reference. As entirely unprepared as the navy was to meet the unexpected outburst of civil war in 1861, it is due to the energy of all its officers and bureaus that the chief of ordnance is able to say, not without honest pride, that no ship or squadron has been delayed for the want of ordnance and ordnance supplies since the beginning. A very great difficulty was, however, encountered in the want of depots for storage in the West. At the outset, there was not a naval gun on the Mississippi, and all, or nearly all, our cruisers were on foreign stations. With unexampled energy, therefore, the Navy Department set to work, while using the old guns, to make new ones. The statement of ordnance in 1861 was two thousand four hundred and sixty-eight heavy guns and one hundred and thirty-six howitzers. Of these, among which many were old and not very serviceable, only five hundred and fiftyfive were on vessels of every class; the rest were stored in navy-yards or were upon receiving-ships. By the following table it will be seen that, from 1861 to the date of the report, in 1863, there was an increase of one hundred per cent. in numbers alone.

"The following tabular statement affords a comprehensive view of the facts, and illustrates the rapid increase in the number of effective guns of smooth bore, and the addition of rifled pieces, which has been made in the ordnance of our navy :