strings: "The enemy would fight," said the President once, in a letter to General Hooker, 'fin intrenchments, and have you at a disadvantage, and so, man for man, worst you at that point, while his main force would in some way be getting an advantage of you northward. In one word, I would not take any risk of being entangled upon the river like an ox jumped half over a fence and liable to be torn by dogs front and rear without a fair chance to gore one way and kick the other." It was also to Hooker that he wrote : "Only those generals who gain successes can set up dictators. What I now ask of you is military success, and I will risk the dictatorship."