It is all so clear in the maps, so clear in the mind, But the orders are slow, the men in the blocks are slow To move, when they start they take too long on the way⁠— The General loses his stars and the block-men die In unstrategic defiance of martial law Because still used to just being men, not block-parts. McDowell was neither a fool nor a fighting fool; He knew his dice, he knew both armies unready, But congressmen and nation wanted a battle And he felt their hands on his shoulders, forcing his play. He knew well enough when he played that he played for his head As Beauregard and Johnston were playing for theirs, So he played with the skill he had⁠—and does not lie Under a cupolaed gloom on Riverside Drive. Put Grant in his place that day and with those same dice, Grant might have done little better. Wherefore, now, Irvin McDowell, half-forgotten general, Who tried the game and found no luck in the game And never got the chance to try it again