Lee has tried his strokes on the right and left of the line. The centre remains⁠—that centre yesterday pierced For a brief, wild moment in Wilcox’s attack, But since then trenched, reinforced and alive with guns. It is a chance. All war is a chance like that. Lee considers the chance and the force he has left to spend And states his will. Dutch Longstreet, the independent, Demurs, as he has demurred since the fight began. He had disapproved of this battle from the first And that disapproval has added and is to add Another weight in the balance against the grey. It is not our task to try him for sense or folly, Such men are the men they are⁠—but an hour comes Sometimes, to fix such men in most fateful parts, As now with Longstreet who, if he had his orders As they were given, neither obeyed them quite Nor quite refused them, but acted as he thought best, So did the half-thing, failed as he thought he would, Felt justified and wrote all of his reasons down Later in controversy.