Chesapeake Bay, Friday, July 4.
While I was writing the above letter Mr. Olmsted came out from a long interview with Dr. Letterman, the new Medical Director, in which the latter had urged him to go to Washington and see and advise the Surgeon-General about the state of things here. So Colonel and Mrs. M. were put on board the “Daniel Webster” (then loading to sail that night), we took Mrs. Trotter in exchange, Doctors Ware, Coolidge, and Jenkins were left on the “Elizabeth” to misery and business, and we came off at once. We passed the “Monitor,” roaring and whistling away, at one of the doubtful points of our position. I looked down upon her as we passed: she is literally nothing but a flat tray, a foot and a half out of water, with what looks like a small gasometer in the middle of her.
As we passed Fortress Monroe this morning we heard of the President’s call for three hundred thousand men. Very good; but we wish he would send fifty thousand here at once.
