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Dr. Robinson was appointed
Commander-in-Chief for the defense of the city, and James H. Lane was
appointed second in command. But Lane was the principal figure in the
enterprise. He alone had military experience, and he alone had the
daring, the genius and the personal magnetism of a real leader.
The free State men, for the last year, had been passing through the
furnace-fires of a vigorous discipline, and they would have fought as
the Tennessee and Kentucky backwoodsmen of Andrew Jackson fought behind
their cotton bales at the battle of New Orleans. They had seen their
rights wrested out of their hands by a mob of ruffians, and now they
were proposing to settle the matter in that court of last resort that is
the final and ultimate appeal of the nations. Except Gen. Lane, they had
small knowledge of military tactics, but they knew how to look along the
barrel of a rifle; moreover, they would fight behind breastworks, and
this to raw troops would have been an immense advantage.
It is probable that the first intimation that Gov.


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