Twenty years have passed away since a band of hastily-gathered minute-men left their homes to defend the soil of Pennsylvania from the first threatened invasion of the State by the rebel army under General R.E. Lee. Viewed through the lapse of this long period, crowded as it has been with so many momentous events in the life of the nation, the incidents of that brief and comparatively unimportant campaign begin, nevertheless, from their increasing remoteness, to take upon themselves a degree of

After the reverses to our arms at the disastrous battles of the Second Bull Run and Centreville, in the latter part of August, 1862, and the retrograde movements of the Union forces in Virginia in consequence, the purpose of the enemy to follow up his advantage by endeavoring to take the Capital, invade the Middle States, and thus strike terror into the hearts of the people of the North, became immediately apparent. In the early part of September, war meetings were being held in Pennsylvania to