One of the ravines is ten miles long.

Another cuts the plateau itself for six miles, and a permanent stream flows through it.
The colonel and Dick saw everywhere rivers, brooks, bayous, hills, marshes and thickets, the whole turned by the Southern engineers into a vast and most difficult line of intrenchments.

Grant now had forty thousand men for the attack or siege, but he and his generals did not yet know that most of the scattered Confederate army had gathered together again, and was inside.

They believed that Vicksburg was held by fifteen thousand men at the utmost.
"What do you think of it, Colonel ?" asked Dick, as they sat horseback on one of the highest hills.
"It will be hard to take, despite the help of the navy.

Did you ever see another country cut up so much by nature and offering such natural help to defenders ?" "I've heard a lot of Vicksburg.