CHAPTER IX. A DAY IN CAMP. "I hear the bugle sound the calls For Water, Stable, and Tattoo, I hear it sound the Sick-Call grim, With faces wry as they drink down PARTIAL description of the daily programme of the rank and file of the army in the monotony of camp life, more especially as it was lived during the years 1861, '62, and '63, covers the subjectmatter treated in this chapter. I do not expect it to be all new to the outside public even, who have attended the musters of the State militia, and have witnessed something of the routine that is followed there. This routine was the same in the Union armies in many respects, only with the latter there was a reality about the business, which nothing but stern war can impart, and which therefore makes soldiering comparatively uninteresting in State camp-such, at least, is the opinion of old campaigners. The private soldiers in every arm of the service had many experiences in common in camp life, so that it will not be profitable to describe each in detail, but where the routine differs I shall be more entertaining and exact by adhering to the branch with which I am the most familiar, viz.: the light artillery; and this I shall do, and, in so doing, shall narrate not the routine of my own company alone, but essentially of that branch of the service throughout the army as artillerymen saw and lived it. Beginning the army day, then, the first bugle-call blown was one known in artillery tactics as the Assembly of Buglers, to sound which the corporal or sergeant of the guard would call up the bugler. It was sounded in summer about five o'clock, and in winter at six. It was the signal to the men to get out of their blankets and prepare for the morning roll-call, known as Réveillé. At this signal, the hum of life could be heard within the tents. "Put the bugler in the guard-house!" Turn out!"-"All up!"-and other similar expressions, mingled with yawns, groans, and exclamations of deep disgust, formed a part of the response to this always unwelcome summons. But as only the short space of fifteen minutes was to intervene before the next call, the Assembly, would be blown, the men had to bestir themselves. Most of them would arise at once, do the little dressing that was required, and perform or omit their toilet, according to the inclination or habit or time of the individual. A common mode of washing was for one man to pour water from a canteen into the hands of his messmate, and A CANTEEN WASH. thus take turns; but this method was practised most on the march. In settled camp, some men had a short log scooped out for a washbasin. Some were not so particular about being washed every day, and in the morning would put the time required for the toilet into another "turn over" and nap. As such men always slept with their full uniform on, they were equivalent to a kind of Minute Men, ready to take the field for rollcall, or any other call, at a minute's notice. As soon as the Assembly sounded, the sight presented was quite an interesting one. The men could be seen emerging from their tents or huts, their toilet in various stages of completion. Here was a man with one boot on, and the other in his hand; here, one with his clothes but toned in skips and blouse in hand, which he was putting on as he went to the line; here was one with a blouse on; there, one with his jacket or overcoat (unless uniformity of dress on line was required-it was not always at the morning roll-calls, and in some companies never, only on inspections). Here and there was a man just about half awake, having a fist at each eye, and looking as disconsolate and forsaken as men usually do when they get from the bed before the public at short notice. Then, this roll-call was always a powerful cathartic on a large number, who must go at once to the sinks, and let the Rebel army wait, if it wanted to fight, until their return. The exodus in that direction at the sounding of the assembly was really quite a feature. All enlisted men in a company, except the guard and sick, must be present at this rollcall, unless excused for good reasons. But as the shirks always took pride in dodging it, their notice of intention to be absent from it for any reason was looked at askance by the sergeants of detachments. The studied agony that these men would work not only into their features but their voice and even their gait would have been ludicrous in the extreme, if frequent repetitions had not rendered it disgusting; and the humorous aspect of these dodgers was not a little enhanced by the appearance which they usually had of having been dressed much as is a statue about to be dedicated, which, at the signal, by the pulling of a single cord, is instantly stripped of all its drapery and displayed in its full glory. Other touches, which old soldiers not artillerymen would readily recognize as familiar, might be added to the scene presented in camp, when the bugle or the drum called the men into line for the first time in the day. When at last the line was formed, it was dressed by the orderly, now called, I believe, first sergeant, and while at "Parade Rest" the bugles blew. RÉVEILLÉ. D.C. There were words improvised to many of these calls, which I wish I could accurately remember. Those adapted to Réveillé, in some regiments, ran as follows: I can't get 'em up, I can't get 'em up, I can't get 'em up, I tell you. I can't get 'em up, I can't get 'em up, I can't get 'em up at all. The corporal's worse than the private, |