low which seemed hard enough to
fell an ox, and then remarked "All right!" I could not have been made more
happy than I was by his decision if he had knocked me down. He settled one
thing at any rate which had long been a disputed question in our family,
namely, that my breathing apparatus was "all right."

After the examinations were concluded, the "lucky ones" were sworn in and
marched down to the quartermaster's department to receive their
equipments. The "pride, pomp and circumstance of glorious war" had never
possessed any great charm for me. I had belonged to an engine company and
a Sunday-school, but never to a military company; in fact, until I went on
to Camp Stevens I do not remember ever to have had a musket in my hand.
This will serve to explain why, when all of the members of my company had
been supplied with arms, the officer in command called attention to the
fact that I had my gun wrong side before, my hand grasping the lock or
hammer instead of the "guard." The suggestion that I should join the
"awkward squad" was sufficiently exasperating to have almost induced me to
throw up my commission.

But a still further humiliation was in store for me. At our first drill in
the manual of arms, among the other orders given was, "ram cartridge,"
when the officer in charge discovered that I had inserted the wrong end of
the ramrod into the muzzle of the gun, I having found the hollow space in
the large end very convenient in which to insert the ball of my little
finger in sending the imaginary cartridge to its destination. Fortunately
for me, no further opportunities for demonstrating my fitness for
promotion in the "awkward squad" were furnished me, and my leisure hours
were spent in acquiring proficiency in drill. How well I succeeded will
appear.

While we were on Camp Stevens we had a great many visitors. Among those
whom I shall ever remember was that "grand, square and upright" citizen of
Pawtucket, Charley Chickering. It so happened that the day he visited us,
I was performing guard duty around the camp. I noticed that my portly
friend, as he paraded up and down the sidewalk opposite me, seemed deeply
interested in my movements. Presently he came across the street and walked
alongside of me awhile as I paced my beat back and forth. He was silent.
So was I. But at length that ominous chuckle of his began to be heard, or
perhaps I should say a series of chuckles, which all who are acquainted
with him so wel