o chance, they will get along.

"Then the married men are inquiring for tin reflectors, for hard bread,
though healthy, is never tempting. India rubber cloaks are in
requisition too.

"Those who are going, claim the doctor in case of accidents. Those who
stay, their wives at least, want him for fear of measles; while the
disciple of Esculapius, though he knows there will be better cooking if
he remain at home, is certain there will be food for fun if he go. It is
soon decided--the doctor goes.

"Then the privates share in the pleasure of the day. How should a
soldier be employed but in active service? besides, what a capital
chance to desert! One, who is tired of calling 'All's well' through the
long night, with only the rocks and trees to hear him, hopes that it
will be his happy fate to find out there is danger near, and to give the
alarm. Another vows, that if trouble wont come, why he will bring it by
quarrelling with the first rascally Indian he meets. All is ready.
Rations are put up for the men;--hams, buffalo tongues, pies and cake
for the officers. The batallion marches out to the sound of the drum and
fife;--they are soon down the hill--they enter their boats;
handkerchiefs are waved from the fort, caps are raised and flourished
over the water--they are almost out of sight--they are gone."

Apart from these trips abroad and the stated drills and terms of guard
duty the tasks which occupied the time of the soldiers depended upon the
season of the year. A general order of September 11, 1818, had commanded
the making of gardens at all the military posts.[249] In the fall of
1819 when the temporary cabins at New Hope Cantonment had been built,
the soldiers began ploughing for the crop of the next summer.[250] Major
Long, in 1823, found two hundred and ten acres under cultivation--one
hundred of wheat, sixty of maize, fifteen of oats, fourteen of potatoes,
and twenty acres in gardens.[251] All through the history of Old Fort
Snelling the soldiers were employed as farmers. A visitor in 1852
observed that "its garrison is rather deficient in active
employment, and we noticed a number of the rank and file taking exercise
in a large corn and vegetable field attached to the Fort. It was
certainly not exactly soldierly employment, but it was more manly, to
our mind, than shooting and stabbing at $8 a month, and no question
asked."[252]

For the horses and cattle kept at the fort a great deal of hay was
necessary fo