got a pair of chickens in his drum, and one is for you." "Well, if
the poor fellow is sick, let him fall out."

A little explanation now about how the army is organized will probably
make my story clearer. That an army is made of three principal arms,
viz., artillery, cavalry, and infantry, is familiar to all; that the
cavalry is mounted is also well known, but that in actual fighting they
were often dismounted and fought as infantry may not be familiar to all.
The cavalry and infantry--or foot troops--are organized practically
alike, viz., first into companies of 101 men and officers; second, into
regiments of ten companies, or less, of infantry and twelve companies,
more or less, of cavalry, two or more companies of cavalry constituting
a "squadron," and a like number of companies of infantry a "battalion;"
third, into brigades of two or more--usually four--regiments; fourth,
divisions of two or more--usually three--brigades; fifth, army corps,
any number of divisions--usually not more than three. Logically, the
rank of officers commanding these several subdivisions would be colonel,
commanding a regiment; brigadier-general, his rank being indicated by
one star, a brigade; a major-general, two stars, a division; a
lieutenant-general, three stars, an army corps; and the whole army a
general, his rank being indicated by four stars. This was carried out by
the Confederates in the organization of their armies. But not so with
ours. With few exceptions--ours being one--the brigades were commanded
by the senior colonels, and towards the end of the war this was
sometimes temporarily true of divisions; the divisions by brigadiers,
whilst we had no higher rank than that of major-general until General
Grant was made, first, lieutenant-general, and finally general.

The artillery was organized into companies commonly called batteries.
There were two branches, heavy and light artillery. The former were
organized more like infantry, marched on foot and were armed with
muskets in addition to the heavy guns they were trained to use. The
latter were used against fortifications and were rarely brought into
field work. The light artillery were mounted either on the horses or on
the gun-carriages, and, though organized into a separate corps under the
direction of the chief of artillery, were usually distributed among the
divisions, one or two batteries accompanying each division.

In addition to these chief branches of the service, th