storing ordnance-supplies.

The storehouse, offices, and workshops are extensive buildings,--the
former being eight hundred feet long, and one of the latter six hundred
feet long and thirty-two feet wide.

In a description of the armory printed in 1817, the grounds are
described as a perfectly level, elevated plat, situated about half a
mile east of the village, from which there is a gradual ascent, flanked
on the north by a deep ravine and on the south by a less considerable
one, with an extensive plain spreading in the rear, the adjoining parts
being uncovered, fronting on the brow of the declivity, and commanding
an extensive and beautifully variegated landscape. At the present time,
the armory is not only in the city, but the streets at the north, south,
and east of the grounds are as thickly inhabited as any other portion of
the town. There has, however, been an increase in the population of
Springfield since 1817, from two to twenty-six thousand souls. A larger
number of workmen are employed within the armory-grounds at the present
time than the entire population of the place amounted to fifty years
ago.

The water-shops formerly occupied three different sites, being
denominated the upper, middle, and lower water-shops, on a stream called
Mill River, which exhibits, in a distance of less than half a mile, four
or five of the most charming waterfalls to be seen in the State. In 1817
these works comprised five workshops, twenty-eight forges, ten
trip-hammers, eighteen water-wheels, nine coal-houses, three stores, and
five dwellings.

These buildings were all constructed in the most substantial manner, of
stone and brick, and yet remain in an excellent state of preservation.
The trouble and expense attending the transportation of the various
parts of the musket from one series of shops to another, however,
rendered it desirable to assemble them all in one place, and the
location of the upper shops was decided upon as the most advantageous.
About eight years ago the work of constructing the new shops was begun.
Extensive excavations were made for a new dam, the bed of the stream was
changed, the sides being laid for a distance of half a mile with
freestone, and the basin raised five feet above its former level. Some
idea of the magnitude of these works may be formed from the fact that
over one million dollars was expended upon the foundations alone, before
a brick was laid in the superstructure.

A beautiful an