pressure from
Headquarters, for information as to tactics and army regulations.
Commissions for the officers came from the Governor, and uniforms from
the tailor; the mustering officer appeared, and these miscellaneous
gentlemen of various previous occupations and training, suddenly
became officers and men, in the army of the United States, tailor-made
and Governor-made.

Probably the parchments and the textile fabrics had been selected with
quite as much care and discrimination as the raw material which they
covered and designated. Certainly the commissions and uniforms were
made by rule and in accordance with the army regulations. The
officers, so far, had simply happened.

The diverse effect of all these new clothes was remarkable. Of course
there was no such blaze of glory as that which now appears upon the
Avenue on occasions of official display; but compared with the sober
drabs of civil life, the blue cloth with the gold buttons and the new
shoulder-straps were comparatively gorgeous. Some whose youth was more
easily affected by the unusual display assumed airs of importance;
others wore their honors with meekness, and some went about with a
settled determination expressed upon their faces to attend to business
and to ignore as far as possible these honors and glories thus
suddenly thrust upon them. The camp put on a military appearance, and
the regiment, if not a lion, was at least clothed in the skin of that
formidable beast. Arms and equipments were procured for two companies,
and there were feeble attempts to drill. Company K, blessed with an
officer of some experience, went forward with a bound, and the blind
leaders of the blind in other companies groped on. A drum corps was
organized, if that could be said to be organized in which every member
drummed or fifed independently of all others.

The Adjutant and Sergeant-Major were made out of the same raw
material, and in a few days the regiment reached that astounding
perfection of drill which permitted it to get into line and go from
line into column and the reverse. The sound of men counting off, "1,
2," "1, 2," "1, 2," was heard throughout the camp, and that wonderful
complication in which No. 2 was perpetually stepping to the right of
No. 1, was a daily occurrence, and finally came to be understood. Of
course the line was not at first the shortest distance between two
fixed points, and the process of going from line into column resembled
a convulsion.