ns. The
doctor in especial was a very great favourite, both with men and
women; who I notice are most ready to bestow their favour where it is
least cared for. I don't know but Dr. Sandford cared for it; only he
did not show that he did. The claims of society however began to
interfere with my geological and other lessons.

A few days after his brother's arrival, the doctor had been carried
off by a party of gentlemen who were going back in the mountains to
fish in the White Lakes. I was left to the usual summer delights of
the place; which indeed to me were numberless; began with the echo of
the morning gun (or before) and ended not till the three taps of the
drum at night. The cadets had gone into camp by this time; and the
taps of the drum were quite near, as well as the shrill sweet notes of
the fife at reveille and tattoo. The camp itself was a great pleasure
to me; and at guardmounting or parade I never failed to be in my
place. Only to sit in the rear of the guard tents and watch the
morning sunlight on the turf, and on the hills over the river, and
shining down the camp alleys, was a rich satisfaction. Mrs. Sandford
laughed at me; her husband said it was "natural," though I am sure he
did not understand it a bit; but the end of all was, that I was left
very often to go alone down the little path to the guard tents among
the crowd that twice a day poured out there from our hotel and met the
crowd that came up from Cozzens's hotel below.

So it was, one morning that I remember. Guardmounting was always late
enough to let one feel the sun's power; and it was a sultry morning,
this. We were in July now, and misty, vaporous clouds moved slowly
over the blue sky, seeming to intensify the heat of the unclouded
intervals. But wonderful sweet it was; and I under the shade of my
flat hat, with a little help from the foliage of a young tree, did not
mind it at all. Every bit of the scene was a pleasure to me; I missed
none of the details. The files of cadets in the camp alleys getting
their arms inspected; the white tents themselves, with curtains
tightly done up; here and there an officer crossing the camp ground
and stopping to speak to an orderly; then the coming up of the band,
the music, the marching out of the companies; the leisurely walk from
the camp of the officer in charge, drawing on his white gloves; his
stand and his attitude; and then the pretty business of the parade.
All under that July sky; all under th