er came to my knowledge, I got
along all right, and very pleasantly. It is a fact, at any rate, that I
presented a more respectable appearance than that which was displayed
during the brief time I held the position at Austin, Arkansas, in May,
1864.

CHAPTER XXIV.

THE SOLDIER'S PAY. RATIONS; ALLUSIONS TO SOME OF THE USEFUL LESSONS
LEARNED BY SERVICE IN THE ARMY IN TIME OF WAR. COURAGE IN BATTLE.

This story is now drawing to a close, so I will here speak of some
things of a general nature, and which have not been heretofore
mentioned, except perhaps casually.

One important feature in the life of a soldier was the matter of his
pay, and a few words on that subject may not be out of place. When I
enlisted in January, 1862, the monthly pay of the enlisted men of a
regiment of infantry was as follows: First sergeant, $20; duty
sergeants, $17; corporals and privates, $13. By act of Congress of May
1st, 1864, the monthly pay of the enlisted men was increased, and from
that date was as follows: First sergeant, $24; duty sergeants, $20;
corporals, $18; privates, $16. That rate existed as long, at least, as
we remained in the service. The first payment made to our regiment was
on May 1st, 1862, while we were in camp at Owl Creek, Tennessee. The
amount I received was $49.40, and of this I sent $45 home to my father
at the first opportunity. For a poor man, he was heavily in debt at the
time of my enlistment, and was left without any boys to help him do the
work upon the farm, so I regarded it as my duty to send him every
dollar of my pay that possibly could be spared, and did so as long as I
was in the service. But he finally got out of debt during the war. He
had good crops, and all manner of farm products brought high prices, so
the war period was financially a prosperous one for him. And, to be
fair about it, I will say that he later repaid me, when I was pursuing
my law studies at the Albany, New York, Law School, almost all the
money I had sent him while in the army. So the result really was that
the money received by me, as a soldier, was what later enabled me to
qualify as a lawyer.

I have heretofore said in these reminiscences that the great
"stand-bys" in the way of the food of the soldiers of the western
armies were coffee, sow-belly, Yankee beans, and hardtack. But other
articles of diet were also issued to us, some of which we liked, while
others were flat failures. I have previously said something ab