cumstances.
However, the "tenderfeet" incident had passed, and we were preparing our
evening meal, when bang! bang! bang! bang! rang out a half-dozen shots
in quick succession. Every man jumped as though the whole rebel army was
upon us. It was soon discovered that the explosions came from the camp
of the "tenderfeet." Some of those greenhorns had gathered a number of
those unexploded shells, set them up on end for a fireplace, and were
quietly boiling their coffee over them when they, of course, exploded.
Why none of them were seriously injured was a miracle. At the moment of
explosion no one happened to be very near the fire. A moment before a
dozen men had been standing over it. Does Providence graciously look out
for the tenderfoot? Some of them, I fear, were made to feel that they
would rather be dead than take the guying they got for this evidence of
their verdancy.

Camp life at Bolivar Heights soon resolved itself into the usual routine
of drill and picket duty. How many corps of the army were encamped here
I did not know, but we were a vast city of soldiers, and there was no
end of matters to occupy attention when off duty. These included bathing
expeditions to the Shenandoah, a mile and a half away; the "doing" of
the quaint old town of Harper's Ferry, and rambles up Maryland and
Loudon Heights, both of which were now occupied by our troops. This was
our first experience in a large encampment in the field. One feature of
it was exceedingly beautiful, and that was its system of "calls." The
cavalry and artillery were encamped on one side of us. Each battery of
artillery and battalion of cavalry had its corps of "trumpeters" or
"buglers," while the infantry regiments had their drum corps, whose duty
it was to sound the various "camp calls." The principal calls were
"reveille," the getting up or morning roll-call, at sunrise usually; the
guard mount, the drill, the meal calls, the "retreat" (evening
roll-call), and the "taps," the "turning in" or "lights out" call. The
reveille, the retreat, and taps were required to be sounded by each
battery, troop, and regiment in consecutive order, commencing at the
extreme right. The firing of the morning gun was the signal for the
first corps of cavalry buglers to begin the reveille, then in succession
it was repeated first through the bugler corps and then by the drum
corps back and forth through the lines until it had gone through the
whole army. As a martial and musical