o be at headquarters when the trouble was being talked
about, he heard an officer suggest making use of the empty hogsheads
at the sugar-house; how to get them to the trenches was the next
question. This he promptly offered to solve if simply ordered to
do it and left to himself. Cavalry had never been of any use in
a siege, he said; it was time for a change. The order was instantly
given. Prince swung himself into the saddle and rode away. Before
daylight his men had carried through the woods and over the hills
to the mouth of the sap, opposite the southern angle of the
priest-cap, enough sugar hogsheads to make two tiers. The heads had
been knocked in, a long pole thrust through each hogshead, and thus
slung, it was easy for two mounted troopers to carry it between
them. Quietly rolled into position by the working parties and
rapidly filled with earth, a rude platform erected behind for the
sharp-shooter to mount upon, with a few sand-bags thrown on top to
protect his head,--this was the beginning of the great trench
cavalier, whose frowning crest the astonished Confederates awoke
the next morning to find towering high above their heads. Afterwards
enlarged and strengthened, it finally dominated the whole line of
defence not only in its immediate front, but for a long distance
on either side.

Not less ingenious was the device almost instinctively resorted to
by the artillerists for the safety of the gunners when, after the
siege batteries opened, the Confederate sharp-shooters began picking
off every head that came in sight. The first day saw a number of
gunners stricken in the act of taking aim, an incident not conducive
to deliberation or accuracy on the part of their successors at the
guns. The next sunrise saw every exposed battery, from right to
left, protected by a hinged shutter made of flat iron chiefly taken
from the sugar troughs, covered with strips of rawhide from the
commissary's, the space stuffed tight with loose cotton, and a hole
made through all, big enough for the gunner's eye, but too small
for the sharp-shooter's bullet. Such was substantially the plan
simultaneously adopted at three or four different points and
afterwards followed everywhere. The remedy was perfect.

On the 3d of July arrangements were made for the daily detail of
a brigade commander to act as General of the Trenches during a tour
of twenty-four hours, from noon to noon. His duties were to
superintend the siege o