CHAPTER III.

The Buglers' Drill—Getting Used to the Calls—No Ear for Music—A Visitor from Home—A Basket full of Goodies—Taking Tintypes—A Special Artist at the Battle of Bull Run—Horses for the Troopers—Reviewed by a War Governor—Leaving Camp Meigs—A Mother's Prayers—The Emancipation Proclamation—The War Governors' Address.

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HOULD there be living to-day a survivor of Sheridan's Cavalry Corps of the Army of the Potomac who can, without shuddering, recall the buglers' drill, his probationary period on earth must be rapidly drawing to a close. I do not mean the regular bugle calls of camp or those sounded on company or battalion parade. I refer to the babel of bugle blasts kept up by the recruit “musicians” from the sounding of the first call for reveille till taps. A majority of the boys enlisted as buglers could not at first make a noise—not even a little toot—on their instruments, but when, under the instruction of a veteran bugler, they had mastered the art of filling their horns and producing sound they made up for lost time with a vengeance. And what a chorus! Reveille, stable call, breakfast call, sick call, drill call retreat, tattoo, taps—all the calls, or what the little fellows could do at them, were sounded at one time with agonizing effect.

The first sergeant of Company I said to me one day while we were in Camp Meigs:

“The adjutant wants more buglers, and he spoke of you as being one of the light weights suitable for the job. You may go and report to the adjutant.”

“I didn't enlist to be a bugler; I'm a full-fledged soldier.”

“But you're young enough to bugle.”