By the time the talk about the war was ended the party had reached the citadel, which they visited with interest, and then proceeded to the Bishop's Palace, now occupied as a military barrack, and in a bad state of repair. While they stood looking down upon the city and the grassy and bushy slope of the hill, Frank recited the following piece of verse, which was written by Charles Fenno Hoffman shortly after the stirring events commemorated in the lines:
"We were not many—we who stood
Before the iron sleet that day;
Yet many a gallant spirit would
Give half his years, if he but could
Have been with us at Monterey.
"Now here, now there, the shot it hailed
In deadly drifts of fiery spray;
Yet not a single soldier quailed
When wounded comrades round them wailed
Their dying shouts at Monterey.
"And on, still on, our columns kept,
Through walls of flame, its withering way;
Where fell the dead, the living stept,
Still charging on the guns that swept
The slippery streets of Monterey.
"The foe himself recoiled aghast
When, striking where he strongest lay.
We swooped his flanking batteries past,
And, braving full their murderous blast,
Stormed home the towers of Monterey.
"Our banners on those turrets wave,
And there our evening bugles play,
Where orange-boughs above their grave
Keep green the memory of the brave
Who fought and fell at Monterey.
"We were not many—we who pressed
Beside the brave who fell that day;
But who of us hath not confessed
He'd rather share their warrior rest
Than not have been at Monterey?"
"There is one thing we must mention in our account of the battle," said Fred, as they were returning from the Bishop's Palace to the city.
"What is that?" Frank asked.
"Why, we must say that there was a young officer here named U. S. Grant; he was a second lieutenant of the Fourth Infantry, and was one of those who charged up the side of the hill to the Bishop's Palace. He afterwards became General Grant, whom all the world knows of, and whose name will be remembered in America for all time."
"I didn't think of that when I was talking about the battle," Frank answered, "but I remember it all now. And I have read in one of the books on Mexico that he was offered promotion for his conduct in the battle, but declined it because another man was promoted at the same time. In declining the offer he said, 'If Lieutenant —— deserves promotion I do not.'"
OFFICERS' UNIFORMS IN 1860.
"And there's another thing that needs explanation," continued the youth, "and that is the uniform of the officers and soldiers of our army in the pictures of the battles in Mexico. It is quite unlike the uniform worn in the Civil War fifteen years later, and now in use."