space, equal indeed to the depth of a large city residence. The barracks for the soldiers are divided into rooms, generally about sixty by twenty feet, and during a part of the war many of them were assigned to the enlisted men who were prisoners.

A full garrison for Fort Warren would be not far from twenty-five hundred men, and that number could be quartered in the casemates.

Above these buildings are the ramparts, on which the chief part of the armament is placed, and these ramparts are walled in by a parapet of about five feet in height, of very thick masonry, intended to protect the men while working the guns, from the fire of an enemy. These ramparts are now provided with a full armament of ten inch and fifteen inch guns, placed as near together as convenience in working would permit, but in our day the greater part of the guns were four inch and thirty-two pounders, the casemate battery alone, consisting of eight inch columbiads.

The entire equipment of the Fort comprises over three hundred of these heavy guns, of which some seventy may always be concentrated upon any one point of the channel which they defend. Outside, and immediately surrounding the walls of the casemated fort is a fosse, or ditch, some fifty feet in width, and outside of this are other defences, (which outwardly, are earthworks,) including an exterior curtain on the north, a ravelin on the south, and a water battery on the northwest, the whole composing in fact a fortress of great strength, even in these days of iron-clads and great guns.

To one who thoroughly explores the Island there will recur vivid reminiscences of the mysterious castles of romance and of history. He will find here a sally-port, a postern, a drawbridge, and a portcullis. Here, too, are passages under ground and in the walls; turret staircases, huge vaulted apartments, and safe and dark dungeons, the ways to and through which may be set down upon the plans of the engineer corps, but are familiar to no living man. One can be easily bewildered among the crooks and turns, the ups and downs of the corridors, and it needs only a dark and windy night to make almost real the romantic descriptions of the Castle of Udolfo, with its clanging sounds of chains, its sweeping gusts of air, its strange moanings and howlings, and the startling noise of some sudden clang of a shutting door reverberating among the arches.

More than twelve years had passed since the 32d Regiment left Fort Warren for more stirring scenes, when the writer for the first time since that day, again visited the Island.

Escaping for a time from the courteous hospitality of the officers of the post, he started alone through the once accustomed scenes. Grim visaged war had smoothed his wrinkled front. There were no sentinels to challenge or salute; no familiar faces in the well-remembered quarters. Even the uniforms were changed; officers seemed to be wearing sergeants’ stripes on their trousers, and unknown ornaments on their shoulders. There were women about the landing, newspapers in the guard-house (!), and a peaceful fishing pole and tackle leaned quietly against the sole survivor of all our sentry boxes.

The doorways to the officers’ casemates were shielded from the hot sun by gaily painted, veranda-like porches, about which shrubs and vines, with bright foliage and blossoms, glistened in the sunlight, and in the very room where erstwhile Mason and Slidell pursued the warlike game of poker, and spat upon the bare flooring, there was a most ladylike parlor, with carpets, mirrors, and an attractive-looking case of book-shelves, well loaded with seemly books.

Again was paced the line of our outposts. Every step awakened old memories—every pebble seemed a friend; but there was no ice upon the glacis or the “shelf” at post eighteen, and instead of the cold winds, came grateful breezes from the sea, which no longer leaden in color dashed against the rock, but blue and smooth basked in the hot noon-day, and laughingly rippled on the beach. It would have been a sad walk but for the beauty of the summer scenes—it would have been a joyous one but for clinging memories.

During the time of our stay in garrison at Fort Warren, the battalion was increased to six companies by the addition of Companies E and F, recruited during the winter.

Company E was raised in the Old Colony by Captain Cephas C. Bumpus. First Lieutenant, Josiah C. Fuller; Second Lieutenant, Lyman B. Whiton. The Company was mustered into service December 7th, 1861, and joined immediately.

Company F was enlisted in Boston, also by Captain Bumpus, who was detailed for the duty, and was mustered in about the first of March, 1861, its officers being, Captain, James A. Cunningham; First Lieutenant, Charles K. Cobb, (Adjutant); Second Lieutenant, William H. Gertz.

The breaking in of the men was upon the regular-army system; first each man was “set up” by himself, then the drill was in squads, in increasing numbers, and afterward in company and battalion. When the weather was such as absolutely to forbid out-of-door drill, the men were taught in the school of artillery, and practiced on the great guns in the casemate battery.

The most exact discipline was necessarily maintained, and as soldierly discipline is only to be obtained by close attention to minutiæ—not even things apparently trifling were neglected. The fact that one button of a soldier’s overcoat was not fastened, was noted and the parade was stopped until the defect was remedied. No soldier was allowed to sit in the presence of an officer. The regulation salutes proper to each rank were required and paid by officers and men, sentinels and the guard. Adhering to the letter of the regulations, our manual was that of Scott, because we were armed with muskets, not rifles. Every nook and corner of every barrack and bunk, and every portion of the dress of every officer and man, must at all times be satisfactory to the keen and critical eye of an “old army” Colonel.

All of this was needed to make perfect soldiers, and all of it was readily accepted and observed by the men, more than nine-tenths of whom were American born, in order that they might become good soldiers. Singularly enough it was more difficult to bring the officers to exact the honors due to rank, than the soldiers to yield them.

Army officers often expressed their surprise at the rapidity with which a command so essentially native, was brought to the extreme of army discipline, and almost without punishment. This result was a complete proof that intelligent Americans can be brought into a state of thorough and exact discipline more readily, by reason of their intelligence, than the uneducated immigrants who were once thought to make better soldiers because of their comparative ignorance. Of course there were occasional extra hours of guard duty for men returning from leave on shore—people on the mainland were so very hospitable—but rarely was any more serious correction requisite.

There was one case, a second offence perhaps, where the sinner was put on special log duty, and he has since declared that it was sufficiently severe to keep him dry for six months. Two or three sticks of four-foot firewood, not excessively large, but good fair size, were placed in the bastion near the officers’ quarters, and as many more at the extreme end of the parade, near the postern. The offender was ordered to shoulder a billet from one bastion, and to carry it in “common time” to the other; there to lay it down, and taking up another, to return over his beat and deposit it at the place of departure—and so on for several hours. The punishment consisted, not in the laborious character of his occupation, but in the fact that he knew it was useless labor, and