As I have stated a fight was a very formal affair; while usually originating in quite an unmentionable way it was arranged to take place with a full regard to the proprieties. One of the sixteen men in my room was a jew named Lovenstein from Richmond. He was a new cadet like myself and was therefore liable to have trouble. He had declined to submit to some indignity required of him by an older cadet and he was thereupon challenged to fight. This latter he had no way of escaping. It was passed around during the day that there was to be a fight in so and so’s room that night, I got there in company with the men from our room about half after eight o’clock, the hour these affairs usually occurred. The room was packed to suffocation, standing around an improvised ring. The air was filled with tobacco smoke but there was absolutely no talking or noise. In the ring in the center of the room the two fighters were facing each other. My sympathies were with the jew because he came from our room. A jew in the South or in Richmond who comported himself as a gentleman was received as such, the commercialism that attached to the race elsewhere did not at that date affect his status as a gentleman in the South. Lovenstein stood up manfully to his task, with the creditable result that secured for him the regard of the other inmates of our room and it soon became understood that he was to be protected thereafter and that no further trouble was to be put up for him. The gala performance of the day was at dress parade. This occurred at five in the afternoon. The large plaza fronting the full width of the Alms House furnished a fine parade ground. Colonel Shipp, a portly, dignified impressive man who at the time of my present writing is still at the Institution now as Superintendent was then the Commandant, his adjutant was a little man named Woodbridge and these two with the well drilled corps as a whole furnished the three striking incidents of the parade. The awkward squads consisting of new cadets were put through simple evolutions at the same hour off from the parade ground at each end of the building. Visitors in large numbers assembled to watch each drill of the corps. At the close, the cadets were at liberty to stroll off in the neighborhood for an hour recreation, and that was liberally availed of. Soldierly dignity was not invariably preserved in these strolls. Pent up youthful vitality freed from restraint showed itself in rough play and upon one occasion an older companion of mine in the exuberance of his spirits lifted me to his shoulders and completed his walk bearing me with him in this position until his return to the restraining formalities of the Institute grounds. One’s introduction to the Institute was in strict military discipline; the details of name, age, residence and the taking of the oath of allegiance to the State and to the Confederacy were followed by a written requisition for a blanket,