THE FURLOUGHMAN. Another June rolled around, the Board of Visitors arrived, the customary salute was fired and the alumni meeting held. The examinations were completed, another class was graduated and a new one admitted to the corps. As usual, at the annual examinations some of the “found” were turned back to join the next class, while the other unfortunates left the Point to return no more as cadets. The fortunate graduates and the happy furloughmen, after drawing the “balances due” from the Treasurer of the Academy, donned their “cit” clothes and went on furlough; the graduates to assume the duties of Second Lieutenants in the army at the expiration of their “graduating leave” on the 30th of the following September, and the second classmen to return to the Point at the expiration of their “furlough” on the 28th of August. The amounts due varied according to the economy practiced by the cadets. Some had nothing due, while others received as much as two hundred dollars in addition to the “equipment fund.” Four dollars per month is retained from the pay of each cadet as his “equipment fund,” and it is given to him when he graduates or leaves the Academy never to return as a cadet. Mine was the furlough class this year, and when I reached home my mother made me open my trunk in the back yard, and she herself was present to see that I shook and aired everything I had, for the reason, she said, that, as there were no women to keep things clean about our barracks, she was sure that we had bedbugs there. I had not been at home long when an old Quaker called on me and said: “H⸺, I have been waiting for thee to come home. During the war I noticed that soldiers always stepped off with the left foot first, and now that thee has been to the Government’s Military School for two years, thee probably knows why.” I had to confess my ignorance on the subject then, and I must confess it now. One day I received an invitation to visit a battalion of State Militia in camp, and I was requested to take my uniform. I accepted the invitation, and wore it in camp. I was able to and did give instruction in many points of the tactics, which at that time were new to the militia, and at the same time I learned much at this camp that was new and useful to me. At the request of the commanding officer of the camp I acted as Adjutant at parades and guard-mounts. I got along all right after the first dress parade, where I took post on the wrong side of the commanding officer after having presented arms to him. However, the militia of my state was not then as well posted on tactics[50] as it is to-day; my blunder was not discovered.