Fort Vancouver was a parallelogram about seven hundred and fifty feet long and four hundred and fifty broad, enclosed by an upright picket wall of large and closely fitted beams, over twenty feet in height, secured by buttresses on the inside. Originally there was a bastion at each angle of the fort. In the earlier times there were two twelve pounders mounted in these bastions. In the center of the fort there were some eighteen pounders; all these cannon, from disuse, became merely ornamental early in the thirties.[5] In 1841, when Commodore Wilkes was at Fort Vancouver, there were between the steps of Dr. McLoughlin's residence, inside the fort, two old cannon on sea-carriages, with a few shot. There were no other warlike instruments.[6] It was a very peaceful fort. The interior of the fort was divided into two courts, having about forty buildings, all of wood except the powder magazine, which was constructed of brick and stone. In the center, facing the main entrance, stood the Hall in which were the dining-room, smoking-room, and public sitting-room, or bachelor's hall. Single men, clerks, strangers, and others made the bachelor's hall their place of resort. To these rooms artisans and servants were not admitted. The Hall was the only two-story house in the fort. The residence of Dr. McLoughlin was built after the model of a French Canadian dwelling-house. It was one story, weather-boarded, and painted white. It had a piazza with vines growing on it. There were flower-beds in front of the house. The other buildings consisted of dwellings for officers and their families, a school-house, a retail store, warehouses and shops. A short distance from the fort, on the bank of the river, was a village of more than fifty houses, for the mechanics and servants, and their families, built in rows so as to form streets. Here were also the hospital, boat-house, and salmon-house, and near by were barns, threshing-mills, granaries, and dairy buildings. The whole number of persons, having their homes at Fort Vancouver and its vicinity, men, women, and children, was about eight hundred. The Hall was an oasis in the vast social desert of Oregon. Fort Vancouver was a fairy-land to the early travellers, after their long, hard journeys across the continent. Thomas J. Farnham was a traveller who came to Oregon in 1839. He was entertained by Dr. McLoughlin at Fort Vancouver. In his account of his travels, which he subsequently published, he gives the following description of the usual dinner at Fort Vancouver: