Of course, we all had our military duties to attend to regularly. The drivers had to clean, feed, water, and exercise the horses, and keep the stables in order. The "cannoneers" had to keep the guns clean, bright, and ready for service any minute--also they had to stand guard at the guns on the hill all the time, and over the camp, at night, to guard the forage, and look after things generally. We had to drill some every day--police the camp and keep the roads near the camp in order. To this day's work we were called, every morning at six o'clock, by the bugler blowing the reveille. I may mention the fact that Prof. Francis Nicholas Crouch, the composer of the famous and beautiful song, "Kathleen Mavourneen," was the bugler of our Battery, and he was the heartless wretch who used to persecute us that way. To be waked up and hauled out about day dawn on a cold, wet, dismal morning, and to have to hustle out and stand shivering at roll call, was about the most exasperating item of the soldier's life. The boys had a song very expressive of a soldier's feelings when nestling in his warm blankets, he heard the malicious bray of that bugle. It went like this: "Oh, how I hate to get up in the morning; Oh, how I'd like to remain in bed. But the saddest blow of all is to hear the bugler call, 'You've got to get up, you've got to get up, You've got to get up this morning!' "Some day I'm going to murder that bugler; Some day they're going to find him dead. I'll amputate his reveille, And stamp upon it heavily, And spend the rest of my life in bed!" We didn't kill old Crouch--I don't know why, except that he was protected by a special providence, which sometimes permits such evil deeds to go unpunished. We used to hope that he would blow his own brains out, through his bugle, but he didn't--he lived many years after the war. =Camp Recreations= In between our stated duties, we had some time in which we could amuse ourselves as we chose, and we had many means of entertainment. We had a chessboard and men--a set of quoits, dominoes, and cards; and there was the highly intellectual game of "push pin" open to all comers. Some very skillful chess players were discovered in the company. When the weather served, we had games of ball, and other athletic games, such as foot races, jumping, boxing, wrestling, lifting heavy weights, etc. At night we would gather in congenial groups around the camp fires and talk and smoke and "swap lies," as the boys expressed it.