Colonel Grant was drilling his men at Caseyville, when there was a rumor that Quincy, on the Mississippi River, was in danger from the guerrilla rebels of Missouri. He was ordered to the exposed point, and, in the absence of transportation, marched his regiment one hundred and twenty miles of the distance. From Quincy he was ordered over the river into Missouri, for the protection of the Hannibal and St. Joseph's Railroad; and Brigadier General Pope, then in command of the forces in that section, stationed him at Mexico, forty miles north of the Missouri River. On the march to this place, the Twenty-first passed through a small village whose principal establishment was a grocery, at which the principal article on sale was whiskey. It was a melancholy fact that many of the citizens now transformed into soldiers had acquired a villanous habit of imbibing this fiery fluid, so destructive to good discipline. Some of the troops stole out of the line, and filled their canteens with the liquor at this shop, and, lacking discretion as well as correct personal habits, were soon reeling from the effects of their frequent potations. Without any violent demonstrations of indignation, which many men would have deemed necessary on such an occasion, Colonel Grant halted his regiment, as if to afford the men a brief rest. Without giving any one an opportunity to suspect that anything was the matter, he passed along the lines, and examined each canteen. Whenever he detected the odor of whiskey, he coolly emptied the contents on the ground, "without note or comment." The intoxicated ones he ordered to be tied behind the wagons, and kept there till they were animated by higher views of military discipline. Whiskey and all intoxicating liquors were rigidly excluded from his camp. Grant was always on time himself, and required promptness and punctuality in all his officers. He never blustered, or seemed to be in a hurry. He insisted that everything should be done at the appointed time. One morning the colonel was walking about the camp, smoking his pipe, when he discovered a company drawn up at roll call. It was half an hour after the required time, and Grant quietly informed the officer that it was no time to call the roll, and ordered him to send his men immediately to their quarters. He was promptly obeyed, and the delinquent was punished for his want of punctuality. The colonel resumed his pipe and his walk, as though nothing had happened. This quiet, undemonstrative way was effective, and the offence was not again repeated. Careful and particular in the minor details of duty, his regiment was brought up to the highest degree of discipline; but it was quite as much the manner as the substance which attracts attention. CHAPTER X. _Wherein Captain Galligasken relates a pleasing Anecdote of the illustrious Soldier, and shows how and why he captured Paducah._