After the close of the war, in 1794, a Corps of "Artillerists and Engineers" was organized. This corps was stationed at West Point, and became the nucleus of the United States Military Academy. In 1802, by operation of the law reorganizing the army, this corps was divided, as the names would indicate, into an Artillery Corps and Corps of Engineers. The Corps of Engineers consisted of one major, two captains, four lieutenants, and ten cadets. The Artillery Corps was again divided into the Ordnance Corps and several regiments of artillery, now five in number, while the duties of the Corps of Engineers were divided between the Engineer Corps and a Corps of Topographical Engineers, organized at a later date; but on the breaking out of the late rebellion it was deemed best to unite the two corps, and they have so remained until the present time. The Corps of Engineers now consists of 118 officers of various grades, from second lieutenant to brigadier general, of which last grade there is only one officer, the chief of the corps, and it requires something more than an average official lifetime for the aforesaid lieutenant to attain that rank. Hardly one in ten of them ever reach it. Daniel Webster's remark to the young lawyer, that "there is always room at the top," will not apply to the Corps of Engineers. The officers are all graduates of the Military Academy, which institution continued as a part of the Corps of Engineers until 1866. The vacancies in the corps are filled by the assignment to it of from two to six graduates each year, and there is attached to the corps a battalion of four companies of enlisted men, formerly called Sappers and Miners, but now known as the Battalion of Engineers. We now come naturally to the duties of our military engineer, and here I may remark that these duties are so varied and so numerous that a detailed recital of them would suggest Goldsmith's "Deserted Village:" ... "And still the wonder grew That one small head could carry all he _ought to know_" [Never lose sight of fact for the sake of rhyme.] In general terms, his duties consist of: 1. Military surveys and explorations. 2. Boundary surveys. 3. Geodetic and hydrographic survey of the great lakes. 4. Building fortifications--both permanent works and temporary or field works. 5. Constructing military roads. 6. Pontoniering or building military bridges, both with the regular bridge trains and with improved materials. 7. The planning and directing of siege operations, either offensive or defensive; sapping, mining, etc. 8. Providing, testing and planting torpedoes for harbor defense when operating from shore stations. 9. Staff duty with general officers. 10. Improving rivers and harbors. 11. The building and repairing of lighthouses.