The day after Mr. Roosevelt’s visit the Camp was astir early. The Ambassador breakfasted with the officers and master carpenters in the mess-room; in spite of the pouring rain, he was off before eight o’clock with Belknap on a tour of inspection. He was delighted with everything, had a good word for everybody. More than twelve hundred men were now employed at Messina, Reggio, Sbarre and the smaller places, where our Lilliputian “wooden palaces” were going up. The Ambassador, who had kept in touch with every step of the work, now saw it “in full swing,” saw the working of the system, the organization of the army of labor. There were corps for clearing the ground, stacking the lumber, delivering the building materials, and for cleaning up. There were interpreters, mostly Sicilians, who had been in America, carters and water-boys. The Sicilian and Calabrian carpenters all served an apprenticeship in the “shop.” Here under the keen eye of Phillips, the carpenter in charge, each man was tested, and then taught to do one thing,--whatever he proved fittest for. To build one hundred houses a week was Belknap’s ambition; sometimes he fell short, oftener he exceeded the number. This is the way the thing was done: First on the ground came Cook--ship’s carpenter from the “Celtic,” a Boston man--with his gang. They cleared the land (the peasants had already cut down the lemon trees), smoothed and leveled the soil, drove the foundation posts, laid the sills. Second, came Emerson, the Philadelphian, and his gang of framers. They put up the side studs, the roof frame, the gable ends (made in the shop), and laid the floor joists. Third, came Cox of Brooklyn with his gang. They placed the end studs, the door and window frames, their “cripples,” and the kitchen framing. When the work of these two framing gangs was done, they passed on, leaving a skeleton house behind them.