Men were arriving every day in squads of from twenty to fifty, and leaving at intervals in detachments of from 100 to 500, to be distributed among their respective regiments at the seat of war. At length our turn came. It was on a Friday.--Now, Friday, though generally considered by superstitious persons an unlucky day, has often proved a lucky one for me. I was born on Friday; was married on Friday; and now I started to go to the war on Friday. I shouldn't wonder if on some Friday in the future I would die--and that will be another great event in my life. Well, we started on a Friday afternoon, and taking the cars at the Old Colony depot in Boston and the boat at Fall River, found ourselves next morning in the city of New York. We were quartered in barracks on White street, furnished with filthy beds, miserable "grub," and allowed free range of the city. A lieutenant (from Haverhill, I believe) had charge of our squad, which numbered about a hundred, and some of his enthusiastic admirers in the crowd presented him with a sword. There was, of course, a presentation speech, enthusiastic, pathetic, patriotic and warlike, and a response suitable and sentimental. It made a good impression on me at the time; but then I had yet to learn the difference between what an Indian would call "talk fight" and "fightem." On the following Monday afternoon, with all "traps" snugly bestowed and knapsacks strapped on, we were drawn up in front of the barracks, when the lieutenant stepped out in front and proposed three cheers for the barrack-master, which were given; but I did not join in, even in dumb show, having too much conscientiousness to outrage the finer feelings of my stomach by cheering for an individual who had cheated and abused it. We then took up our line of march for the transport, and went along almost unnoticed save by a few patriotic individuals who bade us a fervent God-speed and wished that good-fortune might attend us wherever we went; but the great mass seemed hardened to the sight of their fellow men going away from amongst them to explore unknown fields of danger, and to purchase with their life's blood a continuance and perpetuity of that nationality which has made the United States of America the first among nations. As these thoughts entered my mind, they suggested the picture of the hundreds of thousands of devoted men who passed through this great city, with all their hardest and most bitter experiences--hardships and dangers, sickness and death--before them, many, very many of them to return again no more; and I began to realize that, though still in a land of peace and plenty, a few days would bring me out upon far different scenes and into circumstances that would require a bold heart to meet as they ought to be met. Luckily for us all, the future cannot be penetrated, or we should be mourning calamities before they befall us; dreading dangers before they threaten, and finally become