Never mind if they were not very deadly,--they at least looked formidable. Our artillery companies drew their cannon from the “gun-house” on the common; contrast this rough shed with the South Armory of today! After the martial exhibition was concluded, our forefathers betook themselves to the “Green Dragon,” or the “Bunch of Grapes,” or the “Exchange Coffee House” where coffee was by no means the limit, or some other popular tavern, for the military exercises which constituted the climax of the entire day. A clear distinction existed between militia and volunteers in the foot branch of the service, the volunteers being designated fusiliers or grenadiers or light infantry or rifles or cadets, and the militia being known as infantry. But the distinction was obscured in the “train of artillery.” So much of technical qualification was required of the artilleryman and cavalryman that all companies of such troops had to meet the higher military standards of volunteers and were so classified. In such rosters as existed, it was customary to print the names of company officers of artillery and cavalry, while such lists included only field officers in foot commands. First mention of a battalion of artillery appears in the roster of the 1st division for 1790, when the four companies in Boston, Dorchester, Middlesex and Roxbury are so designated. No field officer had yet been commissioned. This is the beginning of the Coast Artillery, the battalion and regimental organization having continued in unbroken existence from 1789 to the present time. While under every militia law ever adopted by Congress, not only the 1st Company but also the command as a larger unit might claim “ancient privileges” on the ground of continuous organization thruout these decades, it is just and right to state that the pride of the “Old First” has always been not to claim any privilege at all, except that of serving wherever and however it could be of the most use. At this date no battalion organization existed amongst the volunteer foot companies, each being an “independent” divisionary corps of infantry. October, 1789, our companies were again in line, this time to receive and escort the President of the United States, George Washington. In October, 1793, a sadder duty summoned them forth. John Hancock, patriot, signer of the declaration of independence, Governor of Massachusetts, and President of the Continental Congress, had finished his long and noble career and gone to his rest. Boston loved and honored its chief citizen; the funeral parade, in which our companies participated, was an expression of heart-felt grief. The companies were again called out on July 4th, 1795, to help lay the corner-stone of the new State-house, the famous “Bulfinch front.”