At a cost of sixteen thousand dollars I put in a most excellent water and sewage system, with a cement-walled lake in the middle of the parade ground, sixty by two hundred feet. Heretofore the parade ground and the officers' yards were bare of grass because of the extreme drought and the millions of ants which ate the grass. We put fountains all over the post, capable of throwing water one hundred feet high, as the reservoirs had four hundred feet pressure. I established a small water motor which sawed all the wood and ran all the machines in the carpenter shop. [Illustration: MY FAMILY AND COMMANDING OFFICER'S QUARTERS, FORT THOMAS, A. T.] [Illustration: PICNIC UNDER COLUMNAR CACTUS NEAR FORT THOMAS, A. T. READ, MILLS, MRS. VIELE, WHIPPLE, NANNIE, LITTLE ANSON, CONSTANCE, FREEMAN.] General Miles visited the post after my work was completed and issued a very complimentary order which gave me a standing throughout the army as one capable of meeting unusual difficulties in my line. Grant was in a most beautiful climate, about four thousand feet above the sea, with Mount Graham six thousand feet higher, three miles away. The climate, trees, foliage, flowers and rapid streams of this mountain were much like the Adirondacks, so we built a small log hut camp there for the ladies and children. Nannie's description of a visit to this camp is better than any I can write. IN CAMP, NEAR FORT GRANT, July 18, 1888. MY DEAR MOTHER: