The Tedium of Camp.
And you, good yeoman, Whose limbs were made in England, show us here The mettle of your pasture; let us swear That you are worth your breeding.--Henry V.
To really enjoy life in a Camp of Instruction requires a peculiar cast of mind.It requires a genuine liking for a tread-mill round of merely mechanical duties; it requiers a taste for rising in the chill and cheerless dawn, at the unwelcome summons of "reveille,"to a long day filled with a tiresome routine of laborious drills alternating with tedious roll-calls, and wearisome parades and inspections; it requires pleased contentment with walks continually cut short by the camp-guard, and with amusements limited to rough horse-play on the parade-ground, and dull games of cards by sputtering candles in the tent.
As these be tastes and preferences notably absent from the mind of the average young man, our volunteers usually regard their experience in Camp of Instruction as among the most unpleasant of their war memories.
These were the trials that tested Harry Glen's resolution sorely.
When he enlisted with the intention of redeeming himself, he naturally expected that the opportunity he desired would be given by a prompt march to the field, and a speedy entrance into an engagement.He nerved himself strenuously for the dredful ordeal of battle, but this became a continually receding point.The bitter defeat at Bull Run was bearing fruit in months of painstaking preparation before venturing upon another collision.
Day by day he saw the chance of retrieving his reputation apparently more remote.Meanwhile discouragements and annoyances grew continually more plentiful and irksome.He painfully learned that the most disagreeable part of war is not the trial of battle, but the daily sacrifices of personal liberty, tastes, feelings and conveniences involved in camp-life, and in the reduction of one's cherished individuality to the dead-level of a passive, obedient, will-less private soldier.
"I do wish the regiment would get orders to move!" said almost hourly each one of a half-million impatient youths fretting in Camps of Instruction through the long Summer of 1861.
"I do wish the regiment would get orders to move!" said Harry Glen angrily one evening, on coming into the Surgeon's tent to have his blistered hands dressed.he had been on fatigue duty during the day, and the Fatigue-Squad had had an obstinate struggle with an old oak stump, which disfigured the parade-ground, and resisted removal like an Irish tenant.
"I am willing--yes, I can say I am anxious, even--to go into battle,"he continued, while Dr.Paul Denslow laid plasters of simple cerate on the abraded palms, and then swathed them in bandages."Anything is preferable to this chopping tough stumps with a dull ax, and drilling six hours a day while the thermometer hangs around the nineties.""I admit that there are things which would seem pleasanter to a young man of your temperament and previous habits," said the Surgeon, kindly."Shift over into that arm-stool, which you will find easier, and reat a little while.Julius, bring in that box of cigars."While Julius, who resembled his illustrious namesake as little in celerity of movement as he did in complexion, was coming, the Surgeon prepared a paper, which he presented to Harry, saying:
"There, that'll keep you off duty to-morrow.After that, we'll see what can be done."Julius arrived with the cigars as tardily as if he had had to cross a Rubicon in the back room.Two were lighted, and the Surgeon settled himself for a chat.
"Have you become tired of soldier-life?" asked he, studying Harry's face for the effect of the question.
"I can not say that I have become tired of it," said Harry, frankly, "because I must admit that I never had the slightest inclination to it.I had less fancy for becoming a soldier than for any other honorable pursuit that you could mention.""Then you only joined the army--"
"From a sense of duty merely," said Harry, knocking the ashes from his cigar.
"And the physical and other discomforts now begin to weight nearly as much as that sense of duty?""Not at all.It only seems to me that there are more of them than are absolutely essential to the performance of that duty.I want to be of service to the country, but I would prefer that that service be not made unnecessarily onerous.""Quite natural; quite natural."
