234 THE SERENADE. 



which I was enabled to do through the most kind but 

 unceremonious attention by which I was surrounded, 

 when about ten o'clock on the second night of my arrival, 

 just as I had fallen into the first deep sleep, I began to 

 dream of home and all the loved scenes that neither time 

 nor distance could make me forget, and once more even 

 the national airs of my country were in my soul as if they 

 had been actually played. The airs grew on me still 

 more my eyes opened, and in a dreamy trance my ears 

 had been serving me faithfully, for under my window, 

 plaintively or gently suppressed, the regimental band was 

 serenading, and pretty English melodies were really 

 floating on the night breeze and gracefully speaking of my 

 country. The real soldier and gentleman of the United 

 States who knew how to wear a sword and use it, and who 

 was prepared to work for and to win the distinctions of 

 rank, so utterly different from the self-constituted generals 

 and majors I had so abundantly met with in my travels 

 many of them hearty good fellows but no soldiers was in 

 America precisely what he is in England ; and between 

 the officers of the one country and the other, in mind, 

 bearing, and bravery, the difference was nothing. While 

 on this visit to the barracks, the chaplain to the Fort came 

 to see me, and I had the satisfaction of shaking by the 

 hand a countryman of mine, and a Bristol man, and it 

 gives me very great pain that at this moment I should 

 have forgotten his name. 



My wish to continue my journey on the following 

 Friday having been repeatedly expressed, I was told that 

 if I would accept their companionship, two of the officers, 

 Lieutenant Bayard, of whom I have before spoken, and 

 Major Martin, would accompany me ; but as " Friday 

 was an unlucky day," they wished me to remain at the 



