It is a common mistake to suppose that an army officer on the frontier leads an idle life. Rarely is more than one of the three officers of a company present with it, and this one must accordingly attend every day to all the company duties. The other two officers may be detailed on special service, such as commissary or quartermaster's duties (and the latter in a new post will be no sinecure) or attendance on court-martial, or searching where lime can be found; or they may be on the sick list, or guarding the wagon-train which brings supplies to the post, or absent on the leaves which are granted after continuous service. It is not infrequent for cavalry to be six or eight months on a campaign without seeing a permanent camp, much less a post where any of the comforts of civilization can be found. With small bodies of troops, where there are but few officers to form society for one another, the life becomes fearfully monotonous and dreary.
Old posts are deserted and new ones built so frequently that there is little danger of officers or men stagnating through idleness, even were Indian hostilities less abundant. An appropriation by Congress for a new post does not represent more than a third of the real expenditure. The other two thirds are supplied "in kind," that is to say, by soldiers' labor. The money appropriation is only expended for such things as the soldiers cannot produce themselves. They cut the timber, run saw-mills, dig drains, make bricks and mortar, carry hods, and plaster the inside of houses. The cavalry-man is fortunate if he can leave off digging long enough to groom his own horse. Frequently one man is detailed to groom, feed, and take to water the horses of several of his comrades. The American soldier on the frontier is certainly a wonderful being. He is at most times a day-laborer, slouchy in his bearing and slovenly in his dress. His one good suit must be saved for guard-mounting, when his turn comes, or for inspection; and the nature of his unmilitary vocations uses up his uniforms faster than his clothing allowance can furnish them. He has little or no real drill, and has been known to go into action without previously having pulled the trigger of his rifle. He has not the mien or bearing of a soldier,--in military parlance, is not well set up. He performs the same manual labor for which the civilian who works beside him earns three times his wages. The writer has seen cavalry recruits, whose company was ordered to march, recalled from the woods, where they were employed at a saw-mill which supplied planks for some new buildings at the post, and where they had passed all their time since their arrival. On joining their command they were put on their horses for the first time, and started off, armed with carbines they had never fired, on a march of over eight hundred miles. If the recruit gives his horse a sore back, he will have to foot it; if he encounters Indians, he must fight as best he can.