The Sun.
London, England, 1861-11-29 00:00:00

PEDEBAL TROOPS 1N WASHINGTON.

They gave us the Representatives' Chamber for
quarters. Without running the gauntlet of caucus
primary and election, every one of us attained that
sacred shrine. In we marched, tramp, tramp. Bayo-
nets took the place of buncombe. The frowsy crea-
tures in ill• made dress coats, shimmering satin '
waistcoats, and hats of the tile model, who lounge,
spit, and vociferate there, and name themselves
1.C., were off. Our neat uniforms and bright barrels
showed to great advantage, compared with the usual
costumes of the usual dramatis personae of the scene.
It was dramatic business, our entrance there. The
new Chamber is gorgeous, but ineffective. Its ceil-
ing is flat, and panelled with transparencies. Each
panel is a coat of arms of a State, painted on glass.
I could not see that the impartial sunbeams, tem-
pered by this skylight, had burnt away the insignia
of the malcontent State. Nor had any rampant Se-
cessionist thought to punch any of the seven lost
Pleiads out from that firmament with a long pole.
Crimson and gold are the prevailing hues of the de-
coration. There is no unity and breadth of colouring.
The desks of the members radiate in double files
from a white marble tribune at the centre of the semi-
circle. In came the new actors on this scene. Our
presence here was the inevitable sequel of past
events. We appeared with bayonets and bullets
because of the bosh uttered on this floor ; because
of the bills—with treasonable stump-speeches in
their bellies—passed here ; because of the cowardice
of the poltroons, the imbecility of the dodgers, and
the arrogance of the bullies, who had here co-ope.
rated to blind and corrupt the minds of the people.
Talk had made a miserable mess of it. The ultima
ratio was now appealed to. Some of our companies
were marched upstairs into the galleries. The sofas
were to be their beds. With their white cross-
belts and bright breastplates, they made a very pic-
turesque body of spectators for whatever happened
in the hall, and never failed to applaud in the right
or the wrong place at will. Most of us were be-
stowed in the amphitheatre. Each desk received its
man. He was to scribble on it by day, and sleep
under it by night. When the desks were all taken,
the companies overflowed into the corners and into
the lobbies. The Staff took committee-rooms. The
Colonel reigned in the Speaker's parlour, Once in,
first, we washed. . . But the best of the enter-
tainment was within the Capitol. Some three
thousand or more of us were now quartered there.
The Massachusetts Eighth were under the dome.
No fear of want of air for them. The -Massachu-
setts Sixth were eloquent for their State in
the Senate Chamber. It was singularly hitting,
among the many coincidences in the history of this
regiment, that they should be there, tacitly aveng-
ing the assault upon Sumner, and the attempts to
bully the impregnable Wilson. In the recesses,
eaves, and crypts of the Capitol what other legions
'were bestowed Ido not know. I daily lost myself,
and sometimes, when out of my reckoning, was put
on the way by sentries of strange corps—a Reading
Light Infantry man, or some other. We all frater-
nised. There was a fine enthusiasm among us ; but
not the soldierly rivalry in discipline that may

grow up in future between men of different States
acting together, but the brotherhood of ardent fel-
lows
first in the field and earnest in the cause. All
our life in the Capitol was most dramatic and sensa-
tional. Before it was fairly in the dim interior of
that representatives' chamber, the reveilles of the
different regiments came through the corridors.
Every snorer's trumpet suddenly paused. The im-
pressive souad of the hushed breathing of a thou-
sand sleepers, marking off the fleet moments of the
night, gave way to a most vociferous uproar. The
boy element is large in the 7th Regiment: Its
slang dictionary is peculiar and unabridged. As
soon as we woke the pit began to chaff the galleries
and the galleries the pit. We are allowed noise
ad libitum. Our riotous tendencies, if they existed,
escaped by the safety-valve of the larynx. We
joked, we shouted, we sang, we mounted the speaker's
desk and made speeches—always to the point—
for if any but a wit ventured to give tongue he was
coughed down without ceremony. Let the M.C.'s
adopt this plan, and silence their dunces. With all
our jollity we preserved very tolerable decorum.

The regiment is asset bien compose. Many of the
privates are distinctly gentlemen of breeding and

character. The tone is mainly good, and the esprit de
corps high. If the colonel should say, "Up boys, and
at 'em !" I know that the Seventh would do brilliantly
in the field. I speak now of its behaviour indoors.
This certainly did it credit. Our thousand did
the Capitol little harm that a corporal's guard of
Biddies with mops and tubs could not repair
in a forenoon's campaign. Perhaps we should have
served our country better by a little Vandalism.
The decorations of the Capitol have a slight flavour
of the South-Western steamboat saloon. The pic-
tures (now, by the way carefully covered) would
most of them be the better if the figures were bayo-
toted and the backgrounds sabred out. Both pielk
tures and decorations belong to that bygone epoch
of our country when men shaved the moustache,
dressed like parsons, said " Sir," and chewed tobacco
transition epoch now become an historic blank.
The home correspondence of our legion of young
heroes is illimitable. Every one had his little tale
of active service to relate. A decimation of the regi-
ment, more or less, had profited by the tender mo-
ment of departure to pop the question and to receive
the dulcet " Yes." These lucky fellows were, of
course, writing to Dulcinea regularly, three meals
of love a day. Mr. Van. Wyck, M.C., and a brace
of colleagues, were kept hard at work all day giv-
ing franks and saving threepennies to the ardent
scribes. Uncle Sam lost certainly 3,000 cents a-day
in this manner. What crypts and dens, caves and
cellars there are under that g?eat structure! And
barrels of flour in every one of them this month of
May, 1861. Do civilians eat in this proportion ?
Or does long standing in the "position of a soldier"
(yule " tactics" for a view of that graceful pose) in-
crease a man's capacity for bread and beef so enor-
mously ? It was infinitely picturesque in these dim
vaults by night. Sentries were posted at every turn,
Their guns gleamed in the gaslight. Sleepers were
lying in their blankets wherever the stones were
sofest. Then in the guard-room the guard were
waiting for their turn. We have not had much of
the scenery in America, and the physiognomy of
volunteer military life is quite distinct from any-
thing one sees in European service. The people
have never had occasion until now to occupy their
palace with armed men.—Atlantic Monthly.