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From July 25 to August 9, 1845, at Portsmouth Navy Yard.  Remarkables:  the free and social mode of life among the officers and their families, meeting at evening on the door-steps or in front of their houses, or stepping in familiarly; the rough-hewn first lieutenant, with no ideas beyond the service; the doctor, priding himself on his cultivation and refinement, pretending to elegance, sensitive, touchy; the sailing-master, an old salt, of the somewhat modernized Tom Bowline pattern, tossed about by fifty years of stormy surges, and at last swept into this quiet nook, where he tells yarns of his cruises and duels, repeats his own epitaph, drinks a reasonable quantity of grog, and complains of dyspepsia; the old fat major of marines, with a brown wig not pretending to imitate natural hair, but only to cover his baldness and grayness with something that he imagines will be less unsightly:  he has a potent odor of snuff, but has left off wine and strong drink for the last twenty-seven years.  A Southerner, all astray among our New England manners, but reconciling himself to them, like a long practised man of the world, only somewhat tremulous at the idea of a New England winter.  The lieutenant of marines, a tall, red-haired man, between thirty and forty, stiff in his motions from the effect of a palsy contracted in Florida,—­a man of thought, both as to his profession and other matters, particularly matters spiritual,—­a convert, within a few years, to Papistry,—­a seer of ghosts,—­a dry joker, yet sad and earnest in his nature,—­a scientific soldier, criticising Jackson’s military talent,—­fond of discussion, with much more intellect than he finds employment for,—­withal, somewhat simple.  Then the commandant of the yard, Captain S——­, a man without brilliancy, of plain aspect and simple manners, but just, upright, kindly, with an excellent practical intellect; his next in rank, Commander P——­, an officer-like, middle-aged man, with such cultivation as a sensible man picks up about the world; and with what little tincture he imbibes from a bluish wife.  In the vicinity of the Navy Yard, an engineer-officer, stationed for a year or two past on a secluded point of the coast, making a map, minutely finished, on a very extensive scale, of country and coast near Portsmouth; he is red-nosed, and has the aspect of a free liver; his companion, a civil engineer, with much more appearance of intellectual activity.  Their map is spread out in a room that looks forth upon the sea and islands, and has all the advantages of sea-air,—­very desirable for summer, but gloomy as a winter residence.

At Fort Constitution are many officers,—­a major and two lieutenants, the former living in a house within the walls of the fort, the latter occupying small residences outside.  They are coarse men, apparently of few ideas, and not what one can call gentlemen.  They are likewise less frank and hospitable than the navy officers.  Their quarters have not the aspect of homes, although they continue for a term of years, five or more, on one station, whereas the navy officers are limited to two or three.  But then the former migrate with their families to new stations, whereas the wives of the naval officers, though ejected from the navy-yard houses, yet, not accompanying their husbands on service, remain to form a nucleus of home.