the same remarks will generally apply to the other tents of the camp. The small huts are extremely low and very badly constructed and in the summer season would be of little use. Larger log buildings are in process of construction, but the labor on them has been delayed, partially from a want of lumber. The roofs of the log buildings are covered with boards battened at the joints. Some of them are yet unfinished though occupied. Generally speaking the soldiers seem comfortably provided with quarters for the present with the exception of the Fourth Battalion of 3,000 men, which is composed of Western troops. Among these men there is much complaint and in many instances from their own account and from what I could learn not without foundation. Upon arriving at Camp Parole some of them for a week or more occupied the log frames constructed for huts without roofs, others lived in crowded tents or others occupied huts, and as before stated there was not always fuel sufficient. This induced some few of them to go to the forest with their blankets and construct for themselves shelters, a few others constructed pits covered with boughs in which they lived. I sent a sergeant to inspect the latter he reported nine men living inside them outside of camp limits. I saw one man that told me he was living with several others in the woods, and from all I was able to find out I should estimate that about twelve or fifteen were living in the woods, besides those living in pits with temporary shelters, returning to camp only when they required provisions. These facts were unknown to the commanding officer until communicated by me, when he sent a mounted patrol to bring them all in, but the officer did not succeed in finding them. His report is in paper* marked F (2). Six privies enumerated. I saw but one privy for the men in the whole camp and that badly constructed, with the valet filled to the top. I was told that the others had been pulled down by the soldiers, they desiring to use the lumber for their quarters. I respectfully recommend the immediate construction of suitable privies of logs with board coverings and that the soldiers be made to use them instead of creating what would in warm weather be an intolerable nuisance about camp in all directions. Also the immediate construction of kitchens for 100 men, each of logs, and to each kitchen, if a Farmer's boiler were supplied, great economy would appear both in fuel and rations. From the inclosed estimate*, marked F (3), it will be seen that the constructions of barracks of logs of certain dimensions is cheaper than the construction of similar barracks of frame and boards, and I think that it would be found that the construction of log quarters for the whole camp would be cheaper if used for eighteen months than the use of tents for a similar period, for the reason that the destruction of tents by troops here is very great, and they sometimes upon the leaving of troops take the canvas of the vacated tents and double it over those used by themselves. Of course this is done without the consent of the quartermaster, who himself informed me of this practice, though I found no tents with the canvas thus doubled.

Police. - The police of the camp is far being good nor is the rubbish sufficiently far removed from the camp vicinity. But with the limited guard and officers now at the camp it is impossible this should be efficiently done. Many of the company grounds are in extremely bad condition.

Sutler. - The sutler's store is more a refreshment saloon than sutler's store, though a tolerable assortment of necessary articles is kept.

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* Not found.

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