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John was above all else a sportsman, and his programme embraced land, a stout new dwelling-house, preserves of game in a small way, some fishing, and the formation of a new rifle-corps at Chagford. This last enterprise he intended to be the serious business of life; but his mind was open to any new, agreeable impressions and, indeed, it received them at every turn.
I had never known Philadelphia well, but now it was so strange as to be peculiarly interesting, many of the houses deserted, with doors and windows boarded; several of the churches made over into barracks, or riding-schools; the market closed; the State House filled with lounging officers; and the streets thronged, even at this early hour, by a varied uniformed soldiery, speaking Cockney English, the jargon of the counties, Scottish Gaelic, or guttural German, as they elbowed their passage, the many scarlet jackets interspersed with the blue of artillery and cavalry, the Hessian red and yellow, the green of the rifle-corps, or the kilts of the Highlanders.
Vast encampments, which for size, regularity, and order vie with the old Roman castra, are formed at convenient spots. And here all the details of actual service are imitated; cavalry and infantry are disciplined in equally arduous labors; nor does the artillery escape the fatigue of mock-sieges, sham-fights, and reviews. The Chasseurs de Vincennes, or rifle-corps, are the pride of the army.
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