THE VOLUNTEERS.

Evening Star, Issue 4061, 2 March 1876, Page 3

THE VOLUNTEERS.

To the Editor.

SlB, —I saw a long advertisement in your issue a few days since intimating that class firing by all the companies would take place at the two rifle ranges, and expressing the expr ctutinn of the officer commanding the district that each Volunteer Cadet, like & good little boy, “would do his duty. These general o ders were signed, not by him, but by “Frank Pell, Lieut. and ActingAdjutant.” ' ; , Now the only piece of information aired by this waste of is names and titles of the officer, for we find the “ usual bungle,” The Artillery are aimed -with and they fire at ranges and targets for the various classes different to the other co ps, notably- the first d|ass, where they nrv entirely different. In toe etQntof squads from that company, and ary other, or in fact a squad from any. two com--pimies meeting on the range, as they certainly will do at *‘ 6,30 a.m,”; esch wanting to fire different s, -there will most assuredly be a ** i_nuss ” ; for t n or fifteen men don’t care to get up and trudge two miles before that hour .for the sake of the Walk baHk, because some other company’s squad happens to have the senior officer on the ground in it. Perhaps the district’ officer will how issue another set of general orders to vary-the-first and “ make the mess a little thicker.” The old plan of giving each company » morning, and a sergeant for its own usp, worked well enough, and why not let it alone , • ■ . •j Apart from this subject, the acting adjutancy exists.simply on the sufferance of, the captains and officers of compani-.s, and as ran inducement to the various subalterns to get up their dril. Then by what authority does the acting-adjutant issue general orders ? ■ ■. * By-the-bve, I aiu informed thit tha office of act'ng-a jutant was created (at a meeting of officers held some four or five months ago) on the understanding that the li- utenants of each company should each hold it in turn for a month. The first one, as I am told, owing to the peculiar courtesy exhibited to him at hj battalion parade, threw it up tlie first week. The second, who was sppt

pointed directly afterwards, has held the post ever since, to the exclusion of all the others. I am sorry to trouble you upon the subject, but as there has not been a meeting of the Battalion Committee for-I. was going to say.yeats—there is no other way of ventilating these things. There are too many “ wheels within wheels ” connected with the present command of this district, and the sooner it is placed in the hands of some -independent person who is above influence, the better it will be for the movement. Shade of Captain M'Farland, where art thou ?-*I am, &c., • Rifle, i Dunedin, February 26. .