The Nelson Evening Mail. WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 14, 1874.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume IX, Issue 244, 14 October 1874, Page 2

The Nelson Evening Mail. WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 14, 1874.

.'-Ths no Dual report of the Inspector of y Volunteers is a lengthy, and, at the „ first, .glance, a somewhat uninvitinglooking document, but upon perusing '"' ft," we have discovered several little ''"gems tbat are worthy of being brought into ihe light. Oo his official visit to or Gordon gained tbo respect and esteem of all tbe members of the .. -f_rce, who arrived at an exactly oppo- " site conclusion to lhat come to by their •brother. volunteers of tbe province of 'JjJawkeV Bay with regard to their 'Inspector, for, one and ail, they prono onodd him to be •' an officer and a

gentleman." His remarks, therefore, upon the colonial force will be read by them, and by many of the unmilitary public, with interest: His first comments are upon the Wellington men, and with regard to the City Artillery we are told that tbey are very deficient in tbeir knowledge of squad and com* pany drill. The quiet sarcasm of the observation which follows cannot fail to be appreciated. Still referring to the same company, he says, "Its instructor was very defective in his knowledge of certain portions of the rudiments of his duty, owing, perhaps, to his baying for too long a period of his Imperial service served in the tailor's shop of his battery." Hia next remarks have reference to the Hutt company, with regard to which he says, "It ia a promising corps, but waa unacquainted with whin the regulations imperatively require that every volunteer should. know, viz., a 'knowledge of squad and company drill.' Oh inquiring why this corps had not been instructed in theae points, Major Ludlam intimated tbat he ooly permitted it to be practised in such movements as he considered would be useful on service. How Major Ludlam, or any other officer, certified under their hands that the men of tbis company were efficient volunteers, and possessed a knowledge of squad or company drill, and thereby obtained capitation for tbem, I cannot understand. This corps performed one or two movements in light drill with tolerable precision; but I do not think that tbe experience of Major Ludlam, or any other officer, with respect to what manoeuvres would be useful on service, should be allowed to supersede what is expressly laid down as the course of drill in the volunteer regulations, and then to certify in writing that the volunteers know whai tbey do not know."

Major Ludlam has the reputation of breeding the best sheep and growing the finest camellias in New- Zealand, but no man can_be expected to excel in everything, and so long as. he continues to be successful in agricultural, horticultural, and pastoral pursuits, he should bs satisfied, without attempting to set himself up aa an authority upon military matters. We trust that he will accept the rebnke in all humility. Upon tbe officers in another portion of tbe Wellington Province the Inspector ia ■ very hard, but apparently not undeservedly so. He says : — " In the Masterton and Greytown districts, as Staff, there ara two Majors, Bunny and Smith, and a paid Adjutant, Captain Cleland. These majors, I assume, bold commissions in which certain duties are imposed upon them by his Excellency the Governor, but neither of them 1 ever' appear on parade, so that I had no opportunity of forming an opinion as to their qualifications to bold commands. A glance at the returns will show how attenuated is tbe strength of the corps under their charge,; and with so few men drill is out of the question.

We will now travel with the Inspector to Otago, where we find him reporting thus upon the Dunedin Artillery Company : — " It showed a very small attendance, exclusive of its good band, but tboae present were expert in the use of their guns. The corps- is well clothed, has a very Buperior band, and its funds exhibit a credit, inclusive of the value of band instruments, of something like £500. Were it not for these circumstances, as well as from the fact that in its private rules it has one which operates unfavorably in the way of obtaining recruits, and tbat it had determined io rescind, with the consent of the Governor, I would have asked for a discontinuance of its services ; and I would bave been supported in the request by tbe captain of the company, who complained bitterly tbat his efforts to obtain a large and more regular attendance at parade had been unsuccessful." From this we gather that in the event of an enemy attacking Dunedin, the inhabitants will not bo able to look to the defenders of their country for protection, but will bave to fall back upon the £500 reported to he lying in the bank, handsome uniforms, and a number of band instruments We sincerely trust that none of these reeds will prove to be broken or unreliable, Jn Canterbury there appear to be three or four good companies, but in tbe others the discipline appears to be a little lax. Major Gordon does not hesitate to express his opinion in plain terms, so we will allow him to speak for himself. "The No 2 Engioeer.**, at Heathcote," he says, "29 strong on its roll, produced only two men, ou_ of whom was very drunk. Tbis corps will, I conclude, be disbanded. Th? Timaru Artillery Company was in « very unsatisfactory state. Only 1 1 of all ranks paraded, with 9 musician?; and attached to h is a Cadet Company nambering 21, but only 7 were present." The Inspector's report upon ail ih„ other provinces, including Nelson, is generally commendatory, but that he ia not satisfied with the force as a whoa will appe... Irom the following extracts from his concluding ,J observations aud suggestions " : —

"That tbe volunteer force of the colony ia not in the condition in whkh it has been represented to be from time to tiou» by officera corona .uding distriote, in the capitation returns signed i-y them and transacted to your offico, cannot be denieJ; that Jt b^s been in a very inefficient condition ior tjpnse yearjß past, is to me very obvious; atd I regret to have to record my conscientious belief thjat tbe amount of public money expended as capitation on the 31st of March last is lamentably

in excess of the cum which should otherwise represent the state of efficiency of the force in general, so that immediate and effectual measures should be had recourse to, to arrest for the future the useless and wanton expenditure which has fo»- so long a period been carried on, and for which officers commanding districts are primarily accountable It would be unfair and unjust to attach much blame to the volunteers themselves (for most of them koow nothing of the regulations of the service in they are eorolled), when many of the officers appointed by the Government to administer the volunteer regulations, and who are commanded in their commissions carefully and diligently to discharge tbe duties of their rank by exercising and well-disciplining the force under their charge, habitually ignore the directions given to them for their guidance. In the first place, las and . incompetent commanding-officers, and 1 unqualified drill-inatructora may, 'i think, be held accountable for the unsatisfactory state of volu_teer matters, submitted perhaps in too forcible terma to your notice. As a second cause, I most blame captains of companies, but in some measure only, for arming members of tbeir corps without any preliminary drill, and 'placing them in tbe ranks beside their better-drilled ' comrades, when the 28th clause; of the regulations enjoins upon them thatltbey shall, before enrolling new members, subject their recruits to a prescribed amount of rudimentary drill; for if this regulation were attended to, I am confident that larger attendances at drill than at present of the more competent members would result. As a third causp, the Press exercises a most pernicious and detrimental influence on the volunteer movement, sometimes by enlargh g in most laudatory terms upon the manner in which the volunteer corps .go. through their movements on parade, when, as in some cases which I could instance, no parade has taken place at all, and at others by condemning what had taken place when attendance was large and movements very creditably executed." The report appearß, on the whole, to be tbat of an officer who thoroughly understands his work. In some instances he may have been a little too harsh in his remarks, the consequence of whicb will be that those commented upon so severely will resign in disgust, but on the other hand those who have been fortunate ebongh to meet with his approval will feel that the praise bestowed upon them is not that of a mere time-server who is anxious to please everybody, but that it is to be attributed to nn honeat conviction oh the part of the Inspector, that they are striving to do their duty. I r ' The following ia the concluding sentence of tbe report: — "The spirit of volunteering is not dormant; but upon the measures which may now be adopted wiii probably depend its otter extinction or resuscitation —so that those upon whom shall devolve the consideration of these two important questions, should be asked to take as the text of their deliberations, the' truism, attributed to the first Napoleon, that 'Tbat nation stands upon a ro.k, whose citizens (aa distinguished from regular soldiers) are al all timet prepared tv shoulder the musket.'"