THE HAMPSHIRE CAMPAIGN.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 45, 2 December 1871, Page 4

THE HAMPSHIRE CAMPAIGN.

We make the following extracts from the correspondence of the London , morning papers: — MILITIA PLUCK. I may give an instance of the spirit which, as I believe, exists throughout the militia contingent of the force now taking part in these manoeuvres. Coming down the hill past the spectators a man fell out for a few minutes, seemingly to change a stock which was chafing. In the belief that the man had given out, and was waiting for the waggon to come up, his comrades hissed him by companies as they passed him. When he had arranged his stock, the man sprang up, his face flushed, and his eyes flashing. "By ," cried he, 'angrily, " Joe'Jenkins is not the man to fall out this day, if he were walking on his raw flesh." THE COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF. It would be a long sum in the first rule of arithmetic to calculate how many miles the Duke of Cambridge and his staff have ridden in the last week. Scarcely has a camp been pitched when his Royal Highness is sure to appear, questioning commanding officers as to their sick and stragglers and other pertinent matters, detecting with a quick eye and visiting with proper praise or rebuke the good and bad management of the different departments. DISTINGUISHED COOKS. In the camp of the Inns of Court, Sir Roundell Palmer, who resides near at hand, and who has paid them a visit, is said to have concocted a marvellously good stew; while a well-known Q.C. has developed such extraordinary talent as a camp cook that his name bids fair to become famous in the annals of his corps. This morning I stumbled across the detachment of the Honorable Artillery Company attached to the 2nd Division. The men appear thoroughly to enjoy camping out, and showed considerable ingenuity in adapting themselves to the exigencies of the campaign. I saw a solicitor who is well known in the city, and who is a private in the ranks, grumbling at the small rations which he had just received from the regimental quarters; and another member of the corps, whose income is not less than £2,000 a year, and who is known as the wit of the regiment, with his shirt sleeves tucked up, scraping carrots for a stew, and afterwards cutting up the meat. A regiment of infantry which had been out on outpost duty swept by the kitchen of the artillery company, and sadly disturbed the equanimity of the wealthy private, who manifested considerable zeal in protecting his pots. AN INDEPENDENT SENTRY. There is a story to the effect that a distinguished general, passing along the militia encampment the other evening, came upon a sentry who was shovelling about his post in a very irregular manner, and carrying his rifle anyhow. Looking sternly at the man, the general asked, " Don't they teach you to salute an officer in your regiment ? The man stoically replied, "I suppose they do, but you came upon me so that I couldn't, and I shan't now." THE PRINCE OF WALES IN CAMP. It may be interesting to know that at present his Eoyal Highness the Prince of Wales is in exceedingly comfortable quarters. A stylish marquee, which boasts a separate dressing room, has been fitted up for his use in a manner which, if not sumptious, somewhat suggests the idea of luxury; and in the rear stands a still larger canvass erection, which does duty as the Prince's mess tent. Near at hand are some eight other tents of the bell-shape pattern, but all pretilly furnished, intended for the use of the royal suite. Probably the Prince thought that as his luggage as a field officer ought to come' under the 961bs allowed, he himself supplied the needful additional transport ; fori noticed that several vehicles, evidently intended for transport, stood close by, each marked with his Royal Highness's crest. A DAY'S RATIONS. A grocery-issuer looks after the dispensing of the sundries; and it may interest the reader, in connection with these sundries, to know of what consists the ration of a man in camp: ]£lb bread (else lib biscuit); fib of fresh meat, or lib salt meat, or £lb preserved meat; l-6thoz tea, l-3rdoz coffee, 2oz pugar, |oz salt, l-36th oz pepper, 31b

wood—per diem, the charge for which to each man is fid. The Herculean efforts made by a man as he staggers away from the regimental commissary store under the stupendous load of l-36tb part of an ounce of pepper are to be seen, not written about. A GROWL FROM PAT. The British soldier would not be worth his salt if he did not grumble—it is your best soldier who does his work, with a grumble under his moustache. J asked an Irish private in an infantry regiment last night how he liked this sort of thing. -'Well, sir," was the reply, with a good humored grin, " after a year of this, it's devil a bit I'd think of 20 years in hell." But, bless you, I saw the same man two hours after, not walking misanthropically by the margin of the pond, with thoughts bent on suicide —not stropping his razor with intent to apply it to his throat—but leading merrily a rattling chorus which went " Musha rinka da," and looking as if he were prepared to lay his hand upon his heart and avow that that was the happiest moment of his life. A CONTRACT. The Ist Middlesex Militia filed past. These men have, I am told, behaved admirably on the march, and it therefore the more to be regretted for their sakes that their appearance, belies their good name. They were terribly chaffed by the bystanders ; but they were quite equal to the emergency, and returned every compliment fourfold. Their slouching gait and undersized stature were the more striking in that they were immediately succeeded by the stalwart forms of the pioneers of the 42nd Highlanders steady-looking giants, whose axes were held by sinewy arms that looked as though they were made of steel as hard. The pipers that followed blew with twenty organ bellows power, the drummers beat like animated steam engines, and, as file after file of the brawny, solemn, and proud-looking Highlanders passed by, they impressed the spectator with an extraordinary idea of power. It was like a series of living walls, against which nothing less than 96-pounders could prevail. Their marching was indeed superb ; and when they had all passed in breathless silence, unchallenged by a word of chaff, I heard one soldier spectator after another mutter, " By , they are a fine set of men." THE DEVIL'S REGIMENT. The small body of the Inns of Court Volunteers was conspicuous. In their neat uniform, such as all uniforms should be, simple, and of a greyish color, one had some difficulty in recognising the learned brothers of the bar. Their sunburnt faces and steady appearance would pass them for old soldiers anywhere, and their cheery willing way of doing their work would gain the approval of any general. On Thursday, they did the sharpest thing of the day, in turning the skirmishers of the enemy, for which they received the compliments of high quarters at once expressed. To see a learned senior, well known at Westminster, trudging along with a stable lantern hanging to his belt, would impress any jury in the world ; while another, whose books are standard works, was inside a tent, flat on the ground, waiting for an order to lift the pole. If not professional, it is highly patriotic and praiseworthy to hear the juniors tell their seniors that they were " peg" men for tent pitching work ; and to observe the grave senior hammering in his peg with all the solemnity of long study, forbade the belief that he had ever been engaged otherwise. A Queen's Counsel was told off with others for cooking, and was soon deep in trenches, while another took off his coat to fetch water. THE FI'ELD TELEGRAPH. One of the sights is the style in which the R.E. lay down or pick up the field telegraph which is attached to each division. A most ingeniously-constructed waggon, carrying thirty-six miles of wire, perfectly insulated, and coated on the outside with convolutions of linen, is dsvoted to the operation. So skilful are the men engaged in the task that the wire can be laid down at a more rapid rate than a column can move. Little care is taken of the wire, which is simply laid by the roadside, cast into a ditch, or festooned along the hedges. Where a main road crosses the line of the wire, it is stretched aloft, on two slight iron uprights, if no friendly trees

are near, at a height sufficient to clear a loaded waggon. When crossing a byroad a slight trench is cut across, the wire is dropped in, and the trench is filled, without risk, apparently, of the insulation being destroyed by the pressure of waggon wheels forcing sharp fragments of stone into the insulator. The cable is paid out from drums suspended on the floor at the rear of the waggon, and it is picked up in the same way. The cylinders are worked by a system of cog-wheels, capable of being immediately altered in their action, so as to meet the requirements of change of speed, and motion is given to them by the revolutions of. the wheels of the waggon. SCARCITY OF ACCIDENTS. There is one thing upon which we must not forget to congratulate ourselves—the excellent health of the troops. A few days ago there were only seventeen sick in the whole of the 3rd Division, and with the exception of the usual complaint of the season, which cannot be laid to open air living, there has been no illness worth speaking of. Another most remarkable fact is, that over 30,000 men should have led, even for those few days, an existence full of shifts and contrivances, each of which adds some danger to life, without the occurrence of a single fatal accident. The odds were that among this multitude the crush of a wheel, the kick of a horse, or the explosion of some cartridges, or some one of the thousand mishaps which are possible, should have found its victim before now. Yet, though there have been one or two broken legs, no one, so far as I have heard, has been fatally or eveu dangerously hurt. The horses, also, have done wonderfully well. The stout horses of the artillery have fared the best, but the cavalry have had no more than the " dealer's condition" taken out of them, and are in good working order. A CAVALRY ENCOUNTER. No sooner was the order given to the 10th to skirmish, than the crest of the rolling wave of horsemen broke into spray, driven by the word of command, scattering and drifting full in the face of the guns. Lightly the foam flew over the field, lightly over the hedges, lightly up the opposite steep. But, arrived at the top, each horseman reined up sharply, and was for a moment motionless, for below them, in a hollow on the hither side of the guns, was a rock against which it was no shame to be stayed, a column of Life Guards in strength hardly 200 yards distant. In the moment of danger the duty of the light horse was not forgotten. They remained long enough on the top of the hill to circle their horses as a signal that the enemy was before them in force. Then, in obedience to the wave of their officer's sword, they darted back down the hill on the way of safety to rejoin their comrades before the horses of the heavy cavalry could get into their stride. Lightly as they had come, so lightly fled they back, the burnished and glittering column thundering after them with ponderous stride. Checked for a moment by a hollow way, with hedges on each side, many of the flying Hussars were all but overwhelmed by the awful avalanche. If they escaped, it was by the skin of their teeth.