indeed, we can all see-that these foolish and misguided men are deeply impressed with the prompt triumph they witnessed of honest discipline over lawless insubordination. Ever since we peaked anchor and spread the canvas, they were dismal and miserable, while we laughed and worked, had our theatricals and amusements after our parades and drills, fully carrying out the good soldiers' creed 'Duty first, pleasure after."" When the twenty-eight men volunteered to do sailors' work, it was without the slightest expectation of receiving any pecuniary reward for their services; but in the Order dated 11th of February, it was made known to them that the Captain intended to stop a portion of the wages of the mutineers, and hand it over to the volunteers. Previous to the arrival of the ship at Southampton, the volunteers requested Lieutenant-Colonel Sargent to refuse this pay for them, as they wished to enjoy the satisfaction of feeling that they had only done their duty as British soldiers, determined to support their Commanding Officer in any position.' This honourable conduct called forth from Lieutenant-Colonel Sargent the expression of the wish "that he might have the good fortune to lead such men against the most formidable enemies his country might have.”

The year 1861 gave birth to an event which threatened in its complications to plunge England into a war with the United States. Timely precautions, and the good sense of the rulers on both sides of the Atlantic, averted the calamity, but not the less praise is due to the section of the British Army whose services were put into requisition, for the zeal and order with which it hurried to the eventual scene of action, and the attitude which it maintained while the peace subsisting between the two great nations was menaced.

For thirty years a political struggle had been going on in the United States, founded upon the rivalry of opinion touching the propriety of emancipating the negroes employed in the Southern States. The advantage derived by the planters in the South from the services of the slaves in the growth of cotton was held by the politicians of the North to be more than counterbalanced by the moral damage the peculiar institution inflicted on a vast community, which asserted a monopoly of liberty, and professed the recognition of perfect equality. It was in vain that the Southerners declared that the negro was intellectually unfit for "freedom"; that he was perfectly happy in the condition of a serf, the treatment he received being undoubtedly good-his food, clothing, and lodging better than any he could procure were he manumitted; that his enforced labour was indispensable to the prosperity of the cotton and tobacco districts; and that, having

been paid for, his owners had a claim to indemnity if deprived of his services. The Northerners maintained that theoretically and practically the institution was objectionable-in theory, because it was opposed to the principle of equality; in practice, because it gave men the power of tyrannising with impunity over their fellow-men, encouraged debauchery and incontinency, led to the dissolution of the holiest domestic ties, held out a premium to piracy and African warfare, and rendered America the scoff of civilised nations. This opposition of sentiment gradually led to the separation of the whole of the free population of the States into two great parties, who severally called themselves Republicans and Democrats. The battle of opinion was fought in the press, in public halls, bar-rooms, coffee-houses, and hotels. It disturbed the action of Congress; it rendered the Senate and the State Houses scenes of disorder; and at length became a source of division in families and homes. But it was not until 1861 that the strength attained by the Republican or Northern party was made manifest. The period had arrived for the election of a new President. Hitherto, the men who held that office had been more or less inclined to favour slavery: but now the choice fell upon an uncompromising enemy of the institution; and Abraham Lincoln-an earnest Republican, an eloquent and gifted man, raised by his own talents and energies from the humblest position in life to a distinguished station at the Bar-was elected by a large majority. This was the signal for the withdrawal of the Southern party from the Union. A new Government was formed by them, and a resort to arms proclaimed the dissolution of the Republic. Mr Lincoln asserted his authority as the head of the United States' Government; Regiments were raised on either side, and a bitter civil conflict ensued. At an early stage of the quarrel it was expected by the South that England would recognise the seceders, because the cotton which they grew was essential to the prosperity of our manufacturing districts and the carrying trade; by the North the sympathy of England was anticipated, for the simple reason that she was opposed to slavery in any shape. But the Government of Queen Victoria resolved upon preserving a rigid neutrality. Recognising the belligerent attitude of the several parties, Lord Palmerston respected the blockade established by the Northerners, and prohibited the manufacture in British ports and dockyards of vessels avowedly intended for the service of the Southern Confederacy. In adopting this course, England offended both parties, and further outraged the feelings of the North by insisting upon the restoration of two Southern envoys to Europe who had been forcibly removed from an English vessel. No hostile action was

in searching for some rational amusement they had no place to turn to but the canteen in the barracks, or the public-house out of barracks. Well, in order to remedy this, the Government gave a sum of 2,000. to be entrusted to a Committee towards erecting this club, and that sum has been largely added to by subscriptions. In fact, when this establishment is complete, and has everything in it which it is intended to contain, fully 5,000l., and, indeed, more than that sum, will have been laid out upon it. Such, then, is the origin of this club. Here you will be at home, and each member will have the same right to use his club as I have to use mine. Here you will be free from every kind of restraint, except such restraint as all society in a civilised country is subjected to. The club, of course, like all others, will be governed by certain rules and regulations, but these will be few and reasonable, the number being purposely made few in order to show that confidence is placed in you.”

After saying a few words on the propriety of avoiding the sale of beer in the institute, MajorGeneral Eyre concluded thus:

"I am satisfied that the great majority of our soldiers are men of a high order, who long for the opportunity and this place to indulge their better tastes, and to improve those talents which some of you possess in a very high degree; talents which, if properly cultivated, may lead to your advancement, or, at all events, to your improvement. Well, here is just the place such men want, and where all others who like it will find quiet enjoyment and a variety of resources for their leisure. Here are every description of amusing and instructive books, maps, pictures, papers, drawings, games, and almost all in-door and out-door games, plays, concerts, and amusing lectures, with the best refreshments at cost price. Here, also, you can receive your relations who come to see you from a distance. I have only now, by permission of His Royal Highness the Commander-in-Chief, to declare this club open to the soldiers of the Army who like to profit by the many advantages it offers to them, and on his behalf I wish it every success, and all of you great enjoyment of it."

In the few years that have elapsed since the Institute was opened, its funds have greatly increased, and its popularity has extended. It proved the forerunner and example of similar institutions elsewhere, on a smaller scale, all of which have been a blessing to the British soldier.

Eighteen hundred and sixty-one closed with an event which filled all England with mourning. His Royal Highness Prince Albert, the consort of the Queen, died after a sudden and brief illness,

The high rank which the Prince held in the Army would alone have entitled the melancholy event to a record in this History, but, apart from that circumstance, His Royal Highness had established the strongest claims to the love and respect of the nation by the unostentatious exercise of the noblest qualities that can adorn mankind. We have already seen with what modest dignity he declined to take upon himself the Command-inChief of the British Army. He believed that as the honoured husband of the Sovereign LadyRuler of the realm his duty lay in a constant attendance upon her person, and a devotion to her welfare. He was at once the exemplary husband and the wise counsellor. The education of the numerous children vouchsafed to him, and their cultivation of princely virtues, was likewise an object of his unceasing care. But he did not confine himself to the exercise of purely domestic duties. Great Britain found in him an earnest patron and active promoter of all the great enterprises which tended to its benefit. Education, agriculture, science, the arts, the comfort of the poor, and the encouragement of the rich in the performance of generous offices towards their less fortunate fellows, were the objects to which he unceasingly applied his time, his talents, and his means. In a word, he acquired the hearty love of Queen Victoria's people; and, when he passed away for ever, the public voice with one accord ratified the posthumous homage of the Poet Laureate, who inscribed his memory with the glorious title of ALBERT THE GOOD.

CHAPTER XLIII.

THE PROGRESS OF IMPROVEMENT IN GUNNERY.

Allusion has already been made to the introduction of rifled musketry into the British Army. The subject is, however, of so much interest and importance as to merit, in connection with the extraordinary advances that have been achieved in ordnance generally, a separate chapter, even at the expense of an interference with the chronological arrangement by which the writer has endeavoured to be guided.

The repose which a nation enjoys after many years of war, if continued for a length of time, generally induces a state of lethargy which nothing but the renewed alarm of war can remove. And thus it was with England; although there were some occasions on which she was called upon to employ her navies, as at Algiers, Navarino, the operations on the coast of Syria, and some other

minor wars, still for upwards of twenty-five years after the treaty of Paris, which was believed to ensure unlimited peace to all the world, England was in a state of lethargy as regards munitions of

war.

The old Brown Bess, with its heavy flintlock, was looked upon by military men with religious veneration; it had won for us almost countless victories through long dreary years of strife, and could it not accomplish the same good purposes again? Indeed, the Military magnates of the day would have considered it heresy to doubt the perfect efficiency of the flint-lock musket (or "fire-lock," as it was sometimes called), or the ponderous pistol of the heavy Dragoon The same supineness existed in regard to the heavier arms.

Had not the old nine-pounder gone a long way towards winning Waterloo and scores of fights before? It was true that its range was feeble, its trail heavy, and its limber unwieldy, but still it was speaking for itself in the work it had done. Again, the heavier battering ordnance-had it not done its duty well and truly at many a successful siege, and with a peace millennium before us, would it not do for our day at least? And so also with the Navy. The old 32, the smart 24, the ringing 18, had they not fought Trafalgar, St Vincent, Copenhagen, the Nile? It is true there was that ugly carronade which, in an evil hour for the service, Captain Trollope, of the Glatton, had by accident as it were, raised up into notice, and which it is believed was generally viewed with dislike in the Navy as a very defective arm. But with all its faults it was believed it would serve the day in the long peace before the nation. Even well into the years of the Forties we find ships armed with carronades. This state of things, however, could not continue. A spirit of improvement appeared to be suddenly shed over us. advent of that mighty innovator "steam" to marine propulsion, and its application to war ships, aroused us from our slumbers to enter upon that great campaign of scientific improvement which has so prominently marked the last thirty years. The discovery was soon made that a better method of exploding the charge of a musket could be provided than the old flint and hammer. About the same time that the introduction of percussion locks upon our muskets was determined upon, it was found that our new steam war-ships required a new and more powerful description of guns than had hitherto been used, both as regarded the guns themselves, and the manner of mounting and working them. At about the same time, the late Sir William Snow Harris made those valuable discoveries regarding the conduction of electricity down the masts and through the bottoms of ships, which have since conduced so much to their safety. It may be then viewed that steam, mag

The

netism, and detonating powder were the three elements, if they may be so called, which came nearly together to rouse us from our slumbers, and bid us look to our arms-three mighty elements, too, which have since acted such important parts in the mechanical revolution, civil and Military, upon which we have entered. In the same slow manner in which all great changes occur, the transition from the old flint musket to the percussion gun was not arrived at at once. Firstly, one or two Regiments were armed with the new firelock; for, curiously enough, it still was sometimes known by that name; then, as confidence in the percussion lock became established, other Corps were armed with it, until about the year 1840 the change had been completed so far as concerned the soldiers of the regular English Army. The percussion musket was not completely introduced in the Indian Army for some years afterwards; many of the Indian Corps at the first Chinese war were armed with the flint musket. But old Brown Bess was to go through a greater change yet. The increased range and precision of fire of rifled guns had been long known, and two Regiments (the 60th and the Rifle Brigade) of the British Army had been armed with rifled carbines. The known efficiency and power of these two Corps raised the question of the expediency of extending the use of the rifle in the British Army. A gun that could be used with almost unerring aim at 800 yards was certainly immeasurably more valuable than one whose powers of destruction were limited to somewhere about 400 yards; and however considerable the cost of the rifle might be over that of the smooth-bore, the rulers of the day arrived at a wise decision in giving the final death-blow to the old revered Brown Bess, and substituting for it the Enfield rifle. With this improved arm it is possible that the English Army would have been contented, in spite of the superior powers of the Prussian breech-loading needle-gun, which was then creating much attention, if our slumber had not been roused to the astounding effect of the breech-loading gun on the bloody fields of Königgratz.* The question of retaining the muzzle-loading musket in face of the manifest advantages of the breech-loading rifle could not be entertained for one moment, and once more the small arms of the British Infantry had to undergo a change, as fast as Government could make the necessary arrangements for the purpose. The conversion of the Enfield muzzle-loading rifle to what is known as the "Snider" was not effected until about the year 1867, when the muzzle-loader had ceased to exist, except amongst the carbines of the Royal Artillery or Militia. So much for the

In the Prussian war with Austria in 1866.

small arms of the British Army, and now of the Artillery.

The resistance of Sebastopol to the guns of the Allies (in 1855-56) directed the attention of the French Government to the construction of a description of artillery that should prove more efficacious than any that had been used in the memorable siege. Rifled cannon (canon rayé) were found by experiment to be more efficient and capable of a greater range and more decided accuracy than the smooth-bore guns; and nothing was needed but opportunity to prove that the nation possessed of such a description of artillery was more likely to crop fortune in the field than the State which should adhere to the old-fashioned weapon. France found the opportunity, in 1859, when, associated with Sardinia, she made war with Austria, and in the memorable battles on the Ticino and the Po signally defeated her opponents in a few hours, and compelled them to a treaty which gave material advantages to the Emperor of the French and his confederate.

The

A perfect panic was aroused in England by this manifestation of the new power which her ancient foe had acquired. With a statesmanlike promptitude that did honour to his sagacity and patriotism, Lord Palmerston, then Prime Minister, immediately appointed a Royal Commission to inquire into the state of the national defences. Report of the Commissioners recommended the outlay of nine millions sterling upon the fortifications of Portsmouth, Plymouth, Pembroke, Portland, Chatham, Woolwich, Dover, and Cork. Lord Palmerston secured the assent of the House of Commons, and several contracts were at once entered into in 1860 for the purpose of placing an ægis around the British coasts. In the meanwhile vast improvements were taking place in the structure of cannon on both sides of the Channel and across the Atlantic. A Mr Armstrong-a civil engineer of rare ability, whose talents and services procured for him the honour of Knighthood and official employment under the Government--produced a wrought-iron gun* of tremendous

It is the indispensable condition of a good and effective rifled-gun that it should be made of the best material. The strain upon it from the explosive force required to give its projectile a double motion (the longitudinal and the rotatory) is such that it must fulfil every condition of strength, both in the character and quality of its material, and in the mode of its construction. Cast-iron is comparatively worthless for its composition, and should not be tolerated now that the mode of its manufacture out of wrought-iron has been discovered. Before this it was a necessity. Indeed, castiron is emphatically a base metal, at least, where strength and reliance are required. It is only a sort of pottery, having no fibrous or tenacious properties. Treacherous, uncertain, granulous, and brittle, its cheapness is the only apology for its use. In all the forms of its manufacture-utensils and implements, fixture and furniture, fastening and hinge-it is con

calibre, which embraced the principle of loading at the breech, previously applied to the riflemusket. Mr Whitworth, of Manchester, another engineer of distinguished talent, rivalled Sir W. Armstrong in the manufacture of a muzzle loading rifled-cannon. In justice to the country and to the manufacturers, numerous trials were made of the relative powers of the new ordnance, but these trials left it doubtful, down to 1863, which of the two systems was the most efficacious, regard being had to all the conditions of utility, safety, rapidity, accuracy, endurance, and facility of transport. The enormous expense of the engines of war thus tested (each gun costing 7001.) indisposed the Government to changes after a contract had been given to Sir W. Armstrong, whose breech-loaders found favour with the Services of

the country, and at this hour his gun is the recognised implement of the Artillery. But it cannot continue to occupy its present advanced position. Recent experiments have shown that heavier metal is necessary than even 12 in. 23-ton rifledguns, throwing a 600 lb. elongated projectile with a charge of 76 lbs. of powder. The masonry of fortifications, and the wood of the most renowned floating "walls," splintering into fragments when assailed by Armstrongs and Whitworths, iron shields were designed to cover the works of the principal fortresses and the sides of our magnificent men-of-war. But a fierce competition as to the relative capacities of the projectiles and the iron-armour soon established the feebleness of the latter, and invention has been racked to strengthen the panoply until it should exhibit a perfect capability of resistance.

And now we arrive at an epoch in which the history of the armaments of the Land Service and Navy are curiously blended. So long as Land

tinually breaking and requiring replacement. Especially is it unfit for cannon, in regard to which safety from explosion is a vital consideration. It has neither the requisite degree nor uniformity of strength. And this defect is not remedied by increasing the size of the gun; for, beside that it thus becomes cumbersome and unwieldy, increase of size does not give corresponding increase of strength. In a gun of great thickness the interior is expanded by the heat of the discharge, while the exterior is unaffected by it. Consequently the strain is not equally diffused; and, as the expansive force when reaching a certain point must find vent, explosion ensues; in which case cast-iron flies into fragments, while the wrought-iron gun, if it should burst, is rather torn than broken. There is also no certainty in the cast-iron gun. It may be tested by the requisite number of charges, and at the next firing explosion ensue. The difference between the two guns is the same as between a cut nail and a screw. Bronze, which answers so well for the smooth-bore gun, fails for the rifled; as, from the softness of the metal, the grooves are so worn as not to give the required accuracy of spiral motion to the projectile. Cast-steel is perhaps the best metal for small rifled-cannon.

+ See Appendix.