cruise for two years, and reappear after an interval of one or two trainings.

An excellent sign in a regiment is when masters or employers of labour come and buy their men out because they cannot spare them for as long a period as the training. It is a sure proof to the colonel that he has at least an admixture of thoroughly good men in his battalion.

I wish here to make a few observations on what is known as the billeting system. That it is a great temptation to young country lads to take them by hundreds and place them for four weeks in a garrison town requires no demonstration. The public, however, would naturally expect that the government would always take pains to minimise these temptations as much as possible. I am afraid that in all the cases where regiments are quartered in billets, exactly the reverse is the case,

The men are told off in parties to the public-houses, varying from three or four to as many as twenty-five, according to the size of the house. Some of these houses are respectably conducted, but of some others the less said the better. Can the public wonder, then, that much immorality and consequent demoralisation take place? It is impossible to preserve discipline at night if the publican is a bad man; the militia non-commissioned officers being, for reasons already pointed out, quite powerless. Moreover in all public-houses, respectable and disorderly alike, the temptations to drink are irresistible for the soldier quartered there. The government allowance of fourpence a day for each man is not sufficient to recompense the publican for the outlay he is obliged to make. He revenges himself accordingly by making the militiaman spend all his pay in liquor, and when the latter has no money in his pocket, the publican advances him beer, expecting to be repaid out of the bounty at the end of the training. When he has money, and does not spend it in the house, the publican has a hundred little ways of making him uncomfortable. But this is not all. The publican is allowed to put two men and sometimes three into one bed. To my mind this system is repulsive -I know it is argued that this is to a large extent the habit of the class from which the men are taken. Granted that this is so, is it the same thing to a ploughboy to sleep at home in the same bed with his brother, and in a public-house alongside some town rough whom he detests? He certainly does not regard it in the same light, and he often shows it by purchasing his discharge in disgust after the training.

The plain truth is that the whole militia billeting system is iniquitous, and it is a scandal that the Government allows it to continue.

The following little fact tells its own tale. In 1882 the company in question was quartered in barracks, and during the training the

men saved 81. 3s. out of their pay, which they entrusted to their captain to put in the Post Office Savings Bank for them. Since that year the company has always been quartered in billets; in 1883 they saved 17. 188. in the training; but in no year since have they saved as much as ten shillings. Now it is permissible to billet militiamen in private houses—that is, in ordinary cottages whose owners or occupiers are willing, for the sake of the small government allowance of 4d. per man per day, voluntarily to take them in. My strong belief is that not nearly as much use is made of this provision as might be made, and that those who are charged with the billeting arrangements sometimes do not take the extra trouble which is involved in seeking private persons who are ready to take in militiamen and in parcelling the men out into small detachments.

After the description of the billeting arrangements which has been given, it might be easily supposed that the conduct of the men under such circumstances is very bad. It is wonderfully to the credit of the men in at least one regiment that they resist the temptations placed in their way to a very large extent. By the word 'conduct' I mean in this instance such behaviour as comes under the laws of discipline, such as breaking leave, brawling or rioting, drunkenness in the streets, &c. In the company I have described, only two men were convicted of drunkenness last year, and in the year before only one. It may be asked, How is the system of billeting to be avoided in those cases where, as often happens, it is impossible or inexpedient to go under canvas, and no barracks or huts are available?

I believe huts of some temporary structure ought to be provided for every such regiment. It would be quite worth while only to call. a regiment out every alternate year till the cost of those huts had been recouped to the country out of the pay of the regiment; or the Secretary of State for War might decide not to call out for training for the year in which a set of these huts were provided, a sufficient number of regiments to prevent any addition to the estimates.

As to the training of the men, the whole of the twenty-seven days during which the militia are called up cannot be utilised for that purpose. Three Sundays, with the day of assembly and the day of dismissal, have to be deducted. In the twenty-two days which remain, the militiaman has to be taken through squad drill, company drill, battalion drill, the rifle exercises, and a musketry course. is marvellous how well some regiments go through their drill at the inspection.

It

Nevertheless, I believe that, with a re-arrangement of the work to be done, still better results might be attained. Some of the drill at both ends might be advantageously omitted. What is the use of taking two days or more in putting the men through Sections 5, 11, and 12 of the Field Exercises, to which a good deal of time, comparatively speaking, is devoted? This drill is chiefly for the purpose

of setting recruits up to look and move as soldiers. To put a lot of militiamen through it for two or three days is a sheer waste of valuable time, as no one can possibly detect the least difference in their deportment afterwards. The time is too short to have any effect.

Ridicule has been cast by some critics on the practice of drilling a militia regiment in marching past and in solid formations for so great a proportion of the training, and they urge instead a continuous practice of the attack at the double and on rough ground. I take leave to differ from these gentlemen entirely. All that you can attempt to do in the twenty-two working days is to get the men in hand as much as possible, to accustom them to be quiet, unflurried, and steady at drill. Nothing is so useful for this purpose as continued marches past or constant exercise in solid formations. The attack in double time has the most demoralising effect on these undisciplined lads, these amateur soldiers. Personally I believe that the open order formations should never be practised by militia regiments during their annual training, except from the halt or during an advance in quick time only. It depends entirely on what results are expected to the force from their annual training. Is it thought that they will be fit for active service? Such an expectation would be simply ridiculous. But, if that is so, surely their training should be adapted to the possibilities of the case. The question then becomes what are these possibilities? I believe the answer to be a no more ambitious one than this. To give the force such a superficial acquaintance with a certain number of a soldier's duties that it may on an emergency undertake garrison duty at once. The moment a militia regiment is permanently embodied a new vista opens before it. Supposing the men to be physically fit for active service, I believe that most militia regiments ought to be capable of taking the field after a year's embodiment, so far as those men are concerned. It will be noticed that I say 'supposing the regiment to be physically fit;' an important question for the country is Would it be fit?"

I should like to examine this point shortly; and closely bound up with it is the question of the militia reserve.

This force was called into existence to supplement the army reserve. The standard of age and physique is high, and it formed on the 1st of January, 1886, a very fine body of 30,128 men. A militiaman who fulfils the conditions necessary for entering this force receives an extra bounty of 11. His obligation then becomes the same as that of an army reserve man. He can be called out in time of national emergency, and drafted temporarily into the regular army.

Now what effect does the existence of this force have on the militia itself? If I show what effect it will have on the company about which I have been giving statistics, it will serve as an illustra

tion of the effect on the force as a whole. The company last year consisted (excluding the staff-sergeants and drummer boy) of 104 non-commissioned officers and men. Of these 19 belonged to the militia reserve. Let us suppose that the country was engaged in a great foreign war; that the militia had been embodied and the militia reserve drafted into the regular army. What would then be the condition of this company? It would be completely emasculated. I do not believe that there would be 35 men left who would be physically fit to go into a campaign. The rest would either be not old enough or not big enough. I have serious doubts as to whether the militia reserve is not a mistake altogether. My belief is that the terms of enlistment for the militia might be safely altered so as to give the country the benefit of the services of every fit militiaman at a time of great national emergency.

At present the militiaman enlists for service in the United Kingdom only. If the terms of enlistment could be so drawn as to assure him that he would never be sent to the field except when the national peril was very great and the army reserve had been exhausted, and that otherwise he would never be sent out of the United Kingdom, I do not believe that such terms would affect recruiting in the least injuriously. The country would gain in two ways. It would have all the physically fit men of the militia at its disposal to use either collectively in their own batteries or battalions, or individually by drafting them into the army, and it would save all the annual_vote for reserve bounty.

The militia is considerably below its strength at the present time, though not so much as it has been quite recently. I do not think that this can be attributed to the terms offered by the country; on the contrary, those terms seem to me to be good. I have known many men who have been excellently fed, clothed, and lodged, and who have had 6d. a day pocket-money for a month, take away with them after the training 21. in cash as well as a practically new pair of boots, two pairs of socks, and a flannel shirt which the country throws in; and every man, who has not misbehaved himself, can be sure of having 17. in his pocket at the end of his month's soldiering. In some quarters the slackness of recruiting has been attributed to the present plan of drilling recruits, which is bound up with the territorial system; but this is certainly not the case in the regiment I have been describing, where this system has proved to be an unqualified success for the recruiting of both the line and militia battalions.

WOLMER.

A GLIMPSE OF RUSSIA.

A MONTH'S residence in any country can give but a very superficial impression of its real condition. Yet, in the art of representing nature, there is a certain value in the slightest sketch, taken on the spot with accuracy and attention, which is quite distinct from, though inferior to, that of the photograph, faithful to detail while wanting in colour, or that of the elaborate picture which portrays everything with its exact proportion of light, shade, local colour, and environment. As the slightest sketch, then, the following observations are offered with the hope that they may be acceptable as a rapid glance at a society and country of which little is known outside the political world, and which is very different from the rest of Europe in government and religion.

Even the shortest visit to Russia disposes of many popular misconceptions; and although it increases astonishment at the repressive rule possible in these days, it becomes evident that generalisations are as false here as in most other cases. Extraordinary stories are current in England as to the private character of the Tsar, the health of the Tsarévitch, and the reign of terror caused by Nihilism. Many of these become incredible on examination and inquiry. An old proverb asserts that there is no smoke without fire. On the other hand, it is well known that if a lie gets the start the truth will rarely overtake it. In the conduct of affairs between nations whose interests are antagonistic, each must endeavour to procure the objects most essential to its own welfare, and it is especially needful to be on the alert when the issues are easily entangled by the historical aspirations of a race with strong diplomatic instincts. To attain these objects personal calumnies are both unnecessary and undignified. This is seen also in private political life, and the esteem and regard in which the late Lord Iddesleigh was held testify to the public opinion on this point. However much he differed from, and whatever blame he attached to, the misgovernment of his opponents, no personal attack fell from his lips. Unfortunately, a portion of the English press is apt to disregard these maxims, and to publish hastily whatever is transmitted by their foreign correspondents. The policies of the two countries may be divergent, but there are continual mis