quer agrees, on good cause shown, to provide a certain sum of money for the erection of barracks. Now comes the Board of Ordnance into play. Orders are given to prepare plans and estimates. These are examined and re-examined-not by military men, not by the Commander-in-Chief, his military Secretary, the Quartermaster-General, the Adjutant-General, or anybody else who really knows what troops need, and what they may do without -but by certain gentlemen in Pall Mall, who cut and carve at their own pleasure, and seem to pique themselves on going as much as possible counter to the wishes and the requirements of the military authorities. We have reason to believe that the new barracks now in progress at Sheerness have suffered much from this process; and we have no hope that the evil will ever be remedied either there or elsewhere, so long as the Pall Mall establishment shall be permitted to exist. Buildings of the first importance to the soldier's moral and physical comfort-ablution-rooms, cleaning-rooms, school-rooms, drill-sheds, are called for and granted. A whole year will probably elapse before the Board of Ordnance shall see fit to act on the Treasury minute ; and when it does act, the chances are at least equal that the whole affair is spoiled. Moreover, they consider it necessary to build, not for a couple of centuries, but for eternity; and employing officers of the Royal Engineers to plan and execute whatever they undertake, the expense is on all occasions huge in proportion to the endless faults that may be discerned. We have great respect for the officers of the Royal Engineers, considered as members of a scientific military corps. We want no better men to plan redoubts, or fortify arsenals, or to attack those of our enemies: but not having been initiated into the mysteries of civil architecture, they make but indifferent house-builders. We are told, though we will not vouch for the truth of the story, that a handsome garrison-chapel just completed in the Royal Barracks at Dublin, is so ingeniously arranged that, except the band (in a gallery opposite to the pulpit) not a soul can hear one word of the sermon. The expenditure upon storekeepers, their deputies, and clerks, and here and there even upon barrack-masters, seems to be out of all proportion with the pay and allowances granted to officers of rank and standing in the army. Take the case of Chatham, where there seem to be employed one storekeeper, one deputy, and four clerks. The salaries of these gentlemen, with payments on account of rates and taxes, and sums to cover travelling expenses, printing, advertisements, stamps, and other small disbursements, come to 20497. per annum. Surely this is more than the nature of their duties and position would seem to require. require. You have in Chatham, a colonel commanding the garrison, a lieutenant-colonel of the Provisional Battalion, two chief officers of engineers, a lieutenant-colonel commanding artillery, a brigade-major, and the clerks and people who work for them, and the combined pay of the whole does not exceed the expense of these six civilians by more than a trifle. But we are quite contented with the one simple fact, that out of the whole sum required by the Board for the ensuing year, namely 3,115,218, only 716,2547. are to be laid out upon the pay, allowances, and contingencies of the military ordnance corps. Whatever benefits may arise from a division of labour in the prosecution of mechanical operations--however adverse to public liberty may be the system of centralization when applied to the administration of justice on a small scale, and to the management of a national police-it is very certain that the executive government of a great country becomes both feeble and costly, in proportion as it distributes its functions over a larger number of separate departments than are absolutely required to carry on the public service. What is to prevent the military part of the business of the Ordnance Office being transferred to the Horse Guards, and its civil functions to the War Office? In neither case can it be necessary to do more than add some clerks and accountants to the pen-and-ink staff of our chiefs of departments, and these you have in abundance at Pall-Mall and in the Tower. So also with regard to deputy adjutant-generals, surveyors-general of fortifications, majors of brigade, and so forth: these should remain exactly as they are, only that they ought to report to the Commander-in-Chief instead of reporting to the Master-General; while over our barrack-masters, storekeepers, and the host of civil functionaries doing duty under them, the Secretary-at-War would exercise the same vigilant control which he now does over the governors, wardens, &c. of the military prisons. In like manner, we would hand over to the Admiralty the undivided charge of every article of armament, equipment, and ammunition, likely to be required for Her Majesty's fleet. Why should there not be an adequate magazine at every dockyard in the United Kingdom, of which a naval storekeeper should have the charge, and from which he might issue guns, shot, shell, powder, &c., ad libitum ? We cannot see the smallest necessity for a series of storekeepers beyond the naval storekeepers. And as to the building department, our conviction is that-dealing separately, of course, with the erection and repair of fortifications-the work would be better done, and done at one half the cost, were a respectable builder, such as Mr. Cubitt, employed to perform it, subject to the superintendence of a really skilful engineer. Only Only think of the charge for the ensuing year under the head of works, buildings, and repairs, exceeding the sum that is required for the pay and subsistence of the ordnance corps by very nearly 22,0001. It will be noticed, perhaps, that in this brief review of our defensive arrangements, no allusion has been made to the militia reserve, nor any suggestion offered as to the best means of raising and organising that most constitutional array. Our readers, however, need not fancy that we are among the wise amateurs who think themselves entitled to make light of any word coming from the Duke of Wellington. No great country can be safe while it lacks a regular and well-considered system for training its male population to the use of arms, and rendering their courage and numbers available in the hour of need. But there are under existing laws so many difficulties in the way of calling out the militia--of enrolling, drilling, and afterwards disposing of themthat we feel unable to consider the question at the tail of an article. One hint, however, we may venture to throw outnamely, that before anything is done with a view to a supplemental army of this kind, our authorities should examine carefully into the working of the plan on which the little kingdom of Holland acts. There every regiment of the line has so many dormant militia companies attached to it, for whom the government keeps in store a stock of clothing, arms, and appointments uniform with those worn by the regular troops; and who at intervals take their places in the same ranks with the old soldiers, and pick up in an incredibly short space of time both the spirit and the skill of such comrades. We do not see that there would be real prudence in more than this. We want no more permanent fortresses, either inland or on the sea-board: we desire to see no entrenched camp formed round London or near it. And as to a National Guard, the very term stinks in our nostrils. It is probable that if our political machine keeps the track into which it has of late years gotten, we may in the course of time find it impossible to avoid that portentous experiment; but let no Conservative suggest the anticipation of the evil day. As matters at present stand, give us what we ask-thirty thousand good infantry and cavalry, with fifty guns, and we shall have no sort of fear for the safety of London in case of any attempt in the line of invasion. Give us our artillery in fine order, and in half a year's time no fear but we should be in heart for repaying any visit of that sort. The preceding paper was in type before the intelligence of the new French revolution reached us. We do not, however, see cause on that account to suppress it. It is true that some of the the suggestions above hazarded may seem less suitable to the altered circumstances under which that event has placed us and all Europe; and indeed at this moment, so far from reducing one man of the line, we should not be surprised at a speedy call to convert every four-company depôt into a second battalion 600 strong. Meantime it would be unwise surely to defer bringing all the defensive force we now muster into the best trim-and the more we think of it, the more we are persuaded that the plan of the Dutch Militia deserves to be taken into the most serious consideration. Si vis pacem, para bellum. ART. VI.-1. Récits de la Captivité de l'Empereur Napoléon à Sainte Hélène. Par M. le Général Montholon, Compagnon de sa Captivité, et son premier Exécuteur Testamentaire. Paris, 1847. 8vo. 2 tomes. 2. History of the Captivity of Napoleon at Saint Helena. By General Count Montholon, the Emperor's Companion in Exile, and Testamentary Executor. London, 1846-7. 8vo. 4 vols. WE E thought we had seen the last of formal and avowed attempts to prove that the ministers of George IV., especially the late excellent Earl Bathurst, and the officers employed by them, especially Sir Hudson Lowe, were guilty of systematic barbarity in the treatment of Bonaparte: but here is one moreand, as we understand that it meets with favour at Paris, we think it our duty to give a brief notice of its merits. Indeed, having taken some pains to show the true character of, we believe, all the former works of the class, from the forgeries of Santini to the fictions of O'Meara, we could hardly receive in silence the elaborate performance, put forth after the lapse of sixand-twenty years by an officer of high rank in his profession, and also, as it now appears, in the eye of the Heralds. It was well known that M. Montholon was one of the generals who accompanied Napoleon to St. Helena-it was also known that this warrior assisted in the invasion of Boulogne, and partook in consequence of the detention at Ham-but we learn now for the first time, what would probably have astonished even Sir William Dugdale, that the Count is lineally sprung from a hero who saved the life of Richard Coeur-de-Lion at the siege of Ascalon in A.D. 1192, and was then created by that grateful monarch Baron O'Brion and Earl of Lee' (French Preface, p. lxxxii.). By the way, in case the Bonaparte countship must now be dropped, we hope there will be no objection in any quarter to the resumption of these ancient titles. He ushers in his work by telling us that during six years he shared the captivity of the greatest man of modern times, and relieved the agony of his martyrdom by attentions which He denominated filial—that he was employed in writing from dictation the commentaries of this second Cæsar'-that he watched the deathbed upon that political Golgotha of St. Helena'-and that everything which he states shall be verified by proof.' Though extracts from his papers had appeared in different publications, the whole story is only now produced in a complete and satisfactory shape.Jaloux de perfectionner son œuvre, désormais le plus grand intérêt de sa vie, l'auteur l'a enrichie de quantité de faits et de détails nouveaux, puisés dans ses notes et ses souvenirs.' And all this is echoed by the authoritative critics of La Presse, who say : Unexpected light will be diffused by the recital of General Montholon. Numbers of facts are for the first time made public in this work-numbers of false statements completely refuted. Sir Hudson Lowe is no longer on the scene; at this moment his Memoirs are in preparation for the press in London. It behoves France to be careful that the history of this illustrious yet odious captivity be not TRAVESTIED. It was time that the truth respecting the Emperor should be given to the world. General Montholon writes history-history, serious and authentic; he brings in support of his assertions documents-proofs. He had a right to be believed on his mere word-he asks to be judged only by the evidence he can produce.' The English edition, as well as the French, comes out under M. Montholon's own orders: but the English version was done from a MS., and many passages which that MS. had contained are either suppressed or greatly altered in the Parisian text. The MS. had been rather an illegible one, it seems, for the proper names are sadly travestied in the English text: but we cannot compliment the translator on having always understood what he could spell: for example, in rendering officier d'ordonnance' by officer of ordnance,' instead of 'orderly officer. We are afraid, too, the English scribe must take some of the blame incurred by such occasional metamorphoses as that of Rear-Admiral Pamplin into Lord-Admiral Pamplin,' &c. &c. whole the French edition is far the best of the two. Especially, it has more documents than the other, and more dates!— but we see good reason for keeping them both before us on the present occasion; and the reader will understand this by and bye. After the removal of Count Las Cases in December, 1816, Count Montholon became Napoleon's amanuensis; and these volumes profess to give us the Emperor's own account of many |
