way, "Goosey" would not have made a fuss about it. He never complained of a man in his life, and I am confident would not know how to make up his face for the occasion. In his middle watch a cheerful ease pervades the deck. As the old Islander bowls along, a man or two sings, among the groups in the waist, old stories of love, or war, or storm, or drink. "Goosey" sits and chats with his midshipmen, over a drop of something good. Like other fellows of his stamp, "Goosey" delights in talking about his domesticities, and is only too happy to communicate to you all about his private affairs. He opens his heart freely on all such topics, and never seems to suspect that the world in which he moves has a story of its own about his history. The said world tells a long yarn about "Goosey's" foolish marriage and want of common prudence; "Goosey" considers himself a happy and prosperous fellow. Surely "Goosey" is the best judge. But no; the vulgus mentioned above insist that "Goosey" ought to be the most miserable of men, for manifold reasons known to Toadyley and Co. With these we have nothing to do just now. The middle watch is our business, and, in the middle watch of "Goosey" Sparrow, if you hear him pour out his good-natured, credulous remarks about himself and people generally, you contract a kindness for him, and a respect for him, which a good deal of pleasantry from sharper gentlemen ought not to be able to efface from your mind.

The middle watch, then, may be said (not altogether fancifully) to be the heart of the four-and-twenty hours of sea life. In it we have an image, too, of all life, if we choose to study and consider it. For, in its course, we pass through the alternations of liveliness and weariness, of work and leisure, of thought and conversation, which divide our life as light and darkness divide our time. What is the life of a contented spirit but a Mediterranean summer's middle watch, wearing itself away, from hour to hour, in occupation, meditation, and expectancy, till the end approaches?-the sunlight breaks gradual and radiant from the mysterious world beneath our sea, and the conclusion of our time brings us at once to rest and day.

REMARKS ON THE COMPOSITION OF THE STAFF.

ALTHOUGH the defects of our un-military system have been adverted to, in one shape or another, in almost every number of this Magazine for many years past, it does not seem that either the Horse Guards or the public at large has at any time heeded our warnings; and it required perhaps such a calamitous state of things as the Crimea now presents to awaken the country to a painful sense of our inferiority in military organization.

It is our belief that we are not surpassed by any nation in the elements of military force; for at all periods the chivalrous gallantry of the officer, the hardihood and invincible bravery of the British soldier, have been conspicuous. The annals of the four quarters of the globe can scarcely point to the defeat of a British army; but, alas! those same annals can, with perfect truth, indicate many and many a disaster,

which, if analyzed, would be found traceable to inherent defects of one kind or another in our wretched military system; and we do not hesitate to affirm that so long as interest and money continue to be the only levers by means of which officers are raised to rank and command, so long shall we be subject to misfortune in our military undertakings.

That the great Duke fought his way triumphantly through the Peninsula is no argument in favour of our system; his genius enabled him to succeed in spite of its defects; but that it cost him infinite time, energy, and patience, to mould things to his will, is abundantly shown throughout the twelve volumes of his despatches; and possibly Lord Raglan may also, in process of time, reform, modify, and create, so as to render a British army once more formidable; but, in the mean time, what peril must attend his operations!

Our purpose, just now, is not to follow up these passing remarks by entering in extenso upon the vexed question of our military system as a whole, but to point out the necessity of immediately doing something towards remedying the mournful condition of the staff of the army, upon whose efficiency success or failure in military operations materially depends.

It may here perhaps be as well to mention, for the benefit of our non-military friends, that in military parlance all officers, from the general commanding downwards, who are not attached to regiments, constitute the staff of an army; but there is one particular branch of the general staff, whose duties being both important and multifarious, its members ought to possess peculiar attainments; we mean the Quartermaster-General's department.

When it is borne in mind that everything relating to transport, camp equipment, encampments, quartering of troops, taking up positions, examination and care of communications, military topography, and reconnaissance, belong to this branch, it must be evident that next to those of the General-in-chief the Quartermaster-General's duties rank in importance.

The Adjutant-General and his officers issue the Commander-in-chief's orders, arrange all duties to be performed by the army, regulate discipline and tactics, and provide for arming, clothing, and supplying small arm ammunition to the troops. Theirs being almost entirely what is termed office work, any officers of business habits, and possessing an acquaintance with the regulations of the army, are competent to its performance.

At the Horse Guards the Adjutant-General is undoubtedly the most important staff officer; but in the field the Quartermaster-General's office is really the post of superiority.

Most of the continental services have a permanent staff corps ready to perform all the field duties we have mentioned; and a corps of the like character formerly existed in our own service, and was found to be of great value during the Peninsular war. It was, in fact, a corps of field engineers attached to the Quartermaster-General's department; and we think it is greatly to be regretted that a nucleus, at least, of such a corps was not kept up. It disappeared from the Army List wenty years ago, at the instance of certain short-sighted economists, who a bout the same time demolished the small remains of another

some

war corps, the wagon-train; and deeply have we had to deplore such false economy. Had the staff corps been still in existence, we do not hesitate to say that the road from Balaklava to the camp before Sebastopol would have been stone-laid in preparation for the rains, and if the wagon-train had survived, that same road would have enabled it to carry the sick and wounded to Balaklava, and also provisions from thence to the starving troops.

We have narrowly watched all proceedings in the Crimea, and it is our firm belief that the impracticability of the road between Balaklava and the camp has been attended with more fatal consequences than resulted from the ever-memorable hurricane of the the 14th November; and hence the officer whose immediate duty it was to look to the means of transport has very much to answer for.

Let us here do Lord Raglan the justice to mention that he used his endeavours to obtain a good chef d'état major, and did offer the post to an officer of ability and experience now on the staff in a northern district; but, unhappily, that able man's health was not in a state to admit of his undertaking the onerous duties of a quartermaster-general in the field. Possibly the officer on whom Lord Raglan's selection eventually fell might have fulfilled his duty satisfactorily; but he was seized with fever at Varna, and narrowly escaped from death. The present occupant of that important post served for a short time in the same department at the Horse Guards, and was therefore known to Lord Raglan. We doubt not his being, in many respects, a good and meritorious officer, but have much reason to consider him misplaced in his present office. And, indeed, the same may be said with truth, we fear, of his assistants, since we have too much reason to believe that nearly all of them are totally unqualified for the performance of their duty; and hence the necessity of transferring recently several officers of the Royal Engineers to the department in question!

Under existing circumstances, this is perhaps a wise measure; but surely no time should be lost in restoring those officers to their proper duties, by providing competent men to replace them. Why not at once revive the Royal Staff Corps? The Duke of Wellington approved highly of the corps-which, indeed, was of eminent service to him in many of his operations and from it sprang numerous officers who rose to distinction in the service.

After so dreadful an exposure of our miserable general military organization, there can be no doubt that the highest military authorities will be earnest in seeking to reform the existing system; but this must be a work of time. What we would urge upon them at the present trying crisis is, not to wait for a thorough revision of the system, but to assay a few steps in the right direction, beginning with the staff, to which, it is clear, too much importance cannot be attached. If, however, any one should be blind enough not to perceive this necessity, we would refer him to a great authority, whose opinion on the subject we shall offer no apology for quoting. Baron Jomini says:

"A good staff is more than all indispensable to a well-constituted army. It must be considered as the nursery whence a general is to draw the instruments of which he makes use as an assemblage of officers whose talents are to second his own. When the genius which directs

and the talents of those who are to carry out his conceptions do not harmonize, success becomes doubtful, for the most skilful combinations are neutralized through faults in execution. A good staff has, moreover, the advantages of being more lasting than the genius of one man; it can remedy many evils, and we hesitate not to affirm that it is the best safeguard of an army. Petty interests, narrow views, misplaced self-love, may deny this assertion; it must nevertheless remain an undeniable truth to every reflecting soldier and every enlightened statesman. A well constituted staff will be to an army what an able ministry is to a monarchy; it will support the commander even when he is capable of directing all himself; it will prevent faults by furnishing him with good information; it will also prevent them when he is unequal to the duties of command. How many great deeds, both ancient and modern, which have illustrated men of mediocre talents, have been performed by those surrounding them! Regnier was the chief instrument of Pichegru's victories in 1794; and Dessoles, like him, was not unconnected with the glory of Morceau. Is not General Toll associated with the successes of Kutusof? Diebitsch with those of Barclay and Wittgenstein? Gneisenau and Muffling with those of Blucher? and many other names might be cited in support of these assertions." We might carry forward these questions to later times if further illustration were necessary, but shall content ourselves with one only. How much was Beresford at Albuera indebted to Colonel Hardinge? *

If these forcible remarks of Baron Jomini, taken in conjunction with the ruinous condition of affairs in the Crimea, are insufficient to produce the conviction that a strenuous and immediate effort should be made to organize a good working Quartermaster-General's staff, volumes from our pen would be a mere useless expenditure of time and paper.

With a few well-qualified officers at hand equal to the duties of the department, a knot of young men of family and influence might hang about the head-quarters of an army without doing, to use a Horse Guards term, substantive mischief; and if the country chooses to be at the cost of the pay and allowances of such ornamental gentry, that is not our affair; we profess to be strictly utilitarian, and as such freely speak the truth.

As we have already suggested, the re-establishment of the Royal Staff Corps strikes us as the best mode of providing competent officers for the duties of this important department; and here it will not be misplaced if we inform our readers respecting the organization of the corps in times gone by. Its formation was, in outward semblance, precisely that of a battalion of infantry-its proportion of officers and non-commissioned officers the same; its discipline and arms the same. The officers rose by seniority, and were generally, though not invariably, recruited from the Royal Military College; they were expected The battle of Albuera seemed lost through the misconduct of the Spaniards, and M al Beresford had given orders to retreat, when the present CommanderColonel Hardinge, who was serving on the Staff, with great prompt

in-Chief, the ps w. rode up to General Cole, whose division had just arrived on the

in reserve, and pointed out the necessity of reinforcing the Fusiliers' brigade was immediately precipitated on the out the shr troops, and the battle became speedily restored.

years1

ness and decision ground, and stood troops engaged. enemy, supported by othe

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to possess a certain acquaintance with practical mechanics, and the usual acquirements of a scientific military man-as drawing of all kinds, the principles of field and permanent fortification, military surveying, reconnaissance, and a good knowledge of the French language. The sergeants were expected to perform the duty of overseeing all kinds of military works. The privates were divided into three classes, composed of workmen in the usual trades required to be exercised in such a corps-as masons, bricklayers, carpenters, joiners, wheelwrights, smiths, &c., &c. The pay of a sergeant was 2s. 6d. per diem; of a first-class man, 2s.; of the second-class, 1s. 6d. ; and of the third, comprising four-fifths of the total number of privates, 1s. 3d.-the same as cavalry. The pay of the officers again was precisely that of the cavalry, and they were allowed forage in proportion to rank. For all purposes of service, the officers were actually assistants in the Quartermaster-General's department: the field officers ranking as assistants; the captains and subalterns as deputy-assistants; and they received the field allowances of their respective ranking.

It will readily be understood that, although disciplined as a battalion, it was not with any view of acting as such in the field; indeed, it was usual to employ the corps by companies of sixty men or even smaller detachments, according as their services were required. Throughout the Peninsular campaigns, some three or four companies generally moved with head-quarters, in readiness for any employment the quartermaster-general might find for them; but a large proportion of the officers were usually absent on surveying or sketching duties, military reconnaissance, &c. This corps was, therefore, a body of field engineers, at hand for every species of military service, having in its ranks a considerable number of able and intelligent staff officers.

Perhaps it may be said that the corps of Sappers and Miners provides for all such duties as we have glanced at, and consequently the reorganization of a staff corps is now no longer necessary. But to this we reply that the engineers and their sappers belong to, and are specially under, the Ordnance department, and consequently must obey the orders of the commanding royal engineer instead of those of the quartermastergeneral; and that it was to free himself from a sort of control exercised over his measures by the Ordnance and their representatives, that the Duke of York, when commanding in Holland in 1799, originated the staff corps. But we will put forward an hypothetical case to illustrate how service in the field would proceed with dependence on a sapper corps alone. Operations, we will suppose, are carried on and actions fought by our army, with an awkward river in its rear; and it becomes of paramount importance, for the safety of an army so engaged, that in the hurry of the moment it is necessary to throw bridges across such river, to retire by if worsted in the conflict. In such case the quartermaster-general must first refer to the commander of the forces, who has to send for the commanding engineer, or to him, directing him to execute a service proposed by another person. The engineer may be a good and zealous officer, or he may not take the same view as the quartermaster-general; and, in the latter supposition, will he show all the alacrity in executing his wishes that the occasion requires?

Our well-informed military readers will recollect that the foregoing is not altogether a hypothetical case. The action of Fuentes d'Onor