The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1865-02-07 00:00:00

ARMY AND NAVY.

The 16th Lancers at present stationed at Colchester,
Ipswich, and Norwich, will shortly embark for India.
The regiment will be succeeded at the stations named by
the 17th Lancers.

By Her Majesty's command, the rates of personal
allowance for officers of the army travelling
.on duty
without troops have been fired as follows :—For general
officers 20s. a-day, for field officers 15s a-day, and for
captains and subalterns 10s. a-day.
The volunteer movement has been started in the
Tyrol, with every prospect of a large accession to the
armed forces of Austria. A regular enlistment of
volunteer rifle-men is being carried out amongst the
mountaineers of the 'l`yrol, and it is estimated that at
least 40.000 men, all hardy sons of the hills, and the
finest shots in the world, will be organised under the
command of officers drawn from the regular army, and
will be armed with breech-loading rifles of the very best
manufacture. The enrolment of these new battalions
will, it is thought, more than compensate for the con-
templated reductions in the Austrian army.
. . . .

An increase of pay of regimental sergeant-majors is
to take place from the let day of January, 1865, from
3s. 21 to 38. 4d. a day.
The Royal Oak, iron-cased ship, has been docked
after six months' service. Her bottom was found to
be foul "beyond conception ;" masses of animals
zoophytes, corallines, Sic., all so encrusted with weeds
in one mass, that sharp scrapers will alone detach them.
Why does not the Admiralty try the Glasgow composi-
tion, which has been so successful in that quarter,
consisting of a nauseous oleaginous petroleum-like
fluid, which no sane zoophyte would bite into and
adhere after six months' sea-going as if it were the first
day of application.
It is announced at Chatham that the Terrible, with
some other large and powerful steamer, will accompany
the Great Eastern to assist in the work of laying down
the Atlantic telegraph cable.
We have now the captain's aocount of the loss of
H.M.S. Bombay, but are still in the dark, as he him-
self is, of the cause of the catastrophe. The fire, we are
told, was first perceived by two men employed in hand. '
ing up shell, one of whom survives, but can state no
more than that "he saw flames and smoke issuing from
under the starboard foremost handing-room of the after
magazine," upon which he rushed upon deck and rang
the fire-bell. All was right in the "light-rooms"
adjacent, "the magazine was secured," and, except
that he thinks that the spirits must have been ignited.
The captain has no suggestion to make. About the I
cool bravery of the men when the accident was dis-
covered, there can, however, be no doubt. They dis-
played equal firmness, steadiness, and devotion; and
their conduct affords the Times an opportunity for con- 1
trasting the effect of discipline as evinced on this trying
occasion, and impulse or panic as betrayed by those who
were in or around the Surrey theatre at the time the
alarm was given. "In both cases," says our con-
temporary, "the accident was wholly unforeseen, and
in both oases the process of combustion was so rapid as
to leave no chance of safety but in flight. But here
comes the difference. Although the manager and
actors behaved with admirable self-possession, and did
all in their power to mitigate both the danger and the
panic, the audience were seized with a regular
'stampede,' and rushed madly towards the doorways.
Every one looked out for himself, the gallery stairs
were blocked, and it was a mercy that hundreds were
not trampled under foot. In the Bombay all this was
reversed. Every one went to his station with alacrity,
and worked with the greatest zeal and cheerfulness;
there was no confusion even. When the order was
given to clear out the boats not one of those ordered to
remain at the fire and pampis left their station until
they were absolutely driven away by the flames.'"