The Press.
London, England, 1856-06-07 00:00:00

THE PRESS.

the officers absent from their regiments on
furlough, sick leave, &c., and it may be
imagined that the number left for duty at
head-quarters is becoming infinitesimally
small.

now, with offigers, regiments are at the
best mpst imperfeo machines ; discipline ig
neglected, °niers are unheeded, and all sob
dierly feeling* end l} its are forgotten. That
is the best state of .bings that can happen
under such a want, if so long continued as to
be an habitually prevailing one. The worst
state it is fearful to poutemplate, and will be
unnecessary to describe. Those, however, can
easily imagine it who know that our native
soldiery in India is composed of men who are
not our countrymen, and who bear towards
us no feelings of natural allegiance ; men who
are kept well affected to us solely by the habit
of being commanded by us—by the readiness
with which we listen to and redress their
grievances, by liberal pensions well secured to
them, and by regularly issued and most excel-
lent pay. The pay and pension part of the
question are, of course, not affected by the
absence of any number of the European
officers, but in other respects a marked differ-
ence is soon perceptible when there is not a
sufficiency of such officers on the effective
strength. And if such be the state of things
in time of peace, what must it be in war,
when, owing to the additional absences from
casualties, the evil is greatly increased, and
this at a moment when the necessity for
European officers is so much more pressingly
felt? To be sure, in such cases, all staff
officers who can be spared are remanded pro
tempera to regimental duty, but it seldom
happens that any great number can be spared
at such periods, as the same necessity for
additional officers in war time applies almost
equally to the staff. Nor are officers thus
remanded of much use generally, for they
come back disgusted at losing even for the
moment the more high), prized situation they
have left; and, besi4,sa, they have for the most
part long since ceased to have any communi
cation with, or knowledge of, their men. In
such car tia the best officer loses half his value,
for in war time nothing hardly can compensate
for a want of knowledge and of sympathy with
those placed under one's command.
Under these circumstances it is with great
satisfaction that we learn, on the authority of
the Indian prints, that General ANsoN, the
Commander-in-Chief in India, has brought the
matter under the consideration of the Go-
vernment in terms so strong as almost neces-
sarily to enforce attention to the representation
he has made. The evil is one which has been
of long duration, and by nearly every succes-
sive commander-in-chief an attempt to obtain
a remedy for it has been essayed ; but the
vast drafts made latterly for civil employment,
and for officering irregular regiments iu the
Plinjaitb, Nagpore, Pegu, and Oude, have
brought matters apparently to a head. At
the same time, though the evil is obvious, and
the necessity of doing something to meet it
pressing, it is not so easy a matter to hit on
that something as might be supposed—or
rather, we should say, it is not so easy to
obtain from the Home Government the sanc-
tion to the expense which so large an addi-
tion to the number of European officers in
I India, as any thorough cure for it, must neces-
sarily involve. Still in such, cases the first
expense is usually found to be the least, and
it will be more economical in the long run to
face the matter boldly than to stave off the
question till the army shall have become dis
organised and the power of applying a remedy
is past.
The simplest and best plan, and that most
strongly advocated by the highest authorities
upon the point, is the formation of a staff
corps for India, or, more properly speaking,
the placing all officers permanently required
for duties apart from their regiments on full
pay unattached. The difficulties that have
been raised in respect of this are more
imaginary than real, for nothing would be
easier than to direct officers on the staff to be
taken off the rolls of their regiments and
placed upon an unattached list, filling up the
vacancies in the regimental lists by the pro-
motion in succession of the officers below
them. The mode of promoting the unattached

SATURDAY,

officers afterwards to the higher grades when
fairly entitled to them might be arranged by
giving them the higher commission in each
instance on tl4O day an which, had they re-
mained with their reginiente, they would have
in the cgqrse of seniority attained it. With
a view of obviating diffietiliies from remands
to their °gyps, the pistrictigns as to the grades
of tl4e holders of st uppgintinents might be
particula Onee unmeaning ones
at presen;, in #Q44 in relation to various
office; coming under the designation of civil
employ. This would have little likelihood of
remand, except for causes hardly necessary to
provide very favorably for, and in those the
officer might he sent back as a supernumerary
to the corps from which he had been taken
out. This seems a better mode of supplying
the absence of so many officers from their regi,
ments on staff duties than the plan which
General ANsoN is said to have proposed. The
General's plan would be calculated to shift the
evil only instead of removing it ; his idea being
to provide for the wants of Bengal by drafts
from the officers of the Queen's service in
India, and from the army of Madras. The
Queen's army in India, and the Madras army,
should doubtless be allowed to par icipate to
their full share in the advantages which staff
employment bestows; but this would entail a
corresponding decrease in their present regi-
mental efficiency, unless the officers going on
the staff were transferred to an unattached list,
and the vacancies in the regiment filled up in
the manner that we propose.