The Press.
London, England, 1854-12-30 00:00:00

DECEMBER 30, 1854.

dred and thirty-six European officers, and
three corps of sappers and miners attached to
them. There are three regiments of artillery,
(having six hundred and forty-three European
officers in all,) composed of seventeen Eu-
ropean troops and six native troops of horse
artillery, and forty-eight European companies
and thirty-six native companies of foot artil-
lery. There are nine European infantry regi-
ments, one hundred and fifty-five native
infantry regiments, and twenty-one native
cavalry regiments of the line, besides forty-two
irregular cavalry regiments and sixty-one
irregular infantry regiments, with a propor-
tion of artillery attached. These irregular
regiments are less completely officered than
the regulars, but in all other respects they
are as serviceable as corresponding regiments
of the line ; and in addition to all these there
are police and peons in India to the extent of
between three and four hundred thousand
men, many of whom are now armed and
trained for local purposes, and all of whom
might be embodied if necessary, being quite
capable of performing every duty for which
militia or local troops can be required. To
suppose that out of so vast a force as this, the
European commissioned officers of which
number five thousand five hundred gentlemen,
the Indian Government should be unable to
raise and equip an efficient army for service in
Turkey is to suppose that India under Lord
DALHOUSIE is unable to do:what India could do
under Lord WELLESLEY. when we neither pos-
sessed half the revenues, nor the armies, nor the
means of transport which we possess at pre-
sent, and when, in addition, we were at war
with several powerful native States—States
which have long since been subdued and have
passed away. Indeed, it is merely requisite
to cast one's eye over the stations at which
the several regiments of her Majesty's troops
are located to see how many of them might
with perfect safety be withdrawn. The 12th
Lancers at Bungalore, the 10th Hussars at
Poona, the 26th Foot at Cananore, the 43rd
at Madras and Bungalore, the 84th at Belgaum,
the 78th and 86th at Poona, the 83rd at Dura,
with the regiments which the 36th, the 27th,
and 74th have been sent to relieve, might all
be made available, at any rate, till the recruits
now in England were sufficiently advanced to
be sent to fill up the gaps thus created. Of
the Company's forces five troops of European
horse artillery and five batteries of European
foot artillery might be very well spared ; and,
if volunteers were called for from the native
army, nearly all the Mahometan and not a
few of the Hindoo, Sepoys (if it were thought
advisable to take the latter) would be found
willing to go, while officers, arms, and money
might be sent to equip a contingent of cavalry
and infantry to be raised in Turkey, and which
might be fixed at thirty thousand men. The
high pay given to our native troops on foreign
service, when compared with the miserable
pittance which the Turkish Government allows,
would not fail to attract to our ranks numbers
of excellent men. We might thus take, in
round numbers, from India about fourteen
thousand European and thirty thousand
native troops, including a due proportion of
artillery and of sappers and engineers and
irregular horse; and we might take officers
and arms for a contingent of thirty thousand
men to be raised in Turkey, giving in the
whole an army of about seventy-five thousand

men.
The objections that we have heard raised to
this plan, as far as regards native troops and a
contingent, are, first, that an attempt has been
already made to form in Turkey such a contin
gent, and that it has failed. To this we have
merely to reply that all that has been done as yet
was to send out two or three Indian officers to try
and organise the Bashi-Bazouks—a set of plun-
derers by profession—but these officers were
left without the first element of success, being
unrecognised by the Commander of the Forces,
and without any money for the payment of
their men. Had it been otherwise, there could
be no doubt that, if sent in sufficient numbers,
they would have been as successful in Turkey
as other Indian officers were in organising a
contingent in Persia in the year 1834. The
other objection was urged by a general officer,
who quoted his Indian experience as a voucher
for what he said ; but has Indian experience