The Sun.
London, England, 1862-04-22 00:00:00

THE REVIEW AT BRIGHTON. was quite overcome, and backed his horse to its ap-
pointed station in evident confusion.
Everyone now prepared for the me.rch past, whicA
commenced at ten minutes past two, with the listh
Hussars, who it is needless to add seht an admipable
example of discipline and drill to their civilian
comrades. After them came the Ham pshire ber.
saglieri, whose commander forgot to salute the
general; and then the " Inns of Court," wh.o cer-
tainly bore off the palm from anything on the
ground, both for marching and appearance. Every
one seemed to know, and everyone to like this dis-
tinguished corps, and when their well-known, affect-
ing, and most appropriate lyric was struck up by
the band, the crowd made the welkin ring with
their acclamations. I cannot undertake to note
down the interminable succession of corps whi' .1
now passed before the venerable commander-in-cb ief
during a full hour and a half, who, with head on..
covered, returned with marked empreseernent the
salute of every successive corps, and seemed to
watch everything with a most critical eye, whilst
an occasional nod indicated that something- had
passed deserving of more than ordinary commenda-
tion. At 3 o'clock not one half of the corps had
passed the flagstaff, but a short pause took place
in consequence of some difference as to precedence,
which was being settled on the crest of the hill.
When the march was resumed, a lively Scotch
air told that his lordship's countrymen, the Lon-
don Scottish, were coming, and the crowd with ex-
cellent taste seized the opportunity for paying the
chief another compliment. They cheered again and
again. Lord Clyde uncovered, and when /to saw
one of the finest infantry regiments in the world
marching past, adorned with his own nation .al em-
blems, it was quite easy to see that his lordah ip was
Tnen
t
both to toPgli
affected by no common emotion. lie stooped eagerly
r
forward over his horse's neck, and then leaning
back, slapped his saddle-bow in tune to the gay
hspey
rifleswhich
and
etoba himself.nd pl played in c°
It
was a I 3 ther
a most interesting incident, and would have been
strat
the
complete if the pipers of the corps had only la ad
wit
enough to strike up the
pibroch as they past ed the
flag-staff. Of course I do not mean more than a
momentary scream, as every one is aware that even
respect for Lord Clyde could not reconcile southern
ears to any more lengthened specimen of the national.

The Volunteer Review at Brighton, looked for-
ward to with so much interest, came off yesterday
with conspicuous success. Never before, in the long
and terrible history of war, was the attempt made
,o place an army of 20,000 men in the field, and to
undertake military operations with them at a point
50 miles distant from that which they quitted the
same morning. Of course, any country which could
show its ability to do this added materially to its
defensive power, and still more to its military repu-
tation. During the Italian campaign troops, it is
true, were conveyed by railway along the rear of
their own line for a distance of four or five miles,
and brought into action. But in that case the com-
mander simply took advantage of the facilities
fforded by a line which happened to skirt the rear
of his army. In the present instance the fact has
for the first time been broadly recognised that future
wars, especially defensive wars, must be fought with
the help of railways just as much as of monster
guns and iron-plated ships, The illustration of
what can be accomplished through the agency of
our railway system presents itself very appropriately
at a moment when the question of naval supremacy
is unsettled, and when the outer line of defence once
constituted by our wooden walls has been swept
away: The most perfect arrangements of the War-
office, however, and the most irreproachable perfor-

. _
mances on the part of the railway companies, would

!
have been unavailing had it not been for the
patriotism and energy cf the Volunteers with whom
originated the idea of the demonstration that was
yesterday carried out with so much success. It would
be impossible to speak in terms too high of the spirit
animating the force of which the array at Brighton
was but a fraction, but the fact in itself is sufficiently
eloquent that, without a shilling of expense to the
War-office, an army of 20,000 Volunteers was
massed in the course of a few hours on a given
point, the raw material of which that force was
composed being probably equal to any in the world.
The last train from Victoria was telegraphed to
start at 8 o'clock, so that the arrival of the whole
London army at the appointed time became almost
a matter of certainty.

Rain ! Can it be possible ? What can that be
which patters so ominously at the bed-room win-
dow at about 7 o'clock in the morning, which
awakens the sleeper, and causes him to jump up
and look out, and think of Washington Irving's
" wet Sunday ?" Cannot Aquarius hang up his
watering-pot for one day, and allow Lord Clyde to
review the volunteer army in a dry skin ? It is
rain, real south-coast rain, fresh from the cloudy
atmosphere of the Downs, and coming down as if
it meant a day's mischief. A hundred thousand
eyes at that moment looked out of fifty thousand
windows, and offered up inward orisons for that real
blessing to Englishmen, a fine day. At eight
Aquarius shows symptoms of relenting, and at nine
—by which time a breakfast had been swallowed
in all the agonies of suspense—the clouds broke ;
universal Brighton smiled tho smile of hope, and
the cabmen registered a vow at once to treble their
fares. As a specimen I may mention that one
modest individual, whose horse looked as if he
could, with great exertion, reach the Downs by
sunset, asked me £2 10s. for the journey "one
way." But so it always is when any " event" takes
place i❑ the provinces. The local organs of wonder
and acquisitiveness are stimulated to such an ex-
traordinary degree, that the only puzzle with the
natives is how much they may safely demand for
everything, and the result is that before the crisis
has passed, the largest portion of their stock,
whether of lodgings or vehicles, lies a drug in the
market. However, I did not pay £2 10s., and I
got a vehicle which took me to the Downs by such
a route as enabled me to note the preliminaries of
what every one was preparing for. At the ordinary
railway station nobody could guess that anything
extraordinary was going on, were it not for the
crowds which lingered outside the gates, and .die-
-

music.

The last man—l shall not say which was the last
, corps—passed the Commander-in-Chief at 25 minutes
past 3 ; and, with him, it was evident that the prin-
cipal interest of the review had, as far as one half
of the public were concerned, passed away also. The
ring was broken in, the fashionables descended from
the stand, and a certain local restaurateur made a
grand speculation by demanding 2s. 6d. a head for
luncheon, and then informing his guests very coolly
that everything except one semi-denuded ham bone
had been demolished hours before. My own impres-
sion was that the statement was only a mockery, a
delusion, and a snare, for I am positive I saw the
same ham bone in the same place on last Easter
Monday, and therefore I believe it to be a pro-
perty kept exclusively for the purposes of this
annual imposition upon strangers. Hark ! there is
a boom of the great gun. Let us leave the delusive
jambon, and rush into the air; there are squares
being formed in the hollow, and a fierce file fire
comes pop, pop, pop, across the hill. The white
smoke steals curling up over the brow, and the
death rattle of the Enfield sounds nearer and nearer.
One of the two hostile armies is evidently being
forced back upon its reserves—for see, the dense
masses in the hollow close up their ranks, because
they know that they soon will be wanted in sup-
port. Lord Clyde, who commands the attack, is
driving everything before him. Squares baie been
gallantly formed, but only to be as ruthlessly
broken by artillery, and it seems as if the battle
was now to become one of great guns. The retreat-
ing army dispute every inch of ground. The rattle
of their musketry is incessant, but what can infan-
try do against the 6-pounders and siege guns of the
Cinque Ports Bombardiers ? There are now bright
flashes along the White Hawk ridge, which tells us
that the battle comes home. Two haystacks abso-
lutely crest the hill, and round them the deeds of
llugu9m ont and La Belle Alliance are being enacted.
I fancy I
djscern the white belts of the artisan corps
glistening in the new Thermopylae, but I will not
be positive a 5 to whether they are, in this case,
s. Now they come, Engineers
Greeks or Per3ian.
and Guards, infantry and artillery, red, green, and
grey, pell-mell, victors and vanquished. The re-
serves go up, and cover the retreat of their collea-
gues, and a long line covers the ridge from end to
end. The cavalry make two charges, and there is
a pause. People ask each other, "Is there any-
thing more worth stopping for?" ,and even the
" Victor of Brighton Downs " must renumber that
their train leaves at five, sharp. Besides, the pace
had begun to tell on the stouter volunteers, for the
whole slope of the Downs was dotted with groups
of men who had " fallen out " the moment they got
the chance. A loud cheer rose at last from the rea
coats, Engineers and Working Men—they had car-
ried the hill, and were driving the reserves in and
out in every direction. The columns in the valley
began to form front in a promiscuous sort of man-
ner, some towards Coastguard Castle, others front-
ing Windmill-hill, and the impression became
general that it was time the battle was decided
one way or the other. The spectators had,
fact, got mystified. The distinction between
victors and vanquished became more and more
of a problem, r, nd great anxiety was expressed
for something in " the hand to hand" line, in.
place of this distant and complex manoeuvring, and.
it required the final charge of the cavalry down the,
hill to restore every one to good humour. I was
informed that at the termination of the evolutions
Lord Clyde expressed in very warm and encourag-
ing terms his approval of the appearance which
had been made by the volunteers. The improve-
ment, indeed, was conspicuous to everyone, and
will, no doubt, go on until we have a civilian army
equal to any emergency. I did not hear that a
single accident occurred to mar the great success of
the day's proceedings.

cussed the topic of the day noder the inspiration of
the genius loci. For the volunteers a separate

dcba;cadere had been provided, and from it they

repaired to their various rendezvous without the
slightest trouble or confusion. A constant stream
of foot passengers flowed along the pathways, all in

one direction, and amongst them could be noticed

a s.nart sprinkling of single volunteers—red, green,
and grey—the tall " Guards" and the small Engi-
neers, all smoking the calumet of war, which looked

. _
exceedingly like a short pipe, and hurrying off to
their early tryst. I noticed a good many of the

" Two-pound-ienners" crawling empty and sulkily

along, and I derived much comfort from thinking
that such would most probably be their amusement

during the remainder of the day. In the town
were two principal rendezvous, both of which my
model of a cabman—he ought to have been a volun-
teer—was gracious enough to permit me to visit.
In one of them, the Pavilion, once the secluded

Capua of the English Tiberius, but now a Vf ry proper
and useful cavalry barracks, the country corps—
that is to say, the artillery—mustered to the num-

ber of about 2,000. There were the Cinque Ports,
who brought their own pieces, and the Portsmodtb,
who came without any. Much grumbling was
there upon this point. Eighteen six-pounders to
eighteen hundred men ! " A halfpenny-worth of
bread to all this sack !" It was perfectly monstrous,
but it was a fact. Either the Government would

not give the guns, or the railway asked too
much for carrying them, and so there was all
this valiant artillery marshalled on the lucus a non

lucendo principle without the guns wherewith they

could show Lord Clyde their facility in demolishing
infantry F. quares, or sweeping away cavalry squa-

drops. The 18th Hussars were veil, kind and
patronising to the new corners, and comforted them

with the reflection that the absence of guns might,
after all., be better both for themselves and for the
spectators. They (her Majesty's 18th) cautioned
the visitors that if they should be charged at the
gallop their plan would be to keep their bayonets
up, and not lower them to the ground, an error in
practice that had been observed at certain previous
volunteer reviews. .

The question now arose, what were to be the
evolutions. The programme was still a secret in
the bosom of Lord Clyde, whose battles, every one

said, were all models of evolution. At about half-
past 12 o'clock his lordship and three other Queen's

officers, two of whom were Gens. Pennefather and

Dalzell, and followed by four aides-de-camp, gal-
loped across the open, and took up a position close
to the column of the Engineers. Immediately after,
obviously in obedience to orders from his lordship,
the great masses of men began to move, and several
corps, principally light grey, started off at the
double to take up their positions. The intention
seemed to be to form line along the nearer ridge, in
' addition to which skirmishers were thrown out, a
dutywhich is always remarkably well performed by
the volunteers. By this time the crowd of specta-
tors had increased enormously, and people watched
eagerly for the nearer approach of the troops.
About this time the great weather question was
settled by the sun definitively breaking out and
establishing himself in a white, hazy, semi-trans-
parent sky for the rest of the day. It was also
ascertained that the intention of the military autho-
rities was to mass all the troops on the northern
heights, and, after a brief inspection, to have the
much desiderated " march past" before instead of
after the evolutions. The masses on the ridge now
grew gradually denser and blacker; and Lord Clyde
could be recognised in the foreground bplendit3
mounted, and accompanied by Col M'Aiurclo andt
e
three inpectors of volunteers. Very shortly after-
wards_hi,,
the sound of a trumpet was heard,. d
lordship came galloping up to
followed by a brilliant regular and. volunteeri.byquite
and, what surprised me a goodde‘l,
the e ainagn-
staff,
ti betting-ring,
showed a hood
cortege of civilian equestrians, who.
to his lordship in which they thought proper to
deal more curiosity than politeness in the closeness
exhibit their very indifferent horsemanship, Lord
Clyde had a most enthusiastic reception from the
crowd, and when, a few moments after, his lordship
uncovered whilst speaking to the ladies in the Lord
Lieutenant's carriage, the cheering was redoubled,
and kept up for several minutes with an almost
frantic vehemence.. His lordship, who is said to
fear a popular ovation more than a Russian battery,