The Sun.
London, England, 1866-03-15 00:00:00

Dinner to General Sir Hope Grant,

Lieut.-General Sir James Hope Grant, K.C.8.,
was entertained last evening by the members of the
London Scottish Rifle Volunteer Corps at a dinner,
which was given in St. James's Hall, to celebrate
the appointment of that distinguished officer to the
post of honorary colonel of the corps, in which he
succeeds the late Lord Clyde. Upwards of 400 of
the volunteers and their friends sat down to dinner,
and the gallery was almost filled with ladies.
The chair was taken by Lord Elcho, lieutenant-
colonel of the regiment, Gen. Grant occupying the
seat of honour at the chairman's right hand.
Among the company present we also noticed Lord
Campbell, Admiral Bethune, Sir S. Donaldson, Sir
W. Fergusson, Colonel Colville, Sir R. Murchison
(who, as an hon. member of the corps, appeared in
the uniform of the regiment), the Hon. A.Kinnaird,
Col. Erskine, Hon. Major Anson, Col. M'Murdo,
Sir J. Henry, Col. Baker, and Capt. Roupell.
The band of the regiment played a variety of airs
during and after dinner.
On the withdrawal of the cloth the customary loyal
and patriotic toasts were proposed by the CHAIRMAN.
Col. M‘Munno, in responding for the army, called
attention to the fact that on the withdrawal of the
regular troops from the war in New Zealand the
task of terminating the war in which they had been
engaged had been left to the volunteers of that
country ; and he remarked that, although the sol-
diers who had been recalled regretted that they had
not been allowed to finish the work they had begun,
they were delighted to leave it in such good hands.
The gallant colonel next referred to the discipline of
of the British soldier, and the patience he exhibited
under the sore trials he was frequently exposed to
through neglect and inattention to his comforts and
necessities, and glancing at the insufficiency of the
recruiting system in furnishing good men to the
army, the gallant officer observed that, in his opinion,
the army would have been better recruited than it
had been if his suggestion that the pay of the soldier
should be doubled and a portion of it placed in a
savings bank until the expiration of his service,
when the accumulated sum should be given to him,
had been adopted.
Admiral ERSKINE responded on behalf of the Navy,
and Col. ERSKINE on behalf of the Volunteers.

The CHAIRMAN then proposed the toast of the
evening—" The health of Lieut.-Gen. Hope Grant."
(Great cheering.) He stated that his gallant friend
had descended from a very old family, whose name
had been mentioned in Scripture, but owing to the
use of the letter i instead of the letter r, the name
had been altered, the passage in which it occurred
reading, " Now there were giants in those days,"
when the word should have been " grants."
(Laughter.) In early life General Grant had
distinguished himself as the best " golfer " in
Scotland, having won the St. Andrew's medal
by his skill in that pastime; and not only was he
an excellent fiddler, but his violoncello had in fact
been the foundation of his fortune, for through the
recommendation Sir David Bruce had given him as
a good fiddler he had received his appointment of
aide-de-camp to Lord Saltoun, and the two went
fiddling out to China, where they made the Chinese
dance to a music that was entirely new to them.
(Laughter.) After this the gallant officer had dis-
tinguished himself in the Sikh war, and to the hon-
ours gained in that campaign he subsequently added
the laurels he had achieved in the Indian mutiny.
At Delhi he protected the camp against the sepoy
mutineers. At Cawnpore he routed a body of the
insurgents and captured a number of guns, and ad-
vanced with Lord Clyde to the final relief at Luck-
now. He was subsequently engaged in hunting
down the mutineers in Oude. Lord Clyde had said
of him that he never made a mistake in the orders
he received, and was a man in whom he (Lord Clyde)
could place implicit confidence. (Cheers.) After
the repression of the Indian mutiny, General Grant
proceeded a second time to China, where he greatly
distinguished himself in the vigorous assault he
ordered upon the forts of Peiho, in the face of a
protest from his colleague the French commander-
in-chief. (Cheers.) It was expected, on the retire-
ment of Sir Hugh Rose from the chief command of
the army in India, that the appointment would have
been given to General Grant; but Lord Halifax
bestowed it elsewhere, and General Grant came
home to fulfil the duties of Quartermaster-General
at the Horse Guards, where he would doubtless
render efficient service to the army.
The toast was received with f ull Highland honours.

Sir Horn GRANT, on rising, was received with
loud cheers. He thanked the company for the
manner in which his health had been received, and
observed that when four years ago he had had the
good fortune to witness the evolutions of the Lon-
don Scottish Volunteers on parade he thought he
had never witnessed a finer body of men. He
had not been able to be with them on parade since
he had been appointed to the colonelcy, because his
duties at the Horse Guards were at present very
heavy, but he hoped to be able to inspect them in
the summer. He gave some interesting details of
his experience in the Indian mutiny, stating that
although most of the mutineers were very bad
characters, yet they were a very fine body of men,
and he gave a remarkable instance of fidelity on the
part of a sepoy, who, in a, night attack, when Gen,
Grant had his horse shot down, proffered him an-
other he rode, the offer being made at the imminent
risk of his life. He refused to accept it, but laid
hold of the tail of the horse and was dragged out of
the melee ; and the next day when he offered the
sepoy a recompense in money it was refused. He
concluded by expressing his thanks for the honour
done him, and expressed his gratification at being
placed in command of so fine a corps of volunteers
as the London Scottish.
The toast of " The Rouse of Lords" was then
given, and acknowledged. by Lord Campbell ; and
" The House of Commons" by the Hon. A. Km-
naird, M.P. Various other toasts were given, in-
cluding the health of the noble chairman and Lady
Elcho, and the proceedings terminated.

POLITICAL ON was rumoured in South
Shields on Tuesday that Mr. Ingham, M.P. for Sunder-
land, intended resigning his seat in Im-our of Mr. Henry
Fenwick, lately unseated.