The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1854-05-02 00:00:00

are told, " seems only anxious that the men shall be clean
shaved, their necks well stiffened up, and their waistbelts
tight. He insists on officers and men being in full fig—
no loose coats, jackets, or any other less dignified relief to
strained muscle or fretted skin. His wonderful pack kills
the men, as the weight is so disposed as to hang from the
shoulders instead of resting on them. As the French
have got all the best houses and all the best attendance to
themselves, there is all the more reason why we should
make it up out of our own resources ; but resources we
have none adapted to the emergency. No serious harm
is done yet ; but if things are no better on landing on a
spot familiar to every schoolgirl, how will it be when our
fine, well-fed regiments have entered many days' march
into the heart of a desolated and miserable country ? If
this is all we have learnt since the beginning of the cen-
tury, and if this is all the aid our civilization can offer us,
that aid is but equivocal. If the campaign were to be
fought out in Hyde-park, or if the men were lay figures
for the display of neat uniforms, we might congratulate
speculators on the good taste, vigilant eye, and unsparing
discipline of the general in command. Unhappily, this is
a battle not only of man with man, but of flesh and blood,
sinew and skin, with the elements, with fatigue, with
hardships innumerable, all of them telling severely on
natures ill accustomed to this sort of work. But, if civi-
lisation softens the soldier, can it do nothing to mitigate
his hardships ? There can be no necessity why, on the
very day the expedition lands, the sick should be cast on
the floor of their extempore hospital, without the means
of either sitting or lying down in comfort. It should be
the business of our military authorities to be continually
improving the condition of the soldiers, as far as our
means will allow. It is now more necessary than ever to
husband life and strength, and to cherish, by every pos-
sible art the brave band whom we have sent so far from
home, and whose places it may not be so easy to fill in the
event of great loss. Even a cab proprietor cares for his
horses, and, small affection as he may have for them, he
takes care he shall not have to recruit his stock too fast
for his funds. It is to be hoped that due care will be
taken at home to maintain such a report of our progress
abroad as shall insure the early discovery and correction
of such evils as we have instanced before their melancholy
consequences shall be brought home to us by the dimi-
nished numbers of the muster-roll or by bloody disaster.
—Times.

MELANCHOLY ACCIDENT IN THE BALTIC.—A letter
from Memel, of the 19th April, reports the melancholy
death of Captain J. Foote, of the corvette Conflict. Cap-
tain Foote came on shore on the morning, of the 19th,
with another officer, on business connected with the prizes.
About five in the afternoon he wished to return on board,
A fresh north-wester had been blowing for some time,
right against the stream of the Haf, where• it debouches.
There was a heavy surf, especially between the moles.
The head pilot at Memel strongly advised Captain Foote
to take a larger boat for his return, but in vain. The
captain, with his lieutenant, got into a long narrow gig,
which was manned with five sailors. In less than ten
minutes after the boat suddenly disappeared. Ia an in-
stant the life-boat was launched and manned with pilots,
but it came too late to save all ; the lieutenant and one
of the men were still alive and clinging to the thwart
straps of the boat, but half frozen ; the captain, with. four
of his men, had already found a watery grave.