The day happened to be remarkably half-a-dozen other specimens of grimfine; bright, without the intolerable ness from the line to the pole,—and, heat with which the English summer finally, a vast concourse of spectagenerally qualifies its fine days, and tors on foot,-were admitted within which makes it a matter of prudence the singularly narrow gate of the innot to be too eager in wishing to get closure. Apropos, if I shall, in the rid of its native fog and rain. This course of the next war, be appointed fog and rain, too, have the effect of giv- to take the command of the invasion ing the soil that proverbial verdure, of England, I shall wait for some which I am beginning to think the field-day of the British artillery on most delicious feature of any landscape this very spot. I should infallibly whatever. My eyes have been so capture every man and gun of them; burned out with the hard, dry, turme- for it would be utterly impossible for ric-coloured fields of the Continent, them to get out of this gate, in case from the first day when the primrose there was to be the slightest necessity peeps from its leaf, to the day when for getting out, more than one at a the trees of the forest, like our belles time. I myself was in the greatest of Paris, dress for winter, by undress- possible hazard of being jammed in ing themselves of all their vegetable the defile to this hour, from accidentdraperies, that the sight of grass ex- ally coming in contact with a citizen isting beyond the first week of sun- only a little above the ordinary dishine is an absolute relief to my angry mensions. There we stood back to imagination. I, who have seen the back: it required the aid of a dragoon far-famed Slopes of Lausanne, re- to extract me. sembling nothing but a colossal brown loaf, the Pyrenees, as if they had been covered with a tanned bull's hide, and looked from the Rhigi itself on a circle of hills and valleys that might have rivalled the ash-hole of a furnace a hundred and fifty miles round, see the English landscape with a delight which I shall not pique your nationality by attempting to describe. Now, as far as the eye could stretch, the earth was covered with a carpet greener than ever was wrought in the looms of D'Aubuisson, and nearly as soft; light and elastic to the tread; breathing the very air of health, and seconding with infinite effect the surrounding picturesque residences of the richer English, who certainly, in those matters, have the luckiest taste of any people alive. The display began:-we, that is all who, like myself, were on horseback and wore uniforms, and, to the credit of the national politeness, first of the first, all who wore foreign uniforms; then some of the ambassadors, the Russian in the scarlet liveries, which looked as if he were a competitor for the British throne; the Austrian, with his huge vehicle, stuffed with Hungarians and Transylvanians, bilious-looking men, with their noses and chins buried in bunches of yellow hair; the Swedish, with the pallid visages of hyperboreans who had been frozen during the last winter, and who were yet scarcely recovered,-with All the mounted party then advanced in a thick group, led by Sir Hussey Vivian, the present MasterGeneral of the Ordnance, to the spot where the performances were to begin. The practising-ground forms a parallelogram about three-quarters of a mile long, with the Thames at its extremity; a mound about 1200 yards off to receive the shot which fell round the target, and the ships and steamers on the river to receive any which disdain the ground. This must so often occur, and the passing vessels are so happily placed to be struck, that nothing seemed more wonderful, in this day of wonders, than that the batteries had not the honour of sinking every thing that steered in sight. At length the rocket-practice began. The target was instantly knocked down; and the discharges followed each other so fast, that, as whoever attempted to plant it again would have been inevitably pierced like a bleeding heart on a seal, the rockets had nothing to do but to beat it about, and treat it as Achilles did Hector when he had him fairly on the ground. You have seen the rocket-practice at our camps. But I, at least, have seen nothing comparable to the skill, rapidity, and precision to which the service has been brought here. Our artillerists are quick, clever, and brave; this is only saying that they are French. But the Englishman's quietness of movement, dexterity, and attention to things which our impatience overlooks as trifles, give him the true qualities for an artillerist. The rocket, which we have found so difficult to manage, and which even the diligence of the German has often found so dangerous, is here a weapon as much under command as the bayonet. In the discharges, whether single or in volleys, no failure, no recoil, no disaster of any kind took place; and those tremendous fireworks continued sweeping over the field with a steadiness and a strength which, against troops, must have been desolating. The very flight of the Congreve rocket is startling; it springs from the ground in a volume of flame, and then rushes along with a continued roar, with its large head blazing, and striking point-blank, and with tremendous force, at the distance of a mile or more. In a siege it is already extremely formidable. It bursts through roofs; it fixes itself wherever it can bore its way; and it inflames every thing that is combustible. Stone walls only can repel it, and that not always. This weapon may be regarded as almost exclusively English in its use, as well as its origin. It will be like the English bow in the fifteenth century. In the next war what an extraordinary change will take place in all the established instruments of putting men out of the world! We shall be attacked at once from above, around, and below. We shall have the balloon showering fire upon us from miles above our heads; the steam-gun levelling us, from walls and ramparts, before we can come within distance to dig a trench; the Congreves setting our tents, ammunition-waggons, and ourselves in a blaze in our first sleep; and the steam-boat running and doing mischief every where. But of all those mischief-makers I should give the palm to the rocket. No infantry on earth could stand for five minutes within five hundred yards of a wellserved rocket-battery. Half-a-dozen Volleys of half-a-dozen of these fiery arrows would break the strongest battalion into fragments, lay one-half dead on the ground, and send the other blazing and torn over the field. The heaviest fire from guns is nothing to their effect. It wants the directness, the steadiness, the flame, and, VOL, XLIV. NO, CCLXXV, resulting from all those, the terror. If the British troops shall ever come into the field without an overwhelming force of rocketeers, they will throw away the first chance of victory that ever was lost by national negligence. Nothing can be more obvious than that this tremendous weapon has not even yet arrived at its full capacity for war on a great scale. We were next shown the effects of the other branches. Galloping back on both sides, to give way to the huge muzzles of a range of howitzers, we witnessed the precision with which the shells were thrown. Still opening our files, we gave way, with all due deference, to another range. Then the siege-artillery, twenty-four pounders and eighteens, roared away, and shook the mound into dust a thousand yards off. Then, advancing again down the parallelogram, which was lined on three sides with the crowd, fourteen field-pieces set off, playing, in rapid succession, against the targets, at the distance of a third of a mile. Then, as a grand finale to this operation of the day, we had the rockets again. A troop of cavalry, more formidable than cavalry ever were before, a dozen of whom would have put to flight the whole army of Xerxes, or turned the fortunes of mankind at the battle of the Granicus, for they were loaded with irresistible fire, bounded forward with their rockets fixed at their sides, rode to the front, and began their conflagration. At night this must have been sublime. With its fiery trains, and its eccentric sweep, nothing could have surpassed it but a flight of comets. Even in the broad day it was superb. Volleys, by tens and twenties, were thus launched out upon the sky, till a hundred rockets were consumed. The Master-General then turned his bridle, and led us to the modelroom and repository of the arsenal; here we looked over specimens of every species of arm, till we mounted our horses again, in front of this fine building, and rode to the field. We were now on elevated ground, with a wide view of the surrounding country, and that country the true English landscape, and in the finest season. Switzerland may have more romantic scenery, and there are even in France valleys of pastoral beauty; 2 B but the look of perfect cultivation belongs to the landscape of this country alone. The fences, the distribution of the grounds, the planting, the various colours of the cultivation, all make it delightful. One impression is universal; however solitary the champaign may be, in England it seldom has the look of solitude. Of course, I do not speak of its regions of lake and mountain, but in all its more level provinces, even if neither husbandmen nor cattle were to be seen round the horizon, the aspect of cultivation is so clear, that you instantly fill the solitude with the associations of man, of all associations the most touching, constant, and animating. Our cortège, as we rode up, found the field, which is of vast extent, wholly encircled by carriages, horsemen, and multitudes on foot, who had been waiting for some time for our appearance. We evidently made a prodigious sensation, and, I presume, deserved it, if epaulettes and shakos of every colour and plumage, showy uniforms, and horses covered with caparisons of every kind, Turk, Tartar, Russ, Spaniard, German, and French, could reward so many thousand pairs of brilliant eyes for the trouble of admiring us. But if I had any personal vanity to torture, it must be acknowledged that the Marshal was the grand point of attraction. Every one pressed forward to see "Soult." The old soldier's fame had palpably carried off the eyes and plaudits from us all, diplomatists included; an affair which, on this and other occasions, has, I understand, thrown the whole corps diplomatic into that kind of jealousy, which is the more vexatious from its refusing any legitimate outlet, being utterly beyond remedy, and being only the more laughed at the more it is known. The batteries were formed in small separate troops in the diameter of this plain. In a few minutes the trumpets sounded, and they were all in motion. The manoeuvres were those which now form the artillery service of Europe; attack and retreat, the covering of columns in movement, and the change of front. But all were done with extraordinary exactness. The French artillery move as quick, and fire as fast as any corps in the world; but all continental services are apt to overlook minutiæ. Nothing As was overlooked here. Yet nothing was tardy, loose, or unfinished in its performance. The moment when the word was given all was ready; the whole line had limbered up their guns; the next they were seen half a mile off, with their guns in position; in the next they rolled out a rapid and wellsustained fire, and before the smoke had cleared away, they were another half mile off, and in position again. Then came the roar of their volleys. They left the smoke standing, and under its cover had dashed to the opposite extremity of the field. The light artillery were, if possible, still more complete; mounted on quick and powerful horses, they did every thing at the gallop. They were evidently quite equal to the most rapid cavalry movement. And their loosing the tackle of their guns and horses was done with unfailing dexterity. In one instance, perhaps in many, for the smoke sometimes hung heavy, a troop suddenly dismounted, pulled their guns to pieces, and flung themselves on the ground beside the fragments. rapidly again, at a signal, they sprung up, reunited the whole, and with the guns were in full speed across the field. The only point to which I could attach a fault was one which they had beyond question adopted from ourselves-the caps of the light artillery. They are our hot, heavy bearskin muffs, enormous things, which, without protecting the head from the rain, expose the head, and the man with it, to be blown off the horse by a puff of wind. In bad weather they are thus an encumbrance, and in heat they melt the wearer to the bone. The lighter the head-gear of the soldier always the better. Even if helmets were made of straw it would be better for him than any of those cumbrous Baleries of brass and iron, horse-hair, or bear's hide, which always fatigue, always give headaches, and whose weight, when the matter comes to coups de sabre, is more apt to give force to the enemy's sabre than to ward it off. It is not to be forgotten that all nations who follow nature wear the head as lightly covered as possible; the Indian of the West, the Tartar, and all the natively warlike tribes, trust to little more than a tuft of their own hair. But fashion, imitation, and the love of finery, load us and our troops with burdens; and those, too, on the most delicate portion of the human structure, which the most muscular would be unable to bear. As to defence, a soldier gets a hundred headaches for one blow in fair fight; and the soldier whose arm cannot protect his own skull, will not find protection in a cap of adamant. After the review came the hospitality. We were handsomely enter tained by the General commanding the Ordnance; drank loyal toasts in excellent wines; went out to see the regiment with its sappers, to the amount of some thousands, dining in the open air; and, in a serene evening, perfumed by the smell of new-mown hay and a thousand flowers, rode home after a spirited and instructive day, THE REVIEW OF THE GUARDS. I have just returned from. another brilliant scene. The young Queen, attended by a whole host of the nobility, was present in Hyde Park, to see the manoeuvres of the Royal Guards. All the diplomatists were, of course, invited to be on the spot; for English civility seems determined to know no bounds; and, after dining out day after day, in a succession of the very sumptuous hotels of the English patricians, and dancing until we are driven home by the recollection that the next day is far gone, and that we must dress for dinner again, we are continually summoned to some fete champêtre, some public show, or the celebration of the anniversary of some great public establishment. This morning was devoted to attending on the Ambassador, in whose train we exhibited ourselves in Hyde Park. The Park is a large space, open to the citizens, who scatter themselves about its walks and rides in profusion on Sundays; ten times the size of the Champs Elysées, and more than ten times the beauty, notwithstanding the inferiority of its name. It is covered by the matchless verdure which belongs to England alone, undulates just enough to relieve the monotony of an absolute plain, and from its fine groups of trees, and broad sheet of water gleaming through them, has the quiet aspect of a magnificent park attached to a private mansion. But on this day all was tumult, glitter, and multitude. When we entered the field, we found the troops drawn up in a line from north to south. The Foot Guards in the centre, cavalry on the flanks and rear, and troops of fieldartillery forming the extremes of the wings. Handsome houses surround three sides of the Park, and they were crowded at every window, and even on the roofs, with fashionable spectators. July 9. The whole looked not unlike a colossal amphitheatre, of which the Park was the arena, and we and the troops had the honour to be the performers. In front of the centre a guard of honour surrounded the Royal standard, and there the Queen took up her position. She entered the Park about eleven, announced by the firing of cannon. The troops then stood to their arms; and the whole cortége followed her Majesty along the line. This sight was striking. You already know my opinion of the appearance of British troops on the ground. But these were the elite of the British troops-the Life Guards and the Infantry of the Household. Nothing could be more admirable than their tenue. The infantry, well set up, steady, and alert-the cavalry, giants, without the LOURDE look that great height so often gives. Their swords are longer, broader, and altogether a more effective weapon than ours. But they have adopted, in compliment, I presume, to France and bad taste, "the enormous bearskin cap, which places the face of the wearer as nearly as possible at the middle of his figure; and for grace or utility he might as well wear one of the regimental kettledrums. As the cap is too heavy for the man, the man is too heavy for the. horse, powerful and spirited an animal as the English dragoon horse is. The weight of cuirass, carbine, accoutrements, and rider, cap and all, is enough to crush any thing less than the bone and bulk of an elephant. Such soldiers may answer the purposes of parade, or ride through a field-day; but compaigning is out of the question. Even the Belgium campaign of 1815 is not an answer. It was but a three days' evolution. And though on our side the deplorably heavy cavalry were thrown away against the English squares, and scarcely less than devoted to ruin by the unaccountable rashness of Napoleon himself, the English cavalry were chiefly reserved, and brought forward only at the close of the day, which was clearly the only and the fitting time. As we moved along, we had a further opportunity of surveying the people, who, in all the displays of this country, form one of the most interesting portions of the entire spectacle. The multitude was incalculable, and its numbers were brought still more forcibly before the eye, from the limits within which they were compressed. The mass of human beings was solid on three sides of the circle. On the fourth, and in rear of the troops, it was more scattered over the plain, or grouped up on the rising grounds which gave a view of the movements. This coup d'œil was the more novel from the odd erections on which the populace took their places; benches placed on chairs; baskets and barrels for the foundations of structures equally frail; and every kind of slight scaffold sustained the Sovereign people." Fortunately they were not far enough from the ground to break legs and arms, otherwise the public loss in these points must have been considerable, for we heard their crashing every moment. The trees, too, were thickly loaded with that forbidden fruit, spectators; so thickly, indeed, that the branches often broke down with their crop. These were especial objects of attention to the police, and a sort of petite guerre was kept up between the parties below and the parties above during the day. The police had the worst of it. It was the war of the Pygmies and the Cranes. The troops then, on the discharge of a gun, broke off into companies and squadrons, and passed the royal standard, the officers saluting as they passed. The actual manoeuvres now commenced, and for nearly two hours a succession of active field movements were gone through, and, I must acknowledge, gone through with admirable finish, skill, and rapidity. The line advanced, throwing the skirmishers in front, two battalions of rifles. The skirmishers were recalled after some rounds, and the line commenced firing, by volleys of regiments, from the right. Nothing could be more perfect than this fire. Its precision was complete. The line then faced about and retreated, forming columns on halting. The superb cavalry of the Life Guards, flanked by Hussars and Lancers, now moved up by squadrons through the intervals, formed line, and charged. This was by far the finest part of the spectacle, the grand jeu of the day. The whole plain was covered with the two finest animals on earth, men and horses, and both in their finest caparison, spirits, and action. Forbid it all the genius of my native country, that I should give any thing on earth, or under it, precedence of the sex; though, perhaps, I may be forgiven for presuming their ambition not to deal in charges of cavalry. But before we came, an absolute forest of swords, spears, and banners, rushing on with the speed of the whirlwind, shaking the very ground with the thunder of their tread, and rending the skies with the blare of their trumpets; seeing these things, I wonder no longer that Jacques, or Hyacinthe, or any of our eaters of brown bread, delvers of ditches, and dressers of vines, feels the love of lace and manslaughter suddenly spring up within him, flings down the spade for the sabre, and goes forth determined to eat, drink, and be merry, to ride fine horses, wear fine clothes, and be a field-marshal. It is true that a Prussian six-pounder, or the bayonet of an Austrian grenadier, may come seriously in the way of this consummation; but the brains of heroes are made for any thing but close reasoning, and if Jacques has the true material for the bivouac within his configuration, he will think of nothing but boot and bridle, the glitter of his helmet, and the glories of a campaign. In France we have a ridiculous trick of driving the peasantry from our reviews. From this comes the neces sity for the conscription. I shall pledge all my military fame, present and to come, that a regiment of showy hussars, quartered judiciously, and allowed to exhibit itself and its chargers from time to time in a gallop across the fields, would carry away with it as many followers as an Indian army. Even in England, where they raise their soldiers by enlistment, they have not yet attained full knowledge on the subject. They clumsily send down a drummer or two to a country fair, with a sergeant to com |