ments which were requisite to give them a claim to the name of light, by enabling them to manoeuvre with equal alertness and precision. The goose step' in the drill was then introduced, the march and platoon exercise were rendered much more rapid, and the necessary amount of luggage was greatly reduced, so as to render the troops as quickly as possible available in the event of an invasion, which was then almost hourly expected. New muskets were also supplied, and were regarded as a great improvement, though they were in fact only the Brown Bess,' recently distanced by later inventions after her half-century of honourable service.

There was a sweetness, warmth, and generosity in the character of Moore, that endeared him greatly to all connected with him, and when in 1805 he was created a Knight of the Bath, the officers subscribed to present him with a diamond star of the value of 350 guineas. The next year, 1806, they sailed under his command for Sicily, and it was here that Captain Colborne, then of the 20th, became his military secretary.

John Colborne was born in the year 1779, at Lymington, in South Hants, and, losing his father in his early childhood, was, on his mother's re-marriage to the Rev. Thomas Bargus, placed with his sister, under the care of that gentleman, with whom he always preserved the most affectionate filial relations, even after the death of his mother, who did not long survive her second marriage.

By Mr. Bargus he was placed at Wichester College, a place which it has since

then under very different discipline from the newspapers

enjoyed. Boys then prepared their lessons or res roke forth od in chapel unreproved, and the general lawlessness bered in in the first of the two great rebellions, still remem of the the traditions of the school. Indeed, the prevailing tone arkwhole century was irreligious, and this renders the more rema able the deep sense of religion, and the purity of mind, manners and language which characterised John Colborne from his earliest to his latest years, and which became stamped on the memory of all who came in contact with him.

though his career there was not successful. He was regarded He retained through life a warm affection for Winchester, as a backward and dull boy, and though one friend always declared him to be full of the promise of something remarkable, his genius chiefly displayed itself in building and defending snow forts, and like Wellington, Sir William Napier, and many others, he certainly would never have entered the army had his commis sion depended on an examination at sixteen or seventeen year

of age.

However, in 1794, a commission was obtained for him in t

of

20th regiment, through the interest of the Earl of Warwick, by Mr. Bargus. His first active service was in the Quiberon Bay expedition, when, owing to a tissue of misunderstandings, no service was rendered to the gallant Vendéans; but the troops remained for a week on the little isle of Houat, with nothing to do but to gallop about on the rough ponies in which the island abounded. The next year he served in Holland, where he was wounded in the head, and, being taken into a clergyman's house, found his Latin so useful to him, that from that time he resolved to make up for the time that had been lost in his boyhood, to study languages, and even to exercise himself in improving his handwriting; nor from that period did he ever cease to be a diligent student of the best historical and military authors, whenever occasion served.

After a short stay at home he rejoined his regiment, then in Minorca, and, after the battle of Maida, first felt the practical advantage of the course of self-improvement he had pursued for the last seven years; for his knowledge of Italian caused him to be selected to follow the retreating French army, and report their movements. This led to his being placed on the staff; and in 1800, when General Moore came out with the troops who were sent to serve in the Mediterranean and obstruct Napoleon's Eastern projects, Major Colborne was with him, when, under the command of Sir Ralph Abercrombie, our army landed in Aboukir bay in the very face of the enemy, and under the artillery fire of the castle. The troops behaved admirably, huzzaing occa sionally, but not attempting to return a shot till the boats reached the shore. Then, when their contents made their way to the beach and formed in line, Moore gave the word to load, and advancing, this first body of about 2,000 secured the landing of the rest of the army.

That night, as Abercrombie and Moore lay together on the ground, they were heard saying to one another, that they could not fear for England while she had such men as these had shown themselves.

Immediately after followed the surrender of Aboukir Castle, and the battle of Alexandria, in which Abercrombie was mortally, and Moore severely, wounded, and the French General Menou declared he had never seen a field so strewn with dead. The French prisoners said they had never fought till now.' During the siege of Alexandria, a friend of one of these prisoners, seeing Major Colborne and another officer walking at no great distance to the ramparts, shouted to them, and finding that they could speak French, begged them to do him a service. Then, giving the name of a captive French officer in the camp, he tossed over to them a purse full of coins, which he thus con

veyed to his friend, with full confidence in the honour of the first English officers he saw at hap-hazard. When the surrender of Alexandria had taken place, and the French had been finally driven from Egypt, the English troops re-embarked. There was a subscription among the officers for bringing Pompey's pillar to England; but to their great disappointment the authorities interfered, thinking it too heavy for any vessel they could employ.

Major Colborne returned to Sicily, and there was military secretary first to General Fox, and afterwards to Sir John Moore.

In 1808 Moore was appointed to the command of an expedition to Gothenburg, in which the 52d was also engaged; but the eccentricity of the last Vasa rendering co-operation with him impossible, the troops were recalled, and almost immediately after were ordered to Portugal.

We are curiously reminded of a past matter of costume by hearing that, though the first battalion landed at Vimiero in a heavy surf and had no change of clothes till they arrived at Lisbon, they washed their shirts in the streams and watched them dry, and that the men enjoyed themselves much, being relieved from their hair-tying-that dreadful pipe-clayed queue that for so many years had been the torment of the service.

The battle of Vimiero soon followed, and then the convention of Cintra, after which Sir John Moore was sent to take the command in Spain, Major Colborne still going with him as his military secretary; and the forces already in Portugal were marched northward by Sir David Baird to join him in Galicia. They met at Mayorga, and there was a prosperous advance as far as Sahagun, when the intelligence reached Sir John Moore of the failure of the Spaniards, and of the advance of Bonaparte, with an army so overwhelming as to leave him no choice but to retreat. The demoralizing effects of a retreat in the depth of winter were soon felt; and when the reserve, of which the 52d formed part, reached the town of Benbibre, they found it full of stragglers and plunderers in the most disgraceful state of intoxication. It was resolved that a strong example must be made on the first detection of an act of plunder; and when, shortly after, a house at Calcabellos was found being plundered by three men, an artilleryman, a guardsman, and one of the 52d, it was decided that they should be executed. The reserve had been formed into a square, the culprits had the ropes round their necks, and Major-General Sir Edward Paget was in the act of pointing the moral to the surrounding troops, when a cavalry officer galloped into the square to report the enemy's advance. The general announced this to the soldiers, declaring that even a charge of the enemy should not deter him from

completing the execution, but that if the whole reserve would promise to abstain from all such acts for the future, he would pardon the three delinquents, and ended by saying, 'If you mean to fulfil your promise, you will all repeat distinctly three 'times, "Yes, yes, yes.' Scarcely had the assent resounded from the square, when another cavalry officer galloped up to say that the pickets had been some time engaged, and the reserve had to march at once to their post. Lewis, the 52d man who was saved, was a brave soldier, and though always noted for his plundering propensities, he lived to die gallantly at Orthes by the side of the late Duke of Richmond. In fact, plunder and rapine were far from being ingrain in the English soldiery, and were comparatively rare in the early campaigns. Many will recollect Southey's picturesque description of the peasant girl who drove her ass between the two armies just before the battle of Busaco; and Lord Seaton used amusingly to describe a French officer who was trying to propitiate his captor, a dragoon, by giving him all the valuables on his person, taking the man's hesitation in receiving them for greediness for more; till at last, on his tendering a handsome ring, the honest soldier broke out, 'Poor fellow, poor fellow, I'll be hanged if I take it; dare say 'twas given him by his sweetheart!

But to return to the retreating army, with the light division as their rear-guard. On reaching Nogales it was found impossible to attempt to move the stores there collected; and the officers and men, who had already learned what it was to be hungry, stored their haversacks with the abandoned salt beef and pork. Permission was also given to the officers to receive, from the military chest, money on account for bât and forage; but to avoid disorder, and to prevent all the officers from being absent at once from their men, only the captains of companies went from the 52d, and each received three hundred dollars; but having no means of transporting such a load, they distributed the charge among their companies, entrusting each soldier with the care of two or three dollars, and these were carefully restored to them by all who survived.

A few miles further on there was a steep mountain, over which the oxen were incapable of drawing the heavy waggons, and the military chest was necessarily abandoned, since the enemy was pressing too closely on the rear-guard to permit of any delay. Casks closely packed with dollars were rolled over the cliffs, and breaking open, poured out a silver rain down the precipices, in full view of the rear-guard, who, however, had so much on their hands, that not a man left the ranks to secure the treasure; and, indeed, they were themselves in such difficulties, that they threw away the far more valuable meat they had

secured, and had to suffer much in consequence. The camp followers, however, had a scramble for the coin; and Mrs. Maloney, the master-tailor's wife, secured enough to make her fortune; but, poor woman, when embarking at Coruña, her foot slipped, she fell between the boat and ship, and her heavy freight of silver carried her to the bottom at once.

The remainder of the march was dreadfully trying from rain, hunger, and consequent sickness, besides the difficulties of the ground and the dilapidation of shoes. Thus run the recollections of Major-General Diggle :

'Well do I remember the kind act of a worthy woman, Sally Macan, the wife of a gallant soldier of my company, who, observing me to be falling to the rear from illness and fatigue, whipped off her garters, and secured the soles of my boots, which were separating from the upper leathers, and set me on my feet again; even then, decorated as I was with the garters, I should have fallen into the hands of the French, had not Colonel Barclay sent his horse to the rear for me, being unable from weakness to fetch up my lee-way. A year or two after this I had the opportunity of requiting the kindness of poor Sally Macan, by giving her a lift on my horse the morning after she had given birth to a child in the bivouac.'-Historical Record, p. 101.

The sufferings of that retreat reached the tragic height when, after the dreadful fortnight, the army turned to bay, and fought their battle at Coruña to defend their embarkation, that battle which numbered the gallant Moore with Epaminondas, Gustavus, Wolfe, Nelson, and other happy men killed in the moment of victory. The account of his fall in Napier's History is so like a romance of old chivalry, that it vindicates the truth of relations that in these sceptical days men are unwilling to believe. What can be more heroic or touching than the picture of the General struck from his horse by a cannon-shot, but sitting up instantly, with that beautiful and majestic face betraying no sign of pain, and brightening as he saw the success of his troops decisive; and, when Captain Hardinge would have disentangled his sword-hilt from his frightful wound, refusing to part with the weapon

while still in the field?

Colonel Anderson, Sir John Moore's aide-de-camp, in his narrative, says, after the dying General had been carried into a house in the town:- On Major Colborne's entering the room, 'the general spoke most kindly to him, and then said to me, "Anderson, remember you go to the commander-in-chief, and 'tell him it is my request, and that I expect he will give Major Colborne a lieutenant-colonelcy. He has been long with me, ' and I know him to be most worthy of it.""

Of those who buried him at the dead of night, with his martial cloak around him,' on the ramparts of Coruña, and 'bitterly thought on the morrow,' there were at least two, Hardinge and Colborne, who lived to bear to the grave, forty