covers, one of oilskin with curtain behind, for
wet weather; the other—like that worn in
India—of white linen or cotton, for hot
climates.

Next in importance to a serviceable head-
dress, is, that the soldier should be allowed to
wear his beard. Since the Crimean war, we
have advanced a step in the way of common
sense, by authorising the moustache throughout
the army: thus giving to all a wholesome privilege
formerly only accorded to the Horse
Artillery and Cavalry. The order for the
infantry to grow even this morsel of their beards
met with disfavour from nearly all the senior
officers of our army. I myself saw an elderly
colonel, in command of a regiment, shed tears
of vexation at what he termed "the un-English
appearance" his men would have when each
wore his moustache. In all parts of the East a
shaved upper lip is looked upon as positive
disgrace, and yet, until within the last ten years,
the English officers of our Sepoy regiments were
obliged to shave. The moustache is but a
portion of that provision of nature for the health
of man labouring much in heat and frost, in
wind and rain, for which soldiers should be
allowed to thank God in the use. As to the
miseries of shaving, even with the best razors,
the finest of Naples soap, the softest of badger-
hair brushes, the hottest of hot water, and the
most comfortable of dressing-rooms, shaving is
a nuisance to which no man would submit
unless "custom" required it. But what must
the operation be when performed with one of the
cheap razors wherewith soldiers have to attack
their chins, on a dark morning, with cold water
and hard soap, in a comfortless barrack-room?
In the matter of military shaving, the French
are behind us. Except in the Zouaves and
Chasseurs d'Afrique, they make the soldier
shave his cheeks and throat: the very parts for
which nature especially has given the protection
of the beard. In the Crimea, our troops wore
their beards, and found the use of them, as every
man must who wears his beard, whether under
exposure to great heat or to severe cold. Shaving
brings in its train sore-throats, toothaches,
sun-burning, and other ills. An English soldier
has to encounter all climates, from the cold of
Canada to tropical heat. And I have no doubt
whatever that ten years hence our soldiers'
knapsacks will no more contain the materials for
shaving than they now contain the ingredients
for making up pigtails.

Having clothed the soldier's face and throat
with what he would find to be his greatest
comfort, I would next, at once, entirely and for ever,
abolish that infinitely worse than useless instrument
of torture—the leather stock. It is true
that of late years the stock has been somewhat
modified both as to material and size, but why
should it be worn at all? Would any man, not
a maniac, wear such a thing willingly at any
time, more especially when about to undergo as
much physical exertion as a soldier has even on
a common field-day? Why should our troops
be the only men in England or the Colonies
whose windpipes must be compressed before
they are considered fit for duty? Have we not
the written testimony of the best writers on
military surgery, and the verbal opinion of
nearly every medical man who has done duty
with soldiers, that the stock has caused or aggravated
innumerable diseases, and is answerable
for a number of deaths in the ranks? What is the
last article of dress every soldier puts on when
getting ready for parade, and the first he takes
off when parade is over? The stock. When
a man falls out of the ranks sick or faint, what
is the first—the only—part of his dress of
which his comrades relieve him? The stock.
Or, when too ill to speak, to what does his
hand move mechanically, if it be still griping
his neck? Always the stock! I have seen
again and again, both in England and India,
men fall out from the ranks during the manœuvres,
looking deadly pale, and almost as if about
to die; but when their stocks were removed
they at once revived. Yet to this abominable
relic of stiff Prussian dress, which Frederick the
Great considered soldierlike, our military
authorities adhere with a tenacity that would be
absolutely incredible, if it were not within our
positive knowledge.

Every sportsman and every good walker knows
that only when a man's neck is left free and
unfettered is he able to go through bodily
exertion and fatigue. The French military doctors
say—and my own experience as a sportsman in
India confirms the statement—that any one who
is very much exposed to the sun and wants to
avoid sunstroke, should wear nothing whatever
on his neck, but leave the circulation to and
from the brain perfectly free. Thus the Zouaves,
who although in the field they wear no other
protection for the head but a fez or skull-cap
(winding the turban about it in Algeria only
on Sundays), suffer much less than any other
troops from the effects of the sun, and this is
supposed to be owing to their necks being
entirely uncovered. In the French army, however,
experience is allowed to teach more quickly than
in our service. The Emperor is now abolishing
the stock and substituting for it a black neckerchief.
Surely if the soldier's neck must be kept
warm, it were better done by means of a neck-
cloth than a stock. If the coat or tunic have a
stand-up collar, how can it matter what is worn
under that collar? I look upon the stock—no
matter of what it is made—as a murderous
means of inducing all kinds of diseases of the
brain and eyes, and as a certain means of
reducing the amount of work to be got out
of four-fifths of our men. I have, in India,
often seen soldiers who could not go through
either a march or a field-day unless they
slipped their stocks off "on the sly," and then
they could do their work as well as any one.
I never yet asked a soldier—and I have
questioned very many on the subject—what he
thought of the stock, who did not say that
he hated it. And yet what follies, what
cruelties, have I known committed on soldiers
by commanding officers, for the sake of