It was necessary upon admittance into the
Academy for each Cadet to write down in a
book, kept for that purpose, the names of two
respectable references. Of course, every
young gentleman put down the grandest of
his friends, and the entrance calendar glowed
with titles like a Lodge's Peerage. Macarthy,
however, an Irish Cadet, belonging to the
same batch as myself, declared to the
official, that "sure there was nobody respectable
belonging to him, small blame to them."
After that declaration, and being still compelled
to conform to the regulations, he wrote down
unwillingly the names of the Lord Beeswax,
who at that time commanded the garrison,
and the Earl of Moira. He knew them, he
told me, very intimately as the signs of two
public-houses in the town at which the beer
was excellent.

During the first two or three weeks after
admission—that is to say until our regimentals
were completed—those of our batch of
candidates who were so fortunate as to
become Gentlemen Cadets were compelled to
wear "mufti." A very singular and edifying
sight it was to see us drilling in civilian
dresses. Fat little Trueman, four feet high,
practising the goose step, differs entirely from
that martial youth, as he will appear when
"keeping time" in uniform. His mensuration
round the waist will be decreased by at least
two inches, his chin will not be permitted to
repose itself, as now it does, in oily folds.
Finally there will be added half a cubit to his
statute by the aggregate influences of
regimental boots, a shako and a plume. From
what beast or bird that last ornament
emanates, was to me always the great problem.
Why nature (if it be a natural production),
why art (if it be artificial) should have first
constructed it is, to me, now a mystery. One
office—but that could scarcely have been its
original mission—which it fulfilled at the
Royal Military Academy at Woolhurst among
the senior Cadets was that of a shaving brush.

The government of Woolhurst seemed,
when I knew it, to have been carefully
compounded of the worst features of an
oligarchy and of a military despotism. The
age of the Cadets (from fifteen upwards) is
certainly a difficult one to manage; but the
authorities must have gone a good deal out
of their way to construct a system of perfect
inutility.

Lack of authorities in office certainly was
not the cause of failure. There was a
Governor; who was a great military star
shining upon us from his abode a long way
off. He gave swords away upon prize-days,
and expelled unruly Cadets by his sign manual.
Then there was a Lieutenaut-Governor, who
lived in a great house hard by, and went about
with an orderly. He was brilliantly visible
on review-days without being too familiar to
us at other times, and sent up the lists of
the swords-men and the convicts to the aforesaid
Governor, who gave swords away upon
prize-days, and expelled Cadets by his sign
manual. Then there was a "Second-Captain
of the Cadet company," who found out the
men for the swords and for the expulsions for
the Lieutenant-Governor to put down in a list
to send to the Governor who gave swords
away upon prize-days, and expelled Cadets
by his sign manual—and so forth, like
the House that Jack built. The Second-
Captain's abode was not so big as the
Lieutenant-Governor's abode, and he had no
orderly, and was visible from twelve to one
o'clock in the library. Then there were two
Lieutenants of the Cadet company. These
officers saw that the Cadets' uniforms were
properly brushed about twelve times a day,
and inquired whether the military choking
stocks were really put on and buckled behind,
not being in any case a slip of leather
fashioned out of the original misery by the
Cadet himself into a machine that offered no
impediment to breathing. One of these
officers was also to be present in the hall
when the "old Cadets" had their dinners and
the "neuxes" hungered; because the messes
being good for eight and the legs of mutton
eatable by four, the four oldsters cut off all
the handy meat, the two of middle standing
picked the bone, and the remaining two "last
joined" were cheerfully employed in pouring
out the beer and water for their elders. Of
this fact, however—patent enough amongst a
hundred others—the Governor and the
Lieutenant-Governor, and the Captain and the two
Lieutenants of the Cadet company were or
pretended to be profoundly ignorant.

These were the commissioned officers; but
there were also non-commissioned officers,
sergeants, and corporals, marching and
counter-marching, quick marching, and double
quick marching the Cadet company from seven
in the morning until sunset; moreover, there
were half commissioned officers—old Cadets
themselves—who had all kinds of delegated
authority, to the end of the Cadet company's
improvement and their own perfection as
commissioned officers that shall hereafter be.
Their duty was to check injustice and to
promote discipline by a more detailed
investigation of the stocks before the Lieutenants'
arrival, and their practice was to abuse every
individual power with which they were
unhappily entrusted. One of the pleasant—and,
compared with some—even commendable
amusements of these gentry, was not
only to maltreat the bodies of the "last
joined," but to destroy some items of their
property. Our hats were all crushed to a
crown, except those which had crape round
them. I make glad mention of this delicacy,
and only regret that the manifestation of a like
feeling was so rare. Upon a young gentleman's
donning His Majesty's uniform, receiving
nominal pay, and becoming subject to the
articles of war, it may perhaps be supposed
that he comports himself and is treated by
others as a respectability. The Eton boy may