oblivion among the men. Many resisted it by
desertion; others bought discharges by
providing substitutes at a great cost. The first
foreign detachment of the corps was sent to
the West indies, and every man but one died
there of fever before the year came to a close.
The one man survived his comrades only for
about two years and a half; and eventually
the whole band was destroyed. The
companies that were sent to Flanders did excellent
service in the aid of siege works, as true
Sappers and Miners. Therefore the Duke of
Richmond represented to the king the benefit
that would result to the service if a corps of
artificers and labourers were formed
expressly for service abroad. In September,
seventeen hundred and ninety-three, a
warrant was signed for the raising of four such
companies, each of a hundred men, two to
serve in Flanders, one in the West Indies,
one in Upper Canada, and they were to be
stationary in those countries. The whole legal
establishment of Military Artificers at home
and abroad was thus raised to the number of
a thousand men.

In June, seventeen hundred and ninety-
seven, the soldier artificer corps, at
Gibraltar—which had, up to that date,
maintained a separate position, and had lost much
of its good character—was incorporated
with the main body in England and
elsewhere. At that time, detachments for
miscellaneous foreign duty were generally formed
by selections from the stationary companies;
and, as the commanding engineers at the
several fixed stations were glad in this way
to get rid of their most ignorant and untrustworthy
men, these detachments did not
always reflect much honour on the corps.

A detachment of Military Artificers was
sent to Turkey, where a private was attacked
by a Turk, who attempted to stab him with
his yataghan. The capitan pacha ordered the
Turk, who belonged to his retinue, to be
beheaded; but, by the mediation of Lord Elgin,
a mitigation of this punishment was obtained,
and the offender, after receiving fifty strokes ot
the bastinado on the soles of his feet, was
sentenced to twenty years' imprisonment in the
College of Pera—to learn the Arabic language.

While, in the year eighteen hundred and
four, the companies in the West Indies were
losing one man out of every two by yellow
fever, deeds of daring were done, which
Sergeant Conolly thinks most worthy of
record. "Private John Inglis," he says,
"performed the important duty of orderly to
the sick in the hospital at Windmill-hill, and,
to assiduous attention, united marked kindness
and tenderness, shrinking from no difficulty,
and dreading no danger. Private
James Lawford undertook the melancholy
service of receiving the dead, both for the
Artificers and the Artillery, and conveying
them to the burying-ground, near the Grand
Parade. Horrible and hazardous as was this
duty, he persevered in its performance with
a coolness and intrepidity that was perfectly
amazing. Private James Weir was the
principal grave-digger, and attended to his
appointment with unflinching ardour and self-
possession. Surrounded by the pest in its
worst forms, and inhaling the worst effluvia,
he never for a moment forsook the frightful
service, but laboured on, inspiriting those
who occasionally assisted him, until the
necessity for his employment no longer existed."
And all these men the plague spared. A
thousand fell at their side, and ten thousand
at their right hand, but it did not come nigh
them.

We think it a most admirable feature in
Quartermaster Connolly's history, that while
it is full of stirring narratives of war and
curious adventure, it never fails to record
deeds such as these; and, throughout,
chronicles the names even of the humblest
labourers attached to the corps, who have
done deeds worthy to be borne in
remembrance by their comrades.

At Torres Vedras, Corporal Wilson had
charge of a work, and a party of the
Portuguese Ordenenza Militia was placed under
his orders to execute it. He assigned to two
of the men a task, to be completed in a
certain time. They refused to do it, and
complained to their officer that it was too much.
The officer agreed with them, and was inclined
to censure the corporal. Straightway the
corporal offered to bet the officer a dollar
that he could do the assigned work himself
within the given time. The bet was accepted;
the corporal stripped, and, going to work
like a Briton, won his dollar easily enough.
There were no more complaints during the
progress of the lines.

Major Pasley, of the Royal Engineers,
having been appointed to the command of
Military Artificers, at the Plymouth station,
took unusual pains with his men, and was the
first officer who represented the advantage
of training the corps in the construction of
military field works. After the failure of
Badajoz, in eighteen hundred and eleven, the
adoption of such a measure was strongly
advocated by the war officers. It was
recommended then to form a corps under the name
of Royal Sappers and Miners, to be formed
of six companies chosen from the Royal
Military Artificers; which, after receiving
some instruction in the art, was to be sent to
the Peninsula. Early in the succeeding year,
the idea was further supported by the authority
of Sir Richard Fletcher and Lord
Wellington; and Lord Mulgrave, Master-General
of the Ordnance, founded, accordingly, a
school at Chatham, of which Major Pasley
was appointed the director. A few months
afterwards the name of the corps was
changed, in accordance with these new views,
and became the corps of Royal Military
Artificers or Sappers and Miners. On the
sixth of March, in the succeeding year
eighteen hundred and thirteen, the style was