The Officer commanding my Regiment was then, and may possibly have been all his life, a “Glassite,” but had latterly accepted the idea that it was immoral to fight. All the time I was at Aldershot I performed his duties on Courts Martial, as he was unwilling to take an oath. At the end of December, at his request, I accompanied him to London, when he asked that he might be allowed to remain in England, on leave, till the 1st April 1878,[139] when his command would expire, and that I should take out the battalion. He endeavoured to convey his wishes to the Adjutant-General and Military Secretary, but entirely failed to make them understand his position; indeed, I believe they imagined he was suffering under some physical ailment, for the words he frequently used were, that he “had the strongest reasons for not wishing to go into Camp.” He embarked on the 11th January, and on the 27th I followed the battalion, having indeed been very unhappy since I saw them off at Southampton with the band playing “Far away.” The battalion had its complement of Lieutenant-Colonel and two Majors, I (the Senior), being on the Staff, was supernumerary, so when a month later I was sent out, it was “On Special Service,” with the promise given to me verbally by the Commander-in-Chief, the Adjutant-General, and the Military Secretary, confirmed in a Memorandum which was handed to General Thesiger, that I should succeed to the command on the 1st April. But this understanding was not fulfilled. The battalion on arriving at Cape Town was divided; five companies were sent to Fort Beaufort, where the Gaikas were restless, and three companies to Utrecht, in the Transvaal. When I got to the Amatola Mountains, six weeks later, the five companies were gradually withdrawn from the Colonel commanding, and he remained in charge of some Hottentots at Fort Beaufort until June, when he returned home, being retained in nominal command of the Regiment till November, when he completed his thirty years’ service. My fellow-passengers on board ship were General the Honourable F. Thesiger, who was going out to Command at the Cape, Major Redvers Buller, and other Staff officers. We arrived at East London, British Kaffraria, on the 4th March, and a more uninviting spot than it was then, it would be difficult to imagine. It consisted of corrugated iron huts, surrounded by broken glass bottles and empty jam tins, dotted about on bleak, bare sand-hills, through which the muddy Buffalo River cut an opening 250 yards wide to the sea, depositing a barrier of sand, which up to that time had presented insuperable difficulties to forming a satisfactory harbour, although the problem had engaged the attention of the most eminent of our British Marine Engineers. There were no roads; the so-called hotel provided shelter and food, but while there were bath towels there were no baths, and the one closet was common to Whites of both sexes and Kafir servants.