About this period, a detachment of one sergeant, thirty-three carpenters, and two drummers, under Captain C. Holloway, royal engineers, was sent to Gravesend to make various repairs and additions to the defences on the shores of the Thames, as the state of European politics and our unsettled relations with France rendered these precautionary measures absolutely indispensable. They were picked men, of good qualification; and to distinguish them from the corps employed at Woolwich, Purfleet, and Chatham, were permitted to wear a very long fantastic feather of black, topped with crimson. Tilbury Fort and the Blockhouse at Gravesend were thoroughly repaired by this detachment, and the requisite arrangements and appliances for establishing a communication across the Thames, by means of barges for the passage of an army, were effected by them. They also constructed two batteries for four 24-pounders each, with temporary wooden barracks for artillerymen at Shornmead and Hop-Point, below Gravesend. These services were barely finished when thirty of the detachment were recalled to join the expeditions for St. Domingo and the Caribbee Islands. The party that remained, was shortly afterwards increased to one sergeant and fifteen carpenters. Detachments of varied strength were also employed in strengthening the defences on the coast of Sussex, and in repairing the castles at Hurst, Cowes, and Yarmouth. Drunkenness and irregularity were now very prevalent in the corps. Many of the men, from their abandoned habits, were insensible either to advice or punishment: whilst others, whose moral conduct could not be reproached, were negligent of that proper respect for personal cleanliness and appearance which is one of the first considerations of a soldier in every well-regulated regiment. In some degree to check these evils, a few of the most incorrigible among the labourers were dismissed from the corps, or were either turned over to the navy or sent to the West Indies. But even these severe but necessary measures failed to produce that wholesome impression on the habitual delinquents, which it was reasonable to anticipate would be the result. The first symptoms of disorder in the conduct of the men appeared when they found they were liable to be sent abroad if occasion required their services. Led by their constitution and employment to consider themselves permanently settled, they were quite unprepared for any innovation which had a tendency to subvert their position or to interrupt the advancement of their individual interests. The married men particularly received it with unequivocal dissatisfaction. Unwilling to submit to the change, which struck at the root of their privileges, several deserted; and others, not daring to involve themselves in the consequences of so serious a step, remained only to drown their discontent in dissipation, and bring discredit on the corps.