Some important augmentations had been made to the corps, which will be found among the services out of which they in great part arose. Other desirable additions followed, which, belonging more to the incidents of home, will follow in this chapter. A number of sergeants usually employed as clerks, drill-masters, and instructors in the schools, always kept the companies to which they belonged more or less impoverished; so to end a system that could not be avoided, but which operated injuriously, Lord Panmure gave authority, on the 9th October, for the removal of fourteen specially employed sergeants from the companies, bearing them on the rolls of the corps as supernumeraries. Two of the number were appointed staff-sergeants. Widening daily into unwieldy dimensions, with a meagre controlling staff, gave rise to other essential appointments in the corps. On the 17th December, an Adjutant (Captain F. E. Cox, R.E.) and a Quartermaster (Michael Bradford, from the rank of sergeant-major) were commissioned.[133] The appointment of Brigade-Major, long felt to be an inadequate staff rank, was changed to that of Assistant Adjutant-General. Heretofore the chief executive of the royal sappers and miners held no higher regimental rank than that of Captain, with the staff commission of Brigade-Major. Under the same authority a sergeant-major and a quartermaster-sergeant were added to the corps. There was an Exhibition at Fort George, Mauritius, in December, 1855, of a collection of productions indigenous to the island, and subjects of a constructive nature, to represent the industrial habits of the community in that distant region. Indebted for the idea to its great prototype in London, the Exhibition originated with the 22nd company of the corps stationed there, and most of the articles—such as models of inventions and objects of mechanical interest in the island—were contributed by non-commissioned officers and privates of the company, of whom sergeant Frederick Hibling was the chief exhibitor. The exposition was open for a week. Each day had its appointed charge varying from 3_d._ to 2_s._, and the surplus receipts were applied to charitable purposes. From Bermuda the 21st company arrived on the 22nd December, leaving a small detachment of invalids to carry on the works. Its removal was accompanied by a representation which told of the loss the colony would sustain by the step; but the urgency of affairs in the East admitted of no consideration interfering with the resolve of sending the company to the Crimea, constituted as it was of climatized men and competent artificers. At the time of their landing, however, there were strong indications of diplomatic negociations putting an end to existing differences; but to prepare the company for the worst, it was forwarded to Aldershot on the 8th January, 1856, under the command of Lieutenant J. H. Wilson, to be trained in camp to the discipline and usages of war.