If, on the other hand, the detachment be small, and only intended for an incursion for a few days into the enemy's country, when everything will depend upon rapidity of movement, bullocks will not be found to answer; their pace is much too slow for such operations, and it is almost impossible to get them on by night. Coolies alone will here answer the purpose; and with them a great deal of management is necessary. The common mode of making up their loads in gunny bags, used for holding rice on shipboard and in stores, is liable to two objections. 1st.--They afford no defence against the weather, the rain penetrating the bags, and mildewing the rice. 2ndly.--The cloth of which the bags are made is very coarse, and badly sewed; and the rice consequently makes its way through the interstices. The Coolies, also, nothing reluctant to diminish their burdens, will often widen the seams. Thus the route of a detachment may frequently be traced for several miles by the grain strewed on the road. This waste may in some measure be prevented by doubling the bags. But there is nothing equal to the common bags made of mats, which the natives use for their _pingoes_, or loads; they not only prevent waste, but keep the rice long dry. The Coolies frequently plunder their loads; an evil which it is not easy to remedy, as by slipping into the woods unperceived, the Coolie can take out of his gunny bag as much rice as he chooses, and, having concealed it in his cloth, returns to his comrades without having been missed. The best method of preventing this waste appears to be this. Let the quantity of rice sufficient to load all his people be served out to each Congany, for which he is to be held responsible; and let him be punished in case of any remarkable defalcation, making a proper allowance for inevitable wastage. He is the only man capable of checking their thefts. But it is necessary to keep a good look-out on the Congany himself, as it is a common practice among the Conganies to sell the rice entrusted to their care. The same precautions are necessary with regard to the bullock drivers. Here, too, the bags used by the natives should be employed. To persons not accustomed to the species of service which I have been describing, these observations may appear trivial. But they will think otherwise, when they consider that we are speaking of a country in which, if the stock of provisions with which a detachment or an army sets out is either wasted or expended prematurely, it is for the most part impossible to procure a fresh supply. A Commanding Officer, who should unwisely contemn these precautions, might find himself in the disgraceful and dangerous predicament of discovering, when he expected to have provisions enough left for twenty days, that his stock, having been reduced by plunder or neglect, could not last beyond half the period.