observed, don’t “desert” their proper battalion because they attend all their drills. Perhaps now that the militia is embodied it might be possible, legally, to try these men as deserters from the corps with which they do not appear. That, however, is a question for the military powers, not for your humble correspondent. What I am quite certain of is that they will not be tried. Our already slender numbers would be most formidably reduced if all these men were treated as criminals. Moreover, they are not at bottom bad fellows many of them. The idea that it is a crime to get a little more pay out of the public in return for doing a little more drill never entered their minds. The general effect of their action, of course, does not affect them at all. “Why, yer honour, didn’t I put in me toime honest for me pay?” one of them with whom I was expostulating said to me the other day. They are, of course, the best drilled men we have. They have had so much of it. For this war, at all events, it is too late to devise a remedy for this sham.’ Just at present the headquarters of the militia are in the Staff College, that institution having been broken up for the war, and the sixty officers usually there have been sent to rejoin their regiments, or to fill up billets where they are badly wanted. The tents of the militia battalions cover the ground in the neighbourhood. Aldershot is occupied with the brigades that are being formed in hot haste to complete the force in the field. The stores for the 2d Army Corps were by no means in the same state of readiness as those for the 1st. But in Aldershot, at least, many of the waggons were actually ready, and, thanks to the delay which has taken place, and the costly and feverish purchases all over the country of stores, probably this portion of the two corps will be ready when it is required to move. We hear from all parts of the world of enormous purchases of transport material of all kinds which will be hurried into the Levant as soon as it is safe to send them there. Mules especially are being everywhere purchased. The horses that have been of late years registered with the Government for purchase for war have proved invaluable. Indeed, without them we could not possibly have equipped the troops. Many of them are splendid animals, and will greatly assist in making up our deficiencies in draught horses for the artillery and train. CALLING OUT THE VOLUNTEERS.