"Again, under the present system, which effectually combines the faults of both the older, and the merits of neither, your infantry corps with its full _cadre_, of which half is usually absent, theoretically numbers nine European officers. One, the surgeon, is a non-combatant, and two, the adjutant and quartermaster, are usually represented by the wing subalterns. An English regiment, with its _cadre_ of thirty, mounts only its field-officers and adjutant. An Indian corps--would you believe it?--mounts the lieutenant-colonel commanding; the major, second in command; the two wing officers, the two wing subalterns, the adjutant, and the quartermaster. The result is to incur the moral certainty of their all being swept away by the first few volleys. True, you have sixteen native commissioned officers, forty _havildárs_ (sergeants), and the same number of _náiks_ (corporals)--a total of ninety-six. But the belief that Sepoys will fight without Englishmen to lead them, is a snare, a sham, and a delusion. "A host of other evils besets the present state of things. Your cavalry corps are so weak in officers, rank and file, that a six months' campaign would reduce them each to a single troop. Your infantry regiments, eight companies of seventy-five bayonets each, or a total of six hundred and forty, have not been reduced to the form now recognized as the best tactical unit. Again, officers are still transferred, after six and even seven years' service, from the white to the black line, thus bringing them upon the Indian pension list without having served the full time. They also want _esprit de corps_; they dislike and despise 'Jack Sepoy,' and their chief object in life is to regain something more congenial than the out-station and the dull, half-deserted Mess. Again, at the other end of the scale, field officers of twenty-five to thirty years' Indian service are made to do subalterns' work. Regimental zeal is being annihilated; and the evil of senility is yearly increasing. Let me relate a case, which you shall presently see for yourself. Major A----, who has served in a corps for nine years, who has seen three campaigns, and who for three years has acted second in command, lately finds himself superseded by a lieutenant-colonel, when he himself expects to become lieutenant-colonel within six months. What is the result? He is utterly weary of the service, he has lost all heart for its monotonous duties. 'An old subaltern,' says one of your favourites, 'is a military vegetable, without zeal as without hope.'