several cockroaches had committed suicide; and I have assisted to eat honey which was black with ants whose appetites had caused their untimely death. As for cooking, I confess that I avoid the cooking-fires. I have seen sights which have tried my philosophy to the utmost, and am now quite content to eat the very excellent dinners our servants prepare from rations, and not to think of the processes the meat has undergone. My tent-companion and myself pride ourselves much upon our cooks. They are two Goa Portuguese, and are, we flatter ourselves, beyond all comparison the best cooks in camp. Their soups are excellent, their cutlets the best I ever tasted, their preserved potatoes, baked in cakes, delicious. They sent up birds in as good a style as I can get them in a London club. Their pumpkin-pie—when we could get pumpkins—was the talk of camp; the fame of their baked sheep’s head, with brain cutlets, came to the ears of Sir Robert Napier himself. Imagine, then, our feelings, when the stern decree was emanated—all native servants whatever are to be sent away; each officer is to carry 75 lb. of luggage, including bed, cooking-utensils, and plates and dishes; and three officers are to be allotted to each bell-tent. Heads of departments only are to be allowed a bell-tent between two. At first we had believed that this order did not apply to us; that having our own baggage-animals, and providing our forage, &c. at our own cost, and the tent being our own property, we thought that it was a matter which concerned no one but ourselves as to what or who we took on with us. But we were deceived. Quartermaster-generals, eager to effect the greatest possible cutting down, had their eyes upon the special correspondents and the scientific gentlemen who accompany the camp; and we were officially informed that we must be amenable to the same rules as others. We pointed out that we found our own carriage, and therefore that the weight we carried mattered to no one; but were sternly informed that if we purchased grain for our animals, there was so much the less available for the public service. To a certain extent this was true; and so we said that we were ready to go on with the weight that other officers were allowed, but that the tent in the first place was our own, and that it would be quite impossible for three men to write in a tent together. We were ready, therefore, to carry less than the permitted 75 lbs. of baggage, in order to have half a tent each; so that our total kit, including tent, would not exceed the prescribed 140 lbs. Our friends in the quartermaster department were quite unable to grant us this request, and it was only upon a personal application to Sir Robert Napier that we gained our point, as, upon our stating the case, he at once consented to our retaining our own tent to ourselves. The next question was that of servants. “All servants to be sent back, a grass-cutter only being allowed for each horse.” At