I.T., 113, gives some instructions as to how men are to be taught to march and to use their ears and eyes at night, while F.S.R., chapter ix., goes into the subject at length. These operations are divided into night marches, night advances, and night attacks. The men of a company will not be fit to take a useful part in night tactical exercises either in company or in battalion, unless they have had some elementary training as laid down in “Infantry Training,” and have also been practised in the two indispensable duties of maintaining connection (F.S.R., 129 (4)) and in reconnaissance (F.S.R., 130 (1)). Night patrolling and the duties of night sentries have been dealt with under outposts, and I will not say anything more about them here. The rest of the elementary training contained in “Infantry Training” requires no explanation, and you can practise your men in it in small parties. There remains the maintenance of connection, and I have found that training for this is best done at first by daylight. It is very simple, and after one or two daylight lessons the men will work quite well by night, but to begin straight off under darkness will only lead to waste of time, as mistakes cannot easily be corrected, nor the working of a system made plain. The company should parade as strong as possible in this exercise, as, with only a few files on parade, the necessity of maintaining connection, and the difficulty of doing so, are not so obvious as when a fairly large body of men has to be handled without making a noise. Connection has to be maintained within the company itself, and also with the other companies in front or rear, if in column of route, or on the right and left, if deployed. In order to practise this connection with other companies, represent the front and rear, or flank section commanders of the supposed adjacent companies by a man for each company, who should move where those section commanders would be, i.e., in fours, at the head or tail of the directing flank, in line, on the flanks of the front rank. Use these dummies as the recipients of all orders and signals passed along, so that your company may get the habit of keeping touch with the others before it works with the battalion. _I. Connecting Files._ The only sure way of keeping connection between bodies of troops moving in separate parties is by connecting files, who keep within sight of each other and so can seldom be at more than twenty yards distance apart. These files must be taught to pass commands with exactitude, and never to open their mouths otherwise, i.e., they must never speculate between themselves “Are they advancing?” or so forth, or talk at all, because the next file may hear some word of their talk and mistake it for an order. When connecting files are needed they must take up their places without its being necessary to tell them off loudly, and when no longer needed they must close into company in silence and in good order.