The Captain in command of my squadron sometimes, it it is true, came to our room, usually on the weekly inspection day, but a fortnight or three weeks often elapsed between his visits. My Lieutenant came to our room on the weekly inspection day, but rarely at other times. None of our officers ever came to look at our food. As to the drill, until the squadron drilled together the officers hardly ever troubled themselves about it. During the first five months' preliminary training, troopers were left entirely to the care of the Sergeants and Corporals, the Lieutenants looking on for perhaps a few minutes at a time. When, in April, the troopers began to be drilled in squares marked out on the manoeuvring ground, the officers used to ride over there, and every quarter of an hour or so glanced at the square where their men were riding under the command of a Sergeant. "Stables" were superintended by the officer of the week, but as in the 1st and 2nd squadrons (as well as in the 4th and 5th) one officer took the week in turn for the two combined squadrons, he could not be expected to see much of what was going on, among the 250 horses or thereabouts he had to superintend. Lieutenants and Sub-lieutenants, except when they were on "week" duty, never came to the stables, so that really everything devolved on the Sergeants, whose power and responsibility were consequently enormous. Another consequence of the French military system is that officers and rank and file alike are absolutely wanting in that _esprit de corps_ which is so remarkable in British regiments. That privates should feel no particular pride in the body to which they are temporarily, and for the most part unwillingly, attached, is not to be wondered at, but in the case of officers a different explanation is forthcoming. Strange to say, it is a general rule in the French army that officers, on their promotion to a superior rank, are always sent into another regiment (the only exception occurring in the case of Sub-lieutenants, who sometimes--but rarely--remain in the same regiment upon their promotion to the rank of Lieutenant). The consequence of this rule is that an officer who reaches the rank of Colonel has often served in six different regiments. It even often happens, for instance, that a Lieutenant of Dragoons is drafted into the Hussars on his promotion as a Captain, and then passes into the Cuirassiers when he becomes a Major, being transferred to the Chasseurs as Lieutenant-Colonel, and then being put in command of a regiment of Dragoons as Colonel.