RESERVISTS AT SOUTHAMPTON DOCKS READING THE LATEST NEWS FROM THE FRONT.
The alacrity with which the Reservists answered to the call to the colours has already been mentioned (p. [17]).
[Photo by Gregory.
[Oct.-Nov. 1899.
Full notice to the enemy.
The British army had been so organised and prepared by the War Office and successive Cabinets that no considerable body of men was ready to take the field on immediate notice. An elaborate process had to be gone through before any considerable number of squadrons, batteries, and battalions could leave our shores. The immature boys and raw recruits had to be weeded out and replaced by reservists who had left the colours. To call up the reservists the consent of Parliament was necessary, and to convene Parliament some notice would of course have to be given. The whole system was admirably adapted to ensure our enemies having the very fullest notice and the very fullest warning of our intentions; and, as has been seen already, the Boers were not slow to take advantage of our ineptitude. How we should have fared in like circumstances against a European enemy must be left to conjecture. There would have been no such lethargy as the Boers displayed in the first week of war.
[Photo by Gregory.