Colonel Airey, in reply to the toast, took occasion to remark, that it was owing entirely to the hearty co-operation and assistance he had derived from every officer in the regiment, he had been enabled to bring it to the state of perfection in which the gallant General, who was then Colonel, had found it.
Many other toasts were afterwards given, and the meeting broke up at a late hour, but not before health and long life to Sir Thomas had been drunk with at least nine times nine in the most cordial manner.
FOOTNOTES:
[17] There is no parallel in history of an army like the English marching through the South of France, then an enemy’s country, observing such rigid discipline and order that everything was paid for as scrupulously as if it had been in England; and that even the French officers and soldiers told the inhabitants not to quit their houses on the absence of the English army, as they had nothing to fear. I may be induced to make this remark, as none of the authors who have written on these campaigns have sufficiently dwelt on this important feature of the British army. It is a fact, that commissaries were left behind to pay for every article consumed by our army.
[18] In confirmation of this it may be mentioned, that when the late Emperor Alexander of Russia gave a grand review to the Duke of Wellington, at Vertus, about eighty miles from Paris, of 130,000 Russians, picquets were driven into the ground at every wheeling point. How widely different are the movements of the British army! Some time afterwards, when the whole army under the command of his Grace were reviewed in presence of the allied Sovereigns, Field-Marshals, and Commanders, he moved the whole of his forces from the position they had taken, to nearly a quarter of a mile in the rear, no doubt with the view of showing that there were no picquets driven into the ground to direct the movements of the troops.
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE
The roman page numbering at the front of the book goes from i to xix, then from v to viii; this has not been changed.
Several illustrations have a printer’s note in the caption that says “(To face page n)”; this page number n is sometimes incorrect but has not been changed.
Obvious typographical errors and punctuation errors have been corrected after careful comparison with other occurrences within the text and consultation of external sources.