[46]. While on Salisbury Plain he was visited by Lieutenant-General Sir Charles Pasley, frequently by Colonel Hall and Captain Yolland, and by about fifty other officers of the royal engineers; also by Professors Airy, Sheepshanks, and Cape. The last gentleman was very free in his inquiries. The mode of aligning the instrument did not, at first, satisfy him, but eventually the process having been minutely explained by the sergeant, he went away convinced and gratified. Captain Gosset was present at the laying of the first bar and Captain Hawkins at the last.
[47]. In the reign of Tarquin I., 606 B.C., a force of Roman soldiers, ordered to construct common sewers, considered the employment an indignity and destroyed themselves. The self-esteem of the Roman soldier which led to so fatal a result, had a different effect on the modern; for the pride of the latter, tempered by a consideration of duty, urged him into the midst of danger and for the sake of humanity to seek it. Reflecting too, that the service, though paramount, was too objectionable for even convicts to perform, the warm eulogy of the Marquis may not be regarded as undeserved by those on whom it was conferred.
[48]. The accidental destruction of the three smaller chambers was providential, for had they exploded, the battery-shed, with Captain Frome and his assistant, would inevitably have been carried away, and crushed among the falling masses: as it was “the electricity of the two Grove’s batteries, on igniting the powder in the larger chambers, caused an instantaneous disconnection of the Smee’s battery from the smaller chambers, and, at the same time, the table on which they stood was jerked violently forward between two and three feet, upsetting the Smee’s battery on the floor, and throwing out from the others also a quantity of the acids.”—‘Illust. Lond. News,’ September 28, 1850.
[49]. ‘Professional Papers,’ i., N. S., 68-86. Colonel Lewis’s Paper in ‘Jones’s Journal,’ November, 1850.
[50]. Now a quartermaster-sergeant. In his early career he was employed in the chronometrical determination of the longitude of Valentia, and for many years rendered very useful services in filling in the railways on the one-inch map. His talents and energy have singled him out at different times for the execution of particular duties. He was intrusted with the local superintendence of the survey, &c., of Her Majesty’s domain at Osborne, in the Isle of Wight; and as a mark of approbation for the “attention and care” he exercised in discharging the duty, His Royal Highness Prince Albert presented him with a cheque for ten pounds. He also had subordinate charge of the survey made for the military encampment at Chobham Common.
[51]. ‘Professional Papers, R. E.,’ iii., N. S., p. xxiii.
[52]. Captain Yolland, ‘Sector Volume,’ p. xiii.
[53]. Private B. K. Spencer took a few observations at these stations.
[54]. A few observations were taken at this station by Corporal Jenkins.
[55]. Captain Yolland, ‘Sector Volume,’ xiii.