Our life during training is very like the lives
of any other officers in country quarters who
do not live in barracks. After the first week,
symptoms of a contagious disease, known as
asking for leave, take a confirmed form. The
instincts in this direction are, indeed, in some
cases abnormally developed, and require a check
from superior command, which, to do superior
command justice, they generally get. We receive
a great deal of attention from the local gentry,
who are hospitality itself. Upon all great
occasions there is a request, either verbally or in
writing, for uniform; but some among us, who
take their tone from the Guards, steadily refuse
to confer this innocent enjoyment. In church
on Sundays, when we go with the men, uniform
is indispensable. One officer has to go with the
Catholics, who usually form a tolerably strong
detachment. The Wesleyans have also the
option of attending their place of worship, but
every man is made to go somewhere. The rule
is the same all through the service.

The officers vary both as to professional
and social peculiarities. There is the model
officer, who has been in the line, and who,
while secretly regarding the Militia service as
mild, sets a severe example to those who are
inclined to take a light or frivolous view of
its demands. The officer who has been in
the line always looks with regretful sadness
upon another class of his comrades in arms,
represented by the officer with mysterious
leave. The latter usually does his duty
properly enough when present; but he is
continually disappearing for a day, and turning up
again, impervious to all questioning. He has
urgent private affairs, I take it, of a kind
to demand recognition, which cannot be said
for the officer who shirks upon system, who,
you may be sure, is not unrepresented in the
regiment. Then there is the easy-going officer,
whose lodgings are always full of lunch and
ladies, and who is dropped in upon very
generally in consequence of the double attraction.
He will probably have his mother and sisters to
see him occasionally, but, as a general rule,
draws a "hard-and-fast line" at cousins and
friends. He has always the best lodgings in
the place, and is one of the two officers who
have pianofortes at command.

Another variety is the officer who is going to
get his company. He has perhaps been of the
light-and-airy school, but, on a sudden, manifests
great respect for his duty, and is found
"mugging up" the red book at odd times with
great enthusiasm. He has a great dread of
being spun, but, of course, will not confess the
fact. It is to be hoped that he will not make
the same mistake which was once made by a
subaltern in the line, undergoing an examination
for a step. He had got his answers by
heart in anticipation of the questions, but had
not calculated on the order in which the latter
would be asked.

"How old are you?" said the examining
authority.

"Five, sir," was the prompt answer—he
had a great notion that he ought to answer
promptly.

"How many years have you been in the
service?" asked the examining authority, giving
him another chance.

"Twenty-three, sir," was the ready reply.

"Either you are a fool or I am," said the
examining authority severely.

"Both, sir," answered the unconscious
subaltern, not daring to listen, and believing that
he was getting on remarkably well—a delusion
which I need scarcely say was dispelled in a
very decided manner.

But the officer who is going to get his
company is quite eclipsed by the officer who has
got it. The moral tone of the latter goes up
wonderfully, and he makes very severe remarks
upon those of his friends who take a light and
airy view of the service—assuring them in
private that it is not a mere plaything, but
must be considered in the light of a serious
responsibility, and hinting at the extraordinary
efficiency which in these days is necessary
for promotion. The officer who is always
going to resign is another character. He
is about to take this desperate step every time
he gets "fits" from the colonel; but he
never takes it. A great acquisition to the
regiment is the officer who is always doing
somebody else's duty. He does it because he
is good natured, but makes the excuse that
it "improves" him. We call him the chronic
subaltern of the day. The musical officer who
has composed a polka, and is the inevitable
band president, is another acquisition, and a
popular fellow. The latter description, too,
must be given of the latest subaltern: who
is always boasting, without any reason at all—
for at heart he is strictly abstemious—of the
number of "sodas and brandies" he takes at
mess. He says sixteen, and is pleasantly told
by authority that fourteen is the limit allowed
in the regiment. It is he of whom the story
is told that being suddenly left by the
captain to take his company to church, he ordered
the usual compliment to the guard on passing,
in this manner: "Here, Number 3, 4, 5, or
whatever you are, do that thing that you know
you always do to the guard." This is as military
as the order given by the volunteer colonel (an
alderman) when marching through the city, to
"Turn up Chancery-lane." New subalterns,
by the way, are always very important when
pay day comes, and they are actually to have
solid recognition for their services; but their
transports are considerably modified when they
find ten guineas taken for entrance subscription,
to the mess, and that, counting other claims,
instead of receiving anything, they have a little
deficiency to make good. It is the two junior
officers, too, who carry the colours, and for the
privilege of this "honourable bore"—as I have
heard the duty described—they are each
expected to pay, upon the first occasion, a
sovereign to their sergeants.

Of course we return the hospitalities of the
locality, as far as the mess is concerned, and our