horse or field artillery, it would be hard, even in Europe, to find animals more suitable; and, to a soldier's eye, nothing can be finer than the appearance of the batteries and the cavalry regiments which are to be found in all our great military centres in the East. But, with his magnificent appearance and many good qualities, the Waler has his weak points, which must be carefully considered and provided for if we would keep him at his best and reap the full advantage of his service. First and most important, it is to be remembered that in India he is an exotic, and that, before his powers can be drawn upon for hard work, he should go through a slow and careful process of acclimatisation. It may safely be said that the constitution of no Waler troophorse has adapted itself to Indian conditions of service in a less period than one year; and in many, nay, most cases, two years are more likely to be the time necessary. During this period he is peculiarly susceptible to liver derangement and tropical fever, disorders of the digestive organs, and to inflammation caused by the coarse fodder used in India. The Waler, in comparison with other races, is always, and especially during this time of acclimatisation, marked by a lack of stamina in resisting and throwing off disease, and he has not the constitutional courage which so especially distinguishes the Arab. He must at all times, also, be well and regularly fed, and he will fall away rapidly in strength and condition if he is reduced to the coarse and scanty supplies on which the Asiatic horse will thrive comparatively well. When his period of probation is over, however, he is, as far as the effects of climate are concerned, as hardy as the Arab or country-bred, and will equally well withstand the influences of heat or cold. In many ways, in fact, the Waler is to the Asiatic horse what the European is to the Asiatic man. After he has been accustomed to the conditions of life in the country, and so long as he is well fed and well cared for, he is superior in power, energy, and endurance; but, immature, unacclimatised, or cut off from the supplies which are necessary to his different constitution, he very rapidly loses his superiority, and falls into weakness and ill health. on In order to give to the Walers, after they have been purchased at Calcutta or Madras, the advantages of the acclimatisation which so much stress is laid, most of them are transferred to remount depots, where they have also an opportunity of recovering from the debility caused by the long sea-voyage, and also from the injuries which very many of them have received while on board ship and in the process of landing. The Government arrangements differ somewhat at the two great ports of debarkation. At Calcutta, some horses (those required for the troops in lower Bengal) are kept at the depot there for a short time, and are thence sent direct to their destination, while the remainder are sent to the depot at Saharunpore, north of Meerut. The depot at Calcutta has very limited available space, and is really only a series of stables, which receive all the horses as they are landed, and where they can be kept until they are disposed of. The real depot for the Bengal army is Saharunpore, where the supplies for the batteries and corps in the North-west are kept for some time, until they are distributed according to requirements. The arrangements for the horses purchased at Madras are framed on what is, in many details, a preferable system. There the shiploads are landed between August and the following February or March, and are from there at once sent to the remount depot at Husur, where they are kept as a general rule until the succeeding September, when they are issued to corps. Whilst they are at Husur they not only have the advantage of quiet and the most careful feeding and supervision, but a feature peculiar to the place they are handled, backed, and partially trained. The horses which go to the troops in lower Bengal are thus the only Australian remounts arriving in India which do not have the advantage of a time at a depot for rest and acclimatisation before they join their corps; and every officer who has there received these horses almost straight from the ship, will agree in allowing what an unfortunate arrangement it is both for the animals and the service, and how great is the eventual loss to Government. It may here be mentioned that the whole remount department of India consists of a director of remounts under the Government of India, a superintendent of depot at Saharunpore, who has also an assistant, a superintendent of depot at Husur, and a remount agent at Calcutta. Veterinary surgeons are also attached to the depots, and in no employment are their professional skill and the best resources of science more useful or more required. Of course the maintenance of this department, with the various depots and offices, with their subordinate officials and attendants, involves a considerable outlay of public money, and adds very sensibly to the value of each troop-horse before he finally joins the service; and it has been more than once proposed that the depot system should be done away with, and that all horses should be directly forwarded to their future corps from the port where they have been purchased. But this is a most mistaken view, and it is devoutly to be hoped that such false saving may never be practised. The time passed at the remount depot, and the care which is there given to the young horses, is practically a piece of the greatest economy on the part of Government. Not only is the constant supervision of the newly landed horses, and the partial training before joining the service, of the highest value to each of them, but it saves the lives of many which would otherwise succumb to the hard life, exposure, and in many cases reckless treatment, without reference to their condition, which they would receive if sent direct to the service. Horses after a long voyage are, even if they have remained in fair condition, in an extremely low state of vitality, and if exposed to weather, or injudiciously fed or worked, would soon fall away, and probably die. It is to be remembered also, that the state of nervousness of all fresh Walers, from the entirely new sights and associations which they encounter, requires much more careful treatment than they would be likely to get, or indeed it would be possible to give them, in the lines or stables of a service corps. Let us follow a batch of young Australians which the superintendent of the Husur depot, who has come to Madras for the purpose, has just purchased from the shipper, after the most rigidly careful selection, and which are enroute to Husur. A journey by are in managing, both in the lines and in the riding-school, the most difficult-tempered and refractory animals. The power and dominant force of the European rough-rider, which is necessary before the military training is complete, are wanting; but the preliminary handling. of the immature animal could not be in better or gentler hands. The on-looker is tempted to compare the horse-drill at the depot to the teaching of a nursery governess which a boy receives before he is sent to the rougher, sterner, and equally necessary treatment of a public school. train, finally ascending from the able how successful these natives. low-lying country round Madras on to the cool Mysore table-land, brings them to Mallur, a small roadside station, from which they march the eighteen miles to the depot. There they find themselves in an establishment whose snug buildings, wide green paddocks, carefully cultivated fields, and closely trimmed hedges, recall all the ideas of an English farm; and there they find every arrangement made to enable them to pass such a halcyon period as falls into few equine lives. The depot is divided into lines, each of which is under the charge of a European conductor, with a number of native employees under him. In addition to these lines, there is the sick-horse department under the veterinary surgeon and his staff, and there is also the farm under European supervision. The remounts, on arrival, are distributed to these lines, the establishments of which vie with each other in endeavour to improve and quiet the horses committed to their charge in the shortest possible time. In each of the lines, besides the European conductor in charge who is a selected and specially qualified non-commissioned officer from a mounted corps-there is a native subordinate officer, and for every two horses a syce or native groom. A proportion of these syces are employed as sowars or riders, and they handle and gradually break-in and exercise each remount in the riding-school. The remounts are ridden in plain snaffles and cogeers (or native saddles); and the quiet, cool, gentle handling and very good horsemanship of the sowars have most excellent results, and by this admirable system each remount gets a steady piece of education on three days in the week. It is very remark In the horse-lines at the depot there is stabling accommodation for about 400 horses, and there is besides ample room for picketing those for which there is not covered shelter. Till within the last few years, there was always retained at the depot a reserve of 100 to 150 horses in excess of the year's requirements; and this kept the lines always fully occupied, and gave an opportunity of saving all backward and weakly horses till they had had the advantage of another year's quiet and nourishment. Now, however, that by a very doubtful economy barely enough horses are kept to supply the wants of the year, the full accommodation is not made use of, and much space is left vacant. The total amount of ground covered by the depot is rather more than 700 acres; but this includes the native village, tank, wells, roads, gardens, and bungalows occupied by the officials. The whole place is to a great extent self-supporting. Many supplies in grain, forage, &c., have necessarily to be procured outside; but its farm furnishes a great part of its requirements in hay, guinea-grass, lucerne, and oats. Unfortunately, for several months in the year there is a prevailing strong west wind which dries up everything, and, with the precarious rainfall, interferes much with successful cultivation, except where artificial irrigation can be carried out by means of channels led from the tanks and wells. Such as it is, the Husur depot makes the appointment of its superintendent one of the most valued prizes in the gift of the Governor of Madras. To any man who has the taste for country life and the love of horse-flesh so common amongst Englishmen, nothing can be more charming, and assimilate more to English life, than to occupy the cool and picturesque superintendent's bungalow, which stands wreathed in a veil of the most lovely and gorgeously blossoming creepers, surrounded by garden and paddocks studded with stately trees, and to find his daily duties comprised in the charge of several hundred horses, which he has himself selected and bought, and for whose improvement and develop ment he alone is responsible. The appointment has always been held by a soldier, but there is nothing in its nature to make this necessary; and gossip says that so much is it desired, that on one occasion when it was vacant, there was no single profession which did not furnish a representative among candidates who the numerous aspired to fill it. After the horses have been at the depot for some months, the superintendent is able to class them according to the arms of the service to which they will finally be issued. This has necessarily been already partially done when the horses were bought; but some do not develop as much as has been expected-while others, under the influence of care and good food, grow and throw out muscle to a surprising extent; and it is an interesting study to watch whether an animal will grow into the somewhat coarse and heavy type which is suitable to a fieldbattery, remain sufficiently light and active to mount European cavalry, or show the combination of strength, size, and breeding which will qualify it for horseartillery. Some of the most difficult horses to provide are the short, thick, and very active animals which are furnished to the artillery in Bombay, to go as wheelers in teams otherwise made up of Persians. There is so great a demand for horses of the same class for the tram-cars and omnibuses in the big towns in Australia, that comparatively few leave that country; and, though taller or lighter horses may be had in sufficient numbers, the supply of these well-bred, free-actioned, pony cart-horses does no more than meet actual wants. It has been said above, that, in order to keep the Waler horse at his best, he must be well and regularly fed. And this leads to the consideration of the feeding of horses in general, one of the most important questions and one of the gravest difficulties in connection with the maintenance in the field in India of any considerable mounted force. Every one is familiar with the usual practice of feeding horses in England with a proportion of grain, generally given in the form of oats, and a proportion of fodder, given as hay. The system followed in India is very different. Hay is made throughout the land in very small quantities, and is in consequence extremely scarce and with difficulty procurable. In order to supply its place, and to give to horses that amount of bulk to their food which their constitution nately a hardy and prolific plant, demands, grass is cut daily in the in not always easily procurable; vicinity of the stations and brought and the grass-cutters make up in for immediate use. For every their bundles with coarse, rank horse in India a grass-cutter must herbage, and with useless and be kept, whose sole duty is the frequently unwholesome. weeds. collection of the necessary fodder; In order to make up the tale of and the horses in Government ser- weight which they are bound to vice must, like all others, have supply, they are cunning enough, these attendants. And here the if allowed, to wash their bundle practice differs in various parts of before bringing it in, nominally India. for the purpose of removing the dust and dirt which adhere to the plants, but practically doubling its weight by the added moisture. As they are not particular where this washing is done, and generally do it in the nearest filthy stream or puddle, it may be conceived what a probability there is of so conveying noxious spores or organisms to the animals which are to consume the food thus provided. It is a curious and interesting sight, at the stable-hour of a mounted corps in the south of India, In Bengal and the North-west the grass cutters attached to mounted corps are men provided with ponies, on which they can convey the grass when it is cut, and which enable them to go to considerable distances to procure the best herbage. In the south of India the grass-cutters are women, generally the wives of the syces or native grooms; and they may be seen daily sallying forth from the native lines of the cantonment, and returning after their long and weary day's work-how long and weary it is in the dry season may well be supposed-bearing on their heads the bundles which represent the tale of their allotted task. As in most districts there are no Government lands where grass may be procured, and the grass-cutters must seek their supplies in waste places, by the roadside, or on the ground of some farmer who permits their incursion, it follows that the quality of fodder which is received is very variable, and that if the greatest care be not taken in supervision, it is generally indifferent, and often positively bad. The particular grass which is most sought for and most valued as an article of food. is the one known as Hariali in the south of India, Doob grass in northern India, and is the same as the couch-grass of Australia and America. But this useful grass, though fortu to see the grass-cutters standing in rows, each with the results of her day's work before her, while the officer or non-commissioned officer goes round inspecting and weighing each bundle before it is passed into the lines. Here a bundle is short weight; there another has been dressed up with good Hariali grass on the outside to make a respectable appearance, and would pass muster if a searching hand did not dive into its centre and disclose the rubbish with which it is made up; while a third too evidently owes its gravity to undue soaking in the barrack ditch. As each is rejected, the unhappy owner pours forth a voluble and imcomprehensible stream of complaint and remonstrance, while all her companions join in the chorus in tones like the screaming of a flock of sea-gulls disturbed. The offending bundle is removed, and |