318 Notes of the Month on [Sept. 



the dragoon, either light or heavy ? But even among the Seventh — and 

 Heaven knows there is dandyism enough about the Seventh, and will be so 

 as long as it is the Marquis of Anglesey's regiment — is eclipsed by the 

 Tenth to the amount of £150. a coat — the Tenth costing no less than 

 £399. And why, we must ask, is this suffered ? We will not believe that it 

 is because the Marquis of Londonderry is the colonel, and chooses to ride 

 once a year at a Hyde Park review, at the head of the most fiippery corps, 

 excepting IMr. Merryman's, in the universe ? Is it in the idea that the 

 more yards of lace, and the more fur on pelisses, the better soldiers } or 

 is it in the still sillier idea of creating an aristocracy in the array, to be 

 ascertained by their tailor's bill ? We must leave the solution to the 

 twin marquisses. But we will tell them, that a more vulgar and effe- 

 minate mode of marking a military distinction cannot be made : and we 

 will tell the masters of those marquises, that a more vexatious and paltry 

 contrivance for offending the feelings of the service in general could not 

 be adopted. 



If superior ornament of dress be a distinction, let it be given for 

 actual merit in the field, if it must be given at all ; and then we shall 

 acknowledge the pre-eminence of the Seventh and the Tenth, as soon as 

 we can discover the scene of their exploits. But if it be the mere occa- 

 sion for a coxcomb who has just put on his first boots, and knows much 

 more of bergamot than of bullets, to flourish in the face of men of honour, 

 who have known what fighting was, though they have not so many 

 yards of gold and silver on their pantaloons, we must pronounce it a 

 piece of unwarrantable absurdity. We shall tell them further, that 

 nothing is actually more a subject of complaint to the ofHcers, even of 

 these Hussar regiments, than this extraordinary and silly expense of 

 uniform. With lialf-a-dozen young spendthrifts in a corps, it may be 

 popidar while their money lasts ; but with the great majority it is felt 

 to be an offensive, because a totally unnecessary burthen. And there is 

 not one circumstance which causes so much discontent, so many 

 exchanges out of a regiment — always a bad sign — and so rapidly strips a 

 regiment of all its experienced officers, as the expense of this frippery. 

 But the expense is not limited to the first equipment : a dandy colonel is 

 perpetually making some alteration, which, though trivial to the eye,_is 

 formidable to the purse. 



But the whole system is absurd, from the gingerbread hussar to the 

 subaltern of marines, with his collar embroidered with gold acorns and oak 

 leaves, like a French field-marshal. While an uniform at once service- 

 able and handsome, answering every purpose of the field and of parade, 

 might be supplied to the infanti'y for less than one half the price in 

 this Taylor General's list. The less lace daubed on a soldier's coat the 

 better. Why should there not be some reference of the cost to the 

 power of the officer to disburse it ? The pay of the subaltern is not the 

 pay of a scrivener's clerk, yet he must renew his uniform perhaps twice 

 a year — and his imiform costs £50, the sword being its only permanent 

 appendage. A hundred pounds a year out of a hundred and forty, is a 

 handsome allowance for a man's coat out of his whole income. And the 

 evil does not stop here. There are perpetual changes of taste in the 

 clothing board, whether those changes come from head-quarters or from 

 the genius of the old personages who preside over this cutting and 

 button-hole department. It is discovered that the troops will fight better 

 with three buttons on their skirts than with six ; and that without anew 



