136 Ikfnss of tbe 1Rofc t IRtfle, an& Gun 



most terrific engine, and now hangs in the mess-room 

 for public exhibition. Only one dog was caught the 

 whole day, and whose should that be but Parson 

 Bond's ! " 



In 1803 Cornet Hawker exchanged into the I4th 

 Light Dragoons, and got his troop in the following 

 year, for which step he paid 3,990 ; but he sub- 

 sequently notes as an instance of the iniquity of the 

 old purchase system that when he was, to use his own 

 words, "driven out of the service by the Colonel and 

 Lieutenant-Colonel for no other reason than what ought 

 to have been a recommendation namely, the very 

 severe wounds with which I had till lately been dis- 

 abled from doing my duty," he only received 1,785 for 

 his troop. His steps altogether from Cornet to Captain 

 cost him 5,805, and he lost 2,622 by the bargain. 



In 1809 Hawker's regiment was ordered to join the 

 expeditionary force which sailed under the command 

 of Sir Arthur Wellesley for Portugal. The horrors of 

 transit in a filthy old collier, with a drunken master, 

 Colonel Hawker has graphically depicted in his " Journal 

 of a Regimental Officer during the recent Campaign 

 in Portugal and Spain," which was published anony- 

 mously. There are some soldiers, I believe, who 

 grumble at the transport accommodation of to-day. 

 I would recommend such grumblers to get Colonel 

 Hawker's book, and read his narrative of the sickening 

 and hideous tortures to which not only the wounded 

 and invalided but the hale and sound had to submit 

 in his day on board the floating hells which they called 

 transports. 



