MILITAR Y AD VENTURES. 59 



before embarking, but some had been 

 put on board ship as soon as they had got 

 their uniform, there being no time to drill 

 them ; so we were now making up for 

 lost time, and I must say, I never saw any 

 young men improve so rapidly as our 

 recruits did. They saw the necessity for 

 learning their work, as they were all 

 anxious to be enrolled in a battalion with 

 the older soldiers, and they also wished 

 to take a more active part in the next 

 engagement than they did in the last. 



About ten days after the receipt of the 

 dispatch, one afternoon we saw a quantity 

 of dust ascending, a sure sign that troops 

 are in motion ; on examination, this dust 

 appeared to be approaching, though still 

 a long way off, but after a little we 

 discovered, by the length of it, that it 

 was a column of troops in motion. We 



