WITH GENERAL LAKE'S ARMY. 
197 
favourable, and they have not suffered the least inconvenience. 
They do not move above nine or ten miles a day, that they may 
keep their cattle fresh, and in heart, when they enter the enemy's 
country. The gun fires for marching at three o'clock, and they 
reach the ground before the sun has any power. In former 
campaigns the European soldiers were obliged to lie on the ground 
like the natives ; but General Lake has procured cots for the 
whole of them. If the value of an European soldier be considered, 
the additional expense bears no proportion to the advantage of this 
measure in preserving their lives. It has succeeded well, for they 
have very few sick, which would not have been the case had they 
been exposed to the dampness of the ground. Such a march as this 
could not have been undertaken, had not the soil been an unmixed 
sand, which in a few hours after rain becomes perfectly dry. 
This morning the whole of the troops, in cantonments at Futty 
Ghur, began their march. They consist of about the same 
number of regulars, and followers, and by a different route, will 
join his Excellency on the frontiers. He will also receive acces- 
sion of strength on the road, by the junction of regiments at differ- 
ent quarters, so that probably his army will amount to twenty 
thousand men. The eighth light dragoons, with Colonel Vande- 
leure, are at Cawnpore, only waiting for horses. The Nawaub 
Vizier has offered his stud, and they will probably procure from him 
three hundred horses ; a very handsome present ! The European 
troops at present with the army, are the 57 th and 59th light dra^ 
goons, and the 76th foot. Their officers had notice that they were 
to be reduced, and sent to Europe, only a month before they took 
the field ; in consequence of which they had sold, at half price, all 
