494 
MILITARY VETERINARY POLITICS. 
discipline.’ Can Colonel Jackson make good these words'? Who 
constituted him a judge in the matter] Was not his remark harsh, 
petulant, and unnecessary 1 Harsh, however, as it was, it was 
succeeded by what looks very like an act of still more petty and 
irritating despotism about a full-dress uniform, which he directed 
Mr. Johnston to procure and appear in in four days’ time — a period 
within which the uniform could not be made. 
“Upon this Mr. Johnston took what appears to us to have been 
a false step ; but he explains it by the excitement of the moment, 
and the maddening nature of his Colonel’s conduct towards him. 
He tendered his resignation. 
“ It was not until the excitement had passed off that he became 
fully aware of the consequences of his act. The result of it to him 
and his family is starvation or the workhouse. He has served in 
the four quarters of the globe, and he appeals to the confidential 
returns. o.f the regiments in which he has served for evidence of his 
good conduct. The only slip in his military career was the un- 
fortunate act we have mentioned above, which does not, however, 
appear to have been accompanied with one single irritating word 
to his commanding officer. In India Mr. Johnston has made ship- 
wreck of his health in the public service; and now he stands alone 
in the world, without friends, and without one farthing with which 
to purchase a morsel of bread for himself and his family. * Surely 
this is a very hard case. 
“He has made two applications to the Horse Guards, the first to 
be reinstated in his rank in the service for the purpose of retiring 
on half-pay, the second for permission to receive a commuted 
allowance for his commission. Both applications have been sum- 
marily refused. Mr. Johnston quotes numerous precedents of 
officers who had been guilty of heinous offences, who have (some 
of them even after sentence of a court-martial) been reinstated in 
the service, or permitted to receive the commuted allowance, but 
without success. All he gets is the driest form of official refusal. 
“In thus briefly relating the leading facts of this most distressing 
case we have purposely abstained from any irritating remark. 
We are yet not without hope that the Duke of Wellington, when 
he comes to take into account the long services and good conduct 
of Mr. Johnston, as well as his loss of health in India, and the 
circumstances under which his resignation was tendered, may yet 
be induced to reconsider his determination. 
“ There is one person above all who might come forward grace- 
fully and generously in the matter, and whose recommendation 
would not, in all probability, be without effect. Colonel Jackson, 
we should imagine, cannot altogether stand clear with his own 
conscience for having first irritated Mr. Johnston, and then taken 
