Marching 
Halts, 
568 MARCHING AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
by the Pay-Sergeant and myself overnight into six little bags, two of 
which I gave at breakfast the next morning to each subaltern, I kept 
a double set of bags and the empty ones were returned to me on my 
issuing the full ones; the bags were marked with the sub-division 
numbers. 
I carried as a rule money enough for one day or two, but it depended 
of course on our vicinity to a bank. In some places there might be no 
hank at all. : 
I gave the Pay-Sergeant daily the billeting money, and calculated 
out the pay, and entered it both in his pay-book and in my pocket- 
book ; the Pay-Sergeant should accompany the C.O. round billets in 
the evening, and pay all up in the presence of the different sectional 
officers, taking receipts, which he should file—I had a book for him. 
Never but once, in my experience of several long marches, have I had 
a demand for repayment from an innkeeper, for the reason perhaps 
that an officer was always present to witness the payments. I also 
recommend that a copy of all payments be kept by the C.O. personally. 
Pay-books may get lost, therefore a duplicate is useful; I had at one 
time a Pay-Sergeant who was a capital fellow but inclined at times to 
go on the spree; he did so on the march once, and lost his books, and 
if I had not had a copy I should have been in a fix. 
About 8.15 or 8.30 a.m. is the best time to get away on the road, it 
is not easily managed earlier, for the hotels and public-houses are not 
open much before 6.30 or 7 a.m., neither is it good for man or beast to 
make too early a start, unless the weather is abnormally hot. I re- 
member once trying to start out of Bath at 6.30 a.m. to catch the tide 
at Avon mouth and embark on that terrible old tub the “ Assistance ”’ 
for Ireland, half the men could not get into the stables, and half could 
not get out of the inns before 5.30 a.m. and so we were nearly an hour 
late in getting off. Many C.O.’s have a good plan of giving a cup of 
coffee and a biscuit at parade before falling in; the plan I recommend 
is to have the camp kettles packed overnight with 4 oz. of cheese and 
+ lb. of bread a man (in a regiment this can be put in the squadron 
carts); at the half-way halt, pay, water the horses, and let the men 
lunch, the halt should be made near a public-house and near water, to 
enable the men to get a glass of beer or lemonade, and the horses 
to be watered if necessary. From an experience of a long march, I 
found that after the first ten days very few men drank wayside inn 
beer, because 1t was so bad and so dear ; my reason for recommending 
the half-way meal is, that young soldiers especially, on arriving in 
billets at say 1.30 or 2 p.m. hot, dusty, and very empty, often drink 
straight away the two pints of beer allowed them before eating any- 
thing, this amount on an empty stomach makes them unfit for work 
and the horses suffer. If, on the contrary, the men arrive having had 
a good lunch of bread and cheese, they do not want the beer at once, 
and even if they take it, it has no bad effect ; they are ready to get to 
work on their horses and when they have done them up, they have 
their dinners, and enjoy them, with a pipe after as they finish their 
work. 
About fifteen minutes or so after marching off from the place of 
