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    998 THE LEADER. [Saturday,

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    PEEL'S AUXILIARY MEDICAL CORPS. A sepaba...

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    HARTMANN". Tina greatest anxiety is felt...

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    war has torn open the framework of states , and exhibits their anatomy to us , and tells the function , of the muscular part of politics . We may want the head to direct , we may need the heart to knit us together , but the right hand , after all , does the work either of industry or of combat . And yet , the people of this country has suffered that real hold of political power to depart from it ; the English people is divorced frora its army , and , in this respect , we are weaker than some of the states at which we sneer . " We have sustained the

    loss through forgetfuhxess , through misapprehension . The period tells us to value that which we had learned to neglect . "We ought to supply it . The opportunity will not be wanting . Should the present struggle be prolonged , draughts will be made upon the English people for money and for men , and then the English people will have a right to claim a share in the command of its own army .

    Nothing has been more striking in the present war than the letters which have been sent home written by the private soldiers : in force of feeling , in political insight , in moral appreciation , in humanity , in firmness , in military ardour , they are not excelled by the letters of the officers . " We know of no distinction . Turns of expression as good as any in the writings of the professed reporters , or of officers bearing the highest ranis : and educated in the universities , are to be found in the letters of men who have enlisted in the ranks . The stuff of the men is the same .

    The victory won at the Alma was obtained through the good order , the military sagacity of the individual men , whom , the circumstances of tlie time east loose from the ranks , and who were for tLe hour their own officers . " What distinction then is there between men and gentlemen bearing her Majesty ' s commission which should forbid the men ' s rising to the rank of officers ; which would forbid any man in the ranks , with the qualities such as we have indicated , from stepping , —by degrees if you like , by hard labour , and b y daring ardour , —to the highest post on the field ? When men and money are wanted , the English people ought to ask that question of their governors .

    Contrasts are observed between our own army and the French . Our men are , for -the most part , taller , firmer in action , stricter in discipline ; theirs are more inured to active fatigue , more impatient for victory , keener at individual combat ; but take them altogether , and each will admit that it would care for no enemy but that other . Yet the Erench soldier can , tell the English private that of every three officers of the Prench army one had risen from tho ranks . Are we , as Englishmen , to confess that chivalry belongs only to the JEVench people ? That only a smail class of the English share the feeling—a

    class lorn officers ? Say that gentlemanly spirit is absolutely required in tho officer , and thai you do not always find it in the " common people" of England ; admit the assumption , and yet we say that when a man of the common people shows such qualities as are indicated in the letters to which we havo referred , he proves that there aro " gentlemen" oven in the humblest ranks , and that tho qualities of tho officer live under tho coai'se cloth of tho private soldier . If it is gentlemanly and chivalrous feeling that you require , you would still find a full proportion to give tho English people ono-third of tho oflicorB in tho British urmy .

    33 ut there ia > something moro than right ; lucidly , sinco right ia disclaimed by our ^ Legislators as a sufficient ground for public acts . There is policy . Throw open , com-. xnissions to privatos , on condition that thoy axe men cf gcntlomanly demeanour , a « , d you

    at once raise the standard of behaviour for the whole ranks . Yet further ; because men rise from the ranks in the French army , it is not to be supposed that all such men are other than , gentlemen . " What is " gentle " in the Herald ' s acceptation ? It is that a man shall be " nobilis , " that is Tcnowable by his arms ; his family having been distinct "with an inherited cognizance . Now there are many gentlemen in England who have a better right to bear arms than numbers who

    have the money to purchase commissions in the army . To open commissions for privates would have the double effect of ena-hling such men to work their way to command ; while , in passing through the ranks , they would leaven the mass , and strengthen the moral operation , of the measure upon the body of the soldiers . Our army would then really represent the nation and all its glasses . Men and money , we say , will be demanded of the English commonwealth before the

    battle is over . Already recruits are going out , and are continually drafted from the body of the people . ~ W ~ e supply the bone and sinews , we shall have to pay them . "We should obtain only our right if we were to insist that exclusive rules , alien from a comm onwealth like ours , should be broken down . If we give our blood and treasure , give us at least a share in the disposal of it . If we go

    to war for the honour of the Queen ' s flag , let the Queen ' s flag honour the , English people . If we hear the brunt of the loss , let a portion of the political power , which a share in the military profession confers , be returned to the English people . If we could obtain that out of the war , —if we could throw open the army , —if we could secure some degree of sympathy between the great organised physical force of our state and the

    commonwealth , then , we say , the blood spilled upon the Continent would not be in vain , and England will arise from the contest greater than she was before—¦ more worthy for sovereign and statesmen to govern .

    998 The Leader. [Saturday,

    998 THE LEADER . [ Saturday ,

    Peel's Auxiliary Medical Corps. A Sepaba...

    PEEL'S AUXILIARY MEDICAL CORPS . A sepabate subject from the throwing open of the array , though closely allied to it , is the appointment of medical officers . A movement is made to increase the assistance and comfort for the soldiers in the East , and some official jealousy is shown of this movement ; why we tlo not know . Private persona anticipated the official commission , and organised a system to provide for the -widows and dependants of suffering soldiers ; and this plan ,

    to a certain extent , remains hetter than the official plan . The ltoyal Commission seems to contemplate no help for any hut widows or orphans ; whereas the private Association justly takes account of another class of the helpless , and gives , help to the wife who is deprived of aid by her husband ' s absence , finds a home and safety for children whom the claims of war have bereft of their natural protector , and so cheers the soldier fighting in the field , whoBO anxioty would be a more enduring pang than that of the soldier expiring on the field . Are the dependants of

    the dead poor onl y to be thought of ? Does the official commission intend to put a promium upon tho suicide of non-cornmissionod officers or privates P Until , therefore , we have some distinct understanding thut tho Royal Commission intend , in these respects , to" as well aa the private Association , wo must hold that the independent help has not been noedlcas nor superfluous . Sir Itobert Peel and tho Times havo suggested tho formation of a fund to aond more help for tho sick and wounded ; whereupon " Andrew Smith , M . B ., Director-General ,

    Army and Ordnance Medical Department , " publishes a memorandum to prove that the sick and wounded are already provided for ; that there are 276 medical officers in the East ; 30 on their way , and L 5 ready to embark ; that there are boundless supplies of drugs , instruments , hospital stoats , and

    comforts ; and that , in short , so far as it may be done in hospitals , the English soldier who is past fighting may live like a fighting cock . To a certain extent Andrew Smith answers the complaints that have been made . There is a larger number of medical officers for the number of men than were allowed in the Peninsula—one to 97 instead of one to 154 .

    The drugs and instruments are more ample , and comprise the latest improvements of medical chemistry and mechanics ; but the ¦ ver y statement shows that enough , had not "been done at first , and the best feature in . Andrew Smith ' s explanation is that he promises continued improvement as experience shall instruct theory . Very good . Then , why repel the means of supplying additional help , though it be offered even faster than Parliament will perhaps vote the supplies ? Sir Robert Peel and . his coadjutors open their hands—why repel the proffered assistance ?¦ Andrew Smith tells us that the

    allowance of medical officers is sufficient for average purposes ; and ministerial writers represent that the Alma was more than an average purpose—an extraordinary event . Very true , and the State may not be bound to provide for more than the ordinary run of contingencies . But why prevent volunteers from supplying extra aid which would be

    available on " extraordinary" occasions ? There is no sense in the refusal . " When an accident happens— -say a fire on a Grateshead scale—it would be foolish to blame the parish or the local authorities for not sending more than the constituted engine of the district ; but if private engines were to arrive , how mad or criminal must be the man who

    would refuse their help . None but a Spanish grandee or a Chinese would insist upon keeping flames waiting unquenehed ., still less men with wounds unstrapped or legs unamputated , until they could be arrived at by the official person in his regulation uniform . Any help of this kind it is silly and criminal to refuse . Nor would tho benefit be only temporary . " We believe that there is no study so striking and so beneficial as that afi'ordeel by the field of battle . It is there that tho medical man learns the spur of necessity

    under its sharpest pressure ; there that he discovers his own resources of invention , his own decision , his own powers of endurance , in ncrvo and muscle ; learns to know what humanity can suffer , and science can accomplish . If some few young surgeons wont over now , by help of a fund like Sir Robert Peel's , they would not only afford an admirable help to their suffering countrymen , but they would have a fine training ; for themselves , and would bring back into the body of the profession a larger share of that stirring experience which has given to ub already a G-uthrie and a Gulliver .

    Hartmann". Tina Greatest Anxiety Is Felt...

    HARTMANN " . Tina greatest anxiety is felt on tho Continent for tho fate of tho poet llartmann , of whom it has recently boon stated that ho was Hoizcu at Bucharest by officers of tho Austrian G-ovornment , and conveyed to Vienna ior perpetual imprisonment or for execution , on the pretext that he had been condemned to death , for political causes . A contradiction has appeared in a Ministerial paper . I- ' Morning Chronicle says : " Tho report that has lately circuktod in Oormanf ,

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Oct. 21, 1854, page 14, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_21101854/page/14/