Burghers are handled with reasonable skill and alertness, if they make reasonably good use of the immense advantages of their position, they will be able to cut the British lines of communications almost at will, and without any great expenditure of life or material. They will be able to make the problem of supply almost an impossible one.

The statements already made as to the difficulty of maintaining long lines of railway communication in a hostile country have been somewhat general in their character. In South Africa, however, that is, in the portion of it which is for the present to be the field of military operations, the difficulties are exceptional. Their nature and extent will appear from the following consideration of existing conditions.

The field of operations in South Africa is decidedly different from any that has ever been heretofore used in the handling of large bodies of troops. The European Continent, during the last few centuries during which it has been the scene of so many wars, has been a country thickly settled, having a large number of roads available for the movements of large bodies of troops. It has also had a sufficiently dense population, to make it possible for armies of considerable numbers to live on the country. Requisitions upon large towns and cities can be easily made to supply a reasonably large force for a considerable period of time.

So, too, in our Civil War, although the country was rough, and the roads difficult, yet the roads available for wheel transportation were sufficient to allow the movement over them of large bodies of troops. For instance, General Sherman had no serious difficulty in supplying his army of 60,000 men during his march to the sea, mainly by foraging on the country.

As General Howard stated in his despatch to General Sherman of November 1, 1864: "We marched to this place by two good roads from Cave Spring. Hood took much. But there is plenty of corn and some pigs." As General Sherman himself put it, in his despatch to his Commissary, Colonel Beckwith, on November 10, 1864, just before the beginning of the march to Savannah: "When I start I propose to move with great rapidity. Faster than cattle can possibly gain on us.

They are now five days behind, and could not possibly catch up, as I will break the Etowah and Chattahooche bridges in passing, and those streams are now too high to cross without bridges. We can safely rely on the country for half rations of meat. Where a million of people live I have no fear of

getting a share.”

He further said, in his despatch to General Thomas of November 11: "You may act, however, on the certainty that I sally from Atlanta on the 16th inst. with about 60,000 men, well provisioned, but expecting to live chiefly on the country."

But this matter of supplying a large army from the country through which it moves has its limitations. In the first place it must be used with great caution in a friendly country, or in a country where it is desired to keep the inhabitants on friendly terms. In the second place, it is limited in point of time. In an ordinary agricultural region, the amount of supplies that can be collected from any available area is soon exhausted. No dependence therefore can be put upon it as the means of supplying the subsistence needs of a large force for any considerable period.

We are thrown back, therefore, on this question of the subsistence of large bodies of troops, to the impossibility of depending upon anything other than transportation by railroads.

But, as stated before, the question of supply lies at the foundation of all military movements. The matter of transportation lies at the foundation of the question of supply. This fact is now at last becoming understood in England. An extract from the London Times reads as follows:

"LIMITATION UPON ENGLAND'S CAMPAIGN

"Col. Hanna, who is an eminent military authority, has published what seems to me to be a very sensible letter in TheTimes. Our military authorities meet any check in South Africa by sending out an additional division. The Colonel points out that in all countries, and especially in South Africa, where the distances are enormous and the country that we propose to conquer so devoid of any supplies on which an invading army can count, we ought to deprecate any lurge increase on the present number of our soldiers. In support of this he quotes the Duke of Wellington's dictum that war is a question of commissariat, and that commissariat is one of transport. Where everything has to be transported from a distance the Colonel holds

that we cannot trust to railroads, as they may at any time be cut by mobile forces like those of the Boers, in which case we should have to fall back on pack animals, bullock carts, &c. The number that we can employ in active war, therefore, is limited by the number that we can feed.

"I am not a inilitary man, but what Col. Hanna says had occurred to me. Napoleon's expedition to Moscow broke down, not so much from the inclemency of the climate as from the impossibility of feeding such a mass of men as he threw into the country; and, up to a certain point, our advance on Pretoria is analogous to that of Napoleon on Moscow. Pretoria, according to all accounts, is so strongly fortified that it could not be taken without a regular siege, It is not likely that the Boers would resist our advance by a battle of Borodino. They would be more likely, after occupying, after their wont, successive positions from which they can kill or wound many of our men, to fall back into the veldt on either side, and then to harass our communications. These we should have to defend along a line as long as the road from London to Newcastle. Even if the railroad were not cut, it is laid down in the German military works that a railroad with two lines of rail can only supply 40,000 men, and no South African railroad beyond the Orange River has more than one line.”

THE ABSENCE OF PREPARATION ON THE PART OF THE BRITISH ARMY FOR THE HANDLING OF THE PRESENT PROBLEM OF TRANSPORTATION AND SUPPLY.

We have seen how vital to the operations of any army is the problem of transportation and supply, and how impossible it is to handle this problem, for any large body of troops, especially in such a region as the one which is now the field of operations, except by lines of railway. We have also seen how easy it is in that region to destroy any line of railway, and how overwhelmingly difficult will be the work of rebuilding destroyed railway lines, and consequently, of keeping open any line of communications for the supply of any large armies.

Such being the situation, it is easily seen that the only possibility of the British Army conducting successfully any campaign of invasion depends on the efficiency of their commissary and quartermaster service, and of their engineer service.

Now it happens to be the fact, that Great Britain to-day is practically destitute of men of experience for service in the

Quartermaster and Commissary Departments, for any new troops which may be now raised for service in South Africa. Upon this point the evidence is very explicit, and is contained in the following article from the Army and Navy Gazette of October 7, 1899. That article may be deemed, for all practical purposes, to be almost equivalent to an official declaration. Moreover, it is an admission against interest, and consequently entitled to the highest weight as evidence. It reads as follows:

"TRANSPORT IN SOUTH AFRICA.

"The mobilization of the Army Service Corps for supplying one army corps for South Africa will, it is to be hoped, clearly demonstrate how disgracefully under-manned this important branch of the Service is. That the authorities should have permitted such a state of things is to be deplored, for it is culpable neglect, and might involve the country in some dire national disaster. The stations have been drained to the dregs of officers, warrant officers, non commissioned officers and men. The district staff offices have been denuded of clerks, and companies of the corps left without officers or warrant officers, and all this to supply merely one army corps. What would be done if a second or a third army corps were required, or if mobilization for home defense became suddenly necessary? Even to secure enough Army Service Corps of varying grades to proceed to South Africa, a special increase to the establishment has had to be resorted to.

"At the commencement of last session, Parliament decided that an augmentation of some forty officers was required, with an increase of a certain number of transport companies. We find, however, that only a few quartermasters have as yet been added, and but four new companies, without the addition of any of the forty officers required. From the Army List it seems that over seventy subalterns are still wanted to complete the corps. What is being done to secure and train them? Is it that candidates are shy of coming forward to fill the vacancies? And, if so, why? If the rate of pay is inadequate it should be increased. Candidates, and of the right sort, must be found as rapidly as possible, in order to fill the depleted cadres. Surely, by distributing young officers amongst the companies of the corps left at home, they could commence to learn the rudiments of their duties, and their training could be completed as opportunity offers at the technical school of instruction at Aldershot.

"When the seventy or so officers are found the existing establishment of the Army Service Corps will require to be gradually raised. More companies must be created, and each company should always have within its ranks two officers and a warrant officer. For years past the Army Service Corps companies have been starved; rarely have they had even their full complement of officers. The number of captains has been dangerously weak, and the number of subalterns and warrant officers wholly inade

quate to meet even peace requirements. The 'establishment' of clerks, bakers, and butchers is in the same lamentable condition; practically the whole of the clerks in the home offices have been drained for South Africa, and promotions to higher ranks suddenly made at the moment of mobilisation.

"In Indian campaigns good service in supply and transport is done by regimental officers, and seeing that the existing strength of the Army Service Corps is so lamentably weak it would seem desirable to take regimental subalterns to serve in South Africa with the transport companies, setting free those of the corps for duties at home, where they are much needed. The administration of the corps is evidently faulty, otherwise such calls as are now made might have been foreseen and provided for. It is far better to spend a certain sum annually in preparation for contingencies than for the War Office to be 'found wanting' at a critical moment, for then money is recklessly spent and no really tangible good results to anybody. The supply and transport bears so important a part in warfare that, cost what it may to maintain it efficiently in peace, a sufficiency of officers should always be available so that they may be able to fall into their places when war comes. To leave companies without officers, and stations and districts without either officers or clerks, is reprehensible to a degree, and a department which allows such things to be can scarcely be defended. We object strongly to the 'we told you so' form of journalism, but in this particular detail of administration there is literally no excuse for the War Office, as the officials in Pall Mall have for years past been warned of what would happen if war suddenly came. The difficulty in the Transvaal can scarcely be said to have arisen suddenly, yet the unpreparedness of our supply and transport arrangements is beyond dispute, admirable as the system is which we owe to the organizing capacity of Sir Redvers Buller. The system, in fact, is so perfect that the existing breakdown is the less to be excused. We trust, however, that the new quartermaster-general will take steps immediately to represent in the strongest terms the seriousness of our position and obtain permission to fill with all possible despatch the full cadre of officers, so that there may be no repetition of the existing scandal."

The only force in the entire British Army at present existing, for the purpose of transportation and supply, consists of the Royal Engineers, the Departmental Corps, and the Army Service Corps. The figures of those different branches of the service, according to the latest reports, are as follows: