The History of Lumsden's Horse. Various
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dear Playfair—I have felt ever since leaving Calcutta that I never half thanked you for what you did for Lumsden’s Horse, and no one knows so well as myself, or appreciates more to the full, the work you did on its behalf. Now, when I have time to think calmly over the events of the past two months, I can see plainly that the successful issue things were brought to, financially and otherwise, was entirely due to your energy and guidance; and this without in the slightest degree depreciating the valuable services of your fellow-workers on the committee, as I feel confident one and all of them would coincide heartily with my sentiments. …
Yours always,
D.M. Lumsden.
CHAPTER III
OUTWARD BOUND
Life on board a troopship does not offer much material for graphic description, and none but a Kipling could give to its ordinary incidents an absorbing interest for general readers. Nevertheless, it has charms for those who look at it with eyes fresh to such scenes, and for Lumsden’s Horse, at any rate, there was a novelty in the situation not wholly unpleasant in spite of the many discomforts they had to endure and the distasteful duties necessarily imposed upon them. They were learning there a harder lesson than any of which their experiences in camp on the Maidan could have given the slightest conception. It is one thing to go a long voyage on board a liner as first-, second-, or even third-class passenger, but quite another to be penned up between decks in a crowded transport with native servants and Lascars, eating coarse Government rations served in the roughest fashion, doing the work of grooms and lackeys, and sleeping on bare planks in an atmosphere odorous with exhalations from stables and galleys. They had enlisted for a soldier’s life, however, prepared to take the rough with the smooth, and, being in for it, they made the best of their circumstances after the first rude shock of feeling what military service really means had worn off. Discipline may become a property of easiness anywhere else, but on board ship the line that separates rank from rank must be sharply drawn even in the case of a Volunteer company. Comradeship and interchange of friendly greetings between officers and men may still go on as of old; but they cannot make a trooper forget for a moment that certain privileges follow rank, and disabilities cling to those who have it not, while these facts are thrust upon him insistently at every turn and dinned into his ears by every bugle call to duty or to meals. It is well that we also should remember these things in estimating the sacrifices that Volunteers make when they give up the comforts, if not luxuries, of home life and go forth to fight for country and for empire as private soldiers. The privations, the rough fare, the hard marches in all weather, exposure to rapid alternations of heat and cold, fierce sunshine where there is no shelter by day, and pitiless rain from which there is no escape at night, hunger, wounds, and sickness—all these may be cheerfully borne because they are the lot of all ranks alike. Not so, however, with the petty humiliations and drudgery inseparable from many duties on board a transport, where the mere trooper finds that a soldier’s uniform is a badge of distinction truly, but the distinction at times brings with it something closely akin to a sense of humiliation. The company or regimental officers may do all they can to take the keen point off this goading sentiment, but it will wound where there is the least protection against it and rankle too. One must say to the credit of Lumsden’s Horse that they did not allow such considerations to trouble. There is no trace of discontent in their published contributions to Indian papers, of which some extracts from the ‘Englishman’ may be made by way of giving a picture of the voyage as troopers looked at it. We left the ‘Lindula’ steaming down the Hugli apparently well on her way towards South Africa. Though lost to the view of interested crowds who looked for her soon after dawn on the morning of February 27, she did not pursue an uninterrupted course. At this point a trooper of A Company takes up the story in a lively narrative, writing thus:
The absurd antics which the river Hugli thinks it necessary to go through ere flowing to rest in the bosom of its old mammy Ocean compel mariners to sail on it by day alone, and then to go as cannily as a cat on hot bricks. On Tuesday morning we dashed off letters and telegrams, and with a sigh of relief despatched them by the post boat, thinking we were fairly off for Afric’s sandy shores. But no! We had not reckoned with the lead line, which recorded much the same number of feet and inches that the good ship ‘Lindula’ drew, so with a Heave! Ho! Holly! the anchor fell overboard, and then we were stuck for a whole day.
Fancy getting up at 4.30 in the pitch dark! And no chance of shirking either, for the decks are swabbed down and clean as a child’s plate after a penny dinner by 5 A.M. of the clock. Five-thirty heralds a cup of tea, and 6 o’clock sets every nag aboard neighing and whinnying, for do they not know it to be feeding time, better even than the Sergeant-Major, who marches about with a little stick marking time? Then stables—a pleasant job for the deaf and dumb, but trying to a man who wishes to retain the lily-white unstained purity of his mind. Nine o’clock is the signal for the bugler to tootle ‘Mary! come to the cook-house door,’ and before he gets to the ‘y’ in Mary, A Company is tumbling head over heels down the fore companion.
Spinning down the river with the banks gradually receding from sight raises everybody’s spirits, and a merry lot we are when from the Sandheads comes a telegram announcing the capitulation of Cronjé—news greeted by loud and continuous cheers. A little way more and the pilot brig heaves in sight, and soon we lie to in her neighbourhood, listening to round after round of hoarse cheering from the white-hatted figures aboard. Our pilot drops over the side, accompanied by a great sheaf of our last messages to friends, and we get up steam, waving good-bye to India, and begin our voyage, never a man of us for whom the future does not loom big with adventurous hopes; never a man of us reckoning of the toil or peril. Young British blood, hot and eager, keen to flow more swiftly, keen to taste of the life that has given the world so many great names, so many great deeds. India, au revoir!
The gentle reader must not imagine that we have nothing to do. Breakfast finished at 10 o’clock, the bugles wax busy, and call after call resounds through the ship, summoning sections to various tasks. One of the earliest parades of the voyage was that to practise the fire alarm and ‘boats.’ Every man has his appointed place, and lest any should hurry unduly for the boats, sentries have been told off to guard these, having their rifles loaded with ball cartridges, and orders to shoot the first man who may attempt a rush. This extremely important matter has been thoroughly impressed on our minds by practice, and should the alarm be given in stern reality we all know where to make for.
Needless to say, rifle exercise is one of the chief things to which we must pay attention, and morning and afternoon the words of command ring through the ship as squad after squad is put through its facings. Fatigues are innumerable. Bringing forage and stores on deck is a daily task; oiling and packing away saddlery; cleaning spare arms; painting side arms; marking equipment and a dozen other things. Then a signalling class is terribly busy, and a row of otherwise intelligent-looking lads wave their arms wildly to the accompaniment of strange sounds bellowed by the signalling instructor.
When the rifle exercises have sunk into the minds of men, they are allowed to practise shooting. Every day, at 12 and 2, parties assemble on the quarter-deck and shoot at wine cases, biscuit boxes, bits of paper, anything that affords a mark. In spite of the rolling and pitching of the ship, and, what is worse, the vibration caused by the screw, wonderful practice is made. A bit of paper a few inches square is hit several times at 200 yards, and as the larger obstacles recede they are repeatedly struck. Men firing have to judge their own distances, and the practice on the whole has been marvellously good. The Maxim gun has had a turn, too, and a very terrible weapon it is. In spite of the extreme disadvantage under which it labours when placed on a moving platform, excellent shooting has been made with it. An ordinary beer barrel at 800 and 1,000 yards was douched with spray, and then struck after three or four shots had been fired. The noise is atrocious, but it is grand to see the bullets striking the water, one! two! three! four! ever nearing the mark, and then, five! Plump in.
Though we have lots of work to do we don’t forget to play, and many are the tasks indulged in. One of the favourite amusements is boxing, and morning and evening a ring is formed wherein all may enter for a round or two. A few