changed into a salmon, and though it might be supposed that with each succeeding day my lot would become more intolerable, such was not altogether the case. At times, indeed, I longed ardently to be restored to my natural form, to regain that position among the world of men from which I had been so strangely removed, and in these moods I found the companionship of my fellow-fish inexpressibly wearisome. For I was not always alone. Although I have not previously mentioned the fact, I had struck up an alliance with one of the salmon kind, and though, as I have said, her society was not always congenial, our friendship probably had some effect in softening the bitterness of my regrets. She was a beau-but on second thoughts it may be wiser to refrain from further confidences on this head; it is impossible to foresee whose eyes may inspect this page, and unpleasant results might follow indiscreet revelations.

Let it suffice to say that I was not entirely dissatisfied with my present condition, and seldom experienced any overwhelming desire to change it. After the free, roving life of the river I contemplated with a distinct sense of aversion a change to boots, clothes, hats, to all the various conventional items which go to make up a civilised mortal.

When the red sun topped the surrounding woods and its glancing rays shot across the turbid river, I started on my journey up stream with a light

and happy heart, exulting in my strength as, with powerful sweeps of the tail, I clove my way through the thick water. I travelled on till midday, then resting in a quiet pool till evening, continued my upward progress until the sun again appeared above the eastern horizon. I had now reached a stretch of water where the current ran deep and slow. A few hundred yards further down, I had passed under a broad stone bridge which seemed familiar, and now, springing from the river to stretch my fins after the swim, I recognised instantly the pool where I lay.

There, not a hundred yards from me, the mysterious Grey Stone reared its pointed head above the eddying current, and hard by on the sloping bank stood the old elm, but not now clad in the vivid and blooming dress of summer. Its leaves had faded and fallen; the woods on either bank, and on the hills beyond, had assumed the red and brown tints of autumn, and, if still beautiful, they were sombre, in harmony with my thoughts. For a torrent of sad recollections swept on my mind as I recognised these familiar objects. I recalled that glorious day in June, the pleasant anticipations with which at early morning I had walked up the bank, the three-pounder I had killed on a floating March brown, and the fine basket of trout I had carried away from the islands. Then came the crisis of my fate, when, in an insane endeavour to capture the salmon, I had incurred the vengeance of the Queen of the Fishes. Scarcely half a mile away stood Strathearn Lodge. Sadly I wondered if the Pattisons were still there, or if they had flown to foreign parts. For all I knew, within half a mile of the spot where I lay, dear little Alice might now be waking from sleep, fresh and lovely as any rose-bud; but on this point, it may be observed, I was

destined to be correctly informed before many hours had passed. And where, all this time, was the mortal form of Richard Brown? To what base uses might that rascal fish have put it? Surely he had long since disgraced me among my friends. Ah, how I loathed him!

These distressing thoughts did not endure for any length of time; the life that ebbed and flowed within me was too vigorous to admit of morbid sentiment. Never had I rejoiced so greatly in my grace of form, in my strength, and in those superb proportions which gained for me a certain consideration from other occupants of the river. Though still true to my love for Alice Pattison I was neither alone nor unhappy. Neither man nor fish is made to live alone, and the sympathy of my companion was very soothing.

The sun was bright on the water, and a merry breeze curled the current into tiny wavelets. The river had fined down considerably, objects were discernible at a distance of several yards, and suddenly I saw a large insect approaching in which, at a glance, I recognised an artificial fly. As in regular and life-like movement wings and hackles opened and closed overhead, I experienced the same longing to seize it as on previous occasions; but now the desire was overwhelming, irresistible. In vain I struggled against the suicidal impulse; the doom of the salmon had overtaken me, and I knew the supreme moment of my career had arrived. Slowly, reluctantly, I swam towards the fatal fly. Its varied colouring was, of course, wasted on me, but by the length of the hackles, the glint of the tinsel and its general appearance, I had no difficulty in recognising the Black Dog, that old, familiar pattern with which I had slain many a fish in other days.

A sharp and sudden pain,-a heavy pull, and the large hook was firmly planted in the corner of my mouth. I remembered the words of the Queen of the Fishes, yet must thou pass one more ordeal; surely, on my death, the image of a Black Dog will be found impressed on some part of my interior anatomy. It is not my intention to weary you with details of the struggle. You would naturally suppose that an educated salmon, such as I was, would experience little difficulty in breaking away from his captors. To one who from past experience was acquainted with every trick best calculated to baffle the rodsman, the feat, you will say, should have been easy. Your judgment is mistaken; you have not taken into account the instincts which now formed part of my nature. Completely losing my presence of mind, I offered no more resistance to the angler than might be expected from an ordinary salmon of my pounds, and in the course, I suppose, of about thirty minutes (though it seemed hours) I was completely exhausted.

Engrossed in the desperate struggle for life and liberty I had paid little attention to the relentless anglers bent on encompassing my destruction, merely noting that they were two in number and fishing from a boat. They had now landed opposite to the Grey Stone, where the bank was clear of trees, and as, yielding to the strong pressure, I neared the shore by slow degrees, my feelings may be imagined (I cannot describe them) when in the wielder of the rod I recognised the charming features and graceful figure of Alice Pattison. All power of resistance left me on seeing I was about to meet my fate at the soft hands of one I loved so well. Cruel, ungrateful Alice! You little knew whose spirit dwelt in the salmon you reeled in so skilfully, tortured so lightly!

Her companion, needless to say, was that ruffian Malcolm. With a complaisant grin he struck the gaff in my side, and a burning pain tingled in every nerve as he lifted me, motionless, well-nigh insensible, on the bank beside him.

"What a splendid fish," exclaimed the sweet voice once so familiar, “and what a poor fight he made for his size! Make haste and kill him, Malcolm; I never feel safe till they are knocked on the head." On hearing these cruel words I struggled furiously, all but escaping from Malcolm's strong hands. Wretched girl, thus to desire my murder before her very eyes! Canny noo, ma braw fellow, canny, and I'se soon sort ye." Grasping me firmly by the neck with his left hand, Malcolm raised the other aloft; it contained a short, heavy stick. I gave a sudden plunge and the blow descended harm

66

[I had just arrived at the eccentric flourish which represented Dicky's signature when the door opened, and my landlady deposited THE MORNING POST on my writing table. Opening it carelessly, my eye lighted on the interesting item of fashionable intelligence that follows:-"A marriage has been arranged, and will shortly take place, between Richard Brown, Esq., of la, Belgrave Road, S. W., and Miss Alice Pattison, youngest daughter of Mr. Alexander Pattison, of Buchanan Street, Glasgow, and cousin to the late Hon. Mrs. McTaggart, of Drumtochter House,. Inverness-shire."]

ONCE again the state of the Army is before the country, and we are confronted with the familiar spectacle of a House of Commons afraid to trust the military departments, and of military departments afraid to trust the House of Commons. Both parties are fully justified in their attitude, and as this position lies at the root of our military difficulties, it is worth while to glance very swiftly at the causes which produced it.

The miltary service (in the modern sense) of England, as of every other European country, was born, bred, and nurtured in corruption. It was modelled on the bands of military adventurers who made war a matter of profit and loss, and offered shares in the business to any who would buy. Like all other traders these companies possessed their own standard of commercial morality, which was peculiar and not always to the taste of the peaceful citizen. Nevertheless the citizen hired them, drove hard bargains with them, and cheated them whenever he could; whereupon the company indemnified itself by treachery, lawlessness, and plunder. As the simplest means of acquiring property is to take it by force, these companies attracted the worst specimens of humanity; and so began the ill-fame of the soldier.

Gradually the nations came to the conclusion that it would be better for them to take the business, so to speak, into their own hands, to form their own fighting companies, and to pay them themselves. They did so, but they still treated officers as shareholders by the sale of commissions,

still cheated both officers and men as far as they could, and when they found that the service was unpopular secured recruits by emptying the gaols and sending round the pressgang. This was the case in the days of Queen Elizabeth, when a company in Ireland could be bought for fifty pounds. Thus the bad name of the soldier became worse than before.

Then in England there rose a man, Oliver Cromwell, who changed the whole character of the soldier. He made him the best instead of the worst behaved of men, the cream of the population instead of the scum. He conquered the Crown for the Parliament; but the Parliament, still full of its old ideas of the soldier, followed the old traditions and tried to cheat him and his men out of their due. The Army, after showing infinite patience, swept the obnoxious House of Commons away and instituted military government. Cromwell died; his government perished with him, and Parliament resolved that it should return no more.

With immense difficulty Charles the Second saved a small remnant from the wreck of the New Model, but the House refused to recognise it or to grant powers to keep it in discipline. The grand traditions of Cromwell passed away, and in a few years it was again a reproach to be a soldier; which was exactly what the Parliament desired. James the Second, to whom we owe the efficiency of the Admiralty and of the old office of Ordnance, increased the Army, and paid for the act with his throne. The country would have disbanded every

regiment, but for the war with France that followed the Revolution. As things were, the Army was increased and taken over to Flanders, where though generally defeated it was never disgraced, and though neglected and unpaid finished the war with success. It came home clamouring for wages justly due. Parliament disbanded almost the whole of it, thereby driving William nearly to abdication, and showed such dilatoriness in discharging the arrears of pay, that but for the renewal of the war, matters could hardly have ended otherwise than in a great military riot.

The consequence was that even Marlborough, who took the greatest care of his men, could hardly raise recruits for his glorious campaigns. Before the war ended it was found necessary in addition to endless other shifts to introduce short service, and to enlist men for three years. As the war was not concluded at the close of those three years, the country broke faith with the men and declined to let them go at the expiration of their term. Then came the dismissal of Marlborough, an eternal reproach to England, and the disgraceful Treaty of Utrecht, which drove the men nearly mad and caused scores of officers to quit the service in disgust. After that followed the usual wholesale disbandment.

From that time to our own the story has remained the same. Every war meant a frantic rush to make an

Army; every peace a no less frantic rush to disband it. It was under such conditions that the Army fought the battles which gained for us our Empire, with a strength so inadequate that its achievements are still the marvel of foreign nations. Inwardly and outwardly it varied little from the accession of Queen Anne to the accession of Queen Victoria; from 1700 to 1800 it

hardly varied at all. The military authorities, in view of the eternal jealousy of the House of Commons, followed the example of King William the Third and fell back on three principal resources: first, to keep skeleton regiments, or in other words an army of officers; secondly, to raise Marines rather than soldiers; and thirdly, on all critical occasions to hire German mercenaries, who were rather cheaper than native recruits.

So things went on in much the same groove for two centuries. One great and silent change was accomplished almost imperceptibly, and one only. In early days, which lasted beyond the Civil War, garrisons, or to use the official phrase, guards and garrisons, had been reckoned on a distinct establishment from that of the Army proper; they undertook the duties of coast-defence and left the Army free for work in the field. So also the Colonies were guarded for the most part by independent companies, in the few cases where Imperial troops were employed at all, though the American and West Indian plantations relied chiefly on their own Militia. From the beginning of last century these guards and garrisons gradually disappeared, their duties being taken over by the regular troops, and the Colonies absorbed more and more of the regiments of the Line.

At last, after the Indian Mutiny, came a new and extraordinary burden for the Army. The British Government, apparently without the slightest consciousness of what it was doing, took over the whole responsibility of supplying the garrison of India, a far stronger garrison too than had hitherto been thought necessary. Finally in 1870 came the notorious reforms of the Army. Every one knows what they were. They began with the abolition of purchase and the intro