17 MARCH 1900, Page 2

In regard to the Volunteers, Mr. Wyndham stated (1) that

the Government were sending officers to Switzerland to examine the Swiss rifle ranges ; (2) that they intended to help Lord Wemyss's scheme for a Volunteer Reserve by granting free ammunition; (3) that they would encourage every Volunteer regiment to form a company of mounted infantry, but mounted on bicycles and not on horses, for which purpose there would be a capitation grant of 22 ; (4) that there would be a graduated series of capitation grants for shoot. ing; (5) that the Volunteers would have transport on the same scale as the Militia ; (6) that the Volunteer batteries would be rearmed with modern artillery. The cycle proposals will, we trust, be given a good trial. We should like to see the following experiment tried. Let four thousand London and district Volunteer cyclists be told after assembling locally at, say, four in the morning to ride to some place on the South Downs and take up a defensive position, and see how lung the operation would take. We should then like to see an equal force of Regulars start from London barracks at the same hour, assemble at the railway termini, and, going by train, occupy the same position,—the position to be six miles from a railway station.