23 NOVEMBER 1901, Page 14

A GENERAL'S IMPEDIMENTA.

[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."] Sut,—People laugh at the generals who carry about with them while they pursue the nimble Boer a cooking-range and a piano. But these luxurious soldiers may plead an illustrious precedent. Did not Julius Caesar take with him on his campaigns a tessellated pavement in bits (tessellata parintenta sectilia) Suetonius, it is true, mentions it as a piece of common gossip. Still, it is not likely that it was. invented. Doubtless Caesar left it behind on occasion, as, for instance, when he marched from Besancon to within twenty miles of Colmar, making a detour of fifty miles to avoid the

hills, in seven days.—I am, Sir, &c., A. C.