Insubordination appears to be very rife in the British Army
in India. In 1869 there were 293 convictions in Bengal alone, and 214 in the first eight months of the present year. Most of these cases have been accompanied with violence, and in the last one, an attempt by a private to murder his serjeant on parade, Lord Napier has censured the court-martial for not inflicting death. The account does not necessarily prove that the Army is in a bad state, fits of restlessness of this kind having been noticed before — Lord Gough, for instance, had to shoot men for throwing caps at their officers —but the War Office will do well to hint to commanding officers to look a little more strictly after the serjeants. They are invaluable men, but in India, what with heat, and ennui, and want of care on the part of their superiors, they are apt to " worrit " their men nn- endurably. They neglect, too, the useful rule of the service that a drunken man should always be arrested by privates. If he punches their heads a week's confinement meets the necessities of discipline, whereas a blow to a serjeant by law deserves death.
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