We are assured on excellent authority that we, and a
large proportion of the Press, have done an injustice to the Purchase Officers in complaining of their 2,245 petitions for inquiry. A regular Circular, we are told, was issued, either from the War Office or the Horse Guards, but at all events on the responsibility of both, calling on the officers to send in their opinions as to the working of the new arrangements. The circular was re- garded as an order of the most serious kind, and the replies were sent in without any combination, at least among
regiments, at all. If this is correct, the charge of indisci- pline must of course be withdrawn, and the only remaining annoyance is the want of confidence shown in the Government by the desire of so many officers to secure an independent tribunal. They seem to consider the War Office a hostile power, intent on getting as much out of them as it can. There is no reason for that feeling whatever. The House of Commons must rule, and must rule through a civil representative ; but the wish of the entire country is, first of all, for efficiency ; and next, for the contentment of the Army, as a skilled and reasonably-paid profession.
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