short-sighted methods were more or less common to the age, and were not confined to the army.
The "Articles of War," based on the "Mutiny Act," constituted the law which then governed the soldier. The Articles contained a list of all military offences, with their punishments, and were read out to the men once a month after "muster parade." Originally—they dated back a long time—they were of excessive severity, inflicting death or loss of limb for almost every crime. They were not much more lenient in my early days from what I can remember of them, the termination of most of them being to the effect that "any soldier committing this offence shall, on conviction by court-martial, be liable to suffer death or such less punishment as may be awarded." In 1879 the Articles of War and the Mutiny Act were consolidated in the "Army Discipline and Regulations Act." This was repealed in 1881 and re-enacted with some amendments in the present Army Act, which is brought into operation annually by another Act of Parliament.
"Muster parade," I may explain, was held on the last day of each month, and was the only parade at which every officer and man had to be present. The paymaster was the important person, as he had to satisfy himself that every one for whom he had issued pay was actually serving in the regiment. It appears to have been a relic of the days when commanding officers received a lump sum of money for a given number of men, and could not be trusted to have that number in the regiment.
A man sentenced to undergo imprisonment, even if for some such short period as forty-eight hours, had his hair closely cropped off, and was thus made to look like a convict for several weeks after his discharge. "Confinement to barracks" included "punishment drill" for four separate hours each day except Sunday, and this again seemed to have been designed to destroy any shred of self-respect the unfortunate defaulter might possess. The "drill" consisted in being turned and twisted about on the barrack square, in quick time and with only a few short pauses during the hour, the men carrying their full kit, strapped on their shoulders, besides the lance and sword—a total weight
