LORD CARDIGAN'S LAST.
IT is not easy to understand how the Duke of Wellington or any other strict disciplinarian can uphold Lord Cardigan. We have no desire to bear hard upon one whose mishaps so evidently and so directly arise film personal foibles. The public knows little of the man's history,—only enough to suggest a doubt whether circumstances may not have exaggerated those foibles in a man- ner to disarm censure. And much that is now 80 severely con- demned might have passed without blame, or even have won additional fame, in rougher and more generous times. The pale scholar was fain to lead the life of a hypocrite or of a slave in the middle ages ; a Rodamonte must live like-a baited bear in these tame times. But the qualities which might have shaped a rival of the Black Prince or Gaston de Foix make Lord Cardigan an officer of a kind to scandalize a true disciplinarian. Pre- suming officers in the British army to have the spirit of men and the honourable susceptibility of gentlemen, it may be said that Lord Cardigan renders discipline impossible. The military scandals which he has occasioned are so many as to prove some habitual vice in his official deportment. There are now four or five great occasions on which he has been found by the public in open collision with his officers : haughty, not to say: insolent, in demeanour, he has been exposed in flagrant acts of injustice ; in at least four of those cases he has been convicted by public opi- nion of misconduct towards his officers which no gentleman could tolerate; and therefore we say that he has pushed his authority to such lengths as to render discipline an impossibility. That us the worst breach of Jaw which incapacitates others from observ- ing the law. Lord Cardigan has forced his officers to mutiny. There must be some serious flaw in the theory and practice of the Horse Guards, which induces that department to uphold such a commander in the name of discipline.
The error which made him encroach upon the privileges of Parliament is still more flagrant, and pregnant with mischief. Any collision with the House of Commons should be avoided by the Horse Guards : that stunted building is an exceedingly "
glass" house. The millions in the Army Estimates, the sys- tem of purchase which favours the aristocracy, the financial abuses of " crack " regiments, and the growing disposition to turn a reforming criticism upon military affairs, should suggest the policy of good behaviour. Captain Gerard Noel has com- plained of systematic persecution, one act of which was to punish him for not reporting himself on duty with his regiment during the Easter recess. That recess is not a prorogation, but a simple adjournment ; during it, the Member is still on duty, and is pro- tected by the duty against the claims of subordinate duties. In other cases, a well-defined rule protects the Member against hinder- ance and molestation, not only during the session, but also during a number of days more than needful for going to and returning from Parliament : if military regulations do not provide a similar im- munity for Members who may happen to bear a commission, they should be amended. If duties are incompatible, the minor must give way—the military- must cede to the legislative. This might easily be provided ; and the Horse Guards should look to it forth- with, not only for the sake of protecting the Gerard Noels, but also to protect the Cardigans from temptations to error, and still more to protect the Army from the mischief of discipline broken by the fault of commanding officers.
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