Lord Roberts was formerly in command of the Indian army.  He served in that country for thirty-eight years in various capacities.  He went as a youngster during the mutiny, was with the party that relieved Delhi, and saw his first fighting and got his “baptism of blood” upon the “ridge,” which was the scene of the fiercest struggle between the English rescuers and the native mutineers.  He has recently published a readable book giving an account of his experience during thirty-eight years of military service in India.

Lord Kitchener is assisted by four lieutenant generals, each having command of one of the four military divisions into which the empire is divided.  The Calcutta division is under the command of General Sir Alfred Gaseley, who led the combined international forces to the relief of the besieged legations in Peking.  There is a general staff similar to that recently organized in the United States army, which looks after the equipment, the feeding, the clothing and the transportation of the army with an enormous corps of clerks and subordinate officers.

The officers of the staff corps number 2,700, and are appointed from the line of the native army upon the merit system.  Many of them were educated at the military colleges in England; many others have seen service in the regular army of great Britain, and have sought transfer because the pay is better and promotion is more rapid in the Indian than in the British army.  However, before an officer is eligible for staff employment in India he must serve at least one year with a British regiment and one year with a native regiment, and must pass examinations in the native languages and on professional subjects.  This is an incentive to study, of which many young officers take advantage, and in the Indian army list are several pages of names of officers who have submitted to examinations and have demonstrated their ability to talk, read and write one or more of the native tongues.  The gossips say that during his voyage from London to Bombay two years ago Lord Kitchener shut himself up in his stateroom and spent his entire time refreshing his knowledge of Hindustani.

No officer is allowed a responsible command unless he can speak the native language of the district in which he is serving, and, as there are 118 different dialects spoken in india, some of the older officers have to be familiar with several of them.  Such linguistic accomplishments are to the advantage of military officers in various ways.  They are not only necessary for their transfer to staff duty, but insure more rapid promotion, greater responsibilities and render them liable at any time to be called upon for important service under the civil departments.  Several thousand officers are now occupying civil and diplomatic posts, and are even performing judicial functions in the frontier provinces.

The armies of the native states look formidable on paper, but most of them are simply for show, and are intended to gratify the vanity of the Hindu princes who love to be surrounded by guards and escorted by soldiers with banners.  Some of the uniforms of the native armies are as picturesque and artistic as those of the papal guards at the Vatican, and on occasions of ceremony they make a brave show, but with the exception of two or three of the provinces, the native forces would be of very little value in a war.