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176 without giving up one of the little white-faced men in red. It is in the number of officers and regiments, and in a prudent reduction of the weakest or least efficient portion of our Native Army, that a safe diminution of cost can be obtained; and this I am prepared to recommend regardless of frowns or forebodings.' And again he wrote (December 11, 1870): 'I have this year, without any suggestion from any quarter, pressed upon her Majesty's Government the necessity that exists for immediately arming every European soldier and volunteer in India with a Snider rifle. I have ever since the beginning of 1869 pointed out the defective state of our artillery force, and recommended the immediate adoption of rifled guns. I never, therefore, let economic considerations interfere in cases of necessity. I have never suggested a reduction which is, in my opinion, calculated to diminish our military strength. But I do desire to reduce military expenditure by a very large amount. I firmly believe that there are forces in India which we should do better without, and that it is better to keep only those Native regiments in arms that would be useful in war. I think it is not desirable to keep a large number of batteries of artillery in an undermanned state, and I believe that if we have a really sufficient number of guns, fully manned and equipped, in ample proportions to a force of 60,000 to 70,000 men which can be put into the field at a moment's notice, we have a force more than sufficient to overwhelm anything that can be brought against us without very long