Page:Letters from the Battle-fields of Paraguay (1870).djvu/497



AGAIN TO THE ALLIED FRONT. 467

from head to foot, without any sign of his rank, or even of his profession. Dr. Newkirk declared that he had never seen him look so well ; I thought his appearance almost corpse-like. He is evidently suffering from liver complaint, and at times sudden faintness compels him to dismount from his charger. His enemies declare that his ill-health began with a fall upon parade, when he struck with his sword at an officer. They also injuriously call him General da Corte — but what else was the gallant Lord Raglan ? Moreover, the Generalissimo is only acting temporarily, like a certain " Jemmy Simpson" who was sent to uphold in the Crimea the honour of the British arms, when nearly a decade before he was pronounced superannuated in Sind. The Marshal spoke freely of the war. He numbers his men at 20,000, forming the two corps d'armee, commanded by Generals Machado Bittancourt and the highly-distinguished Menna Barreito ; and he would fain have a third of 10,000 more. The vanguard consisted of 4000 men, under the Brigadier Vasco Alves, who held the Juquery bridge. He was very severe upon the climate of Paraguay, with its immense variety of " immundicies,"'^ but he expected that the approach- ing winter would do him good.

From the Quartel General we walked about the camp, which is kept in far better order than the city; and we inspected the men, who seemed, like mulatto children, to grow darker every month. Except here and there an officer or a bandsman, all appeared to be deeply tarred. Again we found the unpleasant spectacle of begging soldiers, even amongst the highly-paid volunteers. Mr, Williams was assured by a liberated African whom he had seen at Bahia that the men had been in arrears for nine months. The officers could not wholly deny the fact, but they justify the non-payment for three to four months, as proposed by the Duke de Caxias, on the grounds that the soldiers have all

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