Page:McCosh, John - Advice to Officers in India (1856).djvu/134

 be found, and such works constructed, what might not be done in a quiet cantonment in India. There is abundance of waste land in the neighbourhood of every European cantonment. The only expense would be the wells and the tools.

7. NATIVE REGIMENT.—After doing duty with an European regiment for a few months the Assistant-surgeon may expect to be posted to the medical charge of a native regiment at some out station. This is a desirable change for a young officer, and he may now,for the first time after his arrival, consider himself settled; he will become a member of the regimental community, an adopted son in a large family, and consider the commanding officer as his father, and each other officer as his brother; and lucky will he be if he finds all things going on harmoniously. But he may find all things the very reverse;he may find many of the officers at variance with one another, a civil war raging in the cantonment, and find it no easy matter to preserve his neutrality. But this he must do if possible, and it is possible, by great discretion, listening to all but repeating nothing. Everything should be confidential where all sides tell their complaints; as confidential as the professional complaints of his patients, should be sacred.

A regiment of Native Infantry consists of 1,000 men, partly Hindoos, partly Mussumien,