Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol 7.djvu/92

 48 THE WINTER TROUBLES. CHAP, they must never go beyond the pink book ; and ' from this curious superstition it resulted that, thir^*"*^ for the purpose of ministering to an army in Europe, the Power which, since the peace of 1815, had waged greater wars than any other, was condemned to take the field as a novice. Our troops Departments charged to nurture a soldiery tended upon ^ '^ the'resi- tliiulv scattcrcd ovcr all quarters of the globe, 'mental' -^ ^ . ° ' system. could hardly, of course, take large units as the objects of their administrative care ; and it was not on any collected army, or any collected divisions, or any collected brigades, but simply on each one of our regiments, regarded as a separate entity, that the State bestowed its care. In peace-time, this plan sufficed ; but it was evident that, if a number of the regiments thus separately tended should be collected into an army, and charged with the tasks of war, the dispersive method of administration would be likely to find itself baffled ; because troops brought together for service in the field require not only care vastly greater than that which would suffice them whilst scattered, but care differing also in kind ; and besides, are so cir- cumstanced that they cannot be advantageously reached — perhaps cannot be reached at all — by any mere clubbing together of the several administrative lal)Ouvs which, before concentra- tion began, had well enough answered the purpose. Under such conditions, no mere in- crease of the old habitual toil performed by the Westminster offices was calculated to meet the new exigency. Accustomed to disperse