Page:Viscount Hardinge and the Advance of the British Dominions into the Punjab.djvu/186

182 Lord Hardinge's services at the Ordnance were not destined to be of long duration. Later in the same year (1852), on the death of the Duke of Wellington, he was selected to succeed his old chief in the command of the army. The nomination was conveyed to him in the most flattering manner by Lord Derby. The office was one most congenial to his spirit, but he felt that he had no easy task in following so pre-eminent a man. Lord Raglan succeeded him at the Ordnance, remaining in that office until he took command of the army in the Crimea.

One of Lord Hardinge's first acts as Commander-in-Chief was to form a temporary camp of exercise at Chobham (July, 1853), under the command of Lord Seaton. The success of this experiment encouraged him to press on the Government the purchase of land at Aldershot for a permanent camp. Looking to the fact that nearly every nation on the Continent had established such camps of exercise, he felt that the days of simple barrack-yard drill were numbered, and that every means should be taken to render the army more efficient in field manœuvres. With this view, and considering the enclosed character of the country generally, it was necessary to secure a large tract of land for tactical purposes. He proposed in the first instance that about 9000 acres should be purchased. Lord Palmerston, then at the Home Office, entirely approved, and wrote that he would urge Lord Aberdeen and Sidney Herbert to support the proposal. The land was purchased; and we have since been