Page:Viscount Hardinge and the Advance of the British Dominions into the Punjab.djvu/195

Rh with too low an establishment, and the strain upon the different departments proved that they were unequal to the emergency.

One of the immediate results of the Sebastopol Committee was the abolition of the Board of Ordnance as an independent department, and the transfer of all its duties and powers to the War Office, under the Secretary of State. This was effected by Letters Patent dated May 25th, 1855, confirmed by Act of Parliament (18 and 19 Vict., cap. 117). As a former Master-General, Lord Hardinge could hardly be expected to look upon this reform with unmixed feelings. He always maintained that the consolidated departments would be too cumbrous for efficiency, and that the change would never have been made if it had not been for the shortcomings in the Crimea — shortcomings which could be traced to other causes. But with characteristic loyalty, he did everything in his power as Commander-in-Chief to make the new system work well. His relations with Lord Panmure (who had succeeded the Duke of Newcastle as War Minister in February, 1855) were always cordial. Only on one occasion did any difference arise between them; and this was on a question connected with rifles, as to which Lord Panmure imagined that Lord Hardinge had exceeded his powers. A friendly correspondence ensued, and Lord Panmure ultimately admitted that he was quite mistaken.

In the previous year (1854), Lord Grey had raised an important debate in the House of Lords upon the