Page:Viscount Hardinge and the Advance of the British Dominions into the Punjab.djvu/43

Rh to have had a Commissariat or a Medical Department. The steady successes at the end of the war show that, under proper direction, the country can and ought to rely on its national troops, and that the army can never be effective unless its military establishments are kept in efficiency in time of peace, of which the most important are under the direction of the Ordnance Department.' He then concludes by saying that 'the most important question to be thoroughly looked into is the question of coast-defence — how the batteries should be armed, where placed, and how the additional expense should be met, especially as regards Ireland, where, from the temper of the people, a proper amount of force should be always distributed.'

The principles thus advocated in 1826 have not lost their importance at the present day. Royal Commissions and Departmental Committees without number have enquired year after year into all these questions; but nothing has been practically done until recently, when estimates have been passed providing for our coast-defences at home and abroad. Guns, however, like ships, are ever changing as to type. Augmentations in numbers are sanctioned only to be cut down again in a succeeding session, and with the view of squaring a popular budget, while departments are remodelled for the purpose of centralizing or dispersing the responsibility of the different heads. He would be a bold man, whether statesman or soldier, who would maintain that everything has even now been finally settled on a secure basis.