LORD WOLSELEY.

Waikato Times, Volume XXXIX, Issue 3124, 23 July 1892, Page 2 (Supplement)

LORD WOLSELEY.

LoiiD Wolsblev was " interviewed " lately, and the following are some scraps of what he told his visitor :—

There is only one way for a to get on in the army. He must try and get killed in every way he possibly can. He must be absolutely indifferent to life. If he does not succeed in getting killed he is bound to get on—that is, always assuming he has the intelligence and the instincts of a soldier.

I can scarcely tell how I felt on going into my first action. It is a sensation hard to describe. You look forward with eagerness to see what a battle is like, I know I was lording to get shot at. . . Nerve—nerve is the great thing needed. The wise men who haven't got it give it up, the fools stay on and conic to grief. \'our soldier may have courage and enthusiasm, but nerve beats everything. Lord Wolaeley entered his first engagement under very inauspicious circumstances. Uβ was at Rangoon when the news cpme of the rout of a British company, and was sent up the river with n force under the command of Sir John Cheape to puuish the enemy. At last we worked our way up to the final position one afternoon, halted, and began making arrangements for attacking the next morning. At daybreak, when the fog cleared, I was told off with four men to a certain point to skirmish. I had never been drilled ! My four men, or rather boys, had never been drilled, or even fired off a musket. His four men were lulled, and Wolaeley only escaped by the skin of his teeth. In the trenches before Sebastopol he was twice severely wounded, and this is how he lost the sight of his right eye, and received a scar on his left cheek, he will carry to his grave : —It was a glorious night, the moon was shining, and by its light I was sketching a plan of the place to pass on to the officer who was to relieve me. I paused for one moment to look at a certain battery, expecting them to open fire. Suddenly I paw a flash. A round shot fell amongst us, and struck the gabion which was filled with stones, scattering them witli terrific force amongst ua. Both the poor fellows by my side were killed. I fell to the ground, I was lifted up by two men and carried into the camp. My left cheek was lying on my jacket—l thought my jawbone wa.s broken. I was hit all over the face, riddled with the stones and Hint. They got me to the doctor's hut—through which a stream of wounded were passing all niiiht—aye, we were losing a battalion a day then. They wanted to patch mo up, but I wonldn't lei them. I whispered that I had something in my check. They said it was my jawbone. But it was not. For the very next morning a sergeant g-avo me, wrapped in a newspaper, a piece of flint two and a half inches long, which they had pulled out of my check with a pair of dentist's forceps. The monotony of that terrible winter in the Crimea was not without its touches of humour, and Lord Wolseley tells an amusing story of a plum-pudding : — It was Christmas— Christmas in the Crimea. What more natural than—3. plum-pudding , ! A brother officer ar.d myself determined to make one. We had no bread, no flour, only biscuit, which we powdered up in a hollowed-out .shell, with a shot for a pestle. No plums either. But we chopped up swme figs, and manured to get a eonplo pounds of bad suet from Balaclava. We had some doubts in our mind aa to whether it ought to bo roasted or boiled, but finally decided on the latter, and wrapped our mixture up in a towel. Now, in the ordinary course of events it was not our turn for the trenches, but. the pudding had scarcely been boiling , an hour when an officer came in and ordered ns out. What was to be done? Eat the Christmas concoction now or tomorrow ? Decision—now. And, unmindful of the fact that Christmas puddings take a srreat fleal longer than hiilf an hour to boil, I confess to eating liberally. Away I wont to the trenches. About 12 o'clock I thought I was going to expire. It wa.s the only night I ever had to leave the trenches.

It was to Lord Wolseley that. Cetewnyn, the last king of the Zulus, surrendered himself after his betrayal by Mm Prime Minister, and tlio following amusing anecdote is related of Cetewayo and his wives :— When I took liim he was accompanied by several hundred wives. I give him three out of these, and shipped him away in a man-of-war to an inland in Table Hay. He was continually asking for mora wives—a request I never granted. But at last when he heard I was returning to Englsnd, b ls sent mo a message to the effect, that if I wouldn't give hira any more would I exchango the three he had for three others ! Lord Wolseley thinks Gordon " ouo of the two great heroes I have met in my life." It was from Wolsoley's house that Gordon staitod for tho Soudan, and tho following is Lord Wol-eley's of how Gordou started for Khartoum : — His departure for tho Soudan took place late in tho afternoon. There he stood in a tall silk hat and frock coat. I I offered to lend him auything wanted. " Don't want anything." he said. " But you've got no clothes ! " " I'll go as I am ! " he said ; and ho moant it. Ho nevor had any money ; ho always gave it away. I know once ho had some £7000. It all went in the establishment of a ragged school for boys. I asked him if ho had any cash. " No," was the calm reply. " When I left Brussels I had to borrow £25 from the king to pay my hotel bill with." 41 Very well," I said, 44 I will try and get you some, and meet you at tho railway station with it." I went round to the various clubs and got £300 in gold. I gave the money to Colonel Stewart, who went with him ; Gordon wasn't to be trusted with it. A week or so passed by, when I had a lotter from Stewart. He said : " You remember tho £300 you gave mo ? When we arrived at Port Said a groat crowd came out to cboer Gordon. Amongst them was an old sheikh, to whom Gordon was much attached, but who had become poor and blind. Gordon got tho money, and gave the whole of it to him."