More miserable still was the appearance of the camels. Several native boats were unloading them at a distance of two or three hundred yards from shore. The water was not more than three or four feet deep; but when the poor beasts were turned into it most of them lay down, with only their heads above water, and positively refused to make an effort to walk to land. Some never were able to make the effort, and their bodies drifted here and there in the smooth water. Some of the camels had got within fifty yards of shore, and then had lain down, looking, with their short bodies and long necks, like gigantic water-fowl. Those who had been driven ashore were in little better plight. Their bones seemed on the very point of starting through their skin, and they lay as if dead upon the sand, uttering feebly the almost human moaning and complainings peculiar to the camel. Others had recovered a little. These were endeavouring to browse the scanty leaves on the bushes around. Some of these camels have been twenty days on the voyage, and during this time have been crowded together like sheep in a pen, with next to nothing either to eat or drink during the whole time. The wonder is that any of them survived it. Government suffers no loss by the death of these unfortunates, as a contractor agreed to deliver them here in a fair condition, and only those who survive the voyage, and recover something of their former strength, are accepted and paid for. At least, this is one version of the story. The other is, that they are consigned to the Land Transport Corps. That body, however, receive no intimation of their coming, and boatload after boatload of camels arrive, and wander away from the beach to die for want of the water within their reach. At a mile from the landing-place the scene is painful in the extreme. Camels and mules wander about in hundreds without masters, without anything. Here they strive for a few days existence by plucking scanty shoots; here they sicken and die. The scenes were frightful everywhere, but were worst of all at the watering-troughs. These were miserably-contrived things. Only ten or a dozen animals could approach at once; they were so unevenly placed, that when one end was full to overflowing there was not an inch of water at the other; and beside this, at a time when water was worth its weight in gold, they leaked badly. They were only supplied with water for an hour or so in the morning, and for a similar time in the evening; and in consequence the scene was painful in the extreme. There was a guard to preserve order, but order could not have been kept by ten times as many men. There were hundreds of transport animals, with one driver to each five or six of them. What could one driver do with six half-mad animals? They struggled, they bit, they kicked, they fought like wild-beasts for a drink of the precious water for which they were dying. Besides these led animals were numerous stragglers, which, having broken their head-ropes, had gone out into the plain to seek a living on their own account. For these there was no water; they had no requisition pinned to their ears, and as they failed thus scandalously to comply with the regulations laid down by the authorities, the authorities determined that they should have no water. They were beaten off. Most of them, after a repulse or two, went away with drooping heads to die; but some fought for their dear lives, cleared a way to the trough with heels and teeth, and drank despite the blows which were showered upon them. I inquired of the Land Transport Corps why these scattered mules are not collected and fed. I am told that nearly the whole of these mule- and camel-drivers have deserted and gone to Massowah. And so it is. The mules and camels are dying of thirst and neglect; the advanced brigade cannot be supplied with food; the harbour is becoming full of transports, because there are no means of taking the men inland, although there are plenty of animals; and all this because the land transport men desert. The officers of that corps work like slaves; they are up early and late, they saddle mules with their own hands, and yet everything goes wrong. Why is all this? One reason undoubtedly is, that the animals have been sent on before the men. A few officers and a comparatively small body of native followers are sent out, and to them arrive thousands of bullocks, thousands of mules, thousands of camels. The Arab followers, appalled by the amount of work accumulating upon them, desert to a man, the officers are left helpless. Had a fair number of officers and followers been sent on to receive the animals as they came, all might have gone well. It was simply a miscalculation. And so it is, I regret to say, in some other departments. You apply for a tent, and are told there are no bell-tents whatever arrived. You ask for a pack-saddle, and are told by the quartermaster-general that there is not a single pack-saddle in hand, and that hundreds of mules are standing idle for want of them. You ask for rations, and are informed that only native rations have yet arrived, and that no rations for Europeans have been sent, with the exception of the sixty days provisions the 33d regiment have brought with them. Why is this? There are scores of transports lying in Bombay harbour doing nothing. Why, in the name of common sense, are they not sent on? The nation is paying a very fair sum for them, and there they lie, while the departments are pottering with their petty jealousies and their petty squabbles.
The fact is, we want a head here. Colonels Merewether and Phayre have gone five days march away, taking with them all the available transport. Brigadier-General Collings only arrived yesterday, and of course has not as yet been able to set things in order. I am happy to say that General Staveley arrived last night, and I believe that he will soon bring some order into this chaos. The fact is, that in our army we leave the most important branch of the service to shift for itself. Unless the Land Transport Train is able to perform its duty, nothing can possibly go right; but the Land Transport Corps has no authority and no power. It is nobodys child. The commissariat owns it not, the quartermaster and adjutant-general know nothing whatever of it. It may shift for itself. All the lâches of all the departments are thrown upon its shoulders, and the captains who are doing the work may slave night and day; but unaided and unassisted they can do nothing. The land transport should be a mere subordinate branch of the commissariat; that department should be bound to supply food at any required point. Now, all they have to do is to join the other departments in drawing indents for conveyance upon the unhappy land transport, and then sitting down and thanking their gods that they have done everything which could be expected of them. General Staveley is an energetic officer, and will, I believe, lose no time in putting things straight. Even to-day things look more hopeful, for General Collings yesterday afternoon put the services of 200 Madras dhoolie-bearers at the disposition of the Transport Corps to supply the place of the mule- and camel-drivers who have deserted. I have therefore every hope that in another week I shall have a very different story to tell. In addition, however, to the mortality caused by the voyage, by hardships, and by bad food and insufficient water, there is a great mortality among the horses and mules from an epidemic disease which bears a strong resemblance to the cattle-plague. Ten or twelve of the mules die a day from it, and the 3d Native Cavalry lost ninety horses from it while they were here. The district is famous, or rather infamous, for this epidemic; and the tribes from inland, when they come down into the plain, always leave their horses on the plateau, and come down on foot. The Soumalis and other native tribes along this shore are a quarrelsome lot, and fights are constantly occurring among the native workmen, who inflict serious, and sometimes fatal, injuries upon each other with short, heavy clubs resembling Australian waddies. The washing, at least such washing as is done, is sent up to Koomaylo. Yesterday two dhoolies, or washermen, were bringing a quantity of clothes down to the camp, when they were set upon by some natives, who killed one and knocked the other about terribly, and then went off with the clothes.