equipment on board ship, with themselves, and so disembark in an enemy's country. To day our equipment is singularly cumbrous. Reduce it to mule units, and all will be well.

For the carriage of wounded two different mule equip

MULE CACOLETS OR CHAIRS. (From Longmore's Gunshot Injuries.') ments are used. Cacolets (caque au lait), copied from the Pyrenean dairy folk, are really slung chairs hooked on to a pack-saddle, and the wounded sit on either side of the animal. A pair of cacolets weigh about 56 lbs., and cost about £5 per pair.

The mule litter, or litière, is really a slung couch carried

on either side of a mule, and supports a person at full length lying down. A pair of litters empty weigh 106 lbs., and cost about £19.

Opinions differ as to the value of both those articles, and doubtless much depends on the training of the animal used. If the mules be unbroken, great risks occur to the

sick, and many men have been thrown out by a kicking animal.

During the recent Egyptian war a new departure was made in this branch of ambulance work, by utilising horses for this purpose, and it is to be hoped that trained cavalry horses will in future be largely utilised instead of mules for our cacolets and litters, leaving mules for pack-carriage proper.

Every regiment of cavalry in our army should have two

cacolets per troop regularly fitted to its troop-horses, and four or more litters for the regiment. At present our cavalry ambulance equipment is very defective, and it will be interesting to study foreign systems of help to wounded troopers.

If English mechanical genius could solve the problem of how to carry our severely wounded men lying at full length along the back of a horse, a great boon would be conferred on humanity.

There would be difficulty in achieving this arrangement, but it should not be impossible. Any one who desires to bestow a boon on an English army should offer a prize for the best cooking-appliances load capable of being carried by a mule, able to utilise wood as a fuel, and divided into two portions for either side of an animal, neither weighing beyond 80 or 90 lbs. It should carry all things needed for cooking for 100 men, or say 50 men on either side.

A "conservancy" load carrying all latrine arrangements would also be a real boon to the sick soldier. The other articles of nursing and feeding appliances are not difficult to stow away in any empty mule pannier-box that may be sealed as a pattern.

Water supply is always a difficulty in mountain campaigns, and for this purpose either small barrels are used, fitting on the pack-saddles of the mules, or large leather bags, called in India puckalls, are used. These are slung over the pack-saddles, and so water is carried. It is advisable to spread a tarpaulin over the saddle, to save it from damage by the water. A pair of iron tanks made to fit the mule-saddle, and made available in camp by adding a wheel and a pair of handles, might be utilised as hand water-barrows. All tents used for mountain campaigns should have their poles cut and socketed for use, so that in passing through defiles the ends may not catch against the rocks. In all that concerns mule equipment for warfare we have in the Indian mountain batteries singularly perfect models for us to copy. A more workmanlike unit does not exist in our English army.

CHAPTER IX.

CAMEL CARRIAGE.

Camel Kadjawas- Bryce's Camel Dhoolie.

CAMELS are used throughout the whole of the East for the carriage of human beings as well as goods.

For the carriage of sick they have been utilised; but they are not an agreeable means of travelling for a sick

man.

In the Affghan campaign, several convoys of sick and

CONVOY OF SICK IN CAMEL KADJAWAS, AND IN BRYCE'S CAMEL DHOOLIE. (After Longmore.)

wounded were sent down in camel kadjawas, but they are more useful for convalescent than for those actually sick. Here is a picture showing a camel convoy on the line of march, and one of the camels has a pair of Bryce's camel

dhoolies-an attempt at providing lying-down accommodation for a sick man on the line of march.

The fact is, no study has of late been given to devise suitable camel-carriage for the sick, and it is in an entirely primitive condition. It should not be impossible to devise a well-balanced camel-litter or dhoolie, in which a sick man could lie at full length, and which by some suspension system would counteract the swinging motion of the camel. When it is remembered that to carry two sick men in two dhoolies twelve bearers are needed, and that all their kit has to be separately provided for by other means of transport, and that if two or three bearers get sick, the whole gang break down, it is essential not to lose sight of some means of utilising camel-carriage for Eastern campaigns.