and captain in the Hampshire regiment, (June
12, 1759,) we had not supposed that we should be dragged away, my father
from his farm, myself from my books, and condemned, during two years
and a half, (May 10, 1760--December 23, 1762,) to a wandering life of
military servitude. But a weekly or monthly exercise of thirty thousand
provincials would have left them useless and ridiculous; and after the
pretence of an invasion had vanished, the popularity of Mr. Pitt gave
a sanction to the illegal step of keeping them till the end of the
war under arms, in constant pay and duty, and at a distance from their
respective homes. When the King's order for our embodying came down, it
was too late to retreat, and too soon to repent. The South battalion of
the Hampshire militia was a small independent corps of four hundred
and seventy-six, officers and men, commanded by lieutenant-colonel Sir
Thomas Worsley, who, after a prolix and passionate contest, delivered us
from the tyranny of the lord lieutenant, the Duke of Bolton. My proper
station, as first captain, was at the head of my own, and afterwards of
the grenadier, company; but in the absence, or even in the presence, of
the two field officers, I was entrusted by my friend and my father
with the effective labour of dictating the orders, and exercising the
battalion. With the help of an original journal, I could write the
history of my bloodless and inglorious campaigns; but as these events
have lost much of their importance in my own eyes, they shall be
dispatched in a few words. From Winchester, the first place of assembly,
(June 4, 1760,) we were removed, at our own request, for the benefit of
a foreign education. By the arbitrary, and often capricious, orders of
the War-office, the battalion successively marched to the pleasant and
hospitable Blandford (June 17); to Hilsea barracks, a seat of disease
and discord (Sept. 1); to Cranbrook in the weald of Kent (Dec. 11); to
the sea-coast of Dover (Dec. 27); to Winchester camp (June 25, 1761);
to the populous and disorderly town of Devizes (Oct. 23); to Salisbury
(Feb. 28, 1762); to our beloved Blandford a second time (March 9); and
finally, to the fashionable resort of Southampton (June 2); where the
colours were fixed till our final dissolution. (Dec. 23). On the beach
at Dover we had exercised in sight of the Gallic shores. But the most
splendid and useful scene of our life was a four months' encampment on
Winchester Down, under th