y a
veteran of fifty, with a long Spartan training, before he gets so high)
pockets the pay of all these furloughs, supernumerary to the real work
of the regiment;--and has certain important furnishings to yield in
return.

At any rate, enrolment, in time of peace, cannot fall on many: three or
four recruits in the year, to replace vacancies, will carry the Canton
through its crisis. For we are to note withal, the third part of every
regiment can, and should by rule, consist of "foreigners,"--men not born
Prussians. These are generally men levied in the Imperial Free-towns;
"in the REICH" or Empire, as they term it; that is to say, or is mainly
to say, in the countries of Germany that are not Austrian or Prussian.
For this foreign third-part too, the recruits must be got; excuses
not admissible for Captain or Colonel; nothing but recruits of the due
inches will do. Captain and Colonel (supporting their enterprise on
frugal adequate "perquisites," hinted of above) have to be on the
outlook; vigilantly, eagerly; and must contrive to get them. Nay, we can
take supernumerary recruits; and have in fact always on hand, attached
to each regiment, a stock of such. Any number of recruits, that stand
well on their legs, are welcome; and for a tall man there is joy in
Potsdam, almost as if he were a wise man or a good man.

The consequence is, all countries, especially all German countries, are
infested with a new species of predatory two-legged animals: Prussian
recruiters. They glide about, under disguise if necessary; lynx-eyed,
eager almost as the Jesuit hounds are; not hunting the souls of men, as
the spiritual Jesuits do, but their bodies in a merciless carnivorous
manner. Better not to be too tall, in any country, at present! Irish
Kirkman could not be protected by the aegis of the British Constitution
itself. In general, however, the Prussian recruiter, on British ground,
reports, That the people are too well off, that there is little to be
done in those parts. A tall British sailor, if we pick him up
strolling about Memel or the Baltic ports, is inexorably claimed by the
Diplomatists; no business do-able till after restoration of him; and
he proves a mere loss to us. [Despatches in the State-Paper Office.]
Germany, Holland, Switzerland, the Netherlands, these are the fruitful
fields for us, and there we do hunt with some vigor.

For example, in the town of Julich there lived and worked a tall young
carpenter: one day a