inland. Everything that has to be
done by troops in embarking can be imitated perfectly on shore, if the
ordinary fittings of a ship are placed in a hut or other building
outside which such a gangway is erected as that over which men and
horses have to be passed in entering a ship. Now, by the willing
assistance of the Admiralty in furnishing the exact fittings used in
transports, this practice had been carried out by all arms--cavalry,
horse and field artillery, army service corps and infantry--at least
in some instances. Practical adaptations in the training of each
corps had been made by the experiments conducted on shore by each.
Printed regulations embodying these had been framed.

[Sidenote: Necessity for mutual understanding shown by incident.]

Unfortunately, the sudden improvement in the ship fittings mentioned
above, coming as it did at the very moment of war, completely, for the
Army, upset the conditions on which the drill had been framed. It had
been devised to make the passage of horses on board as rapid as it
could be when the horses had to be placed in slings. Men, specially
trained in slinging, were in each corps detailed to do the work. To
find, when the embarkation began, that there were no slings, naturally
involved at the last moment a change in method. Moreover, horses
always obey more kindly, especially in strange circumstances, the men
to whom they are accustomed, those by whom they are groomed and fed.
It was, nevertheless, not surprising that the shipping authorities,
unaware that the soldiers were dealing with conditions already
familiar to them, should have detailed men of the ship to place the
horses in their stalls. The horses did not like the unfamiliar hands;
the soldiers were puzzled by their horses being taken from them. In
some cases much delay and confusion occurred, and, indeed, it needed
all the tact and good-fellowship of the navy and army officers to
adjust things satisfactorily. Relatively to other matters the incident
was a small one, but it illustrates the importance of a thorough
understanding between the two services such as can only be gained by
continued practice during peace-time for war.

[Sidenote: Importance of the right stores being on top.]

In the matter of stores a difficulty, which had been very strongly
commented upon in the case of the Egyptian expedition of 1882, again
presented itself. In 1882, in the disembarkation at Ismailia in the
Suez Canal, where the