Your
soldiers are fine-looking men, their general appearance is
good, they have a martial air, and, as far as I can judge,
they go through their manoeuvres pretty well. It would be
difficult to recognize in them the old soldier of the Pope,
the fabulous personage whose duty it was to escort
processions, and to fire off the cannon on firework nights;
the well-to-do citizen in uniform who, if the weather looked
threatening, mounted guard with an umbrella. The Holy
Father's army would present a good appearance in any country
in the world; and there are some of your soldiers whom--at a
little distance--I should take for our own."
"Yes," he said,
"their appearance is good enough, and if factions could be
kept down by mere appearances, I should feel tolerably easy.
But I know many things respecting the army that make me very
uncomfortable--and yet I don't know all. I know there is
great difficulty in recruiting not only soldiers, but
officers; that young men of good family scorn to command,
and ploughboys to serve, in our army. I know that more than
one mother would rather see her son at the hulks than with
the regiment. I know that our soldiers, for the most part
drawn from the dregs of the people, have neither confidence
in their comrades, nor respect for their officers, nor
veneration for their colours. You would vainly look to find
among them devotion to their country, fidelity to their
sovereign, and all those high and soldierly virtues which
make a man die at his post.
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