§ COLONEL ANNESLEYsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for War, Why the new Non-Purchase Corps, the 101st and 102nd, &c., were placed on the roster for home service before those Regiments who were in India at the date of the amalgamation, thus adding two or more years to the Indian service of Regiments who went to India for the Mutiny in 1857?
CAPTAIN VIVIANSir, his Royal Highness the Field Marshal Commanding-in-Chief, with the concurrence of the Secretary of State for War, decided that one non-purchase corps should return home annually. By this arrangement the first returning home would be again embarking for foreign service before the last arrived in this country, thereby giving officers opportunities of ex- 1002 changing fron one non-purchase corps to another, and enabling them to remain on foreign service if they wished to do so, instead of by having the whole of the non-purchase corps at home at the same time, and compelling them to remain in this country unless able to exchange into a purchase corps. Moreover, it was not considered desirable that the whole of these corps should be in this country at the same time.