“As the sun rises, the heat rapidly increases, and the camels and elephants are seen making short cuts across the fields, and keeping always clear of the road; when our bands have blown as much wind as they can spare into their instruments, our men strike up a song, and old windlass tunes, forecastle ditties, and many a well-known old ballad resound through the jungles or on the fertile plains of Bengal, and serve to animate our sailors and astonish the natives.”
[The Shannon's Brigade in India: Being Some Account of Sir William Peel's Naval Brigade in the Indian Campaign of 1857-1858, Verney, 1862]
Sir Edmund Verney, 3rd Baronet FRGS, DL, JP (1838 – 1910)