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From The Royal Engineers Journal.—May 2, 1898.

A Reminiscence of Lieut.-General Sir William F. D. Tervois, G.C.M.G., C.B., F.R.S.

Perhaps one of the most striking- qualities possessed by Sir William Jervois was his keen sense of humour, for no man was more fully alive than he to the anomalies of the position occupied by a governor in a self-governed colony; the nominal centre of all power, but yet impotent to correct the most patent of follies, his success as a governor in Australia and New Zealand was the more remarkable. Beyond all doubt his military reputation was a great advantage to him, for it was felt that in any actual danger of war there was always one on the spot who was fit to take command. Civilian ministers are apt at a serious crisis to lose their heads. During the war-scare of 1884 a Russian man-of-war groped her way into Wellington harbour by night unobserved, and was seen in the morning anchored close to the shore. Some of the ministers came to Sir William in a desperate flurry and asked what they should do. "Do," said Sir William, "why, I'll ask the captain to dinner."

But apart from all prestige derived from his military character, he gained the confidence of successive administrations by a very thorough realization of the position of a constitutional sovereign. Colonial ministries, and likely enough other ministries also, cannot as a rule continue to exist for more than a month or two without some serious internal difference which threatens to terminate their career abruptly. Then was Sir William's time. No matter how distasteful the measures and opinions of his advisers might be, he invariably sent for the chief of them and said, "You are in difficulties. Can I help you?" And not unfrequently the quarrels were quietly made up in his own room. Then ministers, finding that they could trust him as a friend, and, moreover, that he was a shrewd, sensible man of the world, would turn to him for his opinion in difficulties, and be grateful for his advice.

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Sir William never forgot that he was a soldier; on great occasions (excepting the opening of Parliament, when it would have been indecorous) he constantly wore the red coat as the uniform most worth wearing. At public functions his greatest pleasure was to catch sight of some old soldier wearing his medals in honour of the occasion, when he never failed to ask him of his regiment, his services and his present condition; and it was curious to see how such a man, who had been slouching about on a small patch of land for years, would straighten himself to salute and to reply.

Though the life of a constitutional governor is in the matter of real work usually an idle one, Sir William's energy remained to the end of his stay in the colonies insatiable, and on the rare occasions when some genuine task or some difficult problem presented itself, he would attack it with all the restless ardour of a boy. Had he been bred up to sport he would doubtless have expended upon it a portion' of his waste energy, but as things were, he vented it in long rides and as long walks, always traversed at express speed, in spite of the steepness of the hills around Wellington. Needless to say, the forts came in for a good share of his attention. A few months before he left New Zealand he suddenly came down by a very rough path from the hills upon the rear of one of them, and, rapping at the gate, clamoured for admittance. No one took the least notice. Sir William took a little run and went for the gate, scrambled over and dropped down on the other side, light and active as at one-and-twenty, to the consternation of a half-dressed colonial gunner, who had turned out just too late, not expecting so unceremonious a visit from His Excellency.