By Gustavus, a king whose ruling passions were heroism and selfishness, vanity and ambition, they were ordered to "ground their arms," which were at once taken away, with all their swords, bayonets, and accoutrements.
They were then ordered to strip off their regimental coats, and appear in their shirts and breeches. The officers were deprived of their epaulettes and commissions, and were cashiered on the spot.
Their colours were then rent from the poles and torn to pieces, the poles being broken under foot, while the drums were defaced by persons appointed to do so.
The whole battalion then passed from the right of companies out of the hollow square by single files, while a general hiss was maintained by the whole army until the last man had quitted it; and the united sound of this unpleasant expression of contempt rising into the still air, by the sea-shore, is said to have had a very singular and remarkable effect on those who heard it.
Though thus broken up and disbanded, the Corps was not set adrift; for the whole of the privates were drafted into the different battalions of the Artillery, and long after the fiery Gustavus had perished by the hand of the regicide Ankerström, it was a bitter taunt in the Swedish army to have belonged to "the degraded Regiment of Abo."
In all ages and in all armies, the greatest veneration has ever been manifested by soldiers for their ensigns and standards, as being the veritable representation and embodiment of the national glory and honour, or it might be of a righteous cause. In the ages of classical antiquity, the religious care taken of these emblems was extraordinary. The soldiers worshipped them, and swore by them, as some European troops still do. The Roman Legionaries incurred certain death if they lost them in battle; and Livy tells us, that to animate them, the standards were sometimes thrown among the enemy, that they might be recaptured at all hazards.
In all armies at the present day, regimental standards are consecrated by a religious ceremony, have the highest military honours paid to them, and when too old for use, are solemnly deposited in a church, or sometimes burned, or buried with all the honours of war; and by the Queen's Regulations (Section VII.) are finally marched from their last parade, to the air of "Auld lang Syne."
