with the European nations it is large. No penetrative or discriminative genius perceived the superiority of either method. Many years of experience brought that out. And the American method is the best of all by the testimony of the first English soldier.

We do not lay claim to any particular brilliancy in the field of discovery though in that America stands in the foremost rank; but we are at least to be complimented for observing and acting upon the greatest fact that the vast military systems of the world have yet disclosed. True, our celebrated eugolist, Lord Wolseley, does not discuss method, and says wages are an incentive to achievement; but one of his discipline and comprehension can not well help knowing that methods, or scientific systems, are back of all effective expression of combined energies. If the difference that distinguishes the American from the European soldier, or rather that between the two armies, is sought for, it will be found in the methods that govern them. They determine primarily the rank of armies as they do of all other organized bodies of large dimensions. And when two military systems are brought into comparison it is the principle of the superior one that triumphs. What, then, is the principle underlying the great armed force of Europe? and what that underlying the very meager one of the United States? The one is to be always on the verge of action and ready to plunge forth into battle when called, and the other is to lie in repose and await emergencies. The latter has this immense advantage-that you do not have to forget and discard a mass of ideal and impractical rubbish. The lament of the British soldier in Africa is that he can not get away from his tactics, which actual warfare has shown to be mainly worthless; and his beastly tactics in the Revolution helped mightly to establish American independence.

After all that has been seen, and said, and done, it is pretty plainly evident that we have the right idea of military as well as civil affairs. Americans are not even accustomed to account themselves among the first of the powers in arms, and yet their pre-eminence is frankly finally admitted by unquestioned foreign authority. Admirable, however, as the methods of our army are on the whole, they do not reach the standard

of the navy in one thing, and that is in the development of tactics. Indeed, the nub of the whole military problem is to be found in the highly original plans of the American naval officers for arranging and carrying forward a battle. They are not ruled by written tactics. This very weighty fact was brought out by Edward M. Tutt in an interview with Admiral Brown, of Indianapolis. Mr. Tutt's article was on naval tactics, and in an endeavor to learn what books on this subject are used he elicited from the admiral the rather surprising information that there are, in particular, none. The tactics of the navy, said Admiral Brown, are developed by the progress of the fight. It is worth knowing that American naval officers largely map out their fights in action, and we did not know it until Admiral Brown said so. Thus, through the efforts of special newspaper writers many of the finest truths that, but for them, would forever lie buried are brought to light. They cover an extensive field and a most important one.

It is not in the least amiss to say that this naval theory of permitting battle plans to develop themselves by prevailing situations and circumstances is worthy the serious consideration of army officers, for it was employed by the greatest captain the world has known. Napoleon dispensed with discipline and made his dispositions on the field. He had been through the military schools, but he flew in the face of all the European tacticians. His army in camp did very little drill duty, and he fought it in a way to make Austria, Russia and Prussia revise their books. He let the light fall in detail on the innumerable weaknesses of the old system, and now, having escaped criticism for nearly a century, we disclose its absurdity as a whole.

The eminence of the United States army, we see, is not owing to an immense scheme of organization and persistent and rigid discipline, but results from an active principle that is just the reverse of this. And another thing that contributes very materially to the distinction of this republic as a military power is the reputation its soldiers feel in honor bound to maintain. In both foreign and domestic warfare it is unsurpassed, if not unparalleled for pertinacity, skill and valor. No soldiers ever returned from the field of battle with greater reputations than those of Washington, Taylor, Grant and Lee. From the

closing days of the Revolution the American army has felt the weight of an illustrious name. Washington immortalized it, and ever since it has striven to preserve its glory undimmed. No retrogression marks its broad pathway. It is inspired by its fame, and its inspiration is a power of infinite magnitude. On the reputation of the first two wars the Monroe doctrine was put forth, and on that of the Civil war the acquisition of foreign territory was accomplished without molestation or question. Back of the American soldier in the conflict with Spain lay a century of history marked by feats in arms more laudable, and therefore more splendid, than the achievements of Caesar or Napoleon, and the remembrance of these nerved him for victory. And, indeed, one of the strongest incentives to any army is its valor of former days. This is more potent than wages, and together with right methods explains the excellence of our soldiers.

WEST POINT.

BY CHARLES WILLIAM LARNED.

[Charles William Larned, army officer and educator; born New York, March 9, 1850; graduated from West Point in 1870; 2d lieutenant 3d cavalry, June 15, 1870; transferred to 7th cavalry October 10, 1870; 1st lieutenant 7th cavalry June 25, 1876; professor of drawing United States military academy and college of United States army since July, 1876. Author: The Great Discourse, etc.]

Copyright 1901 by Frederick A. Richardson

War as an art has not escaped the regulating force of modern industrial specialization. Starting as an instinct and the natural business of the entire body of adult males, it has steadily shrunk in its scope until it has become, with the advance of civilization, a distinct profession and a special science. This is no less a fact even where, as in the continental system, an entire nation is under military tuition; for the tendency of modern conditions is to specialize the science of arms more and more, and to reduce its principles to exact terms exactly in proportion to the growth of industrial expansion and scientific discovery. Not only has the mechanical enginery of war become more complex, and the problem of supply and mobilization more intricate in detail and precise in execution; but the private soldier has to be taught more things, and is required to know them better than ever before. It is a painful thought, but it is a fact, that the only entirely consistent and approximately perfect organization in the social system is that of human destruction as exemplified in the military hierarchy of Germany. As a working mechanism of human agencies it has no equal.

So long as the forces which operate to bring political and industrial differences to the issue of arms continue to exist, it is entirely beside the mark to declaim against war and to decry the professional soldier; and there are few forms of cant more depressing than the pious horror of commercial cutthroats for the brutal instincts of the military class in view of the patent fact that commercial greed is the vital principle of modern military armament. Industrial war does not differ in aggressive principles from the war of arms, and often its immediate results are not less cruel and disastrous, while its purposes are certainly more sordid and merciless; and when, as in our day,

the two are associated as master and tool, such epithets, so long as chestnuts are hot, come with a bad grace from the monkey to the cat. War will cease to exist only with the conversion of the soul of the commercial and political man to the standard of the ethics of the millenium; and, in the meanwhile, the more professional it is made and the more thoroughly its science is mastered, the more will its horrors be mitigated and its duration lessened.

That war is a science of details which must be mastered in advance is the lesson that Prussia has twice taught the modern world; and Washington, at the beginning of our national career, saw this clearly even under the less complex conditions of that day. In his last annual message to congress he remarks, "A thorough examination of the subject will evince that the art of war is both comprehensive and complicated; that it demands much previous study; and that the possession of it in its most improved and perfect state, is always of great moment to the security of a nation.

From these considerations spring the raison d'etre of the military school; and it is well to bear in mind that whatever be the policy of this nation as to the size or character of its military establishment, the necessity for the school is paramount. Indeed, the necessity for the school grows greater in proportion as the size of the standing army diminishes; and an ideal condition, perhaps, for a republic would be a minimum armed force, and a maximum of thorough military instruction in high grade military schools; a large supply of accomplished officers distributed throughout the land ready at call to organize and lead the volunteer levies of the nation. At all times of military emergency the great embarassment has been and will continue to be the lack of trained officers for the handling of these levies. There never was and probably will never be a lack of men. There are, of course, a considerable number of civilians who feel abundantly competent to wear the straps and draw the pay of command from major to major general; and, equally of course, there always will be abundant lawmakers in times of emergency and excitement ready and willing to afford them the opportunity; and, for this debauch of pull, the country must always pay the price in early disaster and blunder; but this is a con