News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1883-09-27
SOLDERING IN AMMAN.
wEAF IL REQUISITE TO MAKE A
SOLDIER.
Composition of the Annnmite Army aud its
Discipline.

The 81. Jnn1e8's Gazette gives an inter
estng description Of the army at the dis
posal of the King OF AMMAN. 1t is reck-
oned officially at 5000 men. OF these
10000 garrison the capital, and half that
number is assigned to Hanoi and the
surrounding fortresses Nam Dinh-
Mini Binh, Bach Mini, and
other places in Tonquin. The
rest are odinarily disguised in civil
ian attire, and are not to be distinguished
from harmless agriculturists. When a
man is dressed in the customary vest
ments of Madras coast coolie-a hand
kerchief and bit of string-itis is difficult
at the first blush to determine his pro-
fession.
In AMMAN, however, the matter is
rendered comparatively simple. The
law is, from every three men one recruit.
Except, however, in cases of extraordi-
nary public necessity this rule is not
acted up to; one man from every seven
or eight is nearer the average. The Sc
lection of the recruits is left entirely to
the local authorities, and the village
mandarins make a good thing out of the
annual levies.
THE DRILL.
In default of squad drill the Annamese
recruits are put through a variety of I'M
pleasant experiences designed to test
their courage. Physical courage and
endurance are supposed to be the pri-
mary requisites of soldier, and after that
the knowledge of how to load and let off
a gun. 1t is pleasantly assumed 10y the
military officers that the men chosen for
the army are the worst of the popula-
ton. The mandarins are supposed to
keep their districts quiet by drafting all
the n1aaU0iS Sujets into the annual levy.
There is, accordingly the less cOmpunc-
ton in putting them through the pre-
5cribed tests. The first of these is to
assault the raw recruit violently with a
sabre.
The sabre is wooden one, certainly:
but the drill sergeant hits hard, and
knows from personal experience where
it hurts most. Operations commence on
the back and end with blows on the head.
The recruit who stands battering about
the head for q matter of five minutes
without uttering groan or hinching,
even involuntary, is hailed as a finished
soldier and excused further "drill," To
shrink, or even to moan, when beaten
on the head with the wooden sabre is
considered pardonable, and the victim
is noted down as an "ordinary' soldier,
instead of an cable bodied" one.
PUNIsHl1ENTs.
But the recruit who cries out when he
is hit on the body or confesses by a
wriggle that the exercise is painful is re-
ported for punishment and then put
through new course of instruction.
The punishment usually consists in a
certain number of blows from bamboo
on the upper part of the thighs, so that,
except for the dignity of the thing,
there is a close resemblance between
punishment and military discipline.
The military mandarins defend the sys-
tenn on the ground that it is very an
cient, and that it is unique in the mill
tary exercises of the world-the latter
assertion being incontroyertible.
Energetic officers of the army fire.
quently invent fantastic tests of a SINH
lar character in addition to the regula-
ton exercises. A story at Hue is related
of beau sabreor of the Tay-son rebel
hon, who had a ditch dug aud filled the
| bottom with swords and pixies stuck into
| the ground point upward. lie then
Am
! ~, s,- . ---fa a.
ditch. The most stoicaI of the cable
bodied" shrunk from this novel addition
! to the manual of exercises. Only one
| man was found to do it. He went in
with a rush, and the swords and pixies
collapsed before him. They had been
kept in position by the most slender OF
threads