The St. Johns herald., 1894-02-01
RUSSIAN ARMY DUTY.
The Varied Accomplishments the
 Soldiers Must Possess.
4 Practice Maneuver Which Illustrates the Severe Tasks They Are Some times Required to Per
 form.

In the German army every soldier
 is taught to act intelligently on out
 post service and in scouting opera
 tions, and this is not too much to re-
 Q'lire in country where every soldier
 reads and writes, and can readily un-
 derstand map and compass. In Rus-
 sia, however, where nine-tenths of the people cannot read or write, and have
 lost the faculty of thinking consecu- lively, the army cannot teach the sol dier much more than to move as with a machine. In order to have force of good men for piclet-work and ad-
 vance-skirmishing, writes Poultney Bigelow in Harper's Magazine, they have adopted this plan:
 Each company sends four of it's most intelligent men to a select body called the scOuting-corps, and as the Russian regiment has four battalions, with four companies each, that gives regi- mental scout force of sixty-four. This service is very popular, for it is full of variety, and, though the hardship is great, the food is good, for hunting and fishing are in the programme. The men are practiced in every kind of wOodcraft, and are expected to de- velop as much ingenuity and self-reli- ance as an Indian scout in our service. They must sail, row, climb, find their way by map and compass, slip through the enemy's lines, procure every va riety of information, and escape cap ture at all hazards.
 'They are splendid fellows" said Schutzenberg, in answer to question of mine. 'Here is what they did last winter when snow was on the ground and floating ice in the streams:
 ''You must know that we attach very great importance to creeping up close to the enemy and watching his movements. Well, for little practice in this respect I called my sixty-four men together one morning in the bar rack-yard, and divided them into two sides, each commanded by non-com- missioned officers. 1 pointed out on the map a position which one side was to watch, and indicated the direction from which an attack was to be antici- patcd. Another position selected for the other side. Neither side knew what the other side was to attempt, but each had orders to slip behind the lines of the other, and steal three flags that had been posted about a mile and half in the rear of the line that was to be protected. The difficult part of the problem was that neither side knew anything of the positions beyond what was shown them on the map in the barrack-yard, and the non-commis- stoned officers had to transmit this knowledge to their men.
 'Each party found the right position, and, after posting sentry, detached party to steal the flags of the enemy. Six men of the one party went off, each on his own account. Two of them were captured, one of them failed to find the flags because he could not re- member the topography of the map, and one succeeded in finding the flags and bringing them back to the non- commissioned officer. The remaining two found the spot after the flags were gone, and described the spot, so that there was no doubt that they had been CAlCIOs AhS OLA 1A1CAA uCIebLASu OA CIlC other side remained together, and were discovered when close to the picket line. They were fired upon; two were captured, and the remaining four pursued to stream forty feet wide near here. In spite of the float ing ice, they sprang in and struggled to the other side. The pursuers hesi- tated moment at the sight of the ice blocks, then they followed. One was captured in the water because he was hampered by the ice. The rest escaped; but one of the followers in spite of his ice bath, to sneak away with the flags of the en- emy."