The times., 1899-01-25
The Volunteers.
Kisnet.

We are IN receipt OIL many letters lTO!H
members of volunteer regiments now
doing duty in the colonies, and also
great number from their friends at home,
urging The Times to insist upon the pro-
priety of their immediate muster out and
return to their families and civil occupa-
tions. Without exception the argument OF
these communications is that. because men
volunteered for service in war, they
should be released at once upon the cessa-
tion of active hostilities.
We are unable to recognize any justice
in the claim. That there is hardship in
volyed in keeping the volunteers in tropi-
cal countries is admitted. What did they
enlist for? If Spain had been able to
keep up the fight against them, cut off
their supplies, and expose them to all the
horrors possible in actual war, to the end
of their two years service, they would not
have been justified in complaining. Every
thing they might have to encounter would
be rightly regarded as incidental to
service. the exigences of which they would
be presumed to have counted with before
entering il.
Did any of them expect, when eniist'ns,
that if the Government should be Tor
tunate enough TO defeat Spain it would
not need troops TO garrison and defend the
territory ii might capture? Did they pre-
sumo that they would be discharged the
minute the Spanish ensign dropped from
the flagstaff on Havanas MORO Castle?
II they did they were more ignorant than We
have ever regarded the masses OF our coun-
fnr chit
subsequent military necessities, the result
of hostilities, the volunteers took up their
rifles for a service of two years II they
should be needed that long, and they
should expect TO carry out the patriotic
contract they made with the nation They
were not afraid to risk their lives against
Spanish bullets. bayonets, or murder in
case they became prisoners! great pub
lie necessity requires them to be exactly as
brave and devoted today against mosqui-
toes. Algerian decayed beef, and fevers.
That they must suffer we know. That
they have bitter cause for complaint
against official incompetency, corruption.
and cruelty goes without saying; but they
started in to be heroes. and heroes they
must try to be until their fellow-citiZens
can succeed in crushing out treason in the
National Legislature and Alserism in the
| army Then. and not until then, will it be
| possible TO relieve them, through the es-
tablishment Of a regular army force suf-
| ficient to take their places.
If it be only that the volunteers resent
the idea of not having any blood and bat
ties, they should still be brave and pa
tient We have small but poisonously
| influential element in and outside of Con
gress, which is doing all that treachery
and the devil can suggest to stir up the
populations of the Philippines. Cuba, and
| Porto Rico against our flag and honor. II
| it is not stepped upon speedily and ground
| into silence the volunteer army will have
| plenty of active service, and may see its
| numbers increased by one or two hundred
thousand more gallant youths. We do not
| lose sight Of the fact that a condition
precedent to that kind OF expansion would
| be the disappearance from control of the
! army of persons like Alger, Corbin, and
| Eagan.