Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1900-03-13
LONDON WENT WILD
How the News Of Cropje's Surrender
Was Received.
ENGLAND'S FAULTY ARMY SYSTEM
Impossible Now to Get the Right
Sort of Officers.
II RI ~
OTHER TIMELY MATTERS
special Correspondence of The Evening Star.

than ever telegraph spoke. The war office
issued Lord Roberts message at 9:45, and
an hour later staid old London was in hys-
terics. l had not believed it possible that
Englishmen could display such emotion.
Everywhere men were shaking hands with
utter strangers, cheering Lord Roberts, and
also speaking enthusiastically of the mag
| nificent defense Cronje had maintained for
nine days. I came into town today in a
third-class' smoking carriage to hear the
expression of the laboring men. Poor old
Cronje, said one. 1T was the best thing
he could do Yes" said another; hes
| brave man. though Others Joined in,
| and the conversation was as much in eulogy
of Cronje as in praise of Roberts. An Eng
lishman admires bravery in an enemy al
most as much as he does in himself and
really believe that If Cronje were to come
to England he would receive an ovation
second only to that to be given Lord Rob-
ertS- The telegraph stations this morning
were taken possession of by crowds, waving
forms on which were three words, "Cronje
has surrendered" The operators have not
been so worked since the fall of Khartoum
two years ago. Special officers had to be
dispatched from the stations to preserve
order. Flags were floating everywhere. A
huge union jack f1oated from housetop to
housetop across the Strand, almost touch
ing the heads of passersby on the buses
The newspaper delivery wagons had the
national emblem flying triumphantly from
their whips. Almost everybody appeared
In khaki and red-colored ties that are now
being sold by all haberdashers.
Remarkable Scenes.
The fact that today is the nineteenth an
mversary OF the Majuba Hill disaster has
been an added incentive to the general re-
1oicing. In the service hospitals the scenes
were pathetic. The old veterans shouted
and ChePre0 and oh
not done In years and years. One soldier
hobbling about with cane, echoed what
was in his comrades heart by remarking,
Now let us hear of the relief of Lady
smith. and l can die happy"
This evening London is preparing to cell
citrate the victory with untired vigor The
staid old Globe has powerful searchlight
attached to one of its windows and is
flashing different colored lights I'D and
down the Strand. Crowds are already be-
ginning to collect on that thoroughfare and
by midnight it will probably be dense
mass. The service clubs have their illu-
minated mn are decorations shining brilliantly and
ali England, after spending the evening in
rejoicing. will sleep better tonight than has
been possible since the war began.
Reforms Needed.
Military reorganization has been promised
by the government, but what is wanted
more than that is social reform in the
army. When the system of buying COM
missions in the army was abolished it was
aondly imagined that death-blow had been
struck to vicious arrangements which had
gradually grown out of the decadence of
old feudal institutions. The days having
gone by when 1t was the duty as we'll as
the pride of every county magnate to rally
to the support of his sovereign with his
own little body Of followers it continued to
be the fashion for those magnates or for
such members Of their families as fancied
the position, to monopOlZe the captaincies
ana colonelcles and generalships In the
army. In Marlborough's time and in
Welhngtons the arrangement worked well;
but the Crimean war revealed its inherent
or acquired faults. THE army" that is.
the genteel part of it. came to be, for plu-
tocrats as well as for aristocrats, the most
gentiemanly of the professions. The men
admitted to 1t might be, and often were
good officers as well as gentlemen in the
true sense OF the term; but they also might
DC, and sometimes were, neither the one
nor the other. 1t was in the hope of check
ing the evil that the purchase system was
abolished. But what has happened? 1.-THE
army Is still nearly as close preserve as
ever 1t was. The young gentleman who as
pres TO be an officer can no longer buy
commission of-hand with so much money
and he has TO submit to educational tests
lhese tests, however, are for the most
part absurdly unnecessary for the business
ne has to perform. Their only purpose, and
their only result, is to keep out of the
profession men who cannot afford the
heavy expense Of being crammed in all
sorts of Dook-lore quite useless in soldier
ship.
Promotion From the Ranks
1t is true that promotion from the ranks
Is now allowed; but the reform has re-
solved itself into little more than device
for enabling young gentlemen, too witIess
to pass the organizations for which they
have been crammed, to enter the army by
side door. If they enlist as common
soldiers they are allowed special priv
leges by which their "gentility" is con-
served until, after few months, excuse
Is found for giving them the promotion
for which they were destined from the
first.
Now and then a genuine common SOL
der like Hector Macdonald is raised
from the ranks, and obtains the reward to
which his bravery entities him; but not
one man out OF ten who are converted
from soldiers into officers is really of ple-
beian origin. Abolition of purchase has been
turned into farce Promotion from the
ranks Is little more than a subterfuge The
army list is crowded with the names of
men who have really bought their commits
slons, and have done SO not for the honor
OF serving their country, but for the sake
OF the spurious dignity that it gives them
They may or may not figure well in the
clubs and ball rooms to which their com
missions give them the entree but only
those who care to make a serious business
OF their profession of sOldierShip, and have
the skill as well as the will to be efficient
officers. are worth having in it at any
price. As it happens, the great majority
are expensive luxuries.
The HaIf-Pay System.
A large item in each years army est-
mates is what is called by a euphonism
the ''non-effective charges" devoted to pro-
viding haf-pay for young and old gentle
men, who grumble at 1t as miserable pit
lance, but to whom it is, in fact, discredit-
able aims which they should be ashamed
to receive. Their half-pay is payment for
doing nothing after they have been shunt-'
ed for inability to do anything useful. This
country has to bear the burden of this
useless charge. and the money they draw
is diverted from the use that should be
made Of 1t in paying capable officers for
the services they perform.
1t is crying complaint that nearly all
commissioned officers below the rank Of
general are unable to live on their nay.
This Is partly because they are really un-
derpaid. partly because the social exigen-
cies Of their position throw on them I'M
necessary expenses in living up to the STAN
dard of extravaganza prescribed by the
nuveauX riches with whom they have to as
ISOLATE. Everything Of this sort is a canker
In England's present military organization
1t must be rooted out before this country
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