The Savannah morning news., 1902-06-08

States army were better fed than the
oIlcers of any other army on earth.
The clothing allowance for our sol
dlers is too great for an army in time
Oh war and is a serious impeachment to
the quick movement of the troops. The
Japanese soldier carries his entire
equipment on his back-two suits of
clothes, all that is allowed to one SOL
der. The American army is so we'll
equipped that each individual soldier
has a large chest of clothes and re-
qulres an immense army train to move
It's effects from one point to another.
In payment the United States is more
liberal than any other nation. We pay
our soldiers $13 d month in this coun-
try and give 81 a month increase for
each years service up to $40 a month,
and 20 per cent. increase for soldiers
serving in our island possessions or in
Alaska. Germany, l think, pays $3.50
month, France about the same, Aus
trial less, and Great Britain about 50
month, but in the British army
system of fines and assessments for
rations reduces the pay much below
the 50 per month
In modern ordnance the improve
ments have fully kept pace with the
improvements in small arms. and the
large field guns that are used on the
enemy have more than three times the
range which prevailed during the Civil
war, While our rapid-fire guns are es-
pecially destructive in the shorter
ranges of battle.
Accommodating Reserve.
A few years from now our seacoasr
will be made invincible by a system of
seacoast defenses which will ultimate
ly cost the government at least $780,
4 49, i
tive ordnance that can be built
by man. 1t is to be hoped that
there never will be another war;
but it is liable to come, and should
army in China have told me that the
if this be the case, the government of
the United States will not be in as
badly prepared condition for war as
it was at the outbreak of the Spanish
war. That furnished a lesson, and new
we are accommodating a reserve of small
arms and have made liberal apr ,pria-
tons in this Congress to still further
increase our reserve supply. We are
manufacturing our own smokeless pow
der in America now, so that in the flu
ture our soldiers will not be compelled
to use the old black powder.
The regular army is simply the fret
fighting line, and what is call II the
volunteer army must be relied upon
in the future, as always in the past,
in any great conflict in which the cou4
try may become engaged. There is
a wrong conception of the volunteers.
The fact is that the regular army is
as much a volunteer army as the So
called volunteers themselves. Zach in
dividual steps up to the recruiting off,
Ger and enrolls his nAIre on his Cwr
Volition AMI passes the Examination
whether he goes INTO the regular o.
volunteer service, So chat as 4 matt 81
- fact all of our soldiers are volunteer
soldiers There is no such thing Us
cCnscription in this country, and with
the patriotic spirit of our People. their
we'll known bravery and love of coun-
try, there is very little, if any, dam
ger of Consumption in the future
If the people will stop and think for
a minute of all that our army has stood
for in our history, of the gallant body
of men whose lives are at the service
of their country; when they think that
this army has protected the frontier,
while the men not in the field were
opening up and developing our great
country from ocean to ocean; when
they realize that during all the wars of
the past, in the Revolutionary war, the
war of 1912, the Mexican war, and Civil
War, this same army carried the BAN
ner of their country to victory, and
that it never has been and never will
be used except for the benefit of the
people as a whole, and to carry out the
orders of the government, the injus-
tice and outrage of the present assault
on the army will, think, be fully real
lied by all fair-minded Americans.
In India 100000 acres of land
have been reclaimed and rendered
highly fertile by means of irrigation.