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FROM EASTER TO AUGUST.

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looking about us to see what we have to do, are often attended with consequences altogether as dreadful as any active misbehaviour from the most extravagant passion.

It is by steadily directing their minds to the necessity for great and far-reaching changes in the land system of Ireland that the body of quiet reasonable people will keep abreast of events, and can now be of most service to their country. By bringing the Government to recognise that necessity they will be of service to the Government. For the Government everything now depends upon their producing an adequate Land Bill next Session. I say that everything depends upon this, presuming, of course, that in the meanwhile Mr. Balfour will not 'think it his duty' to authorise any more evictions such as those of Bodyke.

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Not impossibly, however, we may have to traverse a time when the quiet reasonable people will be swept away, and their influence quenched for the time and annulled; when the Liberals of the nadir and the new democracy will pass over their body. It is not for nothing that a stump orator of Mr. Gladstone's calibre proclaims the divorce between the masses and the classes, and invites every province and platform to consider its wrongs. The masses stirred, tempers are kindled, a torrent of insincere and envenomed declamation feeds the flame. Mr. Gladstone's powers of self-deception are so inexhaustible that he is never insincere. But how is it possible for Sir William Harcourt or Mr. John Morley, if, as I suppose, they are sincerely desirous to get judicial rents in Ireland revised, to imagine that they further this object by covering the Government with scorn, contumely, and insult for adopting it?

This is probably the last time that I shall speak on these political subjects; certainly, if I follow my own inclination, it will be the last time. In ending, therefore, let me fortify the quiet reasonable people, with whom all along I have supposed myself conversing, by reminding them that even if, as seems not altogether improbable, they should have to traverse bad times, to see their wishes thwarted, and to be for a while powerless, yet the temper of fairness and moderation, which makes their force, is not to be the less kept up and prized by them, but on the contrary is to be still cultivated by them in the highest degree. In the first place, its time is sure to come again, it will not be powerless always, or even for very long; in the second place, it is its own exceeding great reward. It is hardly possible to exaggerate the comfort and consolation which this temper is capable of producing, even in view of characters and proceedings obnoxious to

us.

The Irish members are extremely provoking; but the provocation is far less acute when we have the fairness to remember that these men are impulsive natures to start with, pariahs in the House of Commons, with no hand in the regular administration of their country, and that country long and grievously mismanaged; that

PROFESSIONAL IGNORANCE IN THE

ARMY.

AT the close of last year's autumn inspections the military authorities publicly announced that the officers of the army were ignorant of the most elementary practical work of their profession, and it seems desirable that the British taxpayer should be informed how such a state of affairs has arisen, and what steps must be taken to alter it.

In pointing out the source to which the existing deficiency in tactical training is to be traced, and in suggesting remedies, I shall endeavour to write as temperately as possible, so as to avoid in any way unnecessarily irritating those who, not in my humble opinion. only but in that of many others, are responsible for a situation which can hardly be considered creditable to any one concerned. It is necessary, however, that the case should be put before the public. plainly and without reserve, as otherwise, in the event of interest in the question being aroused, there might be demanded certain drastic measures, the adoption of which would press on the different ranks of officers exactly in inverse proportion to their culpability.

To the public, this revelation of inefficiency must be almost inexplicable. For years past they have had dinned into their ears by their sons, brothers, nephews, cousins, and other relatives in the service, harrowing stories of the life of torture to which officers are nowadays subjected, owing to the never-ceasing courses of instruction, and the examinations at the end of them; and yet, in spite of all these cruel inflictions, it seems that in the most important branch of a soldier's work the result is in the highest degree unsatisfactory. At first sight it might seem that the matter is one which, lying within the province of military discipline, should be dealt with by the military authorities alone, but the truth is that there are in connection with it certain difficulties which these authorities are powerless to overcome until public opinion brings to their aid its pressure on the service.

The seed from which the present state of things has sprung was sown in 1870. A short time before the outbreak of the FrancoGerman war a Royal Commission had investigated the question of VOL. XXII.-No. 127.

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Army Education. The result of their inquiries showed that, putting aside the Artillery and the Engineers, the only regimental officers who had received any systematic professional training, other than drill, were those who as cadets had passed through the Royal Military College, and the few who subsequently, as officers, had belonged to the so-called Senior Department; and, further, that for giving any training to officers whilst in the service no provision existed. At that time, moreover, the tests of efficiency for promotion were so completely nominal, that any officer could rise to the highest rank knowing little or nothing of his profession. In the summer of 1870 steps were taken to remedy this state of affairs, but to the measures then adopted, and to the mode in which they were carried out, the present shortcomings owe their origin.

The first mistake committed was in the programme of subjects in which instruction was to be given. That subject, a thorough knowledge of which is the first essential for all regimental officers on service, the foundation on which all other military knowledge should be built, the prime mover of soldiering, that to which all other aids are but accessories, namely, tactics, was not included in the course of instruction, which comprised field fortification, military sketching and military law only. By tactics' is to be understood the art of handling and leading troops both on the battle field and in the immediate vicinity of the enemy. Without a knowledge of the principles of field fortification, and a practical training in some of its technical details, the best tactician would be unable to utilise to the fullest extent the tactical power of his troops, whilst a knowledge of military sketching aids him in finding his way about strange country, and in understanding ground and its influence on tactical operations. Considered solely by themselves, and not in connection with tactics, these subjects are, to the regimental officer, of comparatively little use in the performance of his duties in the field. Undoubtedly in 1870 this close connection was not generally recognised, and the three subjects were regarded as distinctly separated from each other. Anyhow a fatal error was committed. The world in which the cavalry and infantry soldier lives, moves, and breathes on service is that of tactical work. In peace time he is trained for this work, and his teachers during that time are naturally those under whom he carries on that work in war. Fortification and military sketching are, however, special subjects, a knowledge of which is but supplementary to his tactical knowledge, and being thus special, experts must be the teachers.

The course of instruction adopted in 1870 was therefore one based on no proper foundation, it was one in which commanding officers could take no personal nor practical part, and in which therefore they took as a rule not the slightest interest. It was carried on out of their hands and out of their control, and was con