and disembarking, will it be possible to train the higher officers to
perform their duties well and smoothly.

A great debt is owing from the public to the men of the Army and Navy.
They should be so treated as to enable them to reach the highest point
of efficiency, so that they may be able to respond instantly to any
demand made upon them to sustain the interests of the Nation and the
honor of the flag. The individual American enlisted man is probably on
the whole a more formidable fighting man than the regular of any other
army. Every consideration should be shown him, and in return the highest
standard of usefulness should be exacted from him. It is well worth
while for the Congress to consider whether the pay of enlisted men upon
second and subsequent enlistments should not be increased to correspond
with the increased value of the veteran soldier.

Much good has already come from the act reorganizing the Army, passed
early in the present year. The three prime reforms, all of them of
literally inestimable value, are, first, the substitution of four-year
details from the line for permanent appointments in the so-called staff
divisions; second, the establishment of a corps of artillery with a
chief at the head; third, the establishment of a maximum and minimum
limit for the Army. It would be difficult to overestimate the
improvement in the efficiency of our Army which these three reforms
are making, and have in part already effected.

The reorganization provided for by the act has been substantially
accomplished. The improved conditions in the Philippines have enabled
the War Department materially to reduce the military charge upon our
revenue and to arrange the number of soldiers so as to bring this number
much nearer to the minimum than to the maximum limit established by law.