Show BOYS AT KONT some weeks before war measures actually began a french new newspaper summing up the respective merits of our soldiers and sailors and those of Sp spain ittin concluded that the latter r had a good force fame of seasoned men man on land and sea while the american army was wae largely on paper probably the manila affair did something in the direction of opening that editors eyes if not no dispelling his prejudices but it is not very consequential anyway from much nearer homb ho mb can occasionally sio sion nally adly be heard similar statements even now that our men are raw and rudisell undisciplined lamed that they are not fit to go ge to le the front yet and so on such conclusions are in most eases cases erroneous it nothing worse replying to a statement to the effect that hat our troops are not prepared for work at the fronts the chicago times herod pointedly observes that such feeling should not exten showing ahswing that there to is no foundation for tt it the troops being hurried forward forwar tf for service in cuba and in the philippine islands are not raw recruits A majority of them have been drilling five years or more some of them ten years this is particularly true of the officers the most moat of them are skilled soldiers many of them know what actual war is they have the volunteers well disciplined and these are as brave as the untrained levies which did such heroic service at antietam Antle tam fredericksburg shiloh and on scores of other battlefields the poorest drilled regiments in the national guard are as regulars compared with hundreds of af regiments that were then plunged into battle and did valiant service the national guard of the country converted into united states volunteers it is shown has been readier for war at any time during the past ten years than the volunteers of the sixties were a year after the war began in view of these facts the public can well afford to cease worrying about raw troops being pushed to the front too soon for there are no raw troops save the few recruits needed to fill up companies and a few days of their mingling with the veterans of the guard will fit them to keep the pace in an engagement this would seem to be the proper view to take and being so opinions and statements should be made to correspond A soldiers or seamans nans experiences are none too comforting and it is injudicious it if not unpatriotic to add slighting words to their burdens the american warrior on land or sea seems to be invested with an intuition which enables him to be equal to all requirements from the beginning and of none will this be found truer than of 0 contribution to the great cause |