Show many undraped scarecrows Scare crows in military service APT harold W jones of the army c CAPT medical corps has made an investigation ti of the physical characteristics te of re W c coults r u I 1 t s accepted I croci for the army since the civil wat war as shown by the medical records I 1 and according to these records it seems that the standard of recruits la is ing T the h e measurements of recruits were examined and it is shown that the percentage percent age of strong men enlisted is by far the lowest at the present day only 33 per cent as against 57 per cent in 1875 the men considered weak at the present time are 43 per cent as against 19 per cent in 1875 attention Is called to tho the tact fact that the percentage of foreign born recruits has fallen from more than GO 60 per cent to about 9 per cent and it is suggested that many of the recruits obtained years ago were hardy german and irish emigrants of stocky build which may account for the great difference in the percentage of strong men in the tha f army now many recruits from the country districts of louisiana alabama and mississippi sis sippi are found to be ill fed and under weight and capt jones states that the universal custom of waiving several pounds under the minimum weight gets many an undraped scarecrow into the service capt jones further says bays we must take the figures cautiously As I 1 have said I 1 think there is no doubt that we are getting a different type of man in the service today from what we got years ago he may bo be just as good and he may have more brains but he does not seem to have as much brawn whether the present day recruit would last as well under the old conditions of hard bard frontier service with sanitary conditions far inferior to those of the present time la Is hard bard to say but I 1 think it doubtful if he would the high percentage of strong men in 1876 to 1979 may be due to tho the fact that recruiting at least in this part of the country was not very active then and tho the army could pick its men accepting only the hard test iest and the best |