fatigue duties which they would have found severe when in their full strength. That in consequence of this, and often solely in consequence of this, the men and officers have become harassed, feverish, exhausted of strength, depressed and despondent, and have communicated their feelings to friends at home, and finally to the whole community.

What remedy for this difficulty would meet the wishes of the people?

In the beginning of the war many hundred thousand men, not then able or disposed to volunteer at once, formed themselves into squads and companies for instruction in military drill, thus recognizing the necessity for large reserves to be put in training as an essential element of efficient national defense. Government, however, did not avail itself in any manner of the great strength and security offered in this disposition of the people, and members of these organizations having acquired some degree of proficiency in the manual and finding it impracticable, by purely voluntary action, to proceed further, have for the most part quietly disbanded. The disposition indicated by their formation, however, still exists.

If the Government had required one year ago that a million of militia should be put under systematic training, mainly in camps, the measure would have been exceedingly popular. It would be so now.

The choice of men being made in the first place by lot, and the employment of permanent substitutes being permitted, the laws of trade woulach permitted, the laws of possessed more valuable qualifications for military service than other service to the country. What a citizen is disposed and able to pay for a substitute to take his place in a camp of militia as a general rule, indicates approximately the importance to the community of the function he is already performing in the industrial economy of society. The services of those who are influenced by cowardice, laziness, or disloyalty, to pay extravagantly, however valueless they may be to the community in which they live, must be still less desirable in a military point of view, while men who, from ardent patriotism and inclination for a military life, are induced to make unusual sacrifices rather than to procure substitutes, are of the highest military value. A million of militia deliberately gathered as we have proposed would consist in large part of young men without important business trusts or dependent families, but who yet have, at present, such obligations resting upon them that they cannot volunteer. Thousands of such men would gladly accept a duty overriding those obligations, and legally and morally disengaging them from their present home-keeping duties.

Suppose that a million men had been thus in a great measure detached in advance from their ordinary business entanglements and obligations, and each man accustomed, under training however imperfect, to act in company and regimental relations with others. When the sudden and urgent call for 300,000 volunteers was made a month ago, is it likely there would have been a month's delay in meeting it? Had there been such a resort for recruits, would there have been occasion for this call? We believe not. We believe that had such a reserve been established every regiment of the Army of the Potomac would have been kept by volunteers from it at very nearly its maximum strength, and in this case, that the great loss of life and depression of spirits which occurred in that army through disease and depression of spirits which occurred in that army through disease consequent upon fatigue and exhaustion would have been in a great measure avoided.