served three years with the colours and four in the Reserve.

It is interesting to enquire what in 1871 will be the effective total of this Landwehr. In order to reply exactly, it would be necessary to know the number of losses a contingent of 63,000 men suffers after 7, 8, 9, 10, and II years. In France we estimate the losses at 40 per cent. per annum, but this proportion seems to me to be too high for Prussia, where it cannot, I think, be reckoned at more than 31 or 32 per cent. We thus get the number of 229,000 men as representing the effective of 5 contingents of Landwehr to the 1st of October, 1871. If one only refers to the 1st of October, 1870, when the Landwehr will still include the survivors of the weak contingent of 1859, the figure is smaller, 214,000 men. The half is more than enough to bring up to their war strength all the Landwehr battalions of former Prussia. A Landwehr battalion on a war footing usually numbers 600 men, and to each three battalion regiments of the line correspond two Landwehr battalions: thus it will be sufficient to form 162 battalions, which correspond with the 81 regiments of former Prussia, with a total of 162 times 600, viz., '97,200 men. The Landwehr will therefore number on October 1, 1870, more than 100,000 men, who would be utilised, in case of need, to complete the Landwehr battalions in the annexed provinces and in the other States of the Confederation.

2. The Three Provinces annexed in 1866.-The Prussian organisation was not introduced into these provinces until after the conquest: therefore the law of 1861 will not

be in full execution until about 1878, or even 1880. Now, the corps d'armée of these provinces only includes two contingents of men of the Reserve, those of 1865

and 1866. That provision of the law of 1861 which requires four contingents of the Reserve, so important a provision for the good composition of the Field Army, by its enabling the battalions to be brought up to their full strength without having recourse to the Landwehr, will not then be carried out till October, 1871. At that time, and even from next summer, these troops will be able, in the event of a mobilisation, to complete their war strength by the calling in of their own reserves, without the help of those of the 8 provinces of former Prussia. The date of October 1, 1871, is, as will be seen, interesting on more than one head, for it puts the law of 1861 into full execution.

3. The other States of the Confederation. The minor States of Northern Germany are in the same state as the provinces annexed to Prussia; that is to say, that they were not subjected to Prussian laws until after 1866, and that it is only next autumn that they will be able to put their various corps on a war footing by the incorporation of their

own reserves.

As regards the Landwehr of these States, its organisation cannot be completed before 1878 or 1880. In the event of war, they would bring the battalions up to an effective of 600 men by incorporating the soldiers on the excess of the esta blishment of the Prussian Landwehr. I will here observe that the new Landwehr battalions, those of the three annexed provinces as well as those of the lesser States of the Confederation, are far from having their proper complement of officers. It is known that the Landwehr officers are principally recruited among one-year volunteers; but as the Prussian military institutions are only, since a few years, in operation in the new provinces and in the little States, the system of one-year

volunteers has only been able, up to the present time, of furnishing a very limited number of officers. Now it has hardly half of its proper establishment, and in all probability 8 or 10 years will elapse before the regulated complement of new Landwehr battalions can be reached. In the event of a mobilisation, it would be necessary to transfer a considerable number of subalterns from the Field Army, as was done in 1866.

It would, perhaps, be suitable to conclude the present despatch by reviewing the means by which the Prussians reduced the duration of service to 12 years (instead of 19), but as I have given, on this point, all necessary explanation in my despatch of June 2, 1869, I allow myself to dismiss it. I have simply endeavoured to point out the gradual progress which time has brought to the application of the military law of 1861, and to impress the importance of the year 1871. It will not only be notable for the debates of the new Reichstag, regarding the Articles 60 and 62 of the Constitution of the North German Confederation, but in addition it will mark, as I have desired to show, an interesting date at which the entire Prussian army will be thoroughly constituted conformably to the law of 1871. I sum up, in conclusion, the accomplished progress on this path.

On October 1, 1871, will be definitely constituted, conformably to the new law of military organisation:

(1) For Prussia before 1866:
Field Army, 3 contingents
with the colours, 4 in the Re-
serve. The Landwehr, 5 con-
tingents. That is the sum
total of the military force.
(2) For the 3 new pro-
vinces, and for all the States
of the Confederation: Field
Army, 3 contingents with

the colours, 4 contingents of Reserve.

The formation of the Landwehr will not be complete till towards 1880; but its battalions can be now put upon their war strength (600 men) by means of the incorporation of excess men of old Prussia.

Economical measures.
Anticipatory discharges.
Time of levying delayed.
Leave granted by the King.

The 1st of October is the normal date when the contingent of the third year of service passes into the Reserve, to be succeeded by the contingent of the new levy. But for several years the Prussian Government, for economical motives, discharges by anticipation into the Reserve the men of the third year of service, while it does not incorporate the new contingent till later on. The result of this double measure is the truest economy of all those which the Government tries to realise; for it represents in means the sum of the cost of pay and keep during three months of the third of the effective of the infantry of the line and field artillery.

This year the Royal order of February 17, providing for the anticipatory discharge into the Reserve, is the same as last year. The manœuvres ought to be finished in every corps d'armée by the 15th of September at latest, and the superior commanders are ordered to grant furloughs to the men who took part in the autumn manoeuvres, the first or second day after their return to their respective garrisons.

The order of February 17, then, fixes the number of recruits which each corps shall receive in return for the class sent to the Reserve. This total number, which constitutes the contingent of this year, is 95,540, including 477 men for the navy. Out of these 95,540, 86,860

But the necessity for economising is so great, that, in addition to the measures which I have just enumerated, Prussia adds another, which consists in giving temporary furloughs in considerable numbers to the troops of the second year.' They are called in Prussia congés du Roi. This measure, which I quoted in my despatch of December 2, 1869, and which is said to be provisional, dates from 1868. I here give its dispositions:

Every company of infantry sends 5 men on furlough; each battalion of chasseurs 64 men,' &c.-Vide my despatch of December 2, 1869.

BARON STOFFEL.

BERLIN: June 24, 1870.

N the annals of history the careaccount of the Anglicani, a very ancient nation who inhabit, at the date of our writing, certain islands in the Western Ocean."

:

There is, doubtless, much in the history of this nation well worthy of record; and had we uncontrolled possession of those oldest of metaphysical entities, time and space, we might dwell at some length on their manners and customs, their government and laws, their language and literature; and on each of these subjects we might have much to tell that would appear strange and even incredible to our readers for the Anglicani enjoy the reputation among the inhabitants of other countries of being a very curious people, possessing a vast number of peculiar customs and usages, which their neighbours ascribe to the isolated and insular position of the country they inhabit. For most of these particulars we must refer our readers to the wellknown sources of information indicated in the first words of this paper; we only purpose calling attention at present to the various diseases from which the Anglicani have suffered from time to time, together with the remedies they are accustomed to prescribe for their prevention, amelioration, and cure.

We do not happen to know whether the attempt has ever been made to gauge the true character and disposition of a people from its medical system, but such an attempt appears to us not only justifiable, but to contain within it the elements of successful enquiry. For it seems to us that its customary medicine reveals a nation in a far clearer and more conclusive manner than any other property or attribute belonging to it. So that, regarding it as a national characteristic, instead of

laws,' we would prefer the request, 'Let us fill their medicine bottles and pill-boxes, and we care not who undertakes the administration of all their other affairs.' Indeed, the power of medicine in forming the character of a people seems to us to have been strangely neglected in these days of enlightened enquiry. Now no one disputes the power of diet over a people; it is e.g. a long acknowledged fact that beefsteaks and ale, as the customary food of a nation, tend to produce valour, while the lighter diet of frogs has a precisely opposite tendency. Nor is this effect one confined to the human race; it is well known that bees can, by changing the diet of their young larva, transforma young worker bee into a Queen. But if mere food suffices to produce this effect, it is obvious that the power of medicine in the same direction will be even greater; for, first, it is more potent bulk for bulk than common everyday food, and secondly, it is taken in much larger quantities, by the average number of human beings, than all articles of diet, of whatever kind.

For ourselves, therefore, we believe unreservedly in the power of medicine; but great as our own faith is in such a necessary of human life, it is quite exceeded by the implicit trust and confidence which the Anglicani place in their doctors and doctors' stuff; and of this our narrative will, as it proceeds, afford abundant and incontrovertible proofs.

It is not our intention to go back to the earliest authentic history of the Anglicani; though we may remark in passing, that at no period of their history did they refuse to take a plentiful supply of pills and draughts, or to attach the greatest

possible importance to the calling of Medical Adviser. We would rather meet their stream of history a little lower than the fountain head; more especially as during some centuries of their earlier history, no change worthy of mention had taken place either in their medicine or in themselves.

About five hundred years ago, then, the constitutions of the Anglicani were authoritatively committed to the charge of a powerful army of quacks, who had established a quackdom in a country some way off, but which had extended its operations to the islands of the Anglicani. The method pursued by these men is one well known and approved among the quack profession. They directed their chief at tention, not to the removal of the disease, but to the blunting or disguising the chief obtrusive symptoms. For this purpose they administered intoxicating stimulants and powerful narcotics. The enormous amount of physic prescribed by them was another point of affinity which existed between their method and that pursued by ordinary quacks; some of their most valued patients did scarce anything else than mete out and swallow the prescribed draughts and pills from morning to night. They were, indeed, only able to effect this by an abnormal enlargement of the gullet acquired by them through their assiduous swallowing of strong draughts and large pills, continued for generations-an incidental proof, we may remark in passing, of the truth of those views we have already expressed as to the effect of physic in forming the character and aptitudes of a people. It was certain that at the time of our writing the largest and most nauseous draughts, together with pills of enormous magnitude, were continually swallowed by them without the slight est inconvenience. One virtue these quacks possessed, and this, too, in

common with quacks generally :they were exceedingly and even pressingly assiduous in their attention to their patients. The superintendence which they exercised vastly exceeded the care of the fondest mother for her offspring, or that of the most paternal government for the well-being of its subjects. As a set-off, however, to this single and solitary virtue, there were many objections which the Anglicani, or at least an influential part of them, had come to entertain on the subject of their medical men. 1. Their bills were inordinately long and excessively high. What the poor Anglicani were required to pay in a single year for the support of their army of quacks surpasses all power of human credulity. 2. They would seem not to have been satisfied with administering medicines of the ordinary fluid or solid kind; they had recourse to charms, conjurings, and cunning tricks. Nor was this only the case on an emergency, when extraordinary measures might be thought justifiable, but in the most trivial and common cases; indeed, they would work a charm as readily as mix a draught, and perform a conjuring trick as easily as make a pill. Now the Anglicani had become a little suspicious of these strange and unmedical methods of practising physic. Something to swallow they could understand; that, e.g., a certain measure of fluid or a globular mass of solid substance, physically entering the stomach through the normal passage of the throat, might cause a commotion through the system, this was a truth they could appreciate ; but that cures should be performed without any co-operation on their own part, by some cunning sleight-ofhand, this was to them a proposition so strange as to be almost incredible. 3. It was, moreover, discovered that the labels on the physic bottles could not always be depended on. An innocent-looking fluid would be