SHORT MEN FOR SOLDIERS.

Inangahua Times, Volume IV, Issue 69, 17 September 1877, Page 2

SHORT MEN FOR SOLDIERS.

(pALL MALL GAZETTE.) Tbe standard of height for the G-erman infantry is at present fixed at 1.57 metres, or about sft l|in. A medical man, writing to a German military paper, points out that by thus summarily rejecting all men who are below a fixed height, the State annually " losfes the services of a very large number of men who would make excellent soldiers. A short man, if well proportioned, will the writer argues, not only be able to make as long marches, and bear as much fatigue, as a taller man, but will eren excel the latter in the , power of endurance. The length of pace and tb.B " cadence" which are employed with advantage by the one may riot, it is admitted, suit the other ; and a small man may not be able to use with full effect the weapon carried by his larger brother-in-arras. But iet the short man march with a step suitable to his stature, and let him be armed with a firelock somewhat shorter thabe stock, and the writer maintains that he will be able to render excellent s erv cc. Consequently, it is proposed that all the men "who being below the required height, are now rejected shall, provided always that in other respects

they are well developed, be embodied in a separate corps — a corps whfcb, it is promised will soon contain, so far as physical performances are concerned, the elite of infantry regiments. If the measure round the chest after expiration is equal to half his height, and if the chest is well formed and baa sufficient depth, a man even though two or three inches below the present standard for the German army, will be able to do more work than many of the taller and by no means bo wellproportioned men serving in the infantry. In the others arms it is admitted that a certain stature is essential. The mounted soldier must i have a sufficient length _of leg to enable him to mount and sit his horse, and the artilleryman must be tall enough to enablehim to work, to limber and unlimber his gun ; but mere height is, it is arged, in no way a necessary qualification for a man who has to fight on foot on a modern field , of battle. «