THE MODERN RECRUIT.

Waikato Argus, Volume VII, Issue 530, 21 December 1899, Page 3

THE MODERN RECRUIT.

AT the United Service Institution, Lieu-tenant-Colonel C M. Douglas, V.C., M.D. (hon. brigade Burgeon), read a Saper on " The Recruit from a Depot [edical Officer's Point of View." Major-General J. F. Mauriae, C.li, R.A., waa in the chair. Colonel Douglas said that a comparatively small collection of highly-trained soldiers formed the nucleus of the Army, round which were aggregated a heterogeneous mixture constituting the " Auxiliary Forces." Speaking of the recruits who enlisted in the north of England and in Scotland, he said the great majority weresallow.downcast.nondescriptyouths, mostly artisans. The most cheerful were those who had served a training or two in the Militia. Candidates were carefully examined in respect ot weight, height, circumference of chest, lung and heart, head and teeth. A really good set of teeth was rare except among agricultural recruits. The minimum physical standard was low —weight, 1151 b. ; height, sft. 3jrin. ; minimum girth of cheat, 33in. ; age, 18 vears. This was not a high type of British male. But the short, muscular, well-formed man often made a good soldier, and was more active than the big man. Professor Dudley Sarjent, of Harvard University, took the mrasurementa of several thousands of American students from 16 to 26. This was the averaec result age, 22£ years ; weight, 1561 b. ; height, sft Uiin. ; girth of chest—34£ minimum, 39i maximum ; right upper arm; ll£in. ; right forearm, Of the British recruit the results were on the averageage, 19$ years ; height, sft. sJin. ; weight, 1261 b ; girth of chest, 33£ minimum, 35 maximum ; right upper arm, lOJin. ; right forearm. 9iin. The usual average of rejections was a little over a third ; but sometimes they amounted to two-thirds, and in one case the Army medical officer declined the whole of a batch of 25 or 30. It was said the foreign recruit was worse than ours ; but the comparison was not fair. Compulsory service was a net enclosing all the fishes, big and little ; in our net the meshes were made as large as wo dared, vAj.'r to capture only the best fish and otheis go. Want and hunger were, unfortunately for us, the invisible recruiting sergeants of a great proportion of our Army ; and the men were too often black sheep. But the effect of drill and discipline on the degenerates in our ranks was amazing, and on the whole the raw material of the Army was not quite so bad as many pessimists would have us believe. Unfortunately, soldiering was a trade looked down upon in the working class, who disliked discipline and longed for better pay and shorter hours. Within his own remembrance tho old recruiting sergeants would have laughed at the recruits of to-day. The Army of the past had in it many blackguards, but fewer degenerates ; the Bpecies was almost unknown among them. Ihc inference was that there was more of the fighting spirit in the blackguards than in the degenerates, aud it was the fighting spirit which was essential,