in the army, relative rank and appointments to corps being made strictly with reference to merit; birth, wealth, influence of political friends—­all extraneous circumstances being excluded from consideration.  What can be more truly and thoroughly democratic than this?  What scheme can be better devised to supply our army with good officers, and to exclude from the military establishment the corrupting influence of party politics, and to prevent commissions in the army from being given to “the sons of wealthy and influential men, to the almost total exclusion of the sons of the poor and less influential men, regardless alike of qualifications and of merit?”

Unfortunately for the army and for the country this system ends here, and all further advancement is made by mere seniority, or by executive favoritism, the claims of merit having but little or no further influence.  Indeed, executive patronage is not infrequently permitted to encroach even upon these salutary rules of appointment, and to place relatives and political friends into the higher ranks of commissioned officers directly from civil life, “regardless alike of qualifications and of merit,” while numbers “of sons of the poor and less influential men,” who have served a probation of four or five years in military studies and exercises, and have proved themselves, in some thirty examinations made by competent boards of military officers, to be most eminently qualified for commissions, are passed by in utter neglect!  Our army is much more open to this kind of favoritism and political partiality, than that of almost any of the governments of Europe, which we have been accustomed to regard as aristocratic and wholly unfriendly to real merit.

In the Prussian service, in time of peace, the government can appoint no one, even to the subordinate grade of ensign, till he has followed the courses of instruction of the division or brigade-school of his arm, and has passed a satisfactory examination.  And, “no ensign can be promoted to a higher grade till after his promotion has been agreed to by the superior board or commission of examiners at Berlin, and his name has been placed on the list of those whose knowledge and acquirements (connaissances) render them qualified (aptes) for the responsible duties of their profession.  The nomination to the grade of second-lieutenant is not, even after all these conditions are fulfilled, left to the choice of the government.  When a vacancy occurs in this grade, the subaltern officers present to the commandant of the regiment a list of three ensigns who have completed their course of study; the commandant, after taking the advice of the superior officers of the regiment, nominates the most meritorious of these three to the king, who makes the appointment.”  The government can appoint to the engineers and artillery only those who have been instructed as eleves in the Berlin school of cadets and the school of artillery and engineers, and these appointments must be made in the order in which the pupils have passed their final examination.  In these corps the lieutenants and second captains can be promoted to a higher grade only after they have passed a satisfactory examination.  No political influence, nor even royal partiality, can interfere with this rule.