The students also execute certain works, such as the making of fascines, gabions, saucissons, repair of revetments of batteries, platform, setting the profiles, defilement, and construction of a fieldwork, different kinds of sap, plan and establishment of a camp for a battalion of infantry, &c.
Under the head of artillery, fifteen lectures are given, commencing with the resistance of fluids, movement of projectiles, solution of problems with the balistic pendulum, deviation of projectiles, pointing and firing guns; small arms, cannon, materials of artillery, powder, munition, fireworks for military purposes; range of cannon, artillery for the attack or defense of places or coasts, field artillery, military bridges.
The students are practically taught artillery drill with field and siege guns, practice with artillery, repair of siege batteries, bridges of boats or rafts.
The ten lectures allowed for the course of military legislation have for their object the explanation of the principles, practice, and regulations relating to military law, and the connection with the civil laws that affect military men.
The twelve lectures on what is called military administration relate to the interior economy of a company, and to the various matters appertaining to the soldier’s messing, mode of payment, necessaries, equipment, lodging, &c.
Military art and history is divided into three parts. The first, of five lectures, relates to the history of military institutions and organization. The second, of fifteen lectures, refers to the composition of armies and to considerations respecting the various arms, infantry, cavalry, état-major, artillery and engineers, and the minor operations of war. The third part, of seven lectures, gives the history of some of the most celebrated campaigns in modern times. In the practical exercises, the students make an attack or defense of a work or of a system of fieldworks during their course of fortification, or of a house, farm, village, in the immediate vicinity of the school, or make the passage of a river.
The students receive twenty lectures in German, and are required to keep up a knowledge of German writing.
[EXAMINATIONS AT THE SCHOOL.]
The examinations at the end of the first year take place under the superintendence of the director and assistant director of studies. They are conducted by the professor of each branch of study, assisted by a répétiteur, each of whom assigns a credit to the student under examination, and the mean, expressed as a whole number, represents the result of the student’s examination in that particular branch of study. The examination in military instruction for training (in drill and exercises) is carried on by the officers attached to companies, under the superintendence of the commandant of the battalion, and that relating to practical artillery by the officer in charge of that duty.
The pupils’ position is determined, as at the Polytechnic, partly by the marks gained at the examination, partly by those he has obtained during his previous studies. In other words, the half of the credit obtained by a student at this examination in each subject is added to the half of the mean of all the credits assigned to him, in the same subject, for the manner in which he has replied to the questions of the professor and répétiteur during the year; and the sum of these two items represents his total credit at the end of the year. The scale of credit is from 0 to 20, as at the Polytechnic.