To the objection that selection by public competitive examination will involve expense, we reply that any expense which will do away with the prejudices against the Academy, which the present system of patronage has done so much directly and indirectly to evoke and foster, and which will, at the same time, exclude incompetent and secure the services of vigorous, talented, well-trained officers for every arm of the service, will be well incurred. But in our opinion there will be no more expense in selecting and educating a given number of cadets on this plan than on the present. The two thousand cadets who were appointed by patronage and failed to graduate, cost the Government, directly and indirectly, each year a much larger sum than it would have taken to have excluded them in advance from the institution by competitive examination and filling their places by better men; and their exclusion by substituting better material would have been an incalculable gain to the Academy, facilitating its discipline, increasing the value of its instruction, and giving to the Army a larger number of competent officers.
Even under the despotic government of Austria the competitive system has been adopted for the higher places, and it has been adopted by Prussia and Italy. In Austria every subject can claim admission into the military schools on payment of the cost of his instruction; and all the appointments to the staff are on the competitive system. On this subject I read from the work upon Military Education and Schools, by Hon. Henry Barnard, who stands in the very front rank of the great educators, and who gives, to the competitive system the weight of a name which alone should incline us strongly in its favor:
The yearly examinations, the manner in which the marks of the monthly examinations tell on the final one, and the careful classification of the pupils in the order of merit, reminded us of the system of the Polytechnic more than any other school we have seen. ****
The arrangements for the general staff-school require more remark.
In our report upon Austrian schools we have specially noticed this school as remarkable for its thorough and open competitive character from first to last, and its very sensible plan of study. Admission to it is by competition, open to officers of all arms. The pupils are not unduly overburdened with work; perhaps there is even room for one or two more subjects of importance; but what is done seems to be done thoroughly. The officers are carefully ranked on leaving the school, according as the abilities they have displayed may be considered a criterion of their fitness for employment on the general staff; and in this order they enter the staff corps. The consequence is that every officer knows distinctly, from the time that he first competes for admission until his final examination on leaving, that the order in which he will enter the staff depends entirely on his own exertions and success at the school. It seemed to us that this open competition produced a spirit of confidence and energy in the students as great, if not greater, than any we met with elsewhere.
I quote from the same work in regard to the military education in Sardinia:
Admission into the artillery and engineer school may be considered the reward of the most distinguished pupils of the Accademia Militare, who, after spending their last year in that institution in the study of the higher mathematics, chemistry, and architectural drawing, are transferred for the completion of their education to the school of the artillery and engineers.
The staff-school, the formation of which dates from 1850, is chiefly frequented by officers of the infantry and cavalry, who must be below the age of twenty-eight years upon their entrance. It is carried on upon the competitive final examination, the ablest entering the staff corps in that order.
In the same work Mr. Barnard characterizes the Staff-School at Vienna:
The most striking features in the system of this school, both at the entrance and throughout the course, are, that it is distinctly competitive, that it admits very young officers, and that while the work is considerable, the subjects for study are not numerous. In these three points it differs considerably from the Prussian staff-school, in which the students are generally older, and the principle of competition is not so fully carried out. In the Austrian school the students are placed, on entering, in the order which their entrance examination has just fixed. They are examined once a month during their stay. On leaving the school their respective places are again determined, and they have a claim for appointments in the staff corps in the exact order in which they were placed on leaving the school. In Belgium, the competitive system is fully adopted.