28 LEADING AMERICAN MEN OF SCIENCE 



and good-will of large numbers of people, but Rumford had in a 

 marked degree the happy faculty of winning the confidence of 

 both superiors and subordinates. Reformers with both zeal and 

 tact, such as he possessed, are not common in any field of endeavor. 



Rumford's first work with the army was to rid it of " graft." 

 The officers sold outfits to the recruits on credit, and ran them 

 each year deeper in debt, for the allowance for food and clothing 

 was insufficient, while the resulting bickering and bargaining 

 between officer and soldier were destructive of discipline. 



Rumford's first criticism was that the officer had too much to 

 do with his men. An officer should not be at once commandant, 

 trustee and merchant in his company. Next, that "it is not only 

 unwise but also in a certain sense cruel to put honest men in a 

 position in which their passions can be excited by opportunity 

 and example." He saw, too, that the soldiers kept in idleness in 

 barracks degenerated, and when they were quartered in farmers' 

 houses they were such a terror to the country that the people paid 

 them to stay away. The soldier despised the citizen, and the 

 citizen hated th*e soldier. 



To obviate this, Rumford determined to make the soldier a 

 citizen and to put him in a condition where he would contribute 

 to the wealth and welfare of the country instead of being a drain 

 upon it. 



To do this, Count Rumford increased the pay and privileges 

 of the soldiers, improved the quarters, and cut out from their 

 drill all obsolete and dispensable portions. Schools were estab- 

 lished in all the regiments for instructing the soldiers and their 

 children in reading, writing and arithmetic, and all books and 

 materials were furnished gratis. With his characteristic economy, 

 he provided that the paper used in the schools should be after- 

 wards made into cartridges, so it cost nothing. The soldiers were 

 employed in such public works as draining marshes, building 

 dykes and making roads; the military bands, that he introduced, 

 playing for them while they worked. Military gardens were pro- 

 vided, and each soldier on enlistment was given a plot of ground, 

 to remain in his possession as long as he cultivated it and kept it 



