PEACE ESTABLISHMENTS AND WAR SALARIES. 163 



degree, however, is the argument with its consequent objec- 

 tion applicable in the case when scientific branches of the 

 military service the artillery and engineering branches, that 

 is to say come under notice. 



According to parliamentary estimates not long ago, the 

 cost of the British army was between fourteen and fifteen 

 millions. The sum-total is enormous in proportion to the 

 numerical strength of the army supported. Whether the cost 

 be or be not disproportionately great, is beyond the scope of 

 present argument, the purport of which is to show that 

 owing to the employment of engineer lieutenant-colonels in 

 government manufacturing establishments, and as paid mem- 

 bers of committees either the scientific branch of the mili- 

 tary service is over-supplied with officers, or that the military 

 service of the country is prejudiced ; its efficiency being 

 affected by the withdrawing of a portion of its scientific 

 officers from their purely military avocations, and their em- 

 ployment in civilian capacities, mostly needing a special 

 training for effective discharge. Whichever of these alterna- 

 tives be adopted, the financial loss to the country follows as 

 the corollary. 



The expression ( government manufacturing establishment* 

 is one that may perhaps need explanation. The government 

 is, and perhaps necessarily must be, manufacturer in certain 

 technical branches appertaining to national defence. The 

 government of this country is less exclusively manufacturing 

 than perhaps any other. The tendency of circumstances and 

 times in which we live, is to abolish, more and more, the 

 manufacturing function of the British government, and to 

 commit the war-resources of the country to the charge of pri- 

 vate competition. 



Thus, taking ordnance and their projectiles, the manufac- 

 ture is partly accomplished by government, and partly dele- 

 gated to private firms. British small- arms, again, are not 

 exclusively turned out at Enfield, but are manufactured by 



