AND WAR SALARIES. 171 



riving his intelligence from subordinates, whom he is almost 

 necessarily driven to ignore as to the part they play in ad- 

 vancing his own technical education? It is a remark com- 

 monly enough made, that to put a man in position to exercise 

 authority, without the possession of abilities needful to the 

 rational exercise of the same, is to solicit a meddlesome inter- 

 ference, more prejudicial than complete inaction. 



It is not pleasant for any right-minded man to be under 

 the imputation, self-conveyed, that he is a mere sinecurist, 

 eating idle salt; accordingly the danger is ever imminent 

 that one so circumstanced will exercise the power belonging 

 to him, to the prejudice of others on whom many respon- 

 sibilities should legitimately fall. One has seen illustrations 

 of this evil tendency ; the following is an example : At the 

 beginning of the Russian war, it was resolved to give a trial 

 to Hale's rotatory war-rockets, which differ from the ordinary 

 Congreves in the particular of requiring no sticks. Mr. Hale 

 was engaged to proceed to Woolwich and superintend the 

 manufacture of these his own projectiles. Prior to the time 

 of Mr. Hale's visit to Woolwich, it had been the habit fol- 

 lowed in the rocket department to charge the iron rocket- 

 cases with composition by monkey-ramming ; but Mr. Hale 

 had learned, through experience, that for his projectiles at 

 least the quiet force of hydrostatic pressure supplied a more 

 eligible method of impaction. Now the operation of monkey- 

 ramming, involving a succession of sharp blows, could not 

 have been prosecuted with the necessary safety had the 

 rammers been made of steel. Gun-metal was the material 

 of these monkey-rammers, and necessarily. It sufficed to 

 withstand without bending the utmost percussive efforts of 

 the monkey-ramming machine. To have expected, however, 

 that gun-metal should have withstood hydrostatic force with- 

 out bending and warping, would have been to display un- 

 acquaintance with the altered conditions introduced, as well 

 as ignorance to how great an extent the conditions of danger 



