HONORS TO THE AMERICAN NAVY 



81 



-erning of Guam and of Tutuila there are 

 many ways in which it is educating and 

 promoting the welfare of its civilian em- 

 ployees and men in the service. The 

 three training schools at San Francisco, 

 Newport, and Norfolk take the young 

 recruit, and in shaping and molding him 

 for the peculiar needs of the Navy give 

 him a good practical education. Each 

 boy undergoes a course of instruction 

 before joining the fleet, and once on 

 board he is under the supervision of the 

 officers as to his cleanliness, personal 

 habits, and instruction, including every 

 kind of athletics. 



Ships are supplied with musical in- 

 struments and carefully selected libra- 

 ries, containing reference books and his- 

 torical and biographical treatises. 



There are also at the more important 

 recruiting stations classes of instruction 

 for those interested in the practical sci- 

 ences, such as mechanics, artificers, and 

 electricians, and thus the men become 

 proficient in their respective callings. 



Obedience, manliness, and intelligent 

 devotion to duty are the lessons incul- 

 cated in the mind of the enlisted man, 

 and the Navy is today a veritable train- 

 ing school of the manual arts — an insti- 

 tution which confers upon its members 

 the maximum of advantage consistent 

 with the necessities of the service, and 

 requires as tuition only the willing mind 

 and patriotism of its recruits. 



The educating processes are contin- 

 ually operating, not only aboard ship but 

 in our navy yards and stations. The 

 civilian employees, of which there are 

 about forty thousand, find a broad scope 

 for the exercise of their inventive genius 

 and for the application of their technical 

 knowledge and experience. Here, also, 

 the Navy takes the young man under in- 

 struction, through an apprentice system, 

 and offers the opportunity and incentive 

 for him to adopt and to perfect a special 

 occupation. Employment at navy yards 

 is strictly on the merit system, I am glad 

 to say ; political influence can neither se- 

 cure any privilege or precedence, nor en- 

 able an inferior workman to be retained 

 when discharges are necessary. Promo- 

 tion is by examination, and all of the 

 thirty to forty thousand are directly or 



indirectly under the Civil Service Com- 

 mission. 



In addition to the maintenance of a 

 practical training and educational system 

 on board ship and in the navy yards and 

 stations, the Navy has an educational ad- 

 junct at Annapolis, which, of itself, is an 

 institution of learning of a high charac- 

 ter. Founded by the Hon. George Ban- 

 croft in 1845, ^s membership has grown 

 from fifty-six to about eight hundred. It 

 has been of inestimable value to the naval 

 service and to the country, and besides 

 the technical training given to naval offi- 

 cers, it finds a general field of usefulness, 

 together with other educational institu- 

 tions, in the liberating and broadening 

 influence it exerts, and in sowing 

 throughout society in general its abstract 

 ideas and principles, through the me- 

 dium of the graduated personnel. 



Closely allied with the Naval Acad- 

 emy, so far as one of its great objects is 

 concerned, is the Naval Institute, 

 founded in 1873. The fundamental idea 

 in its establishment was "the advance- 

 ment of professional, literary, and scien- 

 tific knowledge in the navy," and that 

 aim is being attained year by year in a 

 most gratifying manner. It not only is 

 an agency for the dissemination of 

 knowledge throughout the service, but 

 owing to the large number of associate 

 members and members connected with 

 foreign navies, its publications find their 

 way without our own naval circles. They 

 become the medium for an expression 

 and interchange of ideas , upon every 

 timely professional question, and serve in 

 no small degree to engender and foster a 

 spirit of amity and partiality among the 

 navies of the world. 



Time forbids more than this passing 

 mention of the many divergencies of the 

 Navy in the past and present, which have 

 augmented the world's scientific knowl- 

 edge, stimulated universal trade, and pro- 

 moted international comity, but perhaps 

 enough has been said to indicate some- 

 thing of the spirit of enterprise and 

 peaceful endeavor that breathes through- 

 out this branch of the national power. 

 The world is the beneficiary of the diver- 

 sified activities of our Navy, and the 



