THE SANITARY CARE OF THE SOLDIER. 
203 
was that ? You had the good of the whole army to think of. What has 
come out of that removal of the two guns from the great bodies of the 
cavalry and the infantry ? You have developed this great Artillery Regi¬ 
ment which is able to do more and achieve more for the army than the old 
system could have done. I desire to say to you that evolution is work¬ 
ing out in the same way about ourselves in the medical service. If 
you look back on our old medical organisation we had, as it were, in 
each regiment our two galloper guns, viz., the Regimental Doctors and 
the little tiny hospital. This weak and sub-divided service failed on 
the Alma hillside in September, 1854, and came to utter grief in the 
corridors of the great Scutari Hospital in the winter troubles of 1854- 
1855. Our whole organisation to-day is based on the bitter lessons 
learned in that sad and painful campaign. This enfeebled and divided 
service could not do its war work, and there is no doubt whatever that 
while the withdrawal of the Medical Officers from the various corps 
and batteries of the army has caused considerable inconvenience and 
trouble, you must remember that the men who withdrew them made 
the change solely in the interest of war efficiency and to put an end 
for ever to the constant dread of break-down under the old system 
when we went into the field. But our war efficiency once assured it is 
the whole object and aim of the medical service to work in absolute 
sympathy and perfect brotherhood with the army as a whole. 
We have no hope or dream apart from its welfare in peace and in 
war, and we desire that every individual in the army, from the highest 
officer in its hierarchy to the youngest baby in the married quarters, 
shall be thoroughly and efficiently cared for, better and more thoroughly 
than in the best days of the regimental system. 
But we cannot give up our corps organisation and our autonomy for 
field work because we exist for war, that we may have an organisation 
which we can go out to in the field without the feeling that there is a 
constant risk of breaking down. Our station hospitals are far better 
medical organisations than were the old regimental hospitals ; and 
there is no difficulty whatever in developing a perfect medical staff to 
care for officers, their families, and the women and children of the 
army if only we receive a free hand and sympathetic aid in organising 
this branch of our work. 
If, in our devotion to the development of our garrison hospitals, 
sanitary work may seem to have taken a secondary place it is in no 
ways our intention nor our aim. We are before all things sanitarians 
and prevention is our watchword, and there is no difficulty whatever in 
carrying it out under our present unified medical system of organisa¬ 
tion if only we determine to work jointly with the intention to succeed. 
We desire to do a fuller sanitary work for the soldier than ever the 
best Regimental Doctor of the past system did for his regiment or 
battalion or battery, and it is perfectly feasible. Let us consider, then, 
how the medical service working as a unified corp carries out the sani¬ 
tary care of the soldier's life, and what is the routine of a sanitary 
officer's duties. Let us take any large English or Indian garrison and 
study its sanitary organisation so far as we the Army Medical Officers 
are concerned. Although it has been necessary to remove the Medical 
