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in sädition, to the necessary professional acquirements, in the interests of the sewe ought to be taken into account. The SETPROD-MANO" Omanding a bearer company should be a thorough distant active and strong, and a fearless rider. he shond de d with tact, discretion, and knowledge of ola satan 1, are to direct judiciously and control the varied sosomal amcerned with his charge. He should have a quick pengen ve of the leading features of ground, and some acquaint& exigencies, in order to dispose of his bearers, pni o vocable, the dressing-stations, with the best advantage. The super major in charge of a field hospital need not have scare of bese qualities in the same degree; but they are all yoses, in addition to knowledge of hospital management, to arabe er to discharge the duties of his position with credit. Phey are qualities which become less needed in the medical ods on duty as directors of stationary hospitals; and still less P those of general hospitals, where methodical habits, the power of close application, in addition to high professional ability, are of most importance as regards the duties which have to be directed and done in them. Unless consideration is given to these points in the selection of medical officers for particular charges, especially for such a command as that of a bearer company, failure must be expected. Under any circumstances, such charges present diculties for medical officers who have not been habituated to them; but these difliculties will be greatly increased if the most Failure under such suitable are not chosen for meeting them. circumstances will be less the fault of the medical officer holding the charge, than of those who have placed him in it.

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Supplementary medical officers. No number has been calculated for the medical officers who have to accompany the convoys of sick and wounded from the field hospitals to the hospitals on the lines of communication and at the base, or for those with the men invalided to England. These numbers must vary with the varying necessities which the military operations give rise to, and many other circumstances; in the same way as The number of hospitals opened must depend upon the changing exigencies of the war, and the circumstances and condition of the troops engaged in it. There must always be a reserve of surgeons available, so that, when medical officers are detached for special purposes from any particular service to which they have been previously told off, they may be replaced from this supplementary staff; just as surgeons despatched from the base to England on duty, on account of ill-health, injury, or from any other cause, have to be replaced by others from England. Whatever may be the number of the surgical personnel originally assigned to troops on active service, it has generally been estimated that proceeding ye of one-fourth of that number ought to be maintained, in

order to have the means ready for meeting unexpected demands, and replacing casual losses from sickness or injury. There will probably be less difficulty in meeting such demands in future, as there is every reason to expect adequate reliefs will be available from the ranks of the Volunteer Medical Staff and from Voluntary Aid Societies. Help from these sources is contemplated in the Army Medical Regulations, and special rules are laid down regarding the appointment of volunteer surgeons and their disposal in the field. All medical officers of the auxiliary forces, and all civil surgeons who volunteer assistance, whose services are authorised by the general officer in command, on the recommendation of the principal medical officer of the army, are to be distributed for duty in such of the hospitals on the lines of communication and base as the principal medical officer may deem expedient. They are to act under the medical officers in charge of the hospitals to which they are attached. If the representative of a Volunteer Aid Society, not being a medical practitioner, brings under his direction a staff of surgeons and attendants whose services are authorised, the members of this staff are in like manner to be placed under the authority and at the disposal of the principal medical officer, who will allot such duties to them as he may think advisable. No civilian is to be allowed to visit a hospital unless he is provided with a pass signed by the medical officer in charge of it.

B. THE HOSPITAL AND AMBULANCE ESTABLISHMENTS NECESSARY, AND THEIR ORGANISATION.

General remarks.—It has been already mentioned that prior to the changes introduced in the Medical Department in 1873, there were only two kinds of hospitals in the British armyregimental and general hospitals.

But in time of war, when an army was in the field, it always happened that the regimental hospitals were so reduced in capacity that in fact they practically ceased to exist. Had they been maintained as in time of peace, they would have interfered with one of the most essential qualities of an army-a quality now become more important than ever-viz., its mobility. On the army going into cantonments or winter quarters, or becoming stationary for any lengthened period, the regimental hospitals might be expanded, but only to be again reduced when the army resumed active movement. On the other hand, general hospitals, which served the purpose of preventing regimental hospitals from being encumbered with patients, and were open to patients from every corps, were always increased in number and importance according to the nature and duration of the military operations.

Such general hospitals must always exist in time of war, and as they have to be established in situations possessing certain definite relations to the army moving in the field, they have been usually distinguished by names in accordance with these positions.

It will be convenient to study the hospital establishments in the order in which they are usually formed on a theatre of warfare, viz., from the base of the military operations to the field of action. Regarding them in this way they will consist of(1) the principal general hospital, and its subsidiary establishments at the base of operations; (2) hospitals on the lines of communication; and (3) field hospitals, including (4) dressingstations and (5) regimental stations. The necessary communications between these hospital establishments will have to be maintained by (6) field ambulance conveyances; (7) railway ambulance trains; or (8) convoys by road, or river hospital ships. Hospital ships and transport vessels will be used for communicating with (9) the permanent general hospitals in England.

The nature and formation of each of these several establishments, and the purposes they subserve, will now be described.

1. The principal general hospital at the base of operations. -When an army operating against an enemy belongs to a Continental power, the principal general hospital at the base is placed at the most convenient and safest situation near the frontier. When an expeditionary force starts from an insular country like Great Britain, the practice has hitherto been to establish it in a suitable building on the sea-coast, at some place where the army is collected, and from which it proceeds to its special destination. Into this hospital the soldiers who have become disabled from injury or illness in the transports since their departure from England have been at once admitted, and subsequently those who have fallen sick while the army has been in process of being formed at the place of rendezvous. Here also by degrees the great bulk of the sick and wounded from the troops in the field have been at last received. From it the patients who have not appeared likely to convalesce for a long time, or who have been permanently disabled by their wounds, after being arranged for in accordance with the invaliding regulations, have been discharged and sent by hospital ships or transports to England. The stores required for the surgical service, the apothecary's and all other hospital stores, were usually received here as they arrived from home; and from it the various supplies were drawn which the hospitals in front from time to time required.

Existing regulations have modified the functions of the general hospital at the base in several respects. It is still, as formerly, organised for receiving all patients sent from the hospitals in front and on the lines of communication, as well as every one who may fall sick at the base and is entitled to treatment in a military

hospital; but there is now attached to it a military depôt where many of the duties, not strictly medical, connected with the men passing through the hospital, are performed. A hospital ship moored at the seaboard or anchored a short distance off may be employed in place of a general hospital on shore, or may be used merely as supplementary to it. In any case, whether on shore or floating, the military depôt will be attached to it as part of the organisation of the general hospital. This depôt is directed to be under the command of a military officer of experience, and is provided with a considerable staff under his orders. It is designed for receiving all men discharged from further treatment in the hospital, whether men in restored health or invalids, and for arranging all matters connected with their subsequent movements, whatever may be their destination. The conduct of all correspondence not of a medical nature with the various corps to which the men passing through the hospital belong, the settlement of questions relating to their pay, the punishment of men committing offences while patients in hospital, and the disposal of many other matters not of a medical nature, are to be carried out at the military depôt. The necessary guards and fatigue parties for the hospital are also provided by the depôt on the requisition of the P.M.O. of the hospital. By these means it is intended that the medical officers doing duty in the general hospital shall be relieved from many matters which would otherwise have to be arranged by them, and thus have more time at their disposal for their professional work. If the general hospital at the base should from any cause have to change its position, the military depôt would have to move with it; indeed, from all points of view, it has to be regarded as an essential part of its organisation. The depôt for medical and surgical stores at the base has no longer any connection with the general hospital; it is separately constituted, with its own regulations, and its staff is included in that of the principal medical officer who is on the staff of the general commanding the base. The circumstances of war always cause the general hospital at the base to be the first hospital occupied, and the last used, in the course of a campaign whenever it takes place in a foreign country which is not occupied by the invading army after active hostilities have ceased.

2. Hospitals on the lines of communication.-These hospitals are placed at intervals along the lines of communication, and are intermediate between the movable field hospitals in front, and the base of the military operations at the port of embarkation. In the official publication on Field-Hospital Establishments they are designated either 'stationary' or 'general' hospitals. The former are, however, only temporarily stationary while required for their special service, and are equipped with a view to their being readily moved when necessary; while the general hospitals are larger

establishments, originally so called from receiving the sick and wounded of all corps alike without distinction. They are so placed along the lines of communication, whether they are railroads, ordinary vehicular roads, or water communication, as to receive without difficulty the wounded from the field hospitals. They are provided with sufficient medical and surgical stores for gravely disabled men to be treated and cared for in them until they are in a fit state to be sent on to the principal general hospital at or near the base, or who are waiting for opportunities of being sent there.

It is a recognised military principle that the sick and wounded of an army in face of an enemy are to be passed on as quickly As possible from the field to hospitals in rear. Disabled troops

are not merely so many inefficient men, requiring food, care, and attention, but they would be serious hindrances to a commander if they were retained with the army. Neither could such patients be left in places devoid of due military protection; nor could the field surgeons be spared to be left behind with them if they were so placed, for they are constantly wanted with the army moving in the field, to meet the case of a fresh engagement occurring with the enemy. The field hospitals which are with the main body of the army have always to be kept in the lightest marching order possible, ready to afford temporary help and treatment to whatever number of wounded may result from the operations in which the troops are engaged. Hence it is that successive hospitals have to be established between the position of the army in the field as it advances, and the sphere of operations behind. They prevent an accumulation of disabled men in the movable field hospitals by taking the men from them; they benefit the patients by preventing any interruption in their treatment; and they assist in maintaining the strength of the active force in front by affording the means of speedily restoring to efficiency those who are only slightly injured, or are suffering from slight and temporary ailments. They also form the establishments where the results of most of the gravor cases of wounds and sickness are determined prior to the transport of the patients to the base for removal to convalescent stations, or their transfer as invalids to the home country. Even in the earliest period of a campaign, before any conflict occurs with the enemy, the men who fall sick on the line of march require provision of this kind to be made for their reception. The number who leave the ranks from sickness, under the most favourable ciroumstances, when troops are on the move, is often remarkable. It has been calculated that from 4 to 5 in every 100 men will require hospital treatment in the course of a ten days' march. In an army corps of 36,000 men this means from 1440 to 1800 pationts to be treated. If circumstances be unfavourable-whether As to climate, ground, diet, weather, or otherwise-the number of g hospital treatment may be expected to be pro