ished military schools for the education of their officers and the
instruction of their soldiers.

France, which has long taken the lead in military science, has six
military schools for the instruction of officers, containing in all more
than one thousand pupils, and numerous division and regimental schools
for the sub-officers and soldiers.

Prussia maintains some twelve general schools for military education,
which contain about three thousand pupils, and also numerous division,
brigade, garrison, and company schools for practical instruction.

Austria has some fifty military schools, which contain in all about four
thousand pupils.

Russia has thirty-five engineer and artillery technical schools, with
about two thousand pupils; twenty-five military schools for the
noblesse, containing eight thousand seven hundred pupils; _corps
d'armee_ schools, with several thousand pupils; regimental schools, with
eleven thousand pupils; and brigade-schools, with upwards of one hundred
and fifty-six thousand scholars;--making in all about two hundred
thousand pupils in her military schools!

England has five military schools of instruction for officers, number of
pupils not known; a military orphan school, with about twelve thousand
pupils; and numerous depot and regimental schools of practice.

The smaller European powers--Belgium, Sardinia, Naples, Spain, Portugal,
Denmark, Sweden, Wurtemberg, Bavaria, Baden, have each several military
schools, with a large number of pupils.

It is seen from these statistics, that the European powers are not so
negligent in educating their officers, and in instructing and
disciplining their soldiers, as some in this country would have us
believe.

Washington, Hamilton, Knox, Pickering, and others, learning, by their
own experience in the war of the American revolution, the great
necessity of military education, urged upon our government, as early as
1783, the importance of establishing a military academy in this country,
but the subject continued to be postponed from year to year till 1802.
In 1794, the subaltern grade of _cadet_ was created by an act of
Congress, the officers of this grade being attached to their regiments,
and "furnished at the public expense with the necessary books,
instruments, and apparatus" for their instruction. But this plan of
educating young officers at their posts was found impracticable, and in
his last annual message, Dec. 7th, 1796, Washington urged again