on of the fliers
before they were allowed to leave the ground. An unusually large number
of deaths took place in the United States during practise flights of the
aviators early in the spring of 1918, and in May the government
authorized the appointment of an adequate number of college trainers to
carry out the work of conditioning the airmen. Before this time reports
of conditions in England and France established the fact that more
deaths of aviators had been caused by the flight of the airmen when in
poor physical condition than by any defect in the flying-machine.

In all, Mr. Camp's work has been adequately recognized by the Navy
Department as of the greatest benefit, and the constant stream of
testimony from the reserve seamen attached to the various stations that
"there is no place like the navy," is, in some part due to the
activities of this veteran Yale athlete and his associates.

CHAPTER XIV

The United States Marine Corps--First Military Branch Of The National
Service To Be Sanctioned By Congress--Leaving For The War--Service Of
The Marines in Various Parts of the Globe--Details of Expansion of
Corps--Their Present Service All Over The World

When orders came for some 2,700 United States marines to go to France
there was little circumstance, or general fuss and feathers, at the
League Island Navy Yard, in Philadelphia. The Marine Corps, which is
under control of the Navy Department, was quite used to such things.
Through all the years when trouble had occurred in our island
possessions, in the West Indies, Central America, or where not, it was
the marines who received orders to start out and settle things. As a
consequence, orders to go to France were merely in the line of the
customary day's work.

Thus the only ceremony characterizing the departure of Colonel Charles
A. Doyen and his men from the navy-yard at Philadelphia, was a brief
speech by Major-General George Barnett, commandant of the corps, to the
officers of the field and staff of the overseas outfit, and to the
company officers. No colors were unfurled. No reporters or press
photographers were present. The regimental bandsmen went to war with
their instruments cased and rifles over their shoulders. On the
navy-yard parade-ground a sailor baseball nine from one of the
battleships was at practice. The marines slipped away so quietly that
the ball-players did not know until afterward that they had missed
seeing the departure of 2,700 m