. In addition the 36
districts each furnished 3 battalions of the reserve army and one battalion
of opltchenie, or 144,000 infantry, which with the cavalry regiments (3000
men) and the reserves of artillery, engineers, divisional cavalry, &c.
(about 10,000), would bring the grand total in time of war to about 338,000
officers and men with 18,000 horses. The men of the reserve battalions are
drafted into the active army as occasion requires, but the militia serves
as a separate force. Military service is obligatory, but Moslems may claim
exemption on payment of L20; the age of recruitment in time of peace is
nineteen, in time of war eighteen. Each conscript serves two years in the
infantry and subsequently eight years in the active reserve, or three years
in the other corps and six years in the active reserve; he is then liable
to seven years' service in the reserve army and finally passes into the
opltchenie. The Bulgarian peasant makes an admirable soldier--courageous,
obedient, persevering, and inured to hardship; the officers are painstaking
and devoted to their duties. The active army and reserve, with the
exception of the engineer regiments, are furnished with the .315"
Mannlicher magazine rifle, the engineer and militia with the Berdan; the
artillery in 1905 mainly consisted of 8.7- and 7.5-cm. Krupp guns (field)
and 6.5 cm. Krupp (mountain), 12 cm. Krupp and 15 cm. Creuzot (Schneider)
howitzers, 15 cm. Krupp and 12 cm. Creuzot siege guns, and 7.5 cm. Creuzot
quick-firing guns; total of all description, 1154. Defensive works were
constructed at various strategical points near the frontier and elsewhere,
and at Varna and Burgas. The naval force consisted of a flotilla stationed
at Rustchuk and Varna, where a canal connects Lake Devno with the sea. It
was composed in 1905 of 1 prince's yacht, 1 armoured cruiser, 3 gunboats, 3
torpedo boats and 10 other small vessels, with a complement of 107 officers
and 1231 men.

_Religion._--The Orthodox Bulgarian National Church claims to be an
indivisible member of the Eastern Orthodox communion, and asserts historic
continuity with the autocephalous Bulgarian church of the middle ages. It
was, however, declared schismatic by the Greek patriarch of Constantinople
in 1872, although differing in no point of doctrine from the Greek Church.
The Exarch, or supreme head of the Bulgarian Church, resides at
Constantinople; he enjoys the title of "Beatitude" (_negovo Blazhenstvo_),
recei