captains to the
companies. As the great wheel in the factory turns all the machinery, so
one mind moves the whole army. The general-in-chief must designate the
road which each corps shall take, the time when they are to march, where
they are to march to, and sometimes the hour when they must arrive at an
appointed place. The corps commanders must direct which of their
divisions shall march first, what roads they shall take, and where they
shall encamp at night. The division commanders direct what brigades
shall march first. No corps, division, or brigade commander can take any
other road than that assigned him, without producing confusion and
delay.

The army must have its food regularly. Think how much food it takes to
supply the city of Boston, or Cincinnati every day. Yet here are as many
men as there are people in those cities. There are a great many more
horses in the army than in the stables of both of those cities. All must
be fed. There must be a constant supply of beef, pork, bread, beans,
vinegar, sugar, and coffee, oats, corn, and hay.

The army must also have its supplies of clothing, its boots, shoes, and
coats. It must have its ammunition, its millions of cartridges of
different kinds; for there are a great many kinds of guns in the
regiments,--Springfield and Enfield muskets, French, Belgian, Prussian,
and Austrian guns, requiring a great many different kinds of ammunition.
There are a great many different kinds of cannon. There must be no lack
of ammunition, no mistake in its distribution. So there is the
Quartermaster's Department, the Commissary, and the Ordnance Department.
The Quartermaster moves and clothes the army, the Commissary feeds it,
and the Ordnance officer supplies it with ammunition. The
general-in-chief has a Quartermaster-General, a chief Commissary and a
chief Ordnance officer, who issue their orders to the chief officers in
their departments attached to each corps. They issue their orders to
their subordinates in the divisions, and the division officers to those
in the brigades.

Then there is a Surgeon-General, who directs all the hospital
operations, who must see that the sick and wounded are all taken care
of. There are camp surgeons, division, brigade, and regimental surgeons.
There are hospital nurses, ambulance drivers, all subject to the orders
of the surgeon. No other officer can direct them. Each department is
complete in itself.

It has cost a great deal of thought, lab