CONSCRIPTION OR UNIVERSAL SERVICE?
[To ma EDITOR OF TIM "EPRCTATOR."1 SIR,—At a time when universal service is often spoken of as conscription, it may be allowable to submit definitions of each —on approval.
Conscription is essentially the old rough-and-ready way of calling for a certain number of men without caring how they are obtained. If sufficient volunteers are not forthcoming lots may be drawn, and when a well-to-do man is " unlucky " he is at liberty to pay a substitute. Though the French coined the word and carried " conscription " to extreme lengths, Shakespeare had already described its results in Henry IV., Part 1., Act IV., Sce:m ii.—" If I be not ashamed of my soldiers, I am a soused gurnet," &c.—and just as Falstaff refused to "march through Coventry with them," so might any statesman decline to revive the institution.
Not so with universal service, originally introduced in Prussia after her disastrous defeat by Napoleon in 1806, it provides that every sizable, well-behaved youth on reaching military age shall be trained unless the law exempts him, and shall serve in defence of his country for a period which varies in different countries. The best British authorities agree, however, that if a child be taught its duty from the first, and be given appropriate facilities to practise it in boyhood, the only training needed at eighteen years of age is for the infantry four months, and for the other arms six, followed in the next three years by a few weeks' annual service in the Territorial Army, together with a liability to rejoin it in emergency until the end of his thirtieth year.
Russia is believed to be the only European nation now content with conscription, which was superseded by universal service in France after 1870, in other countries as opportunity offered, and Spain showed dissatisfaction last year.-1 am, Sir, HERBERT M. WYATT, Commander, R.N. 10 Vale Road, Bournemouth.
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