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Note.—The invention and development of machinery and the marvellous range of mechanical art, through chemical, electrical, and other superhuman agencies, afforded the American Government an immediate opportunity to supplement its Engineer Corps in 1898, with skilled auxiliaries. In fact, the structure of American society and the trend of American thought and enterprise, invariably demand the best results. What is mechanically necessary, will be invented, if not at hand. That is good engineering.
V. Minor Tactics.—The instruction of the soldier, individually and en masse, in the details of military drill, the use of his weapon, and the perfection of discipline.
Note.—Washington never lost sight of the set-up of the individual soldier, as the best dependence in the hour of battle. Self-reliance, obedience to orders, and confidence in success, were enjoined as the conditions of success. His system of competitive marksmanship, of rifle ranges, and burden tests, was initiated early in his career, and was conspicuously enjoined before Brooklyn, and elsewhere, during the war.