Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1871 [PAGE 354]

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346 wish, still I think there is every reason to be encouraged that we can make a great deal of it.

M I L I T A R Y TACTICS!

The Chairman—Before we close, and I suppose the hour of closing is nearly reached, if not quite, I want to add a word or two. W e have done a great deal of talking; we have taken a very wide range of discussion. "We have gone pretty generally over the field, if we have not pretty thoroughly touched all the points in it. There are many points, however, that will suggest themselves to us doubtless, when we are away, that we shall wish had been discussed, and some of us have, perhaps, now in mind, that it would have been desirable to have discussed while we were together. It is evident to every one, that it was impracticable for us, within so limited a time, to meet all these questions. I shall not detain you by attempting to discuss any additional questions to those that have been before you. I want simply to make an announcement—that in this matter of military education, to which I have alluded once or twice, and hoped that we should get time for a discussion—in this matter of military education, which is a very practical one to be met, and is a somewhat difficult one to be met—I have come to the conclusion that at our institution, military education is not in our way, is on the whole an advantage to us, though it costs an expenditure of funds, and will cost also a considerable expenditure of effort. W e have no objection to continuing it, and, indeed, have gone so far in our preparation for continuing it, as to ask and secure the means to build a large drill hall for the future drilling of our students in military tactics. On much reflection, I finally reached what seemed to me a feasible plan for occasional military education in connection with these schools, and after consulting with the Senators of this State, and the Governor, and some gentlemen from other States, I prepared a draft of a plan, at the request of the Chairman of the Committee on Military Affairs in the House of Eepresentatives, and submitted it to him, and it has by him been laid, as I understand, before the committee in Congress. It has also been submitted to gentlemen connected with some of the institutions in the East, who have expressed an interest in it. It is too late to detail it, because it would occupy considerable time. It is too late to discuss the question. I only wished to say this by way of announcement, that I propose at an early day to take this plan—of which I failed to bring a copy with m e ; I have a copy in manuscript—to take this plan and get it printed, and to send copies to you, at the severalinstitutions interested, and ask of you