is engaged in study in quarters. At the end of the first hour and a half those sections which have attended recitation return to their quarters to study, while their places are taken by the remaining sections which have been up to that time engaged in study in quar ters. Each teacher, as a general rule, has two sections specially assigned to him for instruction, excepting the professor or head of each department who, as has been already explained, devotes his time to general superintendence, and takes the different sections for his personal instruction at such times and in such order as he may judge best. Before proceeding to the section rooms the different sections parade in the barrack square by sound of bugle, under the superintendence of the cadet officer of the day; the roll is then called by the senior cadet, who is termed the section marcher, who reports absentees to the officer of the day, and marches his section off to the section room by direction of the latter. Arrived in the section room, the section marcher causes the cadets to take their seats in the order of their names on the roll, and then hands them over to the instructor. When dismissed by the instructor, the section marcher forms his section as before, marches it back to the barrack square, reports all infractions of discipline which may have taken place either in study or on the march to the officer of the day, and then dismisses his section by the latter's permission. There is no system of private tuition recognized at the Academy. Each cadet must depend on his own exertions, aided by the explanations given by the instructors in the section rooms, and by the occasional assistance he may derive from his more advanced comrades. The allotment of so large a portion of time to independent study is a great departure from the practice of military schools in Europe; and it is a remarkable feature in the West Point system that no continued supervision is exercised over the cadets when studying in quarters beyond that which is supplied by the discipline of the cadets themselves. The senior of the two cadets inhabiting each room is responsible for discipline and orderly behavior. The officer of the day (cadet) visits each room during the hours of independent study; and the officer in charge, who is detailed daily from the assistant instructors of tactics, also visits the rooms at his discretion. Routine of Daily Work. A full-dress parade of the battalion takes place every day at sunset, after which the cadets are marched to supper, the hour of which varies with the season of the year, but is never earlier than 5.30 p. m. Half an hour after supper the evening call to quarters is sounded for study in barracks until tattoo at 9.30. All cadets excepting officers, the non-commissioned officers of the battalion staff, and the first sergeants, must be in bed and their lights extinguished at 10 p. m., the hour for the signal of Taps. The arrangement of time on Sundays is as follows: Breakfast at 7 a. m. Full-dress parade and inspection at 8. Call to quarters for study in barracks at 9. Recreation after church. Dinner at 1 p. m. Recreation. Call to quarters for study, 3 to 5 p. m. After 5 p. m. the arrangement of time is the same as on a week day. Cadets may obtain leave from the Sunday afternoon study in barracks to attend church a second time, should they desire it. There is no yearly vacation. When a youth enters West Point, he is fixed there, unless discharged, for four years without intermission, with the exception of two months' furlough which he may obtain at the end of his second year on certain conditions, and which is subject to a scale of diminution graduated according to misconduct. This discipline would be intolerably severe but for the relaxation afforded by the change from barracks and the section room to camp life. The battalion is encamped from about 20th June to 30th August, and during that period the time is exclusively devoted to military exercises, practical instruction, and amusement. Proficiency in Study-Examinations. The system of estimating proficiency in the different subjects studied is very elaborate. Each instructor keeps daily notes of the proficiency of the cadets forming the sections of which he has the charge; the degree of excellence shown by a cadet at any recitation being recorded by marks, 3 being the maximum for each lesson, which represents thorough proficiency; 25 signifies good; 2 fair; 15 tolerable; 1 very imperfect; any thing below 1 is recorded as 0, or complete failure. A weekly report showing the daily credit of each cadet and the aggregate for the week, is handed in by each instructor to the professor or head of his department at the end of the last study on Saturday, and the professor personally delivers the weekly reports of his department to the superintendent at the office of the latter between the hours of 12 and 2 p. m. on the same day. The pro fessor at the same time recommends such transfers of students from section to section as he may think proper. The aggregate weekly credits of each cadet in all the branches of instruction are then recorded in the superintendent's office. From the weekly class reports, and the monthly record of discipline, a consolidated report of the progress of the Academy is made up monthly and forwarded to the inspector of the Academy, who transmits an abstract of the same to the parent or guardian of each cadet. The weekly class reports form the most important element in determining the relative standing of the cadets in their class at the period of graduation, but a verifying test, or corrective, is supplied by the examinations which take place in January and June, the method of conducting which is as follows: The January examinations commence on the 2d of the month. The examination of the 4th or lowest class is conducted by the whole Academic Board, the constitution of which has been already detailed. The relative standing of the members of the fourth class, up to that time arranged alphabetically, is then determined by the summing up of the weekly class reports, verified or corrected by the results of the examination. A large proportion of the cadets of the fourth class, usually from one-sixth to one-eighth of the whole, are yearly pronounced to be deficient, and removed from the Academy at this their first examination, which on account of its importance is required to be conducted by the whole Academic Board. The examinations of the three other classes take place before committees of the Academic Board, the whole Board being divided into two committees for this purpose. The June, or annual examinations, commence on the first of the month. The first or graduating class alone is examined by the entire Academic Board, and the final relative standing of the cadets determined. The remaining classes are examined before the two committees of the Academic Board. The June examinations take place in the presence of the Board of Visitors, the members of which are specially appointed in each year by the President of the United States, and whose duty it is to report to the Secretary of War, for the information of Congress, on the state of discipline, instruction, &c., &c., of the Academy. The senior assistant professor or instructor of the branch under examination is ex officio a member of the Academic Board or of the committee thereof which conducts such examination; and the immediate instructor of the section to be examined is likewise associ ated with the Board or its committee so far as relates to the examination itself and the arrangement of the section in order of merit. Classification according to Marks. To assist the Academic Board in determining the accurate classification of any section about to be examined, the immediate instructor of that section hands to the Board, before the examination commences, a roll in the order of merit in which he considers the members should stand, based on the weekly credits which he had himself assigned. At the close of the examination the same instructor hands to the Board a second roll in the order in which he conceives the members of the section should stand, judging by the result of the examination. The instructor then retires and the Board proceeds to deliberate. Each member of the Board having kept careful notes of the examination, the relative standing of the cadets of a section in proficiency is determined by discussion. The question next arises, who, if any, are to be pronounced deficient?-a dictum which inevitably entails discharge from the Academy, or putting down to a lower class. The different sections composing the class, having been arranged in one class list in order of merit; one of the Board, usually the professor of the department concerned, supposing e. g. the class to consist of 50 members, may move that No. 50 be declared deficient. If the motion is negatived on discussion, the salvation of No. 50 proves also the salvation of all standing above him. But if the motion be carried, Nos. 49, 48, 47, &c., may be pronounced deficient in like manner, and so on, until a number is reached which is not condemned. The examinations are entirely viva voce. Each cadet is subjected to a searching oral examination of from seven to ten minutes, illustrated on the blackboard where the subject admits of it. The daily record of the proficiency of a cadet in any subject forms, as already stated, by far the most important element in fixing his relative standing among his classmates: it is only exceptionally that the public examinations alter materially the order of merit which has been previously framed from the weekly class reports. At the close of each examination the Academic Board reports to the Secretary of War the names of all cadets who are pronounced deficient in studies or discipline, to be discharged from the Academy unless otherwise recommended by the Academic Board. The rule of discharge for deficiency, even in one solitary subject, is very rigidly enforced; unless where exceptional circumstances, such as loss of time on account of illness, or having been unavoidably prevented from joining the Academy until some time after the rest of his class, induce the Board to recommend that the cadet shall have another trial by being put back to the next lower class. Some detail is necessary to explain how the marks obtained by a cadet at the daily recitations are employed to determine the credit he is to receive in any given branch of study at the period of his graduation. Where a subject is studied for two years, the maximum time allotted to any branch of study, the marks gained during the first year help only to fix a cadet's relative standing in his class for the year next ensuing. The credits shown by the weekly class reports of the second year alone are taken into account in determining the credit due to a cadet at the end of his residence. The exact method of fixing the credits due for any one subject is as follows. The professor makes out a roll of the class in the order of merit finally fixed by the Academic Board at the June examinations. The first on the roll then receives credit for the maximum number of marks allotted to the subject; the last on the roll receives a credit of one-third of that maximum only. The common difference for all the members of the class between those limits is then calculated, and the remaining members receive credits varying from the first cadet and from each other by the amount of that common difference. The figures thus determined represent the credits assigned for any one subject at the period of graduation, and the figure of general merit for each cadet is made up of the aggregate credits obtained by him for all the branches of study, with one column included for discipline. Proficiency in drill or riding does not affect the figure of general merit, except indirectly. Inattention or carelessness at these exercises would be noted by a certain figure of demerit, and would thereby diminish, as will be hereafter explained, the credit to be allotted for discipline at the final examination. Graduation. The qualifications required for obtaining an appointment to the army are simply graduation, or in other words that a cadet shall have passed through the four years' course at the Academy without being found deficient in any one branch of study or in discipline. The proportion of cadets who fail to graduate is very considerablenearly one-half. The present first class is a fair sample. It num |