Results of the levy for the years 1859 to 1861-Continued.

The organization of the French army is based upon three distinct provisions of law:

1st. The law passed March 21, 1832, establishing the principle that every Frenchman is liable to respond to a call in defence of his country, and that none but Frenchmen are admissible into the army.*

2d. The law fixing annually the number of recruits to be levied.

3d. The annual appropriation act which fixes the number of men to be maintained in active service, and the number of those to be called for.

The French army is recruited by drafting, voluntary enlistments, and re-engagements of veteran soldiers, and is composed of

1st. The effective force maintained under arms.

2d. The reserve, comprising the contingent not yet called in, and those who are sent home in anticipation of the expiration of their term of service.

The annual levies are raised by drafts; every Frenchman who has attained his twentieth year within the preceding twelve months is bound to present himself to the authorities of his district. The draft is made by cantons, and the number of men furnished by the department and by canton is in proportion to the number inscribed on the service rolls of each canton.

Up to the year 1830 the annual contingent was based on the population; from 1831 to 1835 the proportion was graduated according to the average of young men inscribed on the conscription lists of a certain number of years pre

cedingt Since 1836 the basis is no longer upon such average, but upon a list

of the year.

*The law of March 9,1831, authorizes the formation of a foreign legion, under condition that the same shall not be employed in France. The law of April 16, 1856, sanctions the 1st and 2d foreign legions, forming two regiments of foreigners, whose service, administration, pay, organization, &c., are assimilated to that of the infantry of the line.

In explanation of the mode, a scale regulating the number of men to be drafted, as fixed by the law of December 11, 1830, M. Lalanne, commissaire du Roy, says: "The law of March 8, 1818, in the bill of the government presented the military population' as a basis for the annual levy. The Chamber of Deputies substituted the whole population, on the ground that it gave a basis for arriving at the desired result made for other purposes than recruiting, and therefore not liable to be questioned. Since then, however, increasing complaints have been made against the system, and a return to the basis of military population' proposed. The commission charged by the government to prepare a new law has examined into the merits of the three bases, i. e., the total population, the military population determined by the registers of the census, and which serves as the basis of the draft, and the same population, deduction made of those whose size or infirmities render them unfit for service. The commission has rejected the latter mode, as subject to serious inconveniences. It weighs heavily upon districts furnishing the largest contingent of the army, and tends to diminish the population both in numbers and in quality. The military board, examining, moreover, only the fitness for service of the number necessary to complete the contingent;

The annual levy in ordinary times is fixed at 80,000 men.

The number of men registered for drafting averages annually about 300,000. The number of young men enrolled was—

According to M. Leon Lalanne, it is calculated that, owing to the number of exemptions, about 175,000 men must be drawn to form a contingent of 80,000 soldiers. In other words, 100 men have to be drafted in order to secure 46 fit for service. In the department of Lozere and Dordogne 73 men in 100 drafted were exempted. Notwithstanding this, says M. Lalanne, France could raise annually 132,000 recruits, taking into consideration all kinds of exemptions, and respecting the rights and satisfying the interests of all concerned.

The legal service of a soldier is fixed at 7 years, counting from the 1st of January after his 20th birthday.

Under the law of March 21, 1832, the young soldier is permitted to furnish a substitute, subject, however, to rigorous conditions as to morality and aptitude for service.

This system of substitution obtains only in practice, at present, with regard to brothers, brothers-in-law, and relations up to the fourth degree. Moreover, by the law of April 26, 1855, modified by act of July 24, 1860, the exemption from service can be secured at a fixed sum, which is applied to a fund for enlisting veteran soldiers, by re-engaging at the end of their service as substitutes. These re-engagements are for terms of not less than two years, and not more than seven years.

Substitutes can be entered on the registers of the districts where they present themselves in lieu of drafted men, provided they are admitted as fit for service by the military board.

Young men of proper size, health, and morality can enter as volunteers at the age of 16 in the navy, and at the age of 18 in the army.

The reserve is formed of men who, although comprised in the levy, have not been called upon to join their regiments, and are consequently not in active service, and of such soldiers who have been granted furloughs, in anticipation of the expiration of their legal term of service.

the remainder are not examined, and the relative proportion of those unfit for service cannot be ascertained. The commission has abandoned the basis 'whole population' for other reasons. The official census has not always been exact; some data was taken from statistical tables, the elements of which have often been erroneous or ill combined. Divers interests, moreover, have often determined some towns to either augment or reduce the number of their population. In the frontier departments, moreover, there is generally a large floating population which influences the number of the contingent without participation in the draft; in consequence, an unfair proportion of men are called out in these districts.

"These two-fold advantages have induced the commission to propose as a basis for the draft the 'military population' as given by tables of the census."

Exemptions and exclusions.

The following are excluded from military service, and can serve in no form in the army:

1. Those who have been subjected by an infamous or afflictive punishment. 2. Those who have been condemned for misdemeanors to an imprisonment of two or more years, and have, moreover, been placed under surveillance of the police, and have lost their civil and family rights.

The following are exempted, and are placed in the contingent of young men. who have been drafted, but who fall within the following conditions: (Article 13, law of March 21, 1832.)

1. Those who are less than 1,560 metres in height.

2. Those afflicted with an infirmity rendering them unfit for service.
3. The eldest of orphan children, having lost both father and mother.*

4. The only son, or the eldest son, or where there is no son-in-law, the only grandson, or the eldest grandson of a widow, and who is still such; of a father who is blind or incompetent to take care of himself.*,

In the cases provided for in Nos. 3 and 4, the younger is exempted if the elder brother is blind or incompetent.*

5. The eldest of two brothers, when both are enrolled and drafted at the same time, provided the younger is fit for service.

6. When another brother is serving otherwise than as a substitute.f

7. He whose brother has died in active service, or has been honorably discharged or permitted to quit the service on account of wounds received in the execution of orders, or on account of infirmities contracted in the army or navy service.‡

The exemptions granted in the cases cited in Nos. 6 and 7 supra apply in the same family as many times as the same causes occur; exemptions already granted in favor of living brothers, by virtue of this article, being, however, deducted, except in cases of infirmity.

Those absent, or not duly represented at the draft of their class, cannot claim the exemptions indicated in Nos. 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7 of this article, if the causes for these exemptions have only arisen after the close of the rolls forming the contingent of their class.§

Those coming within the following conditions are considered as having purged their liability to draft, and their names are struck from the rolls.|| (Art. 14, law of 31st March, 1832.)

*To secure exemptions for these cases, they must exist at the moment of the draft; if they arise after the soldier has been drafted, they are not considered as entitling to exemption.

The exemptions in No. 6 are granted without regard to the rank which the brother holds in the army.

This paragraph is applicable even in cases where the brother served as a substitute. The report made to the Chamber of Peers says: "Substitution will no longer procure exemption of a brother, and has given rise to much complaint. A notable difference exists, indeed, between gratuitous volunteering and that which, without adding to the contingent, is simply a speculation. Nevertheless, exemption should be granted to the brothers of substitutes killed or discharged on account of wounds received or infirmities acquired in the service.” (According to the law of 10th March, 1818, exemption was granted to him whose brother was in actual service as a substitute.) The following amendment, proposed by M. Couterier, was rejected: "The soldier shall also have the benefit of these causes of exemption when they arise during his term of service." Consequently, causes of exemption are valid only at the time of draft or mustering in.

§ This stipulation is applicable to the young man omitted involuntarily, and where no fraud could be imposed.

The difference between Nos. 14 and 13 is easily understood. No. 13, in exempting one individual, calls in another as a substitute to complete the contingent, while No. 14 considers only those who are performing an equivalent for military services, and it does not call upon ubsequent members on the rolls to make his place good.

1. Those who are actually in the land or naval forces, provided they have enlisted for a term of seven years.

2. Registered seamen, and ship carpenters, sailmakers, &c., upon the lists of the maritime inscriptions.

3. Pupils of the "Ecole Polytechnique," provided they are present at that institution and enlisted in the public service for a term of seven years *

4. Members of public institutions who have engaged themselves before being drafted, to follow the profession of instructors, also pupils of the central normal schools at Paris; those of the schools called jeune de languest and the professors of deaf and dumb asylums.

5. Pupils of the large seminaries authorized for ecclesiastical (Catholic( studies; young men authorized to follow studies for the ministry of other beliefs, salaried by the state, under condition, as regards the former, that they shall be held to service if they do not enter holy orders on attaining the age of twenty-five, and with regard to the latter, if they have not been consecrated within the year after the term when they could have obtained the same.

6. Young men who receive the great prizes at the insti'ute or the university. Young men who have drawn numbers, placing them in the contingent, but have been exempted conditionally by virtue of the stipulations of Nos. 1, 3, 4, 5, shall, when they cease to follow the vocation which exempted them, notify such by a declaration to the mayor of their district within the year when they ceased to be in the service, employment, or studies, and receive a copy of such declaration.

Failing to make such declaration and to get it vise by the prefet of the department within one month, they are liable to the penalties indicated in the first paragraph of art. 38 of law of 21st March, 1832. They will be replaced in the contingent of their class, without any deduction for the time elapsed from the cessation of their services, employment, or studies, up to the time of declaration. In the case of exemptions on account of infirmities professional men are consulted. Other cases of exemption or deduction are decided upon the production of authenticated documents, or in default thereof, upon certificates signed by three heads of families, domiciled in the same canton, whose sons are liable to draft or have been drafted.

These certificates must, moreover, be signed and approved by the mayor of the commune of the person seeking exemption.

SYSTEM OF RECRUITING IN PRUSSIA.

Unlike the practice which obtains in most countries of Europe of recruiting by conscription, military service in Prussia is compulsory upon all, and without the chances of a draft or the privilege of furnishing a substitute.

The basis of the Prussian system is the law of 3d September, 1814, by which every Prussian is bound to military service from the age of 17 to 49. During this period the service is divided as follows:

From the age of 20 to 25 (except in Westphalia, where it begins at 21,) every Prussian is liable to be called out for active service; as a rule, however, he remains only three years with his regiment; during the remaining two, in time of peace, he is sent home and placed in the " reserve.

From the age of 25 to 32 he serves in the "Landwehr," first class; and for a further term of seven years, say from 32 to 39, he remains enrolled in the "Landwehr" of the second class.

*

Pupils leaving the school as officers cannot be exempted from military service on resigning their commission. "A soldier," says the minister of war, "who, at the end of four years, obtains a commission and sends in his resignation, is held liable to enter the ranks to complete his term of service."

This school, attached to the ministry of foreign affairs, has only a few pupils.