It will be noted in this diagram that the regular charging equipment consists of a variable rheostat, connected in circuit with the main current supply lines, for regulating the charging current to correspond with the prescribed "starting" and "finishing" rates for the particular types of battery used in the installation. Connections to ammeter and voltmeter are also shown in the diagram.

Charging and discharging are effected by means of the doublepole double-throw switch S, which may be closed on either side of the circuit, as desired. Manifestly, when discharging the battery, the double-pole snap-switch on the "trickling charge" circuit should be in the "open" position; also, when the battery is receiving a "trickling charge" switch S should be thrown in the "open" position.

In conclusion it is safe to say that the storage battery has come to stay in our naval service, and the "trickling charge" will accordingly occupy a prominent place in the operation, care and maintenance of these batteries.

1

[COPYRIGHTED]

U. S. NAVAL INSTITUTE, ANNAPOLIS, MD.

ON THE HISTORY OF DISCIPLINE IN THE NAVY By CHARLES RICHARD WILLIAMS

66

LECTURE I

THE SOURCE OF THE ARTICLES FOR THE GOVERNMENT OF THE NAVY OF THE UNITED STATES "

The fundamental law on which the American Navy rests is the "Articles for the Government of the Navy of the United States." How important familiarity with these articles on the part of every one in the navy is regarded by the Government, is shown by the fact that the articles are required "to be hung up in some public part of the ship and read once a month to the ship's company." The articles, in fact, are the charter of the rights, the duties, the obligations, and the privileges of the officers and men in the navy-their Bible, so to say. Or we may think of the articles as the constitution of the navy, the expression of the essential governing principles in harmony with which all the innumerable rules and regulations, necessary for the direction and discipline of men engaged in the many and various duties of a modern navy, and for insuring the orderly and efficient conduct and control of naval activities, have been formulated and established.

The larger and more complex any human institution or enterprise becomes, the greater the need of regulation, of defining the precise functions, duties, and rights of the various elements composing and conducting it. The rules that were sufficient to govern the navy when it was composed entirely of sailing vessels of different classes, none very large according to modern ideas, would be entirely inadequate under present conditions, when steam and electricity and radio communication, when armor plate, long-range guns, and high explosives, when torpedoes, airplanes, and submarines have brought about undreamed-of prob

lems and made necessary many new varieties of specialized knowledge and skill. The modern great warship is as different from the warship of a hundred years ago as the Waldorf-Astoria from the old Astor House, or as the Baldwin Locomotive Works from an old-time wagon factory. No wonder the rules and regulations of the navy, which in 1830 could be printed in a thin little volume, now make a ponderous tome of hundreds of pages. They have simply kept pace with the enormous changes in construction and equipment, in methods and activities, and the corresponding increase and variety of functions and duties.

Meanwhile, however, the fundamental law, the constitution, as I have called it, of the navy has remained in its essential quality much the same as at the very beginning of an American navy. The present articles are more numerous and more detailed, the arrangement of them is more orderly and logical, and they display greater precision in language and definition; but there are few subjects dealt with in the very first articles that are not treated in the present articles, and in many instances in practically the same language.

The first American articles were adopted by the Continental Congress in November, 1775, more than seven months before the Declaration of Independence. They were styled "Rules for the Regulation of the Navy of the United Colonies." Every commander of a naval vessel received copies and was required to post them in "public places of the ship" and cause them to be "read to the ship's company once a month." The new navy was directed and administered by a committee of Congress, the most efficient member of which was Robert Morris. The committee, in assigning officers to duty, repeatedly enjoined upon them the duty of strictly obeying the articles, and usually ended its letters of instruction with some such injunction as this: "Use your people well, but preserve strict discipline; treat prisoners, if any you make, with humanity; and in all things be duly attentive to the honor and interest of America." These words. are taken from a letter of August 23, 1776, to Lieutenant John Baldwin, commander of the schoonor Wasp, one of the earliest letters of the committee still preserved in the Library of Congress. Similar injunctions are found in many other letters. At the same time, commanders were encouraged and exhorted to be bold. A letter of November 1, 1776, to Captain Elisha

Warren, of the continental sloop Fly, urges: "Although we recommend your taking good care of your vessel and people, yet we should deem it more praiseworthy in an officer to lose his vessel in a bold enterprise than to lose a good prize by too timid a conduct." These quotations afford a very noble impression of the spirit of discipline, humanity, and enterprise which the Fathers desired should permeate and characterize the Continental Navy. They would be entirely appropriate admonitions to naval officers at any time.

The ships of the Continental Navy, few as they were, and often poorly equipped and inefficiently manned, rendered an indispensable service in the struggle for independence. If we add to these ships the vessels commissioned by the individual Colonies and the multitude of authorized privateers, probably more Americans fought during the Revolutionary War on sea than on land, and without their efforts, it is safe to say either that the Colonies would have failed to win their cause or that the war would have been greatly prolonged.

At the end of the war the navy simply began to fade away, the emergency for which it was created having passed. By 1785 the last ship of the fleet had been disposed of. In the establishment of the new Government of the United States, no provision was made for the creation of a navy. It was not till 1798, when the activities of French privateers in the West Indies stirred the country and Congress to the need for defensive action and reprisal, that a Naval Department was formed and a Secretary of the Navy was added to the Cabinet. That year marks the beginning of the navy of the United States. The "Articles for the Government of the Navy" which were then adopted were based on the articles of 1775; and the present articles, by numerous modifications, additions, and amendments, to meet the changing conditions and requirements of the vastly enlarged service, have been developed out of the articles of 1798.

Thus, the general principles of discipline controlling the officers and men of the American Navy, from the far-off days of the little sailing vessels of the Revolutionary struggle down to the present epoch of gigantic superdreadnoughts, have had continuous life and force. It ought to give any young man entering the naval service a certain thrill of elation that he becomes the heir of a long and glorious tradition, and that, in studying the