Mr. SCHENCK. I do notknow thatIshonld make any objection to the amendmentsnggested by the Gentfrom Pennsylvania, Srsvnus Pin;] thatis precisely the meaning of the bill now. As the bill nowstands, it is that this Veteran Reserve corps is to be officered by selection from the present officers of the corps and any other officers and soldiers who have been wounded. These officers having already been prominent before the country, having undergone their examination, and having been appointed, confirmed, and commissioned, would naturally be looked to amongthose who are to supply the officers forthese ten regiments and hence it will do no harm, one way orthe other, I suppose, to leave out the words indicated by the Gentfrom Pennsylvania. Now, sir, to reply to the Gentfrom Massachusetts, Mr. Bourwnu.] let me say, in the 1st place, that your garrisons are organizations. You send a company, or halfa company, or 2 or 3 companies, or arcgiment, to a post or to a fort. The gentleman says that there will always be, in an army of 50,000 men or more, a great number wounded or disabled by the accidents or casualties of the service to make up these garrisons. But the will have no organization. They do not get sic by companies or by regiments. You cannot, therefore, send them, with their properotficers, to perform garrison duty. The reply to the whole matter is that you cannot garrison your posts by selecting one man from one regiment, another from another regiment, 2 from a 3rd, and an officer from a 4th to command them. So that this substitute suggested for a Veteran Reserve corps is simply impracticable and is utterly inconsistent With military discipline and military practice. Then, again, the inquiry is, whether the able bodied men will not necessarily be sent off to places where they will be exposed to the delete rious influences ofclimate; whether they ought not to be changed. Of course they should be changed from time to time, and they may be changed. As a great part of the peace duty will be garrison duty, it is probable that these regiments of the Veteran Reserve corps will be occasionally changed from post to post, from fort to fort, from guard duty atone point to guard duty at another, from garrison duty to guard duty, and from guard duty to garrison duty. So also with the able bodied troops; so also with the remaining 45 regiments of infantry who will not constitute the Veteran Reserve cors. They will be on duty some times on the acific coast, sometimes upon the Florida coast, sometimes along the Indian f from ier, and sometimes elsewhere. There will be room enough for changes and transfers of all, notwithstanding the continuance of the Veteran Reserve corps; for there will be a vast deal more of garrison and post and guard duty to be performed than can possibly be performed by these ten regiments. Now, as to the efficiency of the Veteran reserve corps for such purposes, let us see what the present corps has done. A portion of that corps was sent out to Johnsons Island at a time when other troops had been withdrawn; and during their service as guard to that rebel prison the weather was MlGl lmes so cold that the men froze at their posts. This shows that the members of this cors have been employed for duty at inclement places as well as able bodiedmen. Men of this corps, mounted as cavalry, were sent up through Pennsylvania at the time of the riots in the mining region; and they se outed the country for miles. Again, they were mounted as cavalry and se outed the country in front of the fortifications of Washington toward the close of the war. They guarded the public property here at Wahing ton at every point. At the time of the approach of the rebel enemy to this city in the summer of 1864, they occupied and garrisoned the northeast fortifications of the city, from Fort Stevens entirely around to Fort Reno: They were in conflict with the enemy. Many of them. although they had suEered wounds or contracted disease in former battles, were able to renew the fight, to take again their position as efficient soldiers; and many of them suffered even unto death in the battles which occurred when Washington was thus threatened. Their conduct upon that Occasion received, as it mer ited, great raise. I might go on multiplying notices of the services of this Veteran Reserve cuppa, showing that it is a slander upon officers an men alike to say that they have not performed their duty, and performed it well. Now, sir, it may be said that these men are men who have gone from civil life into volunteer organizations, and that now we pass them over to the regular Army. I admit that this is so; but if it be a sound objection, it is one which extends to all other volunteers. Whatis yournrmy now? it is an army made up largely from civil life. I have taken the trouble to have a table prepared to show how the present line officers. field and company officers, of the regiments in the regular Army have been appointed. I find it is by no means a WestPoint arm. WestPoint has gone further up. West ointgets for the most partthe bureaus. WestPoint is in the Dept. WestPoint has the general supervision of the whole. But when it comes to the line officers, field and company officers, in the several regiments, I find of the 30 colonels 21 were educated at the U.S. Military Academy, 8 not graduates of WestPoint, and one vacancy.Wban you come to lieutenant colonels, there are 25 graduates and 5 who were not graduates of WestPoint. Of the majors, 55 were graduatesof WestPoint and 21 are from civil life. When on at to the captains, you find that only 131 are from WestPoint, while 303 of the present.Army never have been at the U.S. Military Academy. Of the 1st lieutenants, 79 have been at WestPointand 368 have never been there. of the 2nd lieutenants, 15 have been at WestPoint and 29 have never been there, there being a great man vacancies. I find in the present Army, of the dand company officers 1060, and of these only 326 were grad uates of the U.S. Military Academy, while 734 never had that advantage of military education, and have only been taught by commandi troops in the field and by such attention as t icy have been able to bestow on the subject. You would exclude these men who in the volunteer service have been wounded, and yet when these 9 new regiments were made up the officers who were appointed in great part had nothing to commend them except political influence to get them their places. There are men in your regular Army who never until they were put into that Arm served anywhere. I do not complain of this. on had to make a sad den expunsion of your regular Army amid the exigencies of the rebellion, while et there were no men wounded, no men who adprac tical experience and who had seen service, to put in those places. The consequence was they were filled up, these original and other vacancies, by men from civil life without any experience whatever. These men are not to be legislated out, but are to be left for what they may have done since. When we come to the present Army in the field you take the men and there is no inquiry to prove who they are or what they are, no matter to what organization they have belonged, but you object that this is legislating a class into the Army, that it is taking men in a body and transferring them to a position to which they are not entitled. I have occupied more of the attention of the Hoase than I intended, but whatever I had to so might as well have been said now. hit. ONKLING obtained the floor.