Mr. PAINE. Mr. Speaker, the pay and allowances of an officer of the Army who is not a mounted officer will embrace 7 items only. There is, 1st, the pay proper, socalled; 2nd, commutation otprations; 3rd, commutation of servants' wages; 4th, commutation of servants’ rations; and 5th, commutation of clothing for servants. All of these 5 items are paid through the pay dept of the Army. The 6th item is quarters or commutation of quarters; and the 7th is fuel or commutation of fuel. The mounted officer receives also forage as the 8th item of his pay and allowances, which can be comentied only when it cannot be furnished in n. Now will the Gentfrom Pennsylvania [Mr. TuAYizit] claim that the item of pay proper is different in one portion of the U.S. from what it is in another? Will he claim that an officer when in Washington receives a different amount of pay proper from what he receives at Fort Brig er, as the law now stands? Certainly it will be suliicient to meet a declaration of that kind with a simple, absolute denial. Consider next the commutation of rations. This is one of the main items of an officer’s ay, and upon this point the Gentfrom aine SMr. BLAINE’ and the Gentfrom Pennsylvania [.Mr. MAYER have made amost serious mistake. Both 0 those gentlemen evidently suppose that there exists legal authority for issuing to an officer rations in kind; that under the law as it now stands rations in kind are or may be issued to officers. They also entertain the opinion, disclosed in the extracts just read at the Clerk’s desk, that in case rations are commuted, the rates of commutation are different in different localities of the country. They manifestly suppose that when an offi eer chooses to receive commutation of rations and applies to the paymaster for that commutation on his pay account, he receives one rate at Fort Bridger, anotherat Washington, another in Pennsylvania, another in Maine, and still another in California or Oregon. They also imagine that if the officer does not choose to accept from the aymaster commutation of rations, he can at his pleasure present himself to the commissary of subsistence and demand rations in kind. And here we have the foundation on which rests the superstructure of their argument. ir, the gentlemen are utterly mistaken on both of these points. There is not now, there has not been since this war commenced, any provision or authority of law under which a commissary could issue rations in kind to an officer. There has been, there is now, no authority by which a paymaster could allow differ cut rates of commutation of rations to officers at different points. I say again, sir, that upon these points the gentlemen have been most sadly misinformed, and yet upon these errors of fact rests almost the entire sufferstructure of the arguments which the Gentfrom Maine E Mr. BLAINE and the Gentfrom Pennsy vania [Mr. lmvnn] have madein opposition to this bill. The provision of the law is this, and I ask the attention of those gentlemen to it: no officer of the commissary or subsistence dept, or of any other dept of this government, can issue rations in kind to commissioned officers either for themselves or for their servants, not being soldiers. Nor is there any difference in the price of rations as commuted by the pay dept. The price of the ration is fixed at 30 cents, whether at Fort Bridger, in Washington, in Maine, or Oregon. The commutation price of the ration is 30 cents for' officers everywhere, where subsistence is cheap and where it is dear, in all lati tudes and longitudes, at all posts, and for every kind of duty. I will read from page 262 of the Army Regulations, reprinted in 1803: "Subsistence storeswill not be iasuedto officersor to their servants unless they are enlisted men, and arplso reported on the officer’spay account or pay ro. On page 363 of the same book I also read as follows: "Olliceis' subsistence ls commutedat 30 cents perration." This, sir, is the law; and the practice of the Army has been in strict compliance therewith. If any officer of the subsistence dept has issued rations in kind to officers, he has done so in violation of law. If any officer of the pay dept has. commuted officers’ subsistence at any other rate than 30 cents perration, he has done so in violation of law. Mr. speaker, the law does allow commis saries o subsistence to sell to officers of the Army rations at the cost rice, exclusive of transportation, for cash on elivery, upon their certificates that these rations are for t ieir own use or the use of their families. And the provision requiring payment in cash on delivery was necessarily modified during this war in certain cases. Only by such purchase can officers obtain subsistence stores from the government. I will read from page 252 of the Army Regulations: “An ofllcer may purchase subsistence from the commissariat maying cashfor iton delivery, ateustprices. without including costof transportation. on his eer tificate that it is for the useof imself and family.” Now, sir, the Gentfrom Maine and the Gentfrom Pennsylvania are very wide of the mark if the suppose that an officer stationed at Fort ridger, where rations are high, could apply to the commissary dept and insist upon rations being issued to him in kind. They are cgually mistaken if they suppose that be cool apply to the pay dept and insist that his subsistence should be commuted at a price corresponding with the price of subsistence stores at that post.