The lads
remain till they are perhaps one and twenty, and have then acquired
aptitudes for military life, but no other aptitudes.
At that age
the education cannot be commenced anew, and, moreover, at that age
the disgrace of failure is very injurious. The period of education
used to be five years, but has now been reduced to four. This was
done in order that a double class might be graduated in 1861 to
supply the wants of the war. I believe it is considered that but
for such necessity as that, the fifth year of education can be ill
spared.
The discipline, to our English ideas, is very strict. In the first
place no kind of beer, wine, or spirits is allowed at West Point.
The law upon this point may be said to be very vehement, for it
debars even the visitors at the hotel from the solace of a glass of
beer. The hotel is within the bounds of the college, and as the
lads might become purchasers at the bar, there is no bar allowed.
Any breach of this law leads to instant expulsion; or, I should say
rather, any detection of such breach. The officer who showed us
over the college assured me that the presence of a glass of wine in
a young man's room would secure his exclusion, even though there
should be no evidence that he had tasted it. He was very firm as
to this; but a little bird of West Point, whose information, though
not official or probably accurate in words, seemed to me to be
worthy of reliance in general, told me that eyes were wont to wink
when such glasses of wine made themselves unnecessarily visible.
Let us fancy an English mess of young men from seventeen to twenty-
one, at which a mug of beer would be felony and a glass of wine
high treason!
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