THE NEW OFFICERS

When the University Reserve Officers' Training Corps sent its delegation to the second Federal camp at Plattsburg last August, there were not a few in Cambridge who knew that these men would succeed. Such a view was founded on the best of reasons--the instruction here had been excellent and these men had worked. Many of them had been competing for the chosen places at Plattsburg since last April, for at the time of the first camp they were too young to enter. They spent hard months at Cambridge and hard weeks at Barre with a serious purpose, and when they were finally appointed for further and sterner competition, they entered with no trivial aims. The entire University may now read the list of newly commissioned officers with great satisfaction. Many more than three score Harvard men were given positions of authority by the Government. Their success only increases our admiration for them. But it likewise makes us see more clearly what a thoroughly able organization last summer's R. O. T. C. was. We may justly be proud of its first Government test, and the Government's test is an acid one.

There is a further corollary to be drawn from yesterday's list of appointments. This applies to the men in the Corps now. Their opportunity is coming, for this war evidently will not be a short one and age limits are unstationary things. The enrolled students in Military Science and Tactics have seen what diligence has done for their predecessors. It is a faculty ever powerful. It can repeat its work whenever called upon. If our present undergraduates are considering lieutenancies and captaincies, the most effective consideration will be hard work from now on.