superintendency and has since been the law for the execution of the work. To have a law specifying in detail the methods that should be employed in prosecuting the surveys, that had been drawn by a special commission of experts and approved by the administration, relieved the Superintendent of much of the responsibility that had been borne by Professor Hassler, although it did not put an end to the carpings of the critics, or their advocacy of the less expensive "nautical surveys."
The reorganization provided for the employment of civilians and officers of the Army and Navy to serve directly under instructions from the Superintendent; thus securing for the service the opportunity to procure the best talent from either civil or military life. The civil element, it was assumed, would form a body of experts for the prosecution of those branches of the work not properly falling in the direct line of the military, and experience has demonstrated that while the results anticipated have been fully realized, the organization has not only proved effective but conducive to the advancement of the survey in many ways. The Civil War was a serious interruption, but alone, proved the wisdom of the civil organization of the Bureau. On the outbreak of hostilities the military element was necessarily withdrawn for duty with the Army and Navy; and it was not until ten years after the close of the war that officers of the Navy were again available, while officers of the Army, through the exigencies of the Military service, have not returned at all. The organization was preserved through these fifteen years by the permanent civil nucleus, and the work suffered no deterioration, but steadily advanced, notwithstanding that the larger number of the civilians were constantly employed during the four years of the war with the Armies and Navy, in different capacities on the staffs of commanding officers; and that the urgent necessities of the government devolved additional labor, and temporarily, a new class of work upon the office force in compiling, draughting and publishing maps of the interior for the use of the Armies in the field. And when finally, our Armies were disbanded and our fleets reduced to a peace basis, and officers of the Navy resumed the execution of the Hydrographic work, it was but to step into the duties of their predecessors; they had, too, the additional advantage of the fifteen years' experience of the purely civil administration of the Survey, during which time the trained surveyors of the land had become equally expert as
