I have had a good deal of experience in civil life, and I have never yet found any job in civil life to which, other things being equal, I did not prefer to appoint a man who had seen service in the navy or army of the United States; because he has learned, if he is worth his salt, certain qualities which double and treble his value in whatever position he may be put. Therefore, not only for his sake do we owe it to him to see that he has every chance to lead a wholesome and manly life, but we owe it to ourselves, we owe it to the Nation of which we are all part, to see that that man’s capacities for good are given the fullest chance for development. And much though I believe in the Y. M. C. A., and in kindred organizations generally, I believe in them most when they take such shape as this. Now, a special word to you upon whom so heavy a responsibility rests; because it depends upon the way you do your duty in peace as to whether or not, should ever the need for war arise, our flag will receive credit or discredit at your hands, or at the hands of your successors. I can not too often say, in speaking to civilians, what every naval man knows, that in battle those win who have prepared best for the battle beforehand. I have seen to-day men who fought at Manila and men who fought off Santiago. In both places we won, and we won hands down. We won because the shots that hit were those that counted; because the men on our ships knew how to handle them alone and in squadron, knew how to get the best speed out of them, and how to do decent shooting with them. I want you to notice I said decent shooting. I did not say it was first-class. I think most of you are doing first-class shooting now; and I would be mightily ashamed of you if you did not do better than was done seven years ago; and I shall be ashamed of you if you don’t do even better in the future. Nothing has given Americans a better right to satisfaction than the way in which the target practice of the average American ship has improved, until I think we can fairly say that there are certain gun crews and certain individual gun pointers who have reached as high a degree of excellence as it is possible for any man to reach. The gun crew counts for more than its individual pointer. You might have all the individual shots you could gather, and they would not be worth a rap if they could not act together, if they did not act so as to subordinate in the mind of each man the success of that particular man to the success for which they all stood.