commanders-in-chief shall act in accordance with the instructions of their respective governments, and in conformity to the treaty. In order that all may understand, and no mistake be possible, it also provides that one uniform international flag shall mark all hospitals, all posts of sick and wounded, and one uniform badge or sign shall mark all hospital material, and be worn by all persons properly engaged in the hospital service of any nation included within the treaty; that this international flag and sign shall be a red cross on a white ground, and that the nations within the compact shall not cease their endeavors until every other nation capable of making war shall have signed this treaty, and thus acceded to the general principles of humanity in warfare recognized by other peoples. Thirty-one governments have already signed this treaty, thirty-one nations are in this humane compact. The United States of America is not in it, and the work to which your attention is called, and which has occupied me for the last several years, is to induce her to place herself there. This is what the Red Cross means, not an order of knighthood, not a commandery, not a secret society, not a society at all by itself, but the powerful, peaceful sign and the reducing to practical usefulness of one of the broadest and most needed humanities the world has ever known. These articles, it will be observed, constitute at once a treaty governing our relations with foreign nations, and additional articles of war governing the conduct of our military forces in the field. As a treaty under the constitution, the President and Senate are competent to deal with them; as additional articles of war, Congress must sanction and adopt them before they can become effective and binding upon the government and the people. For this reason I have appealed to Congress as well as to the Executive Department. On the breaking up of the original convention at Geneva, the practical work of organizing its principles into form and making them understood and adopted by the people, devolved upon seven men, mainly those who had been instrumental in calling it. These men were peculiarly fitted for this work by special training, enlarged views, and a comprehensive charity, no less than by practical insight, knowledge of the facts and needs of the situation, and a brave trust in the humane instincts of human nature. They are known to-day the world over as "The International Committee of Geneva for the relief of the sick and wounded in war." This committee is international, and is the one medium through which all nations within the treaty transact business and carry on correspondence.