The Prussian organisation of 1870-71 was, admittedly, and as recommended by Jacqmin, taken as a starting point for what was to be done. From that time, also, every new regulation adopted by Prussia in regard to military transport, and every important alteration made in the Prussian system, was promptly recorded and commended or criticised in the ably-conducted French military papers; though in the actual creation of her own system there was no mere following by France of Prussian examples. What was considered worth adopting certainly was adopted; but the organisation eventually built up, as the result of many years of pertinacious efforts, was, in reality, based on French conditions, French requirements, and the most progressive ideas of French military science. The French were, also, to show that, when they applied themselves to the task, they had a genius for organisation in no way inferior to that of the Germans themselves. In his review of the events of 1870-71, Jacqmin declared that, while the education of France in the use of railways in time of war had still to be completed, the basis for such education had already been laid down by Marshal Niel's "Commission Centrale" of 1869. The two essential conditions were (1) unification of control in the use of railways for military purposes, whether for the transport of men or of supplies; and (2) association of the military element and the technical element,--an association which should be permanent in its nature and apply to every phase of the railway service, so that before any order was given there should be a guarantee that it was one possible of achievement, and this, also, without prejudice to other transport orders already given or likely to become necessary. It was these essential conditions that formed the basis of the organisation which France created. As early as November, 1872, there was called into existence a _Commission Militaire Superieure des Chemins de Fer_ consisting of twelve members, who represented the Ministry of Public Works, the Army, the Navy, and the great railway companies. Attached to the Ministry of War, and charged with the task of studying all questions relating to the use of railways by the Army, the Commission had for its first duty a revision of the proposals made by Marshal Niel's Commission of 1869. Following on this came a succession of laws, decrees and instructions dealing with various aspects of the situation in regard to military transport and the military organization of the railways, the number issued between 1872 and 1883 being no fewer than seventeen. These, however, represented more or less tentative or sectional efforts made in combination with the railway companies, who gave to the Chambers and to the administrative authorities their most earnest support and the full benefit of all their technical knowledge and experience in regard to the many problems which had to be solved.