The scheme elaborated by the committee in question took the form of a _Route Service Regulation_ which was approved by the King on May 2, 1867, and was, also, adopted by most of the other German States, but was kept secret until the time came for applying it in practice, as was done in the war of 1870-71. The basis of the scheme was the creation of a system of _Route Inspection_ ("Etappen Inspektion") constituting a department of the General Staff, and designed-- I. To watch over the replenishing of the operating army with men, horses, provisions, ammunition, and other military stores. II. To see to the removal into the interior of the country of the sick and wounded, prisoners and trophies of war. III. With the assistance of the troops appointed for the purpose and the Railway Field Corps, to maintain the line of communication, viz., railway, roads, bridges, telegraphs, and postal arrangements; to undertake the government of the hostile conquered provinces, and other duties. The preparation of the necessary plans for the attainment of these objects was entrusted to a _Central Commission_ composed, partly of officers connected with the General Staff and the Ministry of War, and partly of prominent functionaries on the staffs of the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Public Works (then in supreme control over the railways), and of the Minister of the Interior. Two of its members--a Staff Officer and a railway expert from the Ministry of Commerce--formed an _Executive Commission_ and exercised a general supervision over the arrangements for military transports; though on the removal of the Great Head-quarters from Berlin, the Executive Commission was to be succeeded by an _Auxiliary Executive Commission_, which would supervise the railways in the interior to be made use of for supplying the needs of the army. In time of war the Central Commission was to be supplemented by _Line Commissions_ formed by military officers and railway officers in combination, and operating each in a leading centre of railway traffic. Their function it would be--with the assistance of _District Line Commissions_--not only to communicate to the line or lines of railway in their district such orders as might be necessary for the transport of troops, guns, ammunition, horses, and supplies, but, also, to draw up or make the final arrangements in connection with the time-tables for the running of military trains; to fix the direction in which the trains would go; to decide at what stations the troops should stop for their meals or for their coffee; and, in fact, to arrange everything connected with the said transport down to--as it appeared at the time--the smallest details. In the forwarding of supplies, each Army Corps was to have its own line of communication, separate and distinct from that of the other Army Corps, the object aimed at being that of avoiding the confusion and disorder which might result from the fact of several Army Corps using the same railway.