Owing to casualties, the company commanders were changed too often for efficiency, but they generally performed good service, lack of initiative being, as usual, their chief fault. It is most important for the good of the Service that captains (of all arms) displaying distinguished military qualifications should be quickly promoted to field rank. Yet recommendations sent to St. Petersburg were not acted on for a very long time, if ever. In such a matter some discretion should be allowed the Commander-in-Chief, and he should be empowered to promote junior officers to the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel for distinguished service in the field. Special men would thus arrive at the command of independent units and regiments, posts where the personality of the man in command is so important. It often happened that a regiment which had done badly absolutely changed its character with a change of commanding officers. Seniority should not be the only guide for promotion, and the establishment of field-officers in Manchuria constituted a quite adequate number from which good regimental commanders could have been liberally selected. During the period when we were occupying the Hsi-ping-kai positions, many of the regimental commanders in all the armies were good men, and the 1st Army was particularly lucky in this respect. Though many of the infantry brigadiers who came out to the war proved failures, amongst the regimental commanders were many capable field-officers, whose advancement to the rank of General gave us some first-class brigade commanders. In the 1st Army alone were Major-Generals Lechitski, Stelnitski, Dushkevitch, Lesha, Riedko, Dobotin, etc. Thus, even under the unfavourable conditions under which they served, we found enough good material amongst our infantry officers to give us some confidence for the future. Had the war been continued, many of the colonels promoted to generals for distinguished service would have commanded divisions. This is as it should be, for it ought to be possible for a regimental commander to rise within a year to the command even of an army corps, if he be sufficiently brilliant.