e same kind of skill
in solving strategic and tactical problems that a boy acquires in
solving problems in arithmetic--a skill in handling the instruments
employed. Now the skill acquired in solving any kind of problem,
like the skill developed in any art, such as baseball, fencing, or
piano-playing, does not give a man skill merely in doing a thing
identically like a thing he has done before: such a skill would
be useless, for the reason that identical conditions almost never
recur, and identical problems are never presented. Similar conditions
often recur, however, and similar problems are often presented;
and familiarity with any class of conditions or problems imparts
skill in meeting any condition or any problem that comes within
that class. If, for instance, a man memorizes the sums made by
adding together any two of the digits, he is equipped to master
any problem of addition; and if he will practise at adding numbers
together, he will gradually acquire a certain ability of mind whereby
he can add together a long row of figures placed in a sequence
he never saw before, and having a sum he never attained before.
Or a pianist, having acquired the mastery of the technic of the
keyboard and the ability to read music, can sit down before a piano
he never sat at before and play off instantly a piece of music he
never saw before.

Doubtless Moltke had ideas of this kind in mind when his plans
for educating strategists and tacticians by problems on paper and
by games were ridiculed by the unimaginative, and resisted by the
indolent; and certainly no man was ever proved right more gloriously
than Moltke. In the war with Austria in 1866, the Prussian army
defeated the Austrian at Sadowa or Koeniggraetz in nineteen days after
the declaration of war. In the war with France in 1870, the Prussian
army routed the French and received the surrender of Napoleon III
in seven weeks and two days, not because of superior courage or
experience in war, but by more scientific strategy. As Henderson
says: "Even the French generals of divisions and brigades had had
more actual experience (in war) than those who led the German army
corps. Compared with the German rank and file, a great part of
their non-commissioned officers and men were veterans, and veterans
who had seen much service. Their chief officers were practically
familiar with the methods of moving, supplying, and maneuvering
large masses of troops; their marshals were valiant