 in the way of discipline, which the
superior class men enjoy. These, while intended to be as little as possible
invidious to the less successful, have the effect of keeping constantly before
every man's mind the great desirability of attaining the grade next above his
own.
    It is obviously important that not only the good but also the indifferent
and poor workmen should be able to cherish the ambition of rising. Indeed, the
number of the latter being so much greater, it is even more essential that the
ranking system should not operate to discourage them than that it should
stimulate the others. It is to this end that the grades are divided into
classes. The grades as well as the classes being made numerically equal at each
regrading, there is not at any time, counting out the officers and the
unclassified and apprentice grades, over one-ninth of the industrial army in the
lowest class, and most of this number are recent apprentices, all of whom expect
to rise. Those who remain during the entire term of service in the lowest class
are but a trifling fraction of the industrial army, and likely to be as
deficient in sensibility to their position as in ability to better it.
    It is not even necessary that a worker should win promotion to a higher
grade to have at least a taste of glory. While promotion requires a general
excellence of record as a worker, honorable mention and various sorts of prizes
are awarded for excellence less than sufficient for promotion, and also for
special feats and single performances in the various industries. There are many
minor distinctions of standing, not only within the grades but within the
classes, each of which acts as a spur to the efforts of a group. It is intended
that no form of merit shall wholly fail of recognition.
    As for actual neglect of work, positively bad work, or other overt
remissness on the part of men incapable of generous motives, the discipline of
the industrial army is far too strict to allow anything whatever of the sort. A
man able to do duty, and persistently refusing, is sentenced to solitary
imprisonment on bread and water till he consents.
    The lowest grade of the officers of the industrial army, that of assistant
foremen or lieutenants, is appointed out of men who have held their place for
two years in the first class of the first grade. Where this leaves too large a
range of choice, only the first group of this class are eligible. No one thus
comes to the point of commanding men until he is about thirty years old. After a
man becomes an officer, his rating of course no longer
