::::::::：：:naeaeaeºszczaesºxae
N
�
!
. v.
）------ → ºxºs， yººº...- ****************
،ºs º ſº
§. . . .

Tºuſſuſſulſº
T Hº #
sº |
:
LIBRAR
rºRSITY
|
C-
º
º
[…]
º
º
C
E
DºD
E-
ſº
º
[…]
º
[…]
L-
sº
T
lº
º
a º
E-
[I ºf
* E
[ -
b E
E
D -
B
5-
O -
*
D -
* -
tº
** *
| E
º
[…]
sº
Fº
ſº
E-
E
-]
*Fº
P-
-]
[…]
C
º
F.
º
5.
ſº
ſº
D
º
C-
AEI
C-
º
C
Ł
AT
E-
:


VIEWS
OF
MILITARY REFORM.
*-
VIEWS
OF
MILITARY REFORM.
\,
THE SECOND EDITION,
CORRECTED, AND CONSIDERABLY ENLARGED.
BY
EDWARD sTERLING, Esq.
For MERLY CAPTAIN IN THE 16TH REGIMENT OF Foot.
Nec minus Germanis animus; sed genere pugna, et armorum, superabantur.
TAc. ANN. 2, 21.
tº-
*
LONDON:
Printed by C. Roworth, Bell Yard, Temple Bar.
FOR. T. EGERTON, MILITARY LIBRARY, WHITE HALL.
1811. .

TO
FIELD MARSHAL HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS
THIE DUIKE OF KENT,
&c. &c. &c. &c.
SIR,
WERE the usual language of a dedi-
cation not offensive to the feelings of your
Royal Highness, it would, in the present in-
stance, be no more than a just expression of
mine. I am deeply sensible of the kindness
with which you have been pleased to regard this
little pamphlet; but the attention which your
Royal Highness is ever ready to bestow on the
subject of military reform, stands high on pub-
lic grounds, and throws into the shade every
personal acknowledgment, however natural and
grateful.
The claims, indeed, of such a topic, to the
meditation of your Royal Highness, are of
various
( vi )
various and peculiar force; not resting on the
sentiment of patriotism alone, but on virtuous
pride and consistency of conduct. To your
Royal Highness has Great Britain been already
indebted for an effort, perhaps the very noblest
in her annals, to accomplish the remedy of a
train of disorders, inveterate, dangerous, and
disgraceful; of a standing long prior to your
entrance on the administration of a delicate and
momentous government; and equally menacing
to the safety of the trust which you had under-
taken, as insulting to the purity of your charac-
ter, and to the dignity of your command.
with such abuses, backed as they were by
popularity, and by prescription, it was the lot of
your Royal Highness to contend, on behalf of
the subsistence, the morals, the health, and
happiness, of all within the reach of your au-
thority. In the measures then resorted to by
your Royal Highness, was blended a princely
sacrifice of your own interests, with a solicitude
€VCI).
( vii )
even paternal, for the welfare of others; nor
can the active benevolence—the intrepid and
generous zeal—which you displayed thoughout
the whole of that trying era, be too ardently ap-
plauded by the wise and virtuous, or too grate-
fully requited by your country.
Upon the publicity of these facts, so honoura-
ble to your Royal Highness, and upon the un-
paralleled attention, which for more than eleven
years of assiduous service (not relieved by leave
of absence for a single day) you had previously
given to the duties of your profession, in its least
shewy and attractive, though not its least es-
sential form—on the knowledge of such facts
and such habits, it was, that I ventured to lay
before your Royal Highness a copy of the first
edition of the following essay; less apprehensive
of an unfavourable reception from the admitted
faultsand deficiencies of theauthor, than confident
of a fair and liberal hearing, as well from the mo-
tives by which my publication was dictated, as
* from
( viii )
from its connexion with those important sub-
jects, which have long engaged your feelings,
and employed the studies of your life.
Under the protecting sanction of your Royal
Highness, I now dedicate to you this second
and enlarged edition, trusting that, when re-
commended thus powerfully to the world, the
points which it agitates may grow into general
notice; and that measures of solid and perma-
nent use may succeed to the conviction of their
utility.
With respectful gratitude to your Royal
Highness,
I am, Sir,
Your most obliged humble Servant,
EDWARD STERLING,
Lamblithian, June 4, 1811.
TABLE OF CONTENTS,
Page
INTRODUCTORY Chapter - - - - - - ix
CHAPTER I.
Of Recruiting the Army - - - - - - 1
CHAPTER II.
Of the Education of Officers - s tº gº - 14
CHAPTER III.
The same Subject continued—Sketch of a Novel Insti-
tution, for educating Military Men—Appointment of
Officers—Sale of Commissions ſº º º - 29
CHAPTER IV.
Officers continued—of the Spirit of Emulation—Order
of Distinction—Recompense to Officers who retire 4()
CHAPTER V.
Of the Volunteer System—its inherent Defects—its mis-
chievous Consequences to the Regular Army - - 54
CHAPTER VI.
The old Militia System—necessary Weakness of the old
Militia—injurious Effects of Substitution—Oppression
of the Ballot on Individuals, according to the present
Extent of the Militia Service—Expense of the old
Militia, as compared with their Utility—their mistaken
Discipline - as gº gº sº ºne * - 72
CHAPTER
( viii )
CHAPTER VII. , -
Abolition of the old Militia—detailed Plan of a local
Militia, perfectly new—their Service by Rotation
within their own Counties—Ballot strictly enforced
a Proportion discharged twice a Year - tº may
-º-º-º:
APPENDIX, No, I.
Letter from Mr. Joseph Lancaster to the Author; on the
Introduction of the Lancasterian System of Education
into the Army, under the Patronage of his Royal
Highness the Duke of Kent—the Progress it has made,
and the Advantages with which it has been already
attended º º tºp * º tº tºs sº
No. II.
Observations on the Employment of the British Army
on Foreign Service—with the proper Scenes, and the
legitimate Objects, of their Operations - * º
No. III,
Extract from “Le Tableau Statistique de la Monarchie
Autrichienne,” published at Paris for the Use of the
French Army, on the Eve of the last War with Austria,
(1809,) and containing an Abstract of the Population
of that Empire, with a detailed Statement of the
Amount and Composition of its Military Force - -
Page
94
115
123
164
INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER,
SINCE the first edition of this pamphlet was
published, about 12 months ago, several works
have appeared on questions nearly allied to
those which the author has attempted to exa-
mine, and amongst them are some not more en-
titled to public estimation from the importance
of their subjects, than from their own merit.
The Essay by Captain Pasley of the Engineers,
on the “Military Policy” of Great Britain, has
produced a considerable sensation, and roused
the attention of reflecting men, to objects of
transcendent interest and value.
To prevent the invasion of a powerful enemy,
and save our own dominions by vigorously at-
tacking him at home, is a maxim of defensive
war by no means new either to statesmen or his-
* The useful labours of Major James have been chiefly
bestowed on works of reference. All classes of the army
ought to confess their obligations to his copious dictionary;
and all classes seem to anticipate from the approaching (7th)
edition of his “Regimental Companion,” an ample enumera-
tion both of the principles and detailed rules, which regulate
the duty of the British service. &
torians ;
New Military
Publications.
Essay on the Mi-
litary Policy,
&c.
( x )
torians; for it is more than two thousand years
since the pages of Demosthenes and Polybius
became familiar to the eye of both. But it must
be admitted that the war politics of Great Bri-
tain have never, until perhaps the present mo-
ment, furnished any very marked illustration of
the benefits to be derived from such a doctrine.
The occupancy of scattered, remote, and un-
supported settlements, has been, by the people
of this country, mistaken for substantial con-
quest. Each augmentation of commerce has
been proclaimed an accession of strength, until
the aspect of an enemy, marshalled on the
heights of Boulogne, strikes with dismay the
proprietors of all the wealth, and the lords of
every colony, in the world.
Captain Pasley has stepped forward as the
avowed and warm advocate of a tone and spirit
on the part of Great Britain, by which her mili-
tary exertions would be carried to a far greater
extent, and would be commensurate with pur-
poses far bolder and more elevated, than those
which English politicians or English ministers
have deemed it prudent or popular to entertain
or to acknowledge. His opinion is, that we
should regard our commerce but as subservient
to our safety—that we should apply the re-
Sources derived from it to the increase of our
strength ;
--- ( xi )
strength; and aggrandize the empire, as the best
means of securing its independence.
Conformably with these sentiments, the au-
thor of the essay on our “military policy "la-
bours to impress upon his readers the following
points, though arranged and expressed in a man-
ner somewhat different.
That from the natural and inherent instability
of all commercial greatness, the revenues which
arise from it, as well as the naval superiority to
which it contributes, must partake of its muta-
ble and uncertain character.
That small and detached colonies, which de-
rive their sole protection from the force of the
parent state, must not only weaken her means of
defence at home, by the garrisons which they
require, but must inevitably pass into the hands
of any new power, possessing an equal fleet, and
a superior army.
That the system of subsidizing foreign states
is, generally speaking, to the last degree absurd
and reprehensible; inasmuch as no government
need be bribed to follow its own understood in-
terest; and no bribe which can be offered will
b 2 induce
( xii )
induce it to forego that interest, in favour of
ours, however willing it may be to accept our
money, and to cajole us by promises and demon-
strations of friendship. * }
That while England remains an inferior power
by land, it is folly to consume her strength in
attempting to preserve, on their tottering thrones,
any of those minor sovereigns of Europe, whose
actions will always be ruled, not by their grati-
tude, but by their fears, and whose places will
therefore be regularly found under the feet of
that which stands first as a military power.
That a stationary kingdom must finally be sub-
dued by one which is progressive.
From these premises, enforced and illustrated
at considerable length, Captain Pasley draws
the necessary inference, that it is the duty of
this government to undertake continental con-
quests of the greatest magnitude, and to annex
them permanently to the British empire.
To such a proposition, I confess, it seems dif-
ficult to refuse our entire concurrence, since the
old landmarks and barriers of the European
commonwealth have been overturned by the
violence
( xiii )
violence of the passing age, England might.
formerly, by representations, or by subsidies,
induce some foreign court of wavering and mer-
cenary policy, to lend her a sort of languid aid;
while engaged in hostilities with France. But
which of them can now be roused by such in-
fluence, to any salutary end? or which of them
would it not be mere insanity so to push for-
ward in a premature and reluctant contest? At
the best of times, it ought to be recollected, we
could exercise over the state which we subsi-
dized, but an incomplete, as well as an invidious
authority, while over those which were bound
to us by treaties of equal co-operation only, we
could exercise no authority whatever, that was
not superseded by the first movement of caprice
in their councils, or by the first access of misfor-
tune to their arms.
If, therefore, we can neither negociate foreign
princes into fortitude, nor bribe them into ho-
nour, it appears quite plain that every prospect
of efficient and successful warfare must in truth
be founded on the unity and consistency of our
own government, and on the courageous energy
of our own people. To extend the sway of that
government, and to multiply the number of its
immediate subjects; in other words, to conquer
b 3 all
( xiv )
all we can, and to keep, irrevocably, all we con-
quer, is indeed the only general policy which
henceforth contains for England one ray of
wisdom, or one particle of rational hope. To-
wards the close of the following little work,
some attempts have been made to apply and en-
force suggestions, of a similar nature to those
which pervade the valuable treatise in question.
Out of this subject have grown a few observa-
tions on the state of the Electorate of Hanover;
as connected with its relation to Great Britain,
and with the degree to which that relation, now.
so shamefully and calamitously outraged, might,
under a nobler policy, have been strengthened
and improved. Without appearing presump-
tuous to the public, or unbecoming towards the
able and well-informed author of the “Essay on
Military Policy, &c.” I may venture to observe,
that it is a work which opens a prodigious field
to the action of the British arms; abounding in
clear and solid argument; now and then offer-
ing, on matters of finance, perhaps not essential
to the subject, a calculation, or a theory, some-
what liable to dispute—and in the exposition of
vast and momentous projects, partially, though
but partially, tinged with enthusiasm. It is a
work, however, in which the boldest assertions
ałe frequently borne out, by reasonings amount-
ing
( x )
ing to demonstration; in which few, if any en-
terprizes, are recommended to Great Britain,
above her power to accomplish, and none what-
ever, inconsistent with her dignity and her glory.
to embrace.
An Essay on our “Military Institutions” is
to follow that on our policy—and, if of equal
merit with the latter, may essentially illustrate a
subject which cannot be discussed too often.
After dwelling on the great views of salutary
and even necessary ambition, which ought to
govern this country in the formation of her mili-
tary establishments, we come in regular order to
the composition of that force, by which alone
such prospects can be realized. On the dif-
ferent branches of this delicate and interesting
topic, innumerable suggestions have been offer-
ed to government, and much, in practice, still
remains to be performed. Foremost in rank and
talent stands the “Sketch of the Etat Major,”
by a field officer—displaying a knowledge of
the subject which has rarely been exceeded,
and a force of reasoning, which it appears very
difficult to resist.
The French Etat Major, as finally modified
b 4 within
Etat Major by
a Field Officer.
( xvi )
within the last fifteen years, has proved itself an
engine of wondrous power—for it has animated
and moved those gigantic armies which have
lifted Europe from its base. A luminous and
masterly simplicity reigns throughout the whole
of a service, the most multifarious and complex
in its nature. All its operations proceed from a
common centre; all its departments act under
a uniform superintendence; and the prompt
controul of a single mind never fails to reach the
most distant details, while the most minute
cannot escape its observation. These are a few
of the direct advantages resulting from the
creation of a general staff, over which it is the
express, peculiar, and undivided, duty of a single
officer to preside. The necessary, though indi-
rect consequence of such a system must be, that
the commander in chief of an army is relieved
from the vexation and distraction of details—
that the machine is kept in order without any
appeal to his interference—and that he may
exert his entire genius, in impelling the weight
of the force thus organized, towards the higher
objects of the campaign. To explain the nic-
chanism of so formidable an establishment, and
to recommend the application of it to the British
service, is the end proposed by the author of
the “Sketch of an Etat Major;” and in the
opinion
( xvii )
opinion of many enlightened officers, his task
has been successfully executed, in a work of ex-
tensive knowledge, arranged with judgment, and
written with perspicuity and spirit. The author
has engaged still farther to gratify his readers,
by announcing this essay as preliminary only
to a more copious and developed publication.
The short, but valuable and well-known
pamphlet, by General Stewart, is of rather older
date. It takes a comprehensive survey of the
condition of the British army, from its elements
to its results. The qualification of officers, pre-
liminary to their entrance into the profession,
the care of their interests, and encouragement of
their virtues, are all made subjects of discussion
by the gallant and excellent author, with whom,
in the outline of his opinions, it is impossible not
to concur. Certain principles, indeed, are com-
mon to most works on military reform; un-
happily they are overlooked, or rejected by the
legislature alone, with whom reform must ac-
tually originate. In writing, in conversation,
amongst those who reason on general grounds,
and amongst those who judge experimentally
on the matter, we find but one opinion ex-
pressed as to the necessity of establishing a pro-
fessional education for officers. Almost equally
uniform
Pamphlet by
Gen. Stewart.
( xviii )
uniform is the sentiment in favour of abolishing
the sale of commissions,” and of transferring the
grant of military rights and honours, from the
public market, which is a test of money alone,
to a tribunal capable of deciding upon merit.
Some encouragement to emulous pride, and
to generous ambition, is a debt long due by this
country to the profession of arms. It is of the
essence of municipal law, that punishment should
be its only sanction. Its rewards consist in the
peace and security which it offers, and though
of inestimable value, they may be called rather
negative than express. But in laying the foun-
dations of a military power, far different are the
views by which we ought to be animated, and
far nobler the spirit which it becomes us to in-
spire. That inert submission, which measures
the duty of the tranquil citizen, and which cor-
responds with a system of repose, is of too low a
strain to harmonize with a system of action.
Restless enterprize and impetuous ardour are the
living principles of a warlike body. To set up
True principle
of Military In-
stitutions.
* General Stewart seems rather adverse to an absolute
abolition of purchase—though he urges the necessity of regu-
lating it with additional strictness.-Vide “Outlines of a
Plan, &c.” by the Hon. Brig. Gen. Stewart.—p. 41, 42, 43.
Second Edition, 1806.
the
( xix )
the Mutiny Bill as the rule of sentiment to a
soldier, would be fatally abject and degrading.
He whose feelings are reducible to such a stan-
dard, can hardly be expected to reach the attri-
butes of a hero; as the eye, whose field of vi-
sion is bounded by a penal clause, will never di-
late itself to the prospect of fame and immor-
tality. Personal distinction, the prize of emi-
nent exploits, is an effectual instrument in the
hands of a military legislator. Unlike the ope-
ration of municipal law, his policy ought to act
upon the mind of man by hope rather than by
terror; rewards with him, therefore, ought to be
positive, conspicuous, and expressive ; his
punishments, if it were practicable, ought in-
deed to be negative—consisting only in the ab-
sence of reward.
These three advances towards an ameliora-
tion of our system—in the mode of preparing
British officers for the service—of admitting
them into it—and conducting them through it
—have supplied me with materials for the second,
third, and fourth chapters of the following little
essay. It has been suggested to me that, in
speaking of the army, I have dwelt too exclu-
sively on what appertains to the officer, and that
the
Officers,
( xx )
PrivateSoldiers,
the private soldier, whether of the regular forces
or the militia, is mentioned only in connexion
with the facility of his enlistment, and with the
species of military discipline in which he ought
to be trained; leaving his personal interests,'
with his moral and intellectual discipline, almost,
if not entirely, unnoticed.
Beings similarly constituted, are to be acted
upon by similar motives. The private soldier
therefore ought to be excited to a zealous dis-
charge of his duty, by means corresponding
with those which are applicable to his officer—
the same in their nature, though not in their
degree—and combined with the offer of such
instruction, as would enable him to execute,
what the spirit of emulation might urge him to
attempt.
I was the less inclined to swell this pamphlet
by entering on such an inquiry, because the
attention both of writers and of statesmen
seems of late to have been turned towards the
condition of the private soldier with more than
ordinary seriousness, and in some points with
considerable success. General Stewart, in the
above-mentioned work, throws out some admi-
rable
( xxi )
rable hints for the encouragement and improve-
ment of the soldiery—by judicious selections,
and honorary distinctions—setting before their
eyes immediate and attainable advantages, and
expanding their views of promotion, while he
elevates their sense of military qualification, to
acquirements and enjoyments of the highest
rank, from which they are now, almost unavoid-
ably, precluded.
Mr. Windham, as if prophetic of that cala-
mity, which has robbed England of his generous
and magnanimous spirit, hastened, while power
and life remained to him, to complete a mea-
sure, eminent in foresight and in wisdom, which
stands a noble (though already a mutilated)
monument to his fame, and an invaluable be-
quest to his country. His Bill for abridging
the obligations of service—for rectifying the
possible abuses of courts martial—for more libe-
rally encouraging the effective, and offering a
more consolatory asylum to the disabled soldier
—and for facilitating, by the union of all these
means, the acquisition of a more respectable, as
well as a more numerous army, deserves to be
recorded as the first great effort that has for
many
Mr. Windham's
Measure.
( xxii )
many years been sanctioned by parliament, to
purify the fountains of our military force.*
It did likewise appear to me, that less need
be said on the subject of the private soldier,
both because his pay, with its auxiliary allow-
ances, is in the British service on so fair a scale,
as to render his situation, in that respect, by no
means a matter of complaint; and because those
regimental officers who know their duty, and
* By the act of this present session, (1811,) introduced by
Lord Palmerston, courts martial have the option of substi-
tuting imprisonment for the lash—a step, we may hope, to-
wards the abolition of that disgraceful instrument. The cri-
minal who merits torture combined with infamy, a ſortiori
merits death. By the infliction of a kind of chastisement,
which from the beginning of time has carried opprobrium on
the face of it, a gross error is committed in the administration
of military justice. In no case ought the culprit to be sobranded
with shame as to lose all hope of retrieving his character.
In no case should the punishment of one crime be such as to
harden the disposition to criminality. Better apply perpetual
labour to great offences—to smaller ones, fine, imprisonment,
or an obligation to longer service. It may be a question whe-
ther death should in any instance be held up as a terrible pu-
nishment to a soldier, in whom such a frame of mind ought
to be cherished, as would enable him to despise it under every
form.
posses?
( xxiii )
possess the proper influence over their men, may,
by a series of minute and indefinable discrimi-
nations, set at work the great engines of hope
and fear, of shame and pride, without forgetting
their character, exceeding their authority, or
resorting to the state for assistance. Any plan
therefore which goes to the improvement of the
officer, (and such it is hoped may be found in
the present little work,) will necessarily compre-
hend in it a certain, though indirect method of
operating on the private soldier, by a partial re-
form both of his circumstances and his habits.
One evil now requires to be mentioned, which
I forebore to notice in the former edition, be-
cause, though every military man must be sen-
sible of its magnitude, no specific remedy had
occurred to my mind, as either likely or desira-
ble to be adopted.
The price of labour, in this country, stands so
high, and the profits attendant on the meanest
occupations of civil life, are so much more allur-
ing than the pay of an infantry soldier, when
coupled with his restraints and hardships, that
the very poorest of the lower order, and the
most ignorant of course, constitute the bulk of
Öur ordinary recruits. Shoulders and legs are
all
Better educa-
tion of Soldiers,
( xxiv )
all that we can purchase by the usual expedient
of a moderate bounty; knowledge in its hum-
blest form, that of reading, writing, and three
or four rules of arithmetic, seeks and secures a
better market. But there are situations to be
filled out of this mass of ignorance, for which
ignorance so profound is wretchedly calculated.
The non-commissioned officer, besides being a
model for the private soldier, ought to be an
intelligent and instructed man. The company
accounts, nay the morning states, field returns,
and daily orders, call for a practised and ready
pen. How often is the captain of a com-
pany mortified by the necessity of laying aside
the claims of an old and exemplary soldier,
whose want of scholarship is his sole defect;
while he finds himself obliged to recommend
for the halberd one who can advance no other
pretension | When we consider therefore the
prodigious importance of this intermediate link,
which connects the officer with the rank and
file, we must lament that it should so frequently
be formed of any but the purest metal. This
misfortune however had long been acknowledged
as one of those which scarcely admitted of a
cure, for if the recruit were not decently edu-
cated, there was little prospect that the soldier
would become so.
The
( xxv )
The scarcity of intelligent non-commissioned
officers has been so apparent, even in those re-
giments which are recruited from the flower of
the Scottish peasantry, who are supposed to
have enjoyed, almost without exception, the be-
nefits of early education, as to engage the pecu-
liar anxiety of a Royal Duke, the colonel of the
regiment of Royals, who has devoted the best
years of his life to the steady exercise of his
profession—and the whole force of his quick
and comprehensive mind, to its real interests and
honour. To his Royal Highness the Duke of
Kent belongs the exclusive merit of having
found for the evil so generally deplored, a pow-
erful and decisive remedy.
Without being altogether hopeless of con-
veying some useful instruction to the minds of
grown up men, his Royal Highness turned his
most strenuous efforts to the boys enlisted into
his regiment, and quartered ad interim with the
depôt battalion, which never goes on service.
These he resolved to train up with so much care,
as to ensure from amongst them an inexhausti-
ble fund for the supply of non-commissioned
officers; and in the choice of a plan of educa-
tion, he determined in favour of that which
should bring into cultivation the greatest por-
C tion
( xxvi )
tion of intellect, with the greatest possible ra-
pidity, and at the smallest possible expense.
Those who know the warm and enlightened
patronage which has been extended, not by our
gracious Sovereign alone, but by every branch
of his family, (and by none more conspicuously
than by the royal personage of whom I am
speaking,) to the schools of Mr. Joseph Lan-
caster, will be little surprised at the preference
given on this occasion, to the system of that
great and good man—if, amidst the glare of
dazzling and delusive glory, unpretending vir-
tue, invincible patience, and unbounded bene-
volence, directed by a clear and solid under-
standing to the noblest human objects, can
entitle any man to the epithets of good and
great.
His Royal Highness, so far from attributing
to this system any of the dangers which some
respectable persons have feared from its diffu-
sion, could behold in it nothing but habits of
order, universal and unrelaxed—an economy of
time by which not one moment was sacrificed—
a subordination and discipline which subjected
every movement of head and hand to the voice
of a functionary of acknowledged authority,
but of a station transferable to superior merit—
a senti-
( xxvii )
a sentiment of emulation cherished by the most
ingenious devices; acting both personally and
as an esprit de corps; stimulating each indivi-
dual to outstrip his neighbour, and each class
to eclipse its rival—a spirit of loyalty inculcated
by the most respectful and grateful mention of
his Majesty's name and virtues; those medals
which are looked up to as the rewards of indus-
try, and the trophies of distinction, bearing a
record of his beneficence to the children of the
poor—a knowledge, in fine, of pure and una-
dulterated Christianity, by extracting the chief
lessons of those who are able to read, from the
Bible of the church of England.
In this wise and glorious establishment, it is
easy to find a nursery for multitudes of excel-
lent citizens; but the Duke of Kent could dis-
cern in it such military characteristics, as were
applicable to the speedy production of respecta-
ble and excellent soldiers. With great promp-
titude were his arrangements made; with equal
liberality were they brought into action ; and
with success the most gratifying have they been
attended. The beneficial purposes of the regi-
mental institution have been charitably extend-
ed to the children of the poor soldier, who must
otherwise have languished in ignorance, while
C 2 they
( xxviii )
they were matured in vice; and to crown all,
the good example has been caught by the com-
manding officers of other corps, to a degree
which justifies the hope that this new and
cheering light of intellectual discipline will be
rapidly propagated throughout the British ser-
vice. The details which have been communi-
cated to me on this interesting subject, and
which have been derived from an authority be-
yond dispute, will be found at large in the ap-
pendix.”
Were it decorous or justifiable in any writer,
to solicit expressly for that attention, which the
mere act of publishing supposes him to desire,
I would earnestly implore from the military-
political reader, ten minutes of his time and
thought, bestowed upon the sixth and seventh
chapters of the following little sketch. It is
not that the subject of these chapters can be
called of greater ultimate importance than the
subjects of those chapters which precede them ;
but that it is, if I may be allowed the expres-
sion, more tangible, as it unquestionably relates
to a measure more precise and more immediate.
How little merit soever may be found in the
* No. 1.
detailed
( xxix. )
detailed plan of a national armament with which
the work concludes, the objects of that plan, it
will be acknowledged, are of no secondary mag-
nitude, since it professes to combine a more
numerous militia, with a diminished expense; a
more numerous army, with a greater rapidity in
its augmentation—a progressive completion of
the whole people in the knowledge of military
duty, with a speedy exemption from the bur-
then of practising what they know.
Such are the benefits held forth by that ex-
tensive and perfectly novel measure, which is
disclosed in the seventh chapter of the “Views
of Military Reform,” for the creation of a local
militia on a simple and uniform system; and
for the termination of those complex and dis-
jointed expedients, which all defeat each other's
efficacy, and seem to agree in no one feature,
but in their tendency to check the growth of
the regular army.
The appendix to the present edition contains,
1st, An interesting history of a regimental
school established in the depôt battalion of the
Royals, under the auspices and warm patronage
of an illustrious Duke, and a statement of the
progress which that noble institution has already
made
( xxx )
made towards a general diffusion throughout
the service; as a recommendation to the atten-
tive notice of my readers, need I add more,
than that this document comes to me from
Joseph Lancaster # 2dly, Some observations on
the justice and policy of foreign campaigns un-
dertaken, and conquests achieved, by Great
Britain, in the present state of the military and
maritime world; a considerable part of which
observations were separately published twelve
months ago; 3dly, Extracts from “Le Tableau
Statistique de la Monarchie Autrichienne,” pub-
lished at Paris for the use of the French Go-
vernment in the beginning of the year 1809.
London, May, 1811.
C H A P T E R I.
AMONGst a number of manuscripts which
have lain in my hands since the year 1807, I
have selected the following for publication, be-
cause they contain certain projects of improve-
ment in our military system—a subject on
which all men profess to feel the deepest in-
terest, while most men acknowledge or betray
their ignorance when they come to discuss it in
detail.
The matters which are principally treated of
in these papers, being not only of great, but of
permanent importance, and having from the re-
cent peace of Vienna acquired anew a trans-
cendent interest, I cannot help flattering myself
that the extracts which are now to be communi-
cated, will be found to retain whatever value they
may have originally possessed, notwithstanding
any change of men or measures that has oc-
B curred,
( 2 )
curred, since the day on which they were first
written.
If the armies of England have arrived at a
pitch of strength and numbers unparalleled in
former times, it still becomes a question, whe-
ther they have fully kept pace with the exi-
gencies which have called for their augmenta-
tion. If, moreover, those military, or rather
armed bodies, to which, in the event of a fo-
reign invasion, our defence must be chiefly
entrusted, have been the subjects of much fluc-
tuation and mismanagement, it can, I apprehend,
be no question whatever, that the enormous
expense at which they are maintained, is but
feebly balanced by any utility with which they
have hitherto been attended.
To discuss the means, therefore, of rendering
the regular army more formidable, without suf-
fering it to become sensibly more burthensome;
and the domestic force less burthensome, while
we make it considerably more effective, are, in
few words, the object of the subjoined essays.
The order which has been observed in arrang-
ing the several branches of the subject is as
follows:–
1 St.
( 3 )
1st. Of recruiting the British army by bounty
and by ballot.
2d. Of officers and their education; their
appointment and promotion; the encourage-
ments due to them while they serve, and the
provision to be made for those who may retire.
Second division of the subject—a defensive
force.
1st. Of the principles of the volunteer system.
2d. Of the old militia system; of military
discipline; and of the expediency of a new mi-
litia system.
3d. Detailed plan of a local militia; with
some general observations.
This country may now be considered as at
bay. “There is no flying hence:” our safety
must be found in “tarrying here.”—England
stands alone on the map of the world, as does the
character of these times on the page of history.
Unless, at such a crisis, we call up for the
public defence, all that we can by any means
command or create, of force, both numerical and
moral, it were better that we burn every record
of our national greatness, and leave to the eye
of after-ages no trace of England but her ruins.
B 2 In
( 4 )
Mr. Windham's
Bill,
In physical, no less than in moral power, our
armies have ever been deficient. The officers
have been too frequently over-matched in skill,
and the troops at all times outnumbered.
The single effort which has been made to
remedy the latter of these great evils, and which
has not rather tended to aggravate the disease,
was the bill of last session,” (46th of the King,)
introduced by Mr. Secretary Windham. Had
the minister then brought within the scope of
his proposal, such a modification of the militia
system, as would have cleared away the obstacles
presented by that system, to the recruiting of
the regular army, the nation, it is probable,
might have placed much reliance on the efficacy
of that measure alone; but so far as the Bill al-
ready goes, it contains, in my judgment, the
outline of an arrangement, so flattering at least,
that it will be but fair to make some practical
trial of its result, before we suggest upon that
branch of the service any detailed alterations.
The clause which limits to seven years the pe-
riod of the first enlistment, is hardly yet under-
stood throughout the remoter districts.-Enlist-
ing for general service, and enlisting for life,
* 1806. l
lave
( 5 )
have been so long connected in fact, that the two
obligations have become at length inseparably
blended in the minds of the people: one or two
instances also in which the faith of government
was said to have been broken, and numberless
occasions on which the practice of drafting,
odious and impolitic as it must ever appear, gave
currency to the allegations of violated faith,
have prepared the feelings of the multitude for
distrust, and induced them to regard as no bet-
ter than a mere recruiting decoy, any proffered
relaxation of the ancient usage. It is probable,
therefore, that some time will elapse, before these
prejudices can be wholly wiped away, and the
natural benefits of this indulgent measure so
fully exemplified and ascertained, as to bring it
into perfect operation.*
* An encroachment, which I cannot help thinking a most
pernicious one, was made on the bill of 1806, by the Noble
Lord who succeeded Mr. Windham. Under the original mea-
sure, the period of enlistment could not exceed seven years.
By the subsequent alteration, introduced by Lord Castle-
reagh, an option was given the recruit, to enlist either for a li-
mited period or for life, with a superior bounty in the latter
instance. The objection to this is, that it leaves an opening to
the tricks and importunities of recruiting serjeants. It would
be an important circumstance for all the poor families in the king-
dom to know that, even with their own consent, their sons and
brothers could not become aliens for life, by any act of enlistment,
B 3 But
( 6 )
But how far the expedient of voluntary re-
cruiting under the wisest possible regulations,
and the most encouraging bounties, may in the
end be found equal to the public exigencies, is
quite another subject of inquiry.
The average numbers of the regular army of
Great Britain may perhaps be calculated at
160,000 men. The average consumption of an
army on actual service, exclusively of those who
fall by the sword, is seldom stated, after the
close of a single campaign, at less than one-
third of its original strength. The bulk of the
British troops, I confess, are not often exposed
to the hardships of actual service, and a calcula-
tion drawn from the experience of the conti-
nental armies, may therefore, at first sight,
appear to fail in its application to *our own.—
If, however, we look to the distant settlements
* The very short campaigns of Spain, Portugal, and Hol-
land, seem to have justified the above calculation to its fullest
extent. But of this melancholy fact no advantage ought to
be taken in general reasoning; for one alleged source of the
evil, namely, the misconduct of certain departments of the
army, is surely susceptible of some remedy; and indeed one
of them (the commissariat) has recently been placed in such
hands, that the nation may indulge the most sanguine hopes
respecting its amelioration, which can be realized by zeal, in-
tegrity, and talent.
of
( 7 )
of England, where policy and -commerce have
spread their conquests, into climates so much
more fatal than an host of enemies that there is
hardly an hour's interval between the garrison
and the grave, it might not be deemed unrea-
sonable to estimate the yearly diminution of
our military force, upon a scale even more ex-
tensive than that which has been adopted by the
other states of Europe; but I am satisfied to
take a fourth, instead of a third.
Upon this mode of reasoning, it will be neces-
sary to supply an annual waste of above 40,000
men tº To supply that enormous waste from the
* According to a recent official statement, (1811) in the
debate on the army estimates, the actual amount of regular
soldiers is upwards of 211,000 men—the average consumption
23,000—and the average produce of the recruiting service,
11,000 ! How correct soever this account may have been,
at the time when the Noble Secretary at War delivered his
speech, it is quite improbable that the casualties should con-
tinue to bear so small a proportion to the force employed; if
we persevere in the war of the Peninsula—as persevere we
must, or perish. The state of the recruiting service appears,
from the same authority, miserable beyond imagination; we
consume at the rate of one-tenth—we recruit at the rate of one
twentieth ! What must then be the issue of the contest or are
we to be saved only by an annual disorganization of the old
militia
B 4 unaided
( 8 )
unaided source of the recruiting market ! where
every thing relative to our success is precarious
—precarious from the nature of things, and
doubly so from our choice of measures 1 where
we are sure of nothing but of powerful competi-
tors; of manufactures and the plough, which
we ought not to rival—of the militia and the
volunteers, whose rivalship ministers ought not
to have admitted, because against it they are un-
able to contend.
But I am willing to set upon wise arrange-
ments their highest value, and to give the
utmost latitude to those reforms and modifica-
tions of the militia and volunteer establishments,
which it is acknowledged may be attainable to-
wards the advancement of the recruiting service.
The final success of all these efforts being ob-
viously questionable, what alternative* remains
but the ballot? . A ballot for the maintenance
of a regular army, or, in other words, a con-
scription, on the same principles as that of
France, sounds, I am aware, in an Englishman's
ear, like the knell of death to his country; and
A ballot for the
Line.
* An alternative, neither so severe as the ballot, nor so hu-
miliating as the sacrifice of our colonial empire, is offered with
all deference in the 7th chapter of this essay—and it is humbly
conceived to be more efficacious than cither.
I ar-
( 9 )
I argue it, not on the score of choice, but of
an ultimate and possible necessity. Is it at the
same time less defensible, in its nature, than the
ballot for a militia; or than the impressment of
seamen, in its degree ? The public safety, which
alone can authorise the smallest encroachment
on the freedom of the subject, is a sufficient
justification of the greatest. The security of
England from invasion has never failed to ex-
cuse the application of a ballot to our militia
force; and should it ever become the universal
opinion of our statesmen, that to preserve the
integrity of the British empire, in all its distant
colonies, provinces, and kingdoms, be, no less
than the guardianship of the seat of empire itself,
essential to the safety of the realm, the inference
unavoidably flowing from this doctrine will pre-
scribe it as the first duty of every Minister, to
create a force for service all over the world, no
matter at what price of constitutional feeling, or
by what surrender of individual liberty. The
other states of Europe have long resorted to
compulsory measures for the completion of their
military establishments; and the necessity of the
thing has always been adduced as a fair apology
for its hardship. The navy of England has
been usually regarded by her in the same light
as the standing army of neighbouring nations;
* and
( 10 )
and similar means to those to which they have
been indebted for their troops, have never failed
to furnish her with seamen. . .
Suppose that the period be already arrived, at
which France shall have obtained possession of
the whole maritime continent of Europe—Her
naval force may then be split into numberless.
divisions, and the points of attack infinitely mul-
tiplied or extended. The armies of France may
be transported to the east or to the west, in
squadrons strong enough to fight our fleets, or
so numerous as partially to evade them. The
navy of England must thenceforth cease to be
regarded as her sole and infallible protection,
and the army will grow into a degree of import-
ance proportioned to the interests for which it.
will become responsible. The necessity for an
army being no less apparent than the acknow-
ledged necessity for a naval force, similar me-
thods of supporting or augmenting it must be
equally tolerated by all consistent reasoners.
It appears to me, I confess, that the time is.
not very distant when this great question will.
severely exercise the feelings of every English-
man. Recruiting, to the extent to which our
foreign possessions require that it should be car-
* * ried,
( 11 )
ried, must, on the present system, ere long, be
worn out. Such has been the prodigality of
British life, amidst the perpetual wars of our
unwieldy and precarious empire in India, or
amongst the silent and devouring sepulchres of
the western hemisphere, that nothing but an ac-
cession of wisdom or of power, can continue to
supply this inevitable waste. There can then be
no other alternative but to open new sources of
supply to the army, to share with other nations
our present monopoly of colonial produce; or
to sacrifice, in the defence of that monopoly,
the people for whose sake only it could ever be
deemed worth preserving.
The regular recruiting for some years past has
not exceeded on the average 20,000* men, some-
thing less than one-half of the annual demand.
To aid this deficiency an experiment has been
tried; the militia has been called upon to volun-
teer, and a transient remedy has been obtained
for an inconvenience of which we know the
limits, by the substitution of an indefinite evil.
But this cannot be enumerated amongst our
permanent resources, much less defended as part
of a system. It is living on our capital. To
* 11,000; vide debate on the Army Estimates, *
Say
( 12 )
say nothing of the shock which it gives to the
organization and discipline of the militia regi-
ments, (evident from the actual state of the old
militia,) it only hastens that crisis, at which,
having exhausted all the soldiers who were to
be procured by purchase, we must resort to sol-
diers by compulsion.
The extent of my assertion then is this, that
the necessary expenditure of men in the British
army, must, sooner or later, dry up the ordinary
channels of recruiting, and drive us to a levy
by ballot as a last resource, unless we resolve,
1st, To improve the principles of our militia
service—2dly, To adopt new principles of fo-
reign conquest—or, 3dly, Failing these, to con-
tract the limits of our colonial empire.
That crisis nevertheless being yet but in
prospect, we owe to the feelings of the people,
to the love of liberty, to the practice of the con-
stitution, and to the recency of the law in ques-
tion, a perseverance in the mode of recruiting
by bounty for the line, until there shall arrive
some imminent and overwhelming danger, at
once to open the eyes of government, and to
enlarge their powers; that when they are called
upon to adopt a more rigorous military system,
OT
( 13 ).
or a less ambitious colonial policy, they may
have wherewithal to acquit themselves before
the enemies of either experiment, by contrasting
it with the endurance of a foreign yoke.
CHAPTER
( 14 )
CHAPTER II.
WE may deem it strange, that when the new
officers, modelling of the army was in contemplation,
one leading branch of that important subject
appears wholly to have escaped the notice of Mr.
Windham, both in the provisions of his other-
wise comprehensive Bill, and in the oration by
which he introduced it. The officers of the
army were hardly once named, throughout a
speech of several hours continuance.
Amongst the military virtues by which this
class of gentlemen are distinguished, skill, in
the higher and more difficult departments of
their profession, too plainly holds but a subordi-
nate rank. Buoyant valour, as it laughs at, or
disdains most other sciences, so is it not easily
chastised out of its disposition to undervalue
the science of war; and, since opportunities of
acquiring experience at the head or amidst the
operations of numerous armies, occur less fre-
quently in the British service than in that of
InoSt
most other great European nations, it is plain,
that as the day of trial approaches, the officer
who wants the resource of practice, feels doubly
destitute when he wants education also. But
whatever may be the precise magnitude of this
evil, no means that I can discover have yet
been suggested, of power sufficient to check its
growth.
It is not to be accounted for, except on
grounds extremely mortifying to the pride of
an enlightened nation, that, until within these
few last years, no establishments had been form-
ed, no incitements offered, and scarce an opi-
nion expressed, by persons in authority, favour-
able to the cultivation of military talent; while
government itself seemed to countenance that
weak and fatal notion, that the same ignorance
against which every other profession would in-
dignantly close the door, and which would dis-
grace, in private life, the name of gentleman,
was not unbecoming the character of a soldier;
was no unsuitable qualification for him who, in
every stage of his military progress, would be
charged with the vindication of his country's
rights; and who, when arrived at high com-
mand, might have to negociate a treaty, to ad-
minister a government, and to represent his king.
With
Want of ade-
quate establish-
ments for their
education.
( 16 )
With the exception of some few splendid in-
stances,” in which overbearing and extraordi-
nary natural powers have supplied the defects of
an ill-contrived system, the officers of our land-
forces have had to learn their business at the
moment in which they were called upon to per-
form it; and this, too, in a profession, in which
the good or bad performance even of a com-
mon duty, may have no small influence on the
national welfare.
From the loom of the manufacturer, to the
bench of justice, it would be difficult to find a
single individual admitted to the exercise of any
regular calling, without the recommendation of
a previous discipline, tending to qualify him for
it. Shall the English officer be the solitary ex-
* Exceptions requiring to be pointed out, could hardly be
pronounced illustrious exceptions. This country does un-
questionably possess some officers, whose greatness has been
attested by unexampled difficulties and uninterrupted tri-
umphs. She may boast of others who, with the highest pre-
tensions which rank and character can bestow upon them,
ask only opportunity to evince their title to renown. The
genius of Marlborough could not be measured by any stand-
ard known at the age he lived in; the present day perhaps
has given birth to minds of no inferior growth—and has sea-
sonably called them to a task of parallel glory—to confound
the project of universal empire.
ample?
* *
( 17 )
ample? And yet, if there be one class of men
whose fitness for their pursuit in life ought to
be the peculiar care and province of the public,
it is assuredly the class of military men; be-
reause, though we leave the unspeakable impor-
tance of their profession altogether out of the
question, they, of all others, are least likely to
qualify themselves. Men, in the ordinary walks
of life, have a powerful incentive to the volun-
tary acquisition of such knowledge, as may fit
them for the discharge of their several duties.
Nakedness and hunger are at their heels. The
lawyer and physician will soon find out that fa-
mine is the meed of incapacity; nor can their
foppish ignorance escape disgrace by folding it-
self within the mantle of courage. Far other-
wise with the blockhead in a soldier's garb: his
pay, so far as it goes, is a sure support; his pre-
ferment, if he has money, he entrusts to his
money; if he has friends, to their patronage;
if neither, to chance. But mere promotion will
satisfy the highest ambition of mediocrity—sel-
dom does it breathe one aspiration after fame,
or one sigh for its country's glory.
What then shall we gain, it may be asked, by
bestowing education on subjects, so many of
whom may be considered as altogether hopeless?
C I admit
( 18 )
I admit the folly of predicting, that we shall
thereby create a Turenne, a Marlborough, or an
Eugene—for first-rate intellect is the immediate
work of the Almighty; but let us be cautious
of withholding the light of instruction, from
those in whom the seeds of genius want only
sunshine to mature them. Let absolute igno-
rance be rendered difficult to youths of the
idlest spirit; and extensive knowledge be made
attainable by the most ordinary talents.
Do the officers of our navy possess, it may
be objected, any previous acquaintance with
that science, in their subsequent application of
which consist the boast and power of their
country P
They enter the naval service, we reply, at the
age of 10 or 12 years. They are taught, on
board ship, the naval tactics, with the other
branches of professional science; there they
also learn what cannot be taught on shore, the
practical use of whatever they know. But the
satisfactory and decisive answer is, that a mid-
shipman cannot regularly pass for a lieutenant,
without being examined, and strictly too, in the
theory of his profession.
Where
( 19 )
Where then is the parallel between these two
services P A marching regiment * can hardly,
like a man of war, contain within itself a
school for the instruction of officers. Boys, at
that tender age, when habits of attention are
most successfully fixed, and knowledge most
rapidly acquired, when, also, it is the salutary
custom of England to enter them in the navy,
could not endure the fatigues and hardships to
which a regiment of infantry must ever be ex-
posed. And to talk of laying down a course of
regular study, for young men of 18 or 20 years
of age, who have already been sent into the
army as a pis aller, by way of making them
“good for something”—after the criminal in-
dulgence of their friends, and their own idle or
dissolute habits have rendered them literally
good for nothing, betrays no less wisdom than
did a certain royal effort, to chain down the
surges of the wayward and rebellious Helles-
pont.
Taking for granted, then, the principle for
* Some of the old French regiments had select libraries,
which moved with the corps in time of peace; but they were
rather sources of relaxation to men of taste, already educated,
than of discipline or instruction to the idle.
C 9. which
( 20 )
which I have been contending, and which, in
fact, may be reduced to this, that no man can
become a general, any more than a judge, by in-
spiration, the points that we have next to con-
sider, are, 1st, The species of knowledge which
a soldier ought to possess, and 2dly, The means
by which he might be enabled to obtain it.
On the first of these topics there can be little
hesitation in asserting, that every candidate for
the profession of arms ought to make himself
an accomplished gentleman, no less than a scien-
tific soldier; and that the studies connected
with such a view of the subject will be various
rather than severe. Drawing, and the modern
languages, with the principles and practice of
field fortification, are all too obvious to be over-
looked. Military geography might be rendered
subservient to history, which, ancient and mo-
dern, ought to be diligently taught; for “if
“you would form great minds, you must hold
“up to them great examples.” To these should
be added a general knowledge of the statistical
accounts of all modern nations; comprehending
a survey of their productions and manufactures,
their population, commerce, revenues, and sys-
tem of taxation ; a concise view of their form
of government—of the mode in which they
raisº
( 21 )
raise their armies—of the degree of facility with
which they recruit them—and of the amount,
the discipline, and character, of the troops.
An officer furnished with this stock of informa-
tion, will find himself able to walk alone, in
whatever part of the world his duty may engage
him—being exempt from the risk of deception
or disappointment, whether in relation to the
resources on which he may have to depend, the
privations he must endure, the allies with whom
he is to co-operate, or the enemy whom he has
to encounter. Nor can it be deemed super-
fluous, to recommend to each student, such a
liberal acquaintance with the Latin language as
may fix in his memory the glowing records of
Sallust, of Caesar, and of Tacitus; or fill his yet
untainted imagination with the loftier poetry
of the Augustan aera—strains, immortal as the
warriors whom they sung ! that his earliest sen-
timents may breathe of magnanimity, and his
first sympathies be given to heroic virtue.
If we reflect again on the arduous situation
of the commander of an army, when employed
upon actual service, or allow for the difficulties
not rarely encountered even by subordinate
officers, in the conduct of detached and distant
commands, it may appear desirable to add one
C 3 subject
( 22 )
subject more to those already recited. I am
far from urging, as an essential part of a mili-
tary education, any abstruse researches into
what is called the law of nations, or that the
hours and the spirits of youth should be wasted
amidst the labyrinths of Grotius, Puffendorf,
and Vattel—but, on the Continent of Europe
where, sooner or later, the British bayonet will
be seen again to shine, we may, at once, suppose
a case in which the interests of his Majesty
might be eminently promoted by an officer,
who could blend, on the spur of a critical occa-
sion, the statesman with the soldier—who, by a
prompt and spirited assertion, or by an equally
prompt and temperate admission of those lead-
ing principles, which govern the rights of neu-
tral and belligerent powers, might secure a para-
mount sanction to his enterprizes, and an un-
erring guide to his * negociations. It is quite
needless to dwell upon the advantages that
have accrued to our most inveterate enemy,
from possessing a long list of able officers, ca-
* This prophecy has now become history. The worst fea-
ture in the convention of Cintra was the ignorance of general
principles betrayed on that occasion; and evinced, both in the
rights which we conceded to a vanquished enemy, and in the
wrongs which we offered to an independent ally.
pable
( 23 )
pable of executing, at times, those confidential
missions, which embrace a sort of mingled
character—where the forms of diplomatic dis-
cussion are only called in, to screen or to facili-
tate the exercise of military vigilance, upon ob-
jects which require the correctness of a veteran
judgment, and the fidelity of a soldier's eye.
The views of the French government could
hardly be called mysterious, in the mission of
Andreossi as ambassador to England; nor shall
we ever know how far he had matured those
observations, for which, by nature and habit, he
was so peculiarly gifted, on the extent and
composition of our defensive force, as well as
on the intrinsic excellence or weakness of our
general military system. Was the same person
more recently fixed at Vienna, as the medium
of explanation with a doubtful court, or as a
spy at the head-quarters of an hostile army P
Why was Duroc hurried off to Berlin on the eve
of the campaign with Prussia P Why dis-
patched on a mock complimentary message to
the courteous and credulous Alexander, but to
penetrate or corrupt the Russian councils? And
in all these cases, how fatal has been the re-
sult |
C 4 Were
( 24 )
Were England to act upon her true interests,
she would direct her military enterprizes to ob-
jects of the highest and most “expanded na-
ture. The age demands them, and promises to
reward them. But to attempt, much more to
execute, such vast undertakings, would require
the capability of masters in the science of war.
Men of enlarged views, of extensive knowledge,
and of versatile experience, can be the only
agents of a policy so bold, but so enlightened.
The statesman who plans a series of measures
congenial to the spirit of such a policy, must
be able to form the combinations of a great
general—the officer who realizes them must pos-
sess the attributes of a statesman. These indeed
were gifts of heaven to the Nassau of one cen-
tury, and to the Chatham and the Frederick of
another—but are there no talents worth improv-
ing, except those which outstrip the needless
labour of instruction ? Must we abandon to
utter waste and ruin, those fine regions of the
earth which solicit from us only the grateful
toil of cultivation, because there may be found
on its surface a few chosen spots, of sponta-
neous and exuberant fertility ? Shall we desert
the natural and ordinary means of securing our
* Wide Appendix, No, II.
existence
( 25 )
existence as an unconquered people, waiting the
special intervention of that power, whose favour
we forfeit by our presumptuous weakness, and
throwing back upon Providence the duties
which he has assigned to man P
The establishment of the Royal Military
College was a new epoch in the annals of the
British army. With the noble exception of the
school for artillery officers at Woolwich, the
great principle on which this recent institution
has been founded, seems, in every part of the
empire, to have suffered the most absolute neg-
lect. Government, however, has at length ac-
knowledged, that a distinct profession requires
a peculiar education ; and has borrowed one
from amongst the maxims of private life, in aid
of that noblest of all professions, whose end is
peace, though its instrument is terror.
But it is not in the religion of human policy,
that “faith without works” can save an infatu-
ated people. A salutary doctrine has, indeed,
been proclaimed, and for the vigour with which
it has been acted on, we are referred to the evi-
dence of Great Marlow. The College of Great
Marlow is a receptacle for two or three hundred
pupils. The British infantry contains little
short
( 26 )
short of 7 or 8000 officers. The annual waste
is often more, and seldom less, than a sixth of
that number; and the vacancies, in the space
of one year, will, consequently, amount to from
11 to 1300 commissions. Allowing three years,
then, to complete the collegiate course, the an-
nual influx, from the seminary, cannot exceed
100 cadets, at most ; or about 1-12th of the
regular consumption Thus do we find a tardy
acknowledgment of error, succeeded by a lan-
guid effort to correct it—such is the provision
which has yet been made towards supplying the
demand for military intellect | Such the extent
to which this great, but vulnerable country, has
hitherto carried an institution essential to her
existence
Directed with energy to its proper functions,
a seminary of this nature would bear the same
relation to the regular infantry of England, as
that of Woolwich bears to the Royal Artillery;
or as Oxford and Cambridge, the College of
Physicians, and the Inns of Court, have borne, for
centuries, to the learned professions. Through
it, alone, ought to lie the road to a commission.
From it a degree ought to be taken, analogous
to that of Bachelor of Arts in the civil Univer-
sities; without the exhibition of which, toge-
ther
( 27 )
ther with a certificate of gentlemanly conduct,
no claim to an ensigncy ought ever to be ad-
mitted.
Against those who deride such a proposal at
the outset, as the mere effusion of a Utopian
fancy, I will not take the benefit of any remote
analogies, presented by the records of Greece
and Rome, where the whole body of the youth
were educated to arms. Let us be satisfied with
turning to the later history of Europe, and more
particularly of that people who have now become
the arbiters of Europe; from whose intelligence
we have derived the best theories of modern
war, as we have borrowed its very terms from
their language.
From the military schools of France, towards
the decline of the 17th century, arose the genius
of the illustrious Vauban, against whom every
ancient fortress ceased to be impregnable; and on
whose suggestion was erected that iron frontier,
which has since enabled her to molest her neigh-
bours, undisturbed by the chance of retribu-
tion.
The same establishments have terminated the
18th century, by reforming the movements of
the
( 28 )
the field, as they had before ascertained the
erroneous principles of fortification. They have
given new force to armies, and a new form to
battles. Their banners have waved over the
walls of every capital, or scared the councils of
every sovereign, on the ancient Continent of
Europe. The Alps and Apennines have inter-
posed no obstacle to the invading hosts of
France; they stand but as guides to their
march, or eternal monuments of their triumph.
By these schools, perhaps, more than by any
other definite cause, has the FATAL REvo LU-
TIon been fixed for ever. Snatched by the hand
of Dumourier from early death, the steady tem-
perature of Pichegru's genius succeeded, to give
it strength and maturity; until bestrode and
shackled by the beardless chieftain of Lodi, it
became the degenerate agent of his barbarous
power, and of dismay or ruin to every despot-
ism but his own. We may ascribe it, finally, to
such institutions, of which England has yet
heard little but the name, that the courses of
the Rhine, the Elbe, and the Danube, are to be
found within the dominions of her eternal foe;
and that the ocean, the Mediterranean, the
Adriatic, and the Baltic, now wash the shores
of a common empire.
CHAPTER
CHAPTER III.
I Now pursue that subject in detail, which,
in its more general bearings, employed the pre-
ceding chapter.
For argument sake, we shall set down the
average number of students in the Military Col-
lege, under its proposed extension, at somewhat
about 5,000, which may possibly be near two-
thirds of the number of officers now in our in-
fantry service, and certainly not above the
aggregate of the students in our English and
Irish universities, together with those on the
north of the Tweed. In such an estimate, it is
evident, no allowance can be made for that fluc-
tuation in the numbers of the establishment,
which times and circumstances will unavoidably
produce. Enough, if there be, on the part of
the proposer, no unfair attempt to elude the
reproach of extravagance, by calculating below
their probable amount the expense and diffi-
culties
( 30 )
culties of the undertaking. The main consi-
deration for the country is, that there should be
an ample supply of efficient officers; and tak-
ing the above (which no doubt is sufficiently
high) as a standard, I would ask, is it a work be-
yond the reach of this great people to accom-
plish P and is not the necessity even more than
proportioned to the effort?
These 5,000 students, then, may be divided
into five classes, rising in seniority as at other
universities. But as it would be of importance
to connmunicatc a military tone to every part of
this arrangement, that the whole might be con-
structed on one great warlike model, thesc
classes we shall call brigades, each consisting of
about 1,000 cadets, and each divided into two
battalions. The senior brigade would supply
officers to all the rest. The course of instruc-
tion ought to be completed in four years, and
not sooner. The senior brigade of the five
would thence consist of supernumeraries; each
of these would, on expiration of the fourth
year, be entitled to the honorary appellation of
ensign, and would alone be eligible to a com-
mission in the army, with a strict regard to ser
niority. The number of commissions granted
must,
( 31 )
must, of course, be determined by the number
of vacancies which occurred, and some of the
candidates might suffer occasional disappoint-
ments. But most of these gentlemen might,
till provided for, be attached en second to regi-
ments of the line. There is little likelihood of
our being seriously encumbered by an overflow
or exposed by a deficiency of officers; in this in-
stance, as in most others where wants are reci-
procal, the balance between the quantity of em-
ployment, and the number of those who seek it
will, in the long run, be fairly struck; and the
military, no less than the commercial exchange,
will gradually find its own level.
A vast enlargement must indeed be given to
every feature of the military college, and an im-
mense range of action prescribed to it, before it
can fully effect the purposes on which I have
expatiated. Unity of design ought, for obvious
reasons, to be a leading principle throughout the
whole of this establishment, and all its depart-
ments, without exception, should therefore be
fixed upon the same spot. A healthy situation
ought to be chosen, in a country where the dis-
position and variety of surface were such, as to
illustrate, in a multitude of ways, the most im-
portant military movements. Buildings, on the
plan
( 32 )
plan of barracks, and suitable to the estimated
number of residents, ought to be enclosed
within the skeleton of a regular fortress, whose
works would employ a considerable garrison.
Not that government need encounter, bond fide,
the expense of such a fortress; but their object
being the inculcation of lasting military habits,
in the future protectors of their country, I would
propose that the duties, both of camp and garri-
son, be rigidly and constantly performed, as if
in the immediate presence of a formidable ene-
my; let the works, therefore, be as slight, and
as little expensive as you please, but be sure that
they convey a precise idea of the thing which
they are designed to represent.
The battalions of which this useful army was
composed, might form the two bodies of be-
siegers and besieged. A regular siege might be
Exhibited in all its parts; the approaches scienti-
fically carried on and impeded; the various arts
of attack and defence, strikingly and skilfully
exemplified; until the fortress was relieved, or a
capitulation concluded in form. Sure I am,
that, by such expedients, these boys would be
converted into old soldiers, long before they
came to join their respective regiments; that
they would be capable of allotting their exact
share
( & )
share of service to the mattock, the spade, and
the axe, no less than to the mortar and the mine;
and that they would form their coup d'acil of mi-
litary movements, not from the miniature pro-
portions of a regimental field-day, but from the
operation of brigades and divisions of an army,
combined with or opposed to each other, through-
out an extensive and embarrassed country.
Having thus secured a place for their recep-
tion, some further encouragements must be held
out to youths of limited fortune, or the number
of your pupils will stand no comparison, either
with the scale of your preparations, or the dig-
nity of your objects. The actual terms of board
and tuition, at the college of Great Marlow,
ought to be lowered at least one half. The sons
of officers are, under the present system, the
only persons entitled to enter the seminary at
any thing like a moderate expenditure; that is
to say, at such an expenditure, as will encourage
the middling class of society to furnish the army
with an ample supply of officers, which, without
the assistance of that middle order, it will be vain
and chimerical to expect.
From the moral elements of a military force,
D We
( 34 )
we naturally proceed to their composition; and
the more naturally in the present instance, be-
cause, with the justice of the reasonings which I
have already offered to public notice, is combined
the necessity of a radical change, in the circum-
stances of the existing army. The plan of edu-
cation above recommended, can never be carried
to any great extent, nor indeed be productive of
any material benefit, so long as we shall tolerate
the privilege of purchasing commissions. This
is the master grievance of the British service;
the incubus which locks up every vital power
within us. You but practise upon those whom
you invite to the study of their profession, if you
suffer the rewards of knowledge to be mono-
polized by wealth, or traffic of any kind to
pollute the temple of honour—or buyers and
sellers to find any room within its walls. The
power of command supposes the capability of
commanding. But the best general pledge of
capability in an officer is experience; and the
only general measure of experience, is length of
service. In laying down a system, therefore,
promotion ought to be dispensed according to
seniority; * and the privilege of purchase, which
* This is by no means to be understood as setting aside the
salutary prerogative of encouraging entinent merit by extra-
ordinal y promotion.
stifles
( 35 )
stifles every attempt towards the establishment
of such a system, ought to be utterly abolished.
The abolition of purchase is a project of no
great novelty—in my humble opinion, of no
great difficulty; and notwithstanding the scepti-
cism which has so often been avowed, of no equi-
vocal advantage. Against this measure two ob-
jections have been urged, the first of which is
purely speculative, and of much too fanciful a
complexion to be now-a-days seriously debated.
“If you deprive property of its natural
weight,” it is asserted, “no man of fortune will
send his son into the army; your regiments of
the line will be filled with adventurers ; a bar-
tier will be raised between the wealth and the
force of the state: and the army will become a
mere band of mercenary instruments, fitted to
the designs of despotism or usurpation,” &c.
To an enlightened mind, it is enough, I believe,
to present such arguments ; were we at leisure
to refute them, we need only ask, is the royal
artillery a corps of adventurers? Is the navy
officered by mercenary adventurers? And if they
both were, with the army thrown into the same
Scale, by what branch of the legislature are
D Q they
( 36 )
they primarily subsisted 2 and where are they to
look, for their pay ?
A second objection is less flighty than the
former, although it affects the integrity of the
measure, rather than its immediate policy.—
“You cannot do away purchase,” it is con-
tended; “because, to prevent those officers who
have already purchased commissions, from selling
what they have fairly and legally bought, would
be an exercise of the grossest injustice.” This
objection can be answered only by observing,
that no such iniquity was ever drcamed of; the
charge implied in the objection being no less
than that of changing the nature of property
from moveable to immoveable, and so reducing
its value by the operation of an ea post facto
law.
To avoid such a reproach, let us propose,
that,
1st. Every purchase, of any rank whatever,
shall be henceforward null and void.
2dly. Let every officer, except as hereafter
expressed, who has purchased the commission
which he now holds, take two years to make up
his mind, and if, at any time within that period,
he should feel inclined to sell, let the state be-
COII) &
( 37 )
come the purchaser, at the price which he ac-
tually paid for his commission.
3dly. Should such officer be named for pro-
motion before the expiration of the said period
of two years, let him declare his choice, to sell
at the instant, or, by accepting the offered pro-
motion, to forfeit all privilege of future sale.
4thly. If, at the end of the two years above-
mentioned, any of those officers, who were then
to have made their option, announce their wil-
lingness to remain in the army, they must con-
sider themselves precluded from any further sale
of their commission.
5thly. Let every officer, who, at the date of
the new regulation, shall have been in the ser-
vice for twenty years, be permitted to sell his
highest regimental rank to the public, at any
period of his future life, without limitation, and,
for the price which it originally cost him.
To those who, are startled by the enormous.
expense supposed to attend on such a scheme, I
would observe, that, from the great demand for
officers of late years, the subaltern commissions
have been mostly obtained without purchase.
That those officers, on the other hand, who
have risen by purchase to the higher ranks, must
D 3 feel,
( 38 )
feel an interest in their professional prospects,
which they would hardly be tempted to forego,
for the sake of the highest price that their com-
mission could be supposed to bring them.
That the two years during which they are
allowed to deliberate, will influence their minds
against any precipitate resolution; and, in the
mean time, through the casualties of the ser-
vice, the promotion of some, and the near
approach of others to promotion, the number
of commissions likely to come into the market,
at the expiration of the given period, and of
course the expense likely to be incurred by
their purchase, will fall far short of any esti-
mate which we might now think it rational to
form.
Lastly. That the class of officers most apt to
sell their commissions, on the terms now pro-
posed, will be those who enter the army with a
large command of money, and with a view to
that rapid and sweeping promotion, of which
money is the readiest instrument. Such men
are seldom observed to pay the same soldier-
like attention to their duty, by which poor and
patient merit must at all times seek to recom-
mend itself. When, therefore, that accommo-
dating
( 39 )
dating ladder, by which they have hitherto been
enabled to overtop their competitors, shall have
slipped from under their feet, they will soon be
glad to escape from a profession whose hardships
are henceforth to be endured by all, and whose
sweets are to be fairly distributed. From such
persons, not very numerous I hope, the army
derives no ornament, and the nation little
strength; and we may entertain, upon the whole,
a reasonable confidence, that while the evil is
rooted out for ever, the expense of the remedy
will be far from severe.
D 4 CHAPTER
( 40 )
On the manage-
ment of emula-
tion.
CHAPTER IV.
THou GH government may meet with abun-
dant success, in collecting materials for the
great work of military regeneration ; though
their system may be calculated on the most ex-
tensive scale, and moulded into the most blame-
less and vigorous form; still is it no more than
a half finished undertaking, until they shall
apply to it a moving power, and breathe into,
it a living principle.
In painting the character of a perfect citizen,
the love of his country starts out upon the can-
vass, as his noblest, and most natural feature;
because it combines, while it depends on, a
virtuous assemblage of original associations and
affections; of the remembrance of his infant
happiness; of tender attachments to his family
and friends; of just regard to his rights and
possessions; of reverence for the laws by which
they are protected and secured. If he be en-
gaged in public affairs, we may add the ambi-
tloll
( 41 )
tion of fame or power, as a legitimate incentive
of civil life; as capable of rousing the ardor of
enthusiasm, the spring and mover of illustri-
ous action.
The moral structure of an army is fundamen-
tally different. An officer's regiment is to him
a second home; his sovereign and his profession,
taken together, form an essential part of that
medium, through which he beholds his country.
Under a regular government, while proceeding in
its ordinary course, power, popularity, and politi-
cal reputation, are looked upon by the majority
of military men, but as unworthy pursuits, or as
idle visions. The soldier fights and conquers,
that he may be honoured in his profession, leaving
to his peaceful brethren, the more solid fruits
of victory.* Glory is the great spur to a warrior's
efforts—
* It might be fatal to the public service of this country, if
officers, when invested with that high command which elevates
them into the view of the whole world, suffered their feelings
to be seriously affected by what is industriously published
every day, on the subject of their actions and their merits.
It is, nevertheless, impossible to read the daily effusions of
some of the London newspapers, on the occurrences of each
(and conspicuously of the last and present) campaign, without
the utmost indignation and disgust. Unwarranted assump-
"nº mortifying conjectules, insidious prognostics—envious
depreciation
( 42 )
efforts—“E.v omnibus pramiis virtutis, si esset
habenda ratio pramiorum, amplissimum esse
praemium GLoRIAM ; esse hancunam, qua, brevi-
tatem vita posteritatis memorić consolaretur;
quat efficeret, ut absentes adessemus, mortui wive-
ºremus ; hanc denique esse, cujus gradibus etiam
homines in calum wideamtur ascendere.”
depreciation—bitter taunt—nay, deliberate falsehood—are
the common-place amusement of these journalists. Igno-
rance, by such base devices, is misled, but never undeceived;
error propagated, but never recalled—and genius and virtue
robbed of those rich rewards for which life and happiness
have been vainly devoted. If military men, in high com-
mand, were to feel all this, with the acuteness which it is per-
haps intended to excite, they must either fly into obscurity
for refuge, or die of broken hearts. But although the inhu-
manity of so vile a system may be defeated of its object, the
guilt of it calls no less, on that account, for reprehension. Why
convert those, who fight our battles, into the cngines, or the
victims, of party hatred It is not only the individual, but
England, that suffers, in the mutilated fame of her champions.
An officer, employed on foreign service, stands forth to man-
kind as the chosen representative of his country; his renown
is, therefore, her best inheritance; and whatever Englishman
wilfully derogates from it—or seeks, by base misrepresenta-
tion, to dim the splendor of his achievements, becomes a li-
beller against the state, whose most durable history is that of
her wars and her triumphs.
Where would be the honor of the Roman name, had RO-
man historians been actuated by such a spirit !
* Cicero pro Milone.
But
( 43 )
But the glory to which a soldier is invited by
his approving country, ought not to melt away
into mere abstraction; it ought to assume a
visible, and tangible form. When the sufferings
of the brave express themselves by wounds and
amputations, why should not the rewards of
valor speak to the senses also P Torouse emu-
lation is the master spell of war; not to be
effected by votes of thanks, or general orders,
or other evanescent sounds; for where praise is
indiscriminate, it gratifies no personal feeling;
but by setting before the individual some reward,
on which his imagination may rest, and in the
enjoyment of which there shall be none to parti-
cipate with him. Such is the purpose for which
the laurel, or golden crowns, the suits of armour,”
and seats of pre-eminence, were granted to the
heroes of ancient history. To such a purpose also,
and with admirable efficacy, might the badges
of distinction annexed to orders of knighthood
in modern times, be applied. They would pro-
claim, in the face of the whole world, to whom,
specifically, its esteem and applause were due.
Ever present records of great achievements,
they would remind every man who beheld the
person, of each noble exploit which he had per-
* Vid. Kennet's, & Potter's, Antiquities.
formed,
Of encourage-
ment to officers,
( 44 )
Most due to re-
gimental offi-
CCTS,
formed, and stand at the great tribunal of pub-
lic opinion, the proofs and muniments of supe-
rior and exalted merit. If, therefore, individual
honours are to be instituted, as the sure reward
of military virtue, we may recommend the esta-
blishment of an order of knighthood, as a mode
of accomplishing this purpose, both effectual
and simple.
Upon a very slight view of the subject, it will
appear, that the order of the Bath, however high
and illustrious, is by no means calculated, either
from its nature or its extent, to set aside the
necessity of other concurrent institutions. It
has never been appropriated, with sufficient
strictness, either to the army, or the navy, or to
both ; whereas it ought to be purged of all poli-
tical members, and disentangled from all poli-
tical connexions and motives. Its distinctions,
when bestowed upon military men, have been
unavoidably reserved for general officers, the
publicity of whose stations, and the scope of
whose services, secure to them a degree of re-
nown, in itself the most powerful of all incen-
tives. It is the regimental ranks of officers who
ought to be most sedulously encouraged. Their
pay is but scanty; their privations are severe;
their rewards are contemplated only in distant
perspective,
( 45 ' )
perspective. Their services, though the result
of infinite merit, and though pledges to their
country of future eminence, are seldom so con-
spicuous as to meet the public eye. During the
earlier stages of military life it is, that proper
liabits of feeling can best be engendered; en-
thusiasm roused by the hope of immediate ho-
nours; and pride flattered, and reason satisfied,
by the purest impartiality in dispensing them.
No such prospect having yet been held out
to the subordinate classes of British officers, I
would propose, that a military order of knight-
hood be instituted, and called the “Order of St.
George,” consisting of the Sovereign, and 250
companions; and that all officers of cavalry,
artillery, and infantry, from the colonel to the
ensign enclusive, shall be eligible as companions
of this noble order, and need no other recom-
mendation than that of their respective services.
There will thus be room for one, perhaps, out of
every thirty-five or forty, of those who bear com-
missions, from the rank of colonel downwards;
and each may be addressed by the striking,
though obsolete, appellation of chevalier. Any
signal exertion of skill or courage, no matter
whether attended by victory or defeat; any long
course of exemplary propriety and good conduct,
where
Order of knight-
hood,
( 46 )
where no favorable occasion may have offered
of performing a brilliant exploit; any original
discovery in military science, or new application
of discoveries already made, will confer a fair
claim to this mark of the royal favor. The
badge of the order, as is sanctioned by custom
and good sense, ought to be some brilliant per-
sonal ornament, sufficient to distinguish, at a
single glance, the wearer from those about him;
the more substantial benefits resulting from it,
may be,
1st. Such a precedence with respect to all
officers of equal degree, whose commissions
bear date within the same twelve months, (not
being companions of the order.) as shall give to
the party so distinguished, an understood prio-
rity of promotion.
2dly. The disposal, after his decease, of a
moderate pension, in favor of a wife, a parent,
or a child, at the option of the officer, or, failing
his testamentary disposition, in favor of his
nearest surviving relative. Any attempt to ali-
enate this provision by sale, or to divert it from
its specific object, to be declared void in law.
Such a privilege, so far from deserving censure,
for mingling a mercenary, and unworthy, incite-
ment, with the nobler motives of ambition,
which might be the case were the stipend to at-
tach
( 47 )
tach upon the officer himself, ought on the con-
trary to be now regarded, as a means of con-
necting the enthusiasm of honor with all the
better feelings of the human heart—with the
filial, the paternal, and the conjugal affections.
Another mode of encouragement which may
be suggested, is more of a pecuniary nature, and
relates exclusively to officers retiring from the
service.
It had indeed been my intention to discuss,
as nearly allied to the appointment and promo-
tion of officers, the mortifying subject of their
daily pay. But although the name of gentle-
man in a monied community, is seldom granted
to those who are unable to purchase it; although
the actual subsistence of our infantry officers
must assuredly preclude them from any of those
indulgences, attendant on that envied rank; and
moreover, although the legislature, in its wis-
dom, has thought fit to cut away by the opera-
tion of an income tax, a portion of that pittance
which was before confessedly and cruelly inade-
quate to the purpose for which it had been be-
stowed, yet as a general increase to the pay and
allowances of several thousand persons, would
in the present situation of this country, be a
{\leåSll Tº
Military partſ
( 48 )
Officers retiring.
measure much easier to justify than to carry, such
an exercise of liberality must, I am afraid, be
postponed to some more propitious hour. A
slight addition, nevertheless, to the comfort of
such officers as may retire hereafter; together
with an exemption from certain obligations, to
which those who are already reduced upon half
pay,” have been made, or declared, liable, within
the few last years, are concessions that would
not be seriously burthensome, and that ought
on many grounds to be speedily tendered.
It may be proposed, in the first place, that all
officers who may lose their limbs, or be other-
wise disabled by wounds received in his Ma-
jesty's service, shall have liberty to retire on full
pay,
All officers disqualified from further duty, in
consequence of continued ill-health, brought
on by the hardships of military service; and
who can procure satisfactory medical vouchers
* It ought to be gratefully acknowledged by half-pay offi-
cers and pensioned widows, that a bill which was introduced
by General Fitzpatrick, and adopted by his successors in office,
has released them from the London agents, and given them
paymasters at their own doors.
for
( 49. )
sº
for the nature and origin of their complaints,
shall have liberty to retire on two thirds of their
pay.
All officers who have served for ten years, but
no others, (except in the cases above mentioned)
shall have liberty to retire on half pay.
All officers who have served for fifteen years,
shall have liberty to retire on two thirds of their
pay.
All officers who have served for twenty years,
shall have liberty to retire on ſull pay.
In framing these regulations, the object has
been, to render the benefits of the reduced pay
progressive, by making less provision for an
early retreat, than for that which shall take
place after many years of service; and thereby
to engage officers to so long a continuance in
the army, that they can neither resign their
military habits without pain, nor their interests
without disadvantage. *
The youth will not venture to retire before ten
years, because he will in that case be destitute
of all provision.
IE The
( 50 )
lſalf pay.
The officers of ten and fifteen years standing,
will be apt to look with anxious eyes to the
stages immediately above them. While he who
shall have finished his period of twenty years,
will thence perceive the road to further emi-
nence so broad and easy of ascent, that he will
despair of obtaining, in private life, any ade-
quate substitute for the rank and consideration,
which he must relinquish in making the experi-
ment.
Half pay officers, under Mr. Pitt's admini-
stration, were deprived, by act of parliament,
of the only reliance which had supported the
minds of many amongst them, under the gal-
ling yoke of humiliation and poverty. It was
then declared that half pay was “not so much
a recompense for the past, as a tie upon their
future services.” From this new conversion of
a debt discharged on the part of the public,
into an obligation incurred by the creditor, his
former Scrvices appear to have gone for nothing.
The broken down veteran, who has survived his
friends, and the disbanded youth, who has
not yet acquired them, when thus exposed to
perpetual, and uncertain, disturbance, are equal-
ly doomed to that hopeless idleness which helps
the growth of all other evils, and, sooner or
later,
( 51 )
later, ripens poverty into ruin. Placed upon
half pay, they have to weigh the chance of
starving, if they trust to that alone, against the
chance of starving without it, should they dare
to decline the requisition of government, in fa-
vour of any industrious pursuit to which the
want of a decent subsistence may have com-
pelled them. Suppose the reduced officer so far
to indulge his wounded sensibility, as to fly from
a world which has ceased to smile upon him ;
and so far to have subdued the pride of a sol-
dier, as to forget that he ever was in battle—
what expedient can he hazard? In what em-
ployment can he take refuge from lifeless indi-
gence; with what prudence can he embark in
preparations for any business, which may con-
tribute to relieve his wants; when he has
learned, on the authority of parliament itself,
that he is no longer his own master; that the
state retains her property in his life, though she
withholds from him the means of living; and
that at the moment in which he begins to taste
the delights of industry, by its operation upon
his habits, if not on his purse, an order from
the Horse Guards may come down like a thun-
der-bolt, and crush him by the unrequited ex-
Pences of a voyage to Egypt, to the Cape, or to
Jamaica,
F 2 A nation
( 52 )
A nation ought to act, not justly, but mag-
nanimously, by her servants. But it is not
magnanimity, it is less than justice, to the me-
ritorious officer thrown out of employment, to
suspend his progress in one profession, while
you restrain him from every other. By sub-
mission to the mandate which reduces him, he
has fairly purchased the last sad inheritance of
misfortune—the privilege of being forgotten.
It is the most obvious of errors to imagine
that by recalling to active service, one who has
spent many years in retirement, a benefit must
be conferred upon the party so summoned. He
returns indeed to the performance of the same
duties, but not to the enjoyment of the same
prospects as before. His habits of life have
taken an opposite direction; life itself has ra-
pidly glided away; his old contemporaries have
all outstripped him ; and he has to renew the
race of military rivalship, with a generation
whose fathers were the associates of his youth,
From this revival of hardship, though not of
hope, let it then be the care of a just legislature
to shield the discarded veteran. Let the loud
voice of office forbear to disturb that calm Ob-
Scurity in which he has the courage to repose.
Leave
( 53 )
Leave him where he has learned to curb the
flights of ambition, and to silence her complain-
ings, and let his hut, the sanctuary of honour
and of peace, remain inviolate for ever,
-
E 3 CIIAPTER
( 54 )
CHAPTER V.
HAV ING hitherto applied myself to that
part of our establishment, which may be called
more emphatically the “Army” of Great Bri-
tain, and especially to such general views con-
cerning it, as might help to recommend to
those who regard the public safety, the creation
and diffusion of a military mind, I now turn to
a subject next in order, though scarcely second
in importance.
Satisfied that there exist in the British islands
physical resources abundantly sufficient to main-
tain their independence against a foreign in-
vader, I thought it impossible not to see the
necessity of raising up an intellectual power, to
give those resources a due direction, and bring
them into vigorous play. In however question-
able a light, therefore, may appear the measures
proposed in the preceding chapters, I can hardly
suffer myself to doubt, that the reasonings on
which
( 55 )
which they were founded possess some strength;
that they may at least claim the honour of
being patiently examined, before they are re-
jected as fallacious ; or that, from their associa-
tion with the topics about which they have been
employed, they may borrow a title to public
notice, of which perhaps they are intrinsically
destitute.
A question of very serious import succeeds to
those which have been already treated—“JPhat
is the most eligible form, and what are the best
materials, of that armed body, by which the
troops of the line are to be assisted in repelling a
foreign enemy?”—We must indeed confess, that
the rapid and indefatigable succession of expe-
dients for “the better security of the realm.”
against a foreign invader — those “ unreal
mockeries,” which have danced before our eyes
for the last ten years, would call for more talent
in those who undertook to elucidate, and more
temper in those who were destined to behold
them, than have often graced the exhibitions of
a political stage. The peace of Tilsit did not
take effect, until after the subject matter of
these papers had been collected and arranged.
The peace of Vienna has since followed. They
both, reinforced by a train of collateral evils,
E 4 have
IDefensive
Force.
( 56 )
have multiplied an hundred-fold the arguments for
superseding, by some bold and uniform system
of defence, those ill-conceived, fluctuating, and
abortive projects, of which the French govern-
ment was, from time to time, the real author,
since they were brought forward under its me-
naces, and therefore at its will ; nor have they
served to manifest our confidence in our own
strength so much as in that of Bonaparte, who,
as he swelled or contracted the glittering en-
campments of Boulogne, could accurately mark
the ebb and flow of our public consternation,
and could thus, through the medium of their
proper feelings, convert the majority of this
enlightened and warlike people into the tools of
his interest, the victims of his torture, or the
amusement of his sprightlier and more careless
hours of vengeance. It would nevertheless, be
to the last degree uncandid, if we were not to
qualify our censure of an English Minister and
his acts, by many very plain considerations.
In adjusting the balance of power between
two nearly equal states, which lie so much ex-
posed to each other's influence, that neither can
obtain any aggrandisement, nor suffer any decay,
which will not sensibly affect their mutual rela-
tion, the Ministers of that which is ruled by an
absolute
( 57 )
absolute monarch, have, in comparison with
those of a free country, a far easier task as-
signed to them in the administration of the
public force. An absolute government issues
its mandate, that 50,000 men shall, by a given
day, be added to the standing army; or that
100,000 shall be embodied for the defence of
the interior; the care of government is almost
at an end, the moment in which the order has
been promulgated, and the acquiescence of the
people is a thing of course. But where liberty
forms the end and essence of the constitution,
where public opinion is in fact the ruling power,
and it becomes necessary to conciliate the na-
tional feelings in every act of the legislature,
few, except those who have made the trial, can
appreciate the difficulties which surround a
statesman.” He is not only to foresee a coming
danger,
* Captain Pasley, amongst a variety of sound observations
on the connexion between the form of government, and the
success of any nation in war, deduces the following inference,
from premises which l think do not fully support it—either as
a general maxim, or as applicable to the two governments of
which he speaks.—“If,” says he, “the British nation always
“Succeeds by sea, and always fails by land; and if the French
“nation, on the contrary, always fails by sea, but constantly
“Succeeds by land, the real causes of success or failure can-
" not, in either case, upon any sound principle of reasoning,
“ be
( 58 )
danger, but to convince a whole nation of its
magnitude, as well as of its approach. He must
11Ot
“be ascribed to the freedom of the one nation, and to the des-
“ potism of the other.”—Mil. Pol. p. 36.
If for “real causes,” this intelligent author had substituted
“immediate causes,” his assertion would have been less objec-
tionable. He states that “in order to obtain equal success,
“war by land and by sea must be carried on upon the very
“same principles.”—I admit that it must be carried on with
equal vigour and ability, or that it must be vain to look for si-
milar success.-The question still arises—why is not the mili-
tary service of Great Britain carried on in the same spirit as
the naval Government must be equally desirous of success in
both.-The proximate cause, no doubt, is in the imperfect
composition, or inadequate amount of the military force em-
ployed, relatively to its object: the remote and more alarming
cause, beyond dispute, is to be found in the national feeling;
and in the nature of the constitution, which annexes to that
feeling such resistless weight.
The government of France has paid incessant attention to
its navy—but not having a maritime spirit in the population
to support it, and being encountered by the very heart and
soul of England, as well as by her government—has failed in
every effort. Great Britain, on the other hand, has com-
paratively neglected, or rather discountenanced the cultivation
of her armies, and depreciated, somewhat childishly, the bene-
fits of martial enterprize. We idolize the old prejudices of our
forefathers, and fondly call up from antient times that nominal
and obsolete safeguard of political liberty, the constitutional
terror of standing armies—a terror, for us, the most bancful,
and (as has been wisely said) the most unconstitutional in the
* would,
( 59 )
not only draw forth supplies of men and money,
but must do so in a manner the least irksome to
those, at whose expense, whether of tranquillity
or of treasure, they are to be provided. He must
disappear from office, or he must have the current
world, being directed to the abridgment of the only force by
which the constitution can now be securely defended. But
the reigning idol is our commerce, and the fleet which more
immediately protects it. I'very guinea, in fact, bestowed upon
the land forces, is looked upon by the short-sighted amongst
our trading community, as a robbery committed on the naval
service. Thus has our commercial prosperity, whose chief
value, in the natural order of things, would be measured by
its subserviency to our means of defence, been converted into
the very end of our existence—and thus, by a fatuitous perver-
sion of national sentiment, the soil of England, like that of Al-
giers, has become an appendage to her shipping. Let us re-
member, however, that this head-strong and intolerant, though,
I trust, decaying prejudice, belongs to the nation at large.
Government have yielded to it, but have never imbibed it—and
when that prejudice shall be wholly removed, as every passing
day tends to its removal, from the minds of an energetic and
enlightened people, we shall see the popular sentiment of
England outrun the preparations for foreign service, as it now
does the activity of the royal dock yards.--In the mean time,
it seems apparent from an attentive consideration of this sub-
ject, that the uninterrupted successes of Great Britain by sea,
and her multiplied failures by land, may both be traced to the
strong influence of public opinion upon the measures of her
ministers—in other words, to the freedom of her political in-
stitutions,
of
( 60 )
The Volunteers.
of opinion so strongly with him, as to make their
distant interest seem preferable to their imme-
diate comfort in the eyes of an entire people;
of a people “true” indeed “to imagined right,”
but who cherish their prejudices like so many
virtues: whose jealousy of government is at
once their characteristic and their boast; and to
whom the air they breathe is not more dear,
than is their licence of discussing all political
principles and measures, odious undoubtedly in
its suppression, but terrible in its abuse.
Our minds being predisposed to judge with
calmness of apparent, though, I willingly admit,
involuntary, and in Some cases unavoidable
error, let us review the condition of this country
with reference to her means of defence against
invasion, as she stood in the year 1807, and
afterwards consider what real change has been
effected by measures of a subsequent date.
The volunteer system originated, not in form
only, but substantially and in spirit, with the
people. The renewal of hostilities in 1803 was
a sudden movement. We were unprepared for
it in every thing but in our feelings. Military
exercises had languished during the short-lived
peace, but the sleeping lion was speedily roused
and
( 61 )
and agitated. Government had scarcely time
to announce that the country was in danger,
when unbought myriads of the sons of England
sprung up ready armed from her bosom. While
wisdom and eloquence led the way, patriotism,
loyalty, and native courage, the love of English
liberty, the hatred of France, and of her tyrant,
soon swelled the train of attendant virtues.
Nor was it easy to reject the use of meaner
instruments—of auxiliaries less worthy of such
a cause. A taste for novelty, for amusement,
and for shew, mere personal vanity, and, in many
instances, it must be acknowledged, an appre-
hension of the ballot for militia, all conspired
with the solemnity of the crisis, and produced .
400,000 volunteers on parade.
This numerous body of citizens, armed, as
they were, from various motives, together with
a body of militia, less numerous, purchased in
part by a pecuniary bounty, and partly chosen
by lot, amounting sometimes to forty thousand,
sometimes to eighty thousand, and at the period
*in question to rather more than fifty thousand
men, had composed for the few preceding years
the domestic army of Great Britain.
* 1807,
Were
( 6.2 )
Were numbers only necessary to our protec.
tion, we might have dismissed one-half of the
volunteers as unserviceable, and still retained a
far greater force than ever could be brought
into active duty. But with an unfeigned re-
spect for that national energy to which the vast
extent of the volunteer force might be attri-
buted, and feeling a just pride in the ever-
memorable array of so much splendour, and so
much spirit, I think the occasion not yet gone
by, for examining, how far it would be possible
to substitute some better system in lieu of the
volunteer establishment, backed as it has been
by the old establishment of militia; and that
the season is only now come for determining, by
what sort of institution they ought to be finally
replaced. Should there be any one disposed to
imagine, that the former of these questions has
been settled by my Lord Castlereagh’s Bill,
which encourages the metamorphosis of the vo-
lunteers into a local militia; or that the business
chalked out for France upon the continent is to
act as a shield between us, and the urgency of
any such investigation—I shall briefly answer,
that although the fervour of volunteering has in
a great degree subsided, and its activity as a
measure of government been for the present
dropped, its principles are nevertheless in full
credit,
( 63 )
credit, and ready to be brought into extensive
action; that he moreover must be indeed regard-
less of the views, the interests, and I fear the
means of Bonaparte, who does not recognize in
every thing he undertakes, as well as in all that he
accomplishes, an evidence of his designs against
England only, and a prelude to his attack upon
her shores.
The advocates of the volunteers have spoken
throughout with much more candour than their
opponents, in as much as they have defended
that establishment as a great good, only because
they looked upon it as an inferior evil. They
have admitted most of the leading defects inse-
parable from a force of such a nature; nor have
they ventured to compare its qualities with those
of the militia, much less with the troops of the
line. They have said indeed, and with some
reason, that a voluntary enrolment was most
congenial to the habits and prepossessions of a
free people; that we could not find in any other
way so great an army, either with so few imper-
fections, or at so small a price; and they have
challenged their parliamentary antagonists to
retain the body against which they declaimed, or
to supply their place with an array of soldiers,
not more burthensome, and not less efficient.
The
Arguments in
their favour,
( 64 )
Animadversions
oil them.
The adverse party, on the other hand, have
drawn forced comparisons between the volun-
teers and the regular army—a mode of discus-
sion which the subject was evidently not cal-
culated to bear, any farther than as it might
become the vehicle of raillery or invective. But
in their loose depreciation of this respectable
body, for the want of attributes which were
foreign to its nature, and to which it had ad-
vanced not the shadow of a claim, they shrunk
from the challenge which had been offered to
them, and during the whole of Mr. Windham's
ministry we cannot trace one step towards the
overthrow of this so much deprecated institu-
tion, except in the dismissal of the inspecting
field officers—a measure which shut up the very
source of discipline from those against whom
their defective discipline was already a favourite
reproach, and which seemed to announce, that
the only concession on which the war minister
would tolerate the establishment, was his getting
leave to render it as useless as he could.
Although it is far from being my design to
follow up the prejudices of this class of politi-
cians, much less to emulate their violence, I
shall nevertheless suggest some reasons for be-
lieving that the volunteer system ought not to
be.
( 65 )
be revived; that the old militia system ought to
be instantly reformed; and that we should resort
to a description of armament, which has never,
so far as I am able to learn, been yet adopted in
any country, nor directly recommended by any
statesman, with a view to its application in
Great Britain. It would be an unworthy, though
a cheap device, for getting through a compli-
cated subject, to load it with the worse than
dubious names of party or military writers, and
thus remain exposed to the censure of the poet—
66 Cur non
Ponderibus, modulisque suis, ratio utitur "
Voluntary service is, from its very nature, Arguments
suited only to a single and a transient exi- against them,
gency. To hold together for a great length of
time, and under a succession of trying circum-
stances, a multitude whose habits are those of
personal independence, we shall find the will of
individuals but a feeble tie. A considerable
number of the people of England have taken
up the firelock as a relaxation from business;
not as a recompense for its loss. Nor can we
expect them to learn from a march of four or
five miles, or from a field day of blank cartridge,
of beef and porter, what is the condition of a
soldier on actual service; that it is a condition
“s. F of
( 66 )
of inexorable and galling restraint, of hope for
ever eluded, of unceasing fatigue, of wounds
and sickness for which there may be no relief, of
cold and hunger and nameless privations, which
human nature can scarce endure, but at which
it would be death to murmur, or infamy, more
terrible than death. On the courage of Britons,
none can make a question; but what will mere
courage avail them : A rooted, nay, an instinc-
tive subjection to discipline, except the light
discipline of a dress parade, no man can suppose
them to have acquired. They cannot, like troops,
whose organization, whose time, and almost
whose feelings, have become matter of positive,
legal solicitude, be impressed with proper senti-
ments of submission to their officers, through
whom alone the laws can operate upon men in
arms. They cannot have any professional en-
thusiasm to support them; for their fame, their
fortune, their place in society, can never be said
to rest upon a profession, of which they form no
definite part; and since the proclamation of mar-
tial law, which at once annihilates their charac-
ter of citizens, may be in force for a century, with-
out maturing them into soldiers, there is cause
to apprehend that their military impulse will at
best be but capricious, uncertain, and unsafe.
s
The
( 67 )
The democratic principle on which many vo-
lunteer corps are constructed, and the popular
spirit by which they are governed, have such,
an influence over the election of their officers,
as well as over their authority, when elected,
that the good old terms, “ command” and
“obey,” will eventually be polished down into
an exchange of courtly civilities; better suited
to the relation between a candidate and a voter.
Every volunteer must have his choice of the
battalion in which he is to be enrolled. Hence
it follows, that young and old, vigorous and
infirm, are ranged very frequently side by side,
so that you must either employ the whole batta-
lion upon occasions on which one-half of it will
only serve to benumb the exertions of the rest;.
or, by picking out an effective detachment, you
break the corps in pieces.
From the same circumstance of every man
chusing his own regiment of volunteers, each per-
son is found to offer his services in union with
his own immediate friends and neighbours; the
inhabitants, therefore, of one village or parish,
will necessarily be crowded into the same batta-
lion; and when that battalion is ordered on
active service, the whole male population of the .
| F 2 district
( 68 )
-*
district moves off, without reserve, to the inevi.
table ruin of every species of industry, unless
again you break up the regiment, by leaving
one-half of it behind.
The universal infliction of pecuniary fines, as
a commutation for personal attendance, (though
perhaps in a body so composed there can be
no other expedient,) helps to palm upon govern-
ment a delusive statement of the strength of
each battalion. The rolls are eked out with the
frequent names of wealthy but useless members,
who acquit their consciences by paying their
fines; and having thus contributed a few half-
crowns to the purchase of lace, musicians, and
fopperies, they debit their country with these
proofs of military prowess.
The volunteers have comprised so vast a pro-
portion of the inhabitants of the kingdom at
large, that motives both of economy and of
local convenience, have driven government to
the necessity of so far limiting each Gorps in its
period of exercise under arms, that few advances
can be made in useful knowledge, and fewer
still in military habits, before the permanent
duty is at an end. Nor is this misfortune inci-
dental only—it is inherent in the system. If
the
( 69 )
the public cannot bear the expense of a more
perfect drill, the volunteers will not, generally,
submit to the confinement. f
The number of volunteers throughout Great
Britain, appear from returns made in 1807, to
have exceeded 350,000 men. Many thousands
of these, it is a well known fact, had no other
view in entering their names, than to get
themselves exempted from the ballot for mi-
litia. Here then we see an immense branch
of our population reduced to a sort of military
caput mortuum. By so monstrous an exemption
obtained on such easy terms, an unnatural pro-
portion of the ballot is thrown on the remaining
part of the community. Nor is this all: a mul-
titude of those who as volunteers are exempted,
would, if ballotted for the militia, be unable to
buy substitutes, and must therefore serve in
person. They of course would occupy, in the
ranks of the militia regiments, the places now
filled by hired substitutes, which substitutes
would otherwise be left at liberty, to enlist in
the regiments of the line.
The volunteer force therefore, as established
in England, appears to have merited the follow-
ing censures:
$ F 3 That
( 70 )
Recapitulation. That it possessed no bond of union, but ca-
price, nor any spirit of obedience, abstracted
from partiality to individual officers.
That it was rendered unfit for any joint or
uniform exertions, by combining the extremes
of vigour and infirmity, in the physical power
of those who filled its ranks.
That from the severity of its local pressure,
in places where the march of a battalion would
nearly depopulate a district, industry, whether
employed on manufactures or on tillage, would,
in case of emergency, suffer an absolute suspen-
S1011.
That the public finances could not support,
and the habits of the volunteers could not gene-
rally be expected to receive, the desirable course
of drilling.
That the establishment of fines, in lieu of
personal attendance, while the names of the de-
faulters still continued to swell the returns of
effective strength, tended to practise upon go-
vernment a delusion the most perilous, and to
spread throughout the service a spirit the most
fatal.
§ That
( 71 )
That in fine, the exemption from the ballot for
militia operated as a bribe in favour of the ºvo-
lunteers; but as a check to the growth of all
other military bodies, and drained away the cir-
culating vigour of the nation, to a gulph, that
swallowed and consumed it.
At this point of the subject I conclude the
present chapter. --
F 4. ‘CHAPTER
( 72 )
The Old Militia.
CHAPTER VI.
THE last chapter was devoted to the volun-
teers. The claims of the militia are not less ur.
gent to a grave and impartial, but an immediate
and most anxious consideration.
My enquiry into these two subjects, however,
will exhibit this essential difference; that, as
the censures which l thought applicable to the
volunteer system were levelled against its princi-
ple, equally with its form, so the view which I
am inclined to take of the present militia sys-
tem, comprehends much more of its actual, and
perhaps accidental structure, than of the spirit
which still pervades it, or of the wise and just
policy on which it was originally founded.
The happiest measure for the defence of Eng-
land is, doubtless, that by which the greatest
possible effective force can be produced, with the
least obstruction to the supply of the standing
army; with the slightest degree of encroach-
ment on the liberties and comforts of the peo-
ple;
‘( 73 )
ple; and at the smallestpossible expense.—Could
the volunteers be depended on as an effective
force, it might be allowed, that they possess, to
a considerable extent, some of the remaining
attributes of a wise and happy establishment.
Admitting, on the other hand, the superior effi-
cacy of the Old Militia, (superior to volunteers
only) it becomes my task to contend, that they
are, and must be, too few in number for the
public safety; that their constitution renders
them a direct drain from those channels by
which the standing army ought to be nourished;
that the mode, as well as the duration of their
service is a superfluous tax on the enjoyment of
individual freedom; and that their expense is
incomparably above their value.
The returns of the Old Militia, about three.*
years ago, amounted to something more than
55,000 men, exclusive of the Scotch Militia.
Their strength, since the last migration of vo-
lunteers into the line, may, perhaps, be estimated
considerably lower. If we err in asserting, that
50,000 men, who have never seen the smoke of
an enemy's camp, would be altogether unable
to protect us against an invasion of veterans,
* 1807, when this subject was first contemplated by the
author. ---
who
Their weakness.
( 74 )
who have conquered Europe, and grown old in
the midst of fire, we err with every thinking
man in the kingdom, and with the recorded
authority of five successive administrations;
Of Mr. Pitt, who raised the Supplementary
Militia, while he cherished the infancy of the
volunteer corps, aided them by his liberal and
noble bounties, and inspired them by the energy
both of his praise and his example.
Of Mr. Addington, who called up the Army
of Reserve, a vigorous and successful provision
for a crisis of unlooked-for peril, and who, at the
same time, wakened the volunteer spirit, from the
indolence of security and the dream of peace.
Of Mr. Pitt again, who retrod his former
footsteps.
Of the Grenville and Fox administration,
when Mr. Windham, the organ of their military
theories, proved his sense of the existing danger,
by a certain effort of legislation called the
“Training Bill,” not worthy of the name or
talents of its author.
Finally, of the Duke of Portland's ministry,
who
( 75 )
who lent their sanction to Lord Castlereagh's
Act, (passed pretty early after their accession to
power) by which nearly the whole of the vo-
lunteer body have sunk into the new establish-
ment of Local Militia; and been thereby purged
of their independence, that noxious and un-
steady principle, though they are still left liable
to many fatal objections, operating against his
Lordship's entire system, both in its nature and
its details. -
On evidence, such as this, we are justified in
asserting,
1st, That the Old Militia are unquestionäbly
too weak to answer the purposes for which they
have been designed.
2dly, That a militia, permanently embodied,
cannot be rendered sufficiently numerous, but
that we must have recourse to auxiliaries of an-
other description—whether like the former in
any, and in which of its characteristics, yet re-
mains to be discussed.
Although the established militia of Great
Britain are much too weak for a protection to
their country, they are unfortunately raised in
such a manner as to impede the recruiting of
the regular army, by difficulties scarce to be
surmounted.
Their hinder-
ance of regular
recruiting.
( 76 ).
surmounted. The militia are avowedly raised
by ballot, a method which applies equally to all
classes of society, but which now seldom fails to
fall as a pecuniary fine upon the affluent, and an
utter ruin upon the occupations of the poor. If
the militia were not obliged to leave their coun-
ties, except in cases of extreme emergency, or,
if wars were not of long duration, that service
would produce but a short and mitigated inter-
ruption to the regular business of those who
were compelled to enter it. Since, however, the
militia regiments have been made liable to march
from one extremity of the island to another,
though no alarm of rebellion or invasion should
exist; and since the same individuals remain in
the service, though the war should continue for
twenty years, it is evident, that none but the
very lowest of the people will serve in person,
as private militia men, so long as a moderate
sum of money will suffice to purchase a deputy,
and thereby exempt them from the ballot.
Hence it follows, that the ranks of the militia
are mostly filled by substitutes, bought lika
other recruits, wherever they are to be found—
but not like the recruits of the regular army, for
a price established by law. Nothing surely can
produce a result more ruinous to the army than
such a competition. Private persons, resolved
to
(, 77 . )
to succeed, may bid for substitutes a price ad
libitum; while the state can advance, for a regu-
lar soldier, a sum no higher than the law admits
of. We consequently find, that the price of
substitutes to serve in the militia, has often stood
so high as 25l. and in the Army of Reserve as
40l. may 50l.—a pretty conclusive argument,
how severely the line must have suffered, when
their bounty was no more than sixteen or twenty
guineas; and when an excessive price for home
service, though paid but in a single instance,
would be sure to create an artificial scarcity of
recruits throughout a circuit of several miles.
The clamorous antipathy, excited by the
Parish Bill of Mr. Pitt, which contributed both
to its imperfect execution, and to its final over-
throw, seemed to be chiefly directed against that
particular clause which levied a tax on the
parish in default of men, and made it payable
into the public treasury. Although the law in
question has departed along with its illustrious
and inestimable author, I fear not to assert, that
such a provision was, in its nature, most wise and
salutary; and would, if extended, so far as it
might be found applicable to the militia esta-
blishment, have gone a great way towards cur-
ing, at a single blow, that vice of the old system
which
( 78 )
Their oppres-
sion.
which we are now lamenting. The merit of a
fine, made payable to the public, consists in this,
that when government take into their own.
hands the application of money towards the re-
cruiting service, the legal maximum of bounty,
can never be exceeded, nor the state be outbid,
by the private trader. But although Mr. Pitt
threw the office of recruiting on the parishes,
and made them subject to a tax, by way of
exoneration, yet in cases of ballot, it is obvious,
that a different course must be pursued ; there
the defaulter ought to pay the fine, and if sub-
stitutes must still be found, government itself
ought to provide them.
In prosecuting this argument on the tendency
of the Old Militia laws, it needs no great labour
to demonstrate their pressure upon the interests
and comforts of private persons. The militia
service of Great Britain exposes each corps to a,
removal from its native country, more distant
than that to which the troops of Austria or
Prussia have often been driven by the prepara-
tions or events of actual war. Our militia,
moreover, are bound to serve for the whole dura-
tion of hostilities, a term not only indefinite,
and even on that account incommodious and
severe, but in later times unhappily, of such ex-
tent,
( 79 )
tent, that the prime of life is consumed, and the
chance of recovering a business, as well as the
disposition to industry, under any form, so ef-
faced, that nothing remains for the discharged
militia man, but idleness and indigence in the
decline of his days; no provision, being thought
of in his favour, as in that of the pensioned sol-
dier. Can we wonder, then, if the defence of
all that Englishmen hold dear, instead of being
undertaken with alacrity by substantial trades-
men, or by a sound and invincible yeomanry,
has devolved upon the very lowest of the labour-
ing poor, who cannot command the price of
substitutes; or upon substitutes no better than
the houseless and mercenary vagabond—the
effete and disgusting rabble of the manufactur-
ing towns, ruined in constitution, depraved in
morals, and fit only to be thrown aside, with
other pieces of worn-out machinery, lumbering
the masters whom they have enriched 2
The last point of view, in which we shall exa-
mine the merits of the Old Militia, is one of
eminent and various importance—it is, the com-
parison between their value, and the expense of
maintaining them.
The Old Militia, being kept in perpetual pay,
COSt.
Their compara.
tive expense.
( 80 )
Military disci-
pline.
cost this country the exact sum of money for
which she could support an equal number of
regular soldiers. That is to say, that, limb for
limb, we incur the same expense for a corps, the
use of which is but partial and contingent, as
for those whose applicability is certain and uni.
versal, to every purpose of aggression and de-
fence. But we pay that price, not only for ser-
vices of an inferior nature, we also pay it for a
discipline which is unavoidably less perfect;
and as it is evident, that by bulk alone can we
cure the disproportion of specific gravity, (if I
may so express myself) between the soldier
who has fought, and the militia man who has
only paraded; or, in other words, that numbers
are the only substitute for skill, it becomes de-
sirable to ascertain the existence of such dispro-
portion, and by offering some remarks upon mi-
litary discipline in general, to illustrate a subject
which seems rather neglected than unknown.
The experience of every man who knows
what fighting is, leads to the discovery of one
truth; that a single campaign is a better lesson
to a soldier, than twenty years subjection to the
most minute and elaborate drill serjeant.
“There is nothing more unlike a battle than a
review.” Simplicity is the true excellence of
every
( 81 )
every manoeuvre, as rapidity is the soul of its
execution. We may bring, within a very nar-
row compass, all that a private soldier can learn
of his work, until he has seen his enemy. To
take aim with coolness, to march with celerity,
and to obey with alertness, are points worth all
the rest, and the whole of essential knowledge
to be obtained from a century of drilling. Ac-
cording to the practice now in vogue, the militia
spend several years of their life in learning what
might be taught, much more effectually, in half
as many months. The state, therefore, may be
said to squander away exactly so much of her
time, instruction, and money, as are bestowed
upon these men after the period at which they
ought to have been completed; and to lose so
many successive classes of trained soldiers, as
might, in the same interval, be thoroughly dis-
ciplined and discharged. The age is past when
it took five years to manufacture an infantry
soldier, and the prejudice in favour of that obso-
lete folly no longer exists, but in defiance both
of ridicule and of reflexion. To trace how
many noble energies have sunk, and how much
valuable time, as well as talent, has been wasted,
in the process of congealing a human creature
into a mere automaton, we need not look deeply
into the history of war. The mischief of such
G. a scheme
( 82 )
'a scheme is interwoven with its complexities;
they both arise from the substitution of shew
for service. Every limb has been fettered;
every muscle cramped; the whole frame stif.
Prussian disci- fened out, and distorted from its natural bias,
pline useless
here.
More rational in
Germany.
for the empty purpose of attaining a certain
uniformity of appearance. Though, in the pre-
sence of a hostile army, the punctilio of parade
governs every movement. The march of such
a corps, even to the assault of a redoubt, is for-
mal and slow, and will therefore expose it to in-
numerable shots, for one it can return against
its more active enemy—such is the outline of
what we now and then hear denominated the
German or Prussian drill; as unwisely calcu-
lated for the surface of these islands, as it is for
the genius of the British nation.
In the plains of Germany, where infantry
must endeavour to repel the attacks of horse,
instead of attempting to escape them, and where
the general nature of the ground admits of their
moving in large masses—Frederick the II esta-
'blished such a compact order, and such a rigid
mechanism, in the formation of his battalions,
as would yield the greatest weight of fire in a
given space, and oppose the most impenetrable
'front to a charge of cavalry. That discipline,
2. ' therefore,
( 83 )
therefore, may be considered as generally appli-
cable in a German campaign, although the
French have shewn that, even on such a theatre,
it does not apply universally; and the true con-
jecture seems to be, that the Prussians were
taught only when to practise it, but not when it
ought to be relinquished.
In order to afford the Prussian cavalry, how-
ever, a decided advantage over that of other na-
tions, the king reversed the plan which we have
been describing. Instead of weight, he endow-
ed them with velocity. Light dragoons and
hussars succeeded to the horse grenadiers and
cuirassiers of his predecessors. That monarch,
in truth, had little choice; the nature of the
country, a monitor which we have too long neg-
lected, determined the measures of the great
Frederick. To his cavalry he gave, as the very
soul of action, a rapidity which made it vain
either to fly or to pursue them. But for his in-
fantry, acting on an open field, he preferred the
power of resisting by mere density, to the
chance of separation under circumstances of lo-
cal risque. When, therefore, the authority of
that enlightened warrior is brought by mi-
litary gentlemen, to cover the importation of
w G 2 his
( 84 )
his” infantry tactics into England, let them
prove that this is a country in which he would
have employed them—or that we ought to en-
tertain any fears from an invasion by large bo-
dies of dragoons; above all things let them re-
member, that it is not by tamely copying
the letter of an institution, we can hope to catch
the spirit of a great example.
* Lest these observations should be suspected of implying a
censure on the book of Sir David Dundas, I beg leave to de-
clare, that the “Rules and Regulations,” compiled, and, in
part created, by that respectable and experienced officer,
appear to my mind, a work of extraordinary merit; of equal
perspicuity and copiousness in their details; and of a pre-
cision altogether admirable. When we object to his system,
on the score of its being unsuitable to this country in a de-
fensive war, it ought to be remembered, that he was only the
expounder of the system; we have no proof that the choice,
as well as the exposition of it, was his. He must have been
merely ministerial to a higher authority. Be this as it may,
the “Rules and Regulations” effected one purpose of im-
mense importance to the army. They furnished a uniform
law for the movements of all the corps which composed it;
reduced to a single alphabet, a confusion worse than that of
Babel; and enabled 100 battalions, which might have seen
each other for the first time, to act in perfect concert. This
attainment, it is to be observed, was new in the British army.
Having once established common signs, you may alter, sim-
plify, and amend them as you please.
The
( 85 )
The best correction of this mistake would be,
to exercise and encourage the muscular powers,
instead of using every effort to imprison and
benumb them. The phalanx was a model of
restraint—the legion, of versatility and freedom.
The whole of the phalanx was disturbed and en-
dangered by the least sensible inaccuracy in its
minutest part; it therefore required a level field
to act upon, as well as the most critical and
painful attention, on the side of those who com-
posed it. In the ruder ages of Roman discipline,
while Greece, though in the wane of her virtue,
was yet at the zenith of her skill, Pyrrhus, the
most celebrated officer of his time, shrunk from
a renewal of the combat. But when more than
a century of successful war had ripened the tac-
tics of the Roman legion, of which every soldier
was taught to rely upon himself alone, and had
ample space to wield his arms, the conflict was
short, and the experiment final. The days of
Cynocephalae and of Pydna, are full of instruc-
tion; they were alike determined by the same
cause. In both cases, the order of the phalanx
was deranged, by the inequality of the surface
over which it moved. The Roman soldiers
rushed into the broken intervals—on its flanks,
in its rear, it was equally helpless—and the very
firm array of which it boasted, was the occasion
G 3 of
Illustrated by
ancient history.
( 86 )
By the Ameri-
can War.
By Switzerland,
of its irretrievable ruin. The Macedonian pha-
lanx, we must observe, was then arrived at the
highest excellence of which it was susceptible—
yet this gigantic body vanished like an illusion
of the night, leaving behind it an eternal lesson
of the issue to be anticipated from mere bulk,
when assailed and harassed by a well governed
activity, which is, at all times, able to correct
its errors, to secure its advantages, and to vary
its attacks.
However fortunate for England may have
been the loss of her North American colonies,
such an event can produce no feeling but of
humiliation, to those who affect the “pomp and
circumstance of war,” when they recollect, that
the bravest troops of Europe, the flower of the
British nation, were driven into the sea by a
rabble of marksmen, who knew nothing of a
manoeuvre, but its celerity, and little of a mus-
ket, but to take aim with deadly precision.
Whilst we contemplate the ruin of virtuous
liberty amongst the illustrious tenants of the
Alps, and hear the warning sounds of political
discord reverberated, from the Rhine to the Te-
sin—and from Constance to Lausanne—in one
proud quality it were justice to applaud, and
* wisdom
( 87 )
wisdom to emulate, the example over which we
mourn. Although French intrigue was no where
more successful, than amongst a people devoid of
guile, as they were unhappily careless of combi-
nation; so, never were the arms of France more
formidably resisted, than by the native hardi-
hood, the daring prudence, the expert impetuo-
sity, of some, almost nameless detachments from
the same gallant people, masters of a desultory,
but cool and deadly warfare, and enured to the
firelock, however unsophisticated by parade.
For such men it was reserved to perform those
exploits which nobly redeemed their heroic cha-
racter, on the brink of that grave in which every
other birth-right perished. Who, amongst the
oppressed of Europe, could behold, without
emotions of wonder and of hope, the militia of
Schwitz, the peasants of a petty canton, de-
serted, surrounded, and betrayed, triumphantly
vindicate the cause of freedom, and the dying
glories of Switzerland, on the plain of the twice
memorable Morgarten ?
We have seen the Tyrolese, in three tre-
mendous wars, defend, with matchless cou-
rage and success, a country from which the
stiff battalions of Austria were driven, after a
Series of ignominious defeats, or from which
G 4 they
By the Tyrol.
( 88 )
they had deliberately retired, as being unfit for
the demonstration of their ponderous tac-
tics. The Tyrolese, however, are not beaten
into pieces of breathing clockwork; they are a
nation of light infantry soldiers, made, like their
rifles, of true warlike stuff. They have over-
powered the bravest of the French army, not by
coping with them in the science of manoeuvre,
but simply because they excelled them in the
use of arms, and skilfully played off against
their invaders the most valuable secret of their
own game. But of all that greatness, so dearly
earned, what now remains to the mountaineers
of the Tyrol? The remembrance of unnum-
bered victories against unnumbered foes | Not
vainly have they won the admiring hatred of
that foe—not vainly shed their own sacred
blood—nor reaped their unfading laurels. A
lasting admonition to every sovereign, that he
must stand and commit himself to a brave peo-
ple, or shamefully fall without them —an ungo-
vernable terror to him by whom they have been
usurped !—an indelible reproach to him by
whom they have been abandoned,—they live for
ever in the foremost rank of victims to repu-
diated loyalty, and of martyrs to a sublime de-
votion.
Next
( 89 )
Next to these, on the Continent of Europe, By France.
are the light infantry regiments of France.
The military exhibition, at the Thuilleries, where
Bonaparte commands, and the flower of his
army manoeuvres, has been called (by great and
wise critics, no doubt) a slovenly and unsoldier-
like parade; that is to say, the troops move like
men, and not like figures of buckram. But
these slovens have shewn that they know how to
fight, although they can both feel and reason,
and although they have been led into the field
of battle within a few months of their depar-
ture from the vineyard or the plough. This,
of itself, might furnish some key to the spirit
and character of that victorious discipline, which
has wrought a new aera in history, and dealt out
a new apportionment of the earth. Intelligence
in the officer, activity in the soldier, are the
materials out of which the French army is
formed. Essentials are insisted on; mere pe-
dantries are left to those nations, whom the mo-
dern French have so regularly beaten, but whom
they have never yet been able to instruct.*
In
* The British troops, if not amongst those whose discipline
has been improved by the French, form a glorious exception
to the number of those whom they have beaten. The fact is
unquestionable, that an English regiment, getting fair play,
W. will
( 90 )
In preparing a defensive army for Great Bri-
tain, however, when the adoption of this more
lively discipline is recommended, we do not
dwell upon its superior efficacy in the field, as
its sole or principal merit. The close and em-
barrassed face of this country, it is true, points
out the impossibility of acting in extended
lines, or in deep and massy columns, and the
consequent absurdity of teaching, as a system,
what can never be systematically practised.
But besides the engrafting of so much sub.
stantial excellence on the nature of the disci-
pline itself, a vast abridgment of the period .
required to complete the soldier in it, would be
a distinct and incalculable advantage gained,
by thus simplifying the method of instruction.
From the very outset of the drill, the recruits
Discipline expe-
dited.
will for ever beat a French one. But is it by cold manacu-
vring, or by an illustration of the Prussian drill? No!
it is by fighting—by bringing matters to that test which de-
cided the earliest battles of antiquity—by opposing breast to
breast—animal to animal—not by parading one machine in
presence of another. Take from a British corps the chance
of breaking in with the bayonet, and demolishing their ene-
my by superior force of mind and body, and you reduce them
to a level with beings of an humbler race. The objection
therefore to the old plan of tedious drill, and ceremonious
evolution, is twofold—it is a plan which does not suit-
1, The face of this country—2. The character of the people.
should
( 91 )
should be accustomed to perform every evolu-
tion at a running pace. How to keep together,
how to separate, how to reunite without confu-
sion, and how to fire with a mortal aim, need
be but the study of five or six months, and
would hold their place in the memory for ever.
By gaining time, we gain every thing; for it
will be easy to shew that we thence derive the
power of quadrupling the old militia force, while
so far from augmenting, we materially diminish,
the total expense of our internal armaments.
The details of a plan for realizing such an esta-
blishment, will be found at large in the follow-
ing letter. It now remains briefly to recapitulate
those objections, which I have endeavoured to
urge against the old militia, with a view to mark
more clearly the order in which they have been
arranged; and to lead us more distinctly to
those principles which ought to be deemed most
essential in the formation of a new species of
force, whose properties I shall afterwards de-
velope.
I hope it appears, from what has been stated,
1. That the old militia ought to be largely
rein-
Trained men
multiplied.
Recapitulation.
( 92 )
reinforced, if they are to be entrusted with the
protection of this country.
2. That they cannot, at the same time, be suf.
ficiently augmented, on the present system of
keeping the whole of them in constant pay, be.
cause the nation could not endure either the
hardship of so extensive a ballot, or the burthen
of so enormous an expenditure.
3. That the permission granted to individual
defaulters under the ballot, to purchase substi-
tutes at an indefinite price, seems blindly, nay,
studiously, calculated, to paralize the recruiting
of the regular army; to corrupt every serjeant
into a crimp, and each victim of artifice into a
deserter.
4. That the plan of maintaining a perpetual
militia, composed of the same identical persons,
from the beginning to the end of a long war,
and of requiring from regiments so composed a
service co-extensive with the limits of the island,
is in truth so severe an imposition, as to render
the duties of the militia service hardly less un-
popular than those of the line itself, in the eyes
of the industrious, whose trades and callings
are thus irrevocably sacrificed ; and for whose
maintenance, on their final discharge, no provi-
sion whatever has been made.
5. That
( 93 )
5. That the same cause, combined with the
sort of discipline which has hitherto been incul-
cated, appears to be pregnant with other, and
still more pressing evils; inasmuch as a force of
very limited amount is all that can be thereby
kept on foot; such force is not conversant with
the operations most applicable to a close and
embarrassed country; and the bulk of the peo-
ple are retained in utter ignorance of arms.
Such seem to be the vices of this institution;
undiscovered or unfelt, in ordinary times, the
tempestuous agitations of the passing hour have
shaken into light every latent flaw and infirmity.
Still may government avail themselves of it for
a basis, on which to erect another, and, I trust,
a superior edifice, of less costly materials, of
more regular proportions, vast enough to admit
the whole nation within its walls, and strong
enough to shelter us from every storm.
CHAPTER
( 94 )
present Local
Militia.
CHAPTER VII.
SINCE the period at which I was first led to
observe on the natural inefficacy of the volun-
teer system, on the unavoidable weakness of the
old militia, as also on the character of those
auxiliary measures to which we have hitherto
confided the protection of the British isles,—a
great nominal change has been produced by the
Local Militia Bill of 1808, with respect to some
of the points referred to in the preceding dis-
cussion. §
Lord Castlereagh has reduced the multitu-
dinous mass of volunteers.
The local militia, which he has substituted, are
more amenable to public authority, as likewise
of a more uniform, and a more serviceable age.
The principle, moreover, we may now venture
to consider as on the road to its final re-establish-
ment, that a militia may be disciplined in their
QWIA
( 95 )
own districts, and need not be thence with-
drawn, but at a crisis of actual danger.
Here, I am afraid, the catalogue of good qua-
lities is exhausted, and the language of pane-
gyric must cease.
. The local militia, introduced by Lord Castle-
reagh, are chargeable with some defects, in com-
mon with the volunteers, whom they have sup-
planted; with others which are more charac-
teristic of the old militia; and with one which
is peculiar to themselves.
Like the volunteers, when called into service,
they bear with a partial and uncertain pressure
on the industry and resources of particular dis-
tricts. Like them also, their period of perma-
nent duty (as it is termed) has been so miserably
circumscribed, that before they can know the
difference between the front and rear of a batta-
lion, or learn so much of their arms as how to
load with safety, the men are sent back to their
respective homes, and their firelocks to rust for
eleven months in a storehouse. On the present
plan, as was before observed, this misfortune is
quite incurable, except at an expense on which
we dare not speculate. e
Their
Their defects,
( 96 )
Their constitution like that of the old militia,
limits the hardship of service, as well as the
opportunity of discipline, (such as it is,) to the
same identical list of persons, for a long course
of years. While the great bulk of the people
are, by the same means, and during the same
period, exempted from the whole burthen of
duty, and excluded from all chance of instruc-
tion.
The local militia are engaged for four years,
at the expiration of which term they are all to
be discharged, and a new ballot, to the same
immense amount, imposed at one stroke upon
the nation. This, I confess, appears but a
clumsy method of circulating the hardships and
benefits of the service in question; which, by a
different process, may be far more neatly and sci-
entifically, more equitably and usefully effected.
The state of the island then is this: We have
fifty thousand old militia-men, sufficiently ac-
quainted with the eighteen manoeuvres, but
scarcely any trained marksmen amongst them.
To these may be added five or six times the
number, composed of local militia-men, and of
some straggling corps of volunteers, the rem-
nants of that once prodigious body; neither of
which
( 97 )
which have received any discipline whatever,
nor can by possibility enter into the calculations
of a military man, in settling the arrangements
of an important campaign; for on the chosen
period of twenty-eight days, I wish to make no
farther comment, than that if the object be the
attainment of any thing like discipline, the ex-
pedientis wretchedly imbecile and unproductive:
but that if ministers have in view the rational
purpose of merely mustering their physical
strength, such a purpose might be answered
full as well, by assembling them for three days,
as for thirty; the latter period imposing upon
the public a gratuitous expense, and a needless
hardship upon the militia-men, whom it with-
draws from their fixed occupations.
We shall humbly propose, then, to set on foot
a new establishment of militia, in its nature
permanent and uniform, but susceptible of
change in its parts, and subject to a regular ro-
tation of duty.”
The
* To the substitution of a local, for a general militia, will
now be opposed an argument, which, with some persons, may
possess considerable weight. If the services of the militia be
circumscribed within their own counties, there can be no in-
terchange between Great Britain and Ireland; and it must be
acknowledged, that any measure which lays the latter coun-
H try
Scheme of a
new Militia,
( 38 )
The most alarming difficulty is even now suf.
mounted, for more than a sufficient number of
Iſher!
try altogether out of its contemplation, can afford to the em-
pire at large but a very imperfect defence.
The Bill brought in by Mr. Ryder (1811) for the reciprocal
*Application of the militia of either island to the service of the
other, holds out to one of them great moral advantages, and
certain military advantages to both. Many of the fears which
we now entertain for Ireland may confessedly subside, when
Government have it in their power, at an hour's notice, and
without withdrawing a single regular battalion from abroad,
to reinforce their Irish garrisons with twenty or twenty-five
thousand men, the flower of the English and Scottish militia,
hitherto not disposable beyond the shores of Great Britain,
though a French army should dispute the passage of the
Shannon, or a rebel force besiege the Castle of Dublin.—
Such are the benefits likely to result from the “Militia Inter-
change” Bill of the present session; and with such benefits
before my eyes, and frankly admitting their importance, it
may be asked, with great reason, why propose the adoption of
another plan, wholly incompatible with this
I answer, 1st, The British militia, under the operation of
the Interchange Bill, will lose a vast proportion of their
most respectable officers—this needs no explanation.
2dly, All the advantages attainable by the “Interchange
Bill,” are promised by that which I have humbly suggested,
in a much greater degree, and in a much less exceptionable
manner—-for, the warmest friends of the Bill brought in by
Mr. Ryder, will not deny, That it increases the hardship of the
militia service—thereby raising the price of substitutes, and
still farther (as if that were necessary) ruining the recruiting
service of the army.
That
( 99 )
men are provided, and nothing remains but to
new model and re-organize those materials,
which
That it withholds from this country the incalculable advan-
tage of providing (on a principle recognised by Alfred, and
eternal as truth) a militia by rotation—a measure which would
effectually counteract the only injurious tendency of our in-
sular positioni—by making us a military, no less than a mari-
time people. That it loses sight altogether of that financial
quality in the plan of militia which is unfolded in the 7th
chapter of “Military Reform,” namely, its capacity of fur-
mishing four effective militia men, by imposing on the nation only
the expense of one.
My object, in fact, would be, to defend Ireland, not by an
English militia, but by an English army—the regular army
being first augmented by the acquisition of all the substitutes
(or nearly all) of the militia, who, in consequence of my pro-
posal, would find the army their only resource. The moral
influence of a closer intercourse between the two nations, so
strongly and so justly dwelt upon by the Secretary for the
Home Department, would be no less consulted by sending Bri-
tish soldiers to Ireland, than by sending British militia men; and
as the measure suggested in this pamphlet goes to reinforce the
regular army to such an unexampled extent, as would super-
sede the uses, while it would relicve us from the severities, of
a transferable militia, I do humbly contend, that it comprises
every benefit contemplated by the “Interchange Bill,” and
removes many evils upon which the latter cannot operate at
all. It is, (professedly,) I admit, confined to Great Britain
alone, for, with respect to Ireland, any attempt to establish in
that island a local militia, would, for numberless reasons, be a
piece of political insanity. Any militia whatever, raised by
ballot, would be equally unsafe; indeed, if I am not mis-
HI 2 taken,
( 100 )
which are already, and in overflowing abun.
dance, at the disposal of government. \
taken, the whole militia force of that country is now raised by
bounty. So far, therefore, as relates to the sister island, it
would neither be unjust nor unwise to substitute for the “ In
terchange Bill,” a bill empowering Government to transfer to
this country the services of a certain portion of the Irish mili-
tia, bearing a given ratio to the number of regular forces, ap-
propriated to the separate defence of Ireland.
Since we are upon this subject, it may be observed for once,
that although the Gentlemen who compose the officers of the
Irish militia yield to no class of men on carth, in an elevated
sense of honor, in ardour of mind both military and patriotic,
or in active and affectionate loyalty, yet, under the disposi-
tions which have, for some years, manifested themselves
amongst the lower orders of the people, a national militia
serving in Ireland cannot be looked upon, in all its bearings,
as a perfectly unexceptionable force. How much wiser
would it be to abolish the militia of Ireland altogether, and
raise from amongst its hardy, spirited, and indefatigable popu-
lation, thirty-five or forty battalions of light infantry, attach-
able to the armies on foreign service! Let them be com-
manded exclusively by Irish officers—and designated by the
name of their native country—so favourable are the tempera-
ment and habits of the Irish peasant to the vivacity of such a
service, that I am apt to think a force of that description
might be raised and recruited, at a bounty little exceeding
what is actually paid on enlistment into the present militia.
Whoever saw the light infantry division of native Irish mili-
tia, formed last war under Major-General Scott, stationed as
Athlone in the year 1801, and amounting to near 4000 men,
would admit it to be a corps almost unrivalled, for discipline,
efficiency, and beauty.
Having
( 101 )
Having the command of 50,000 tolerably
trained militia-men, and of above 250,000 good
for nothing, the great and essential principle of
my proposed reform would be, to provide, at
the same expense as is now incurred for the Sup-
port of the above-mentioned 50,000, no less a
force than 200,000, equally well (indeed more
efficiently) disciplined, and ready at your call.
A radical evil of the present system being,
that the local militia, who are drilled for twenty
days, are not designed to re-assemble for near
twelve months, by which means they necessarily
forget the little they have learned, and may
meet on the same footing for a number of years,
without advancing one step in the knowledge or
the habits of soldiers, the cure of this evil ought
to be one of the elements of any plan recom-
mended for adoption.
The effective strength of the old militia, now
divided into rather more than ninety battalions,
we shall take on the average at 50,000 men,
and make them the foundation of the new mi-
litia. *
I. From
* This idea was first entertained in the year 1807, when the
returns were about 55,000 men, and the calculations raised
H 3 upon
( 102 )
1. From and after a given day, let every
battalion, or corps of the old militia, be sub-
divided into four parts, or classes, distinguished
by the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4. These may serve as
the skeletons of new battalions, in round num-
bers about 360, having about ninety of such
skeleton battalions comprehended under each
general class.
2. Let such a proportion of the present local
militia, as will amount to 150,000 men, be
chosen by lot, and be incorporated with these
360 skeleton battalions. The local militia of
each county, respectively, being joined to the
different classes of the old militia of the same
county, so that the whole shall form a body
of 200,000 men. Each county, or district of a
county, now furnishing one battalion or corps
of old militia, will, under the new arrangement,
furnish four battalions or corps, each equal in
strength to the old one, and so on, in the same
proportion, for counties, &c. of greater extent.
upon that basis, producing a force of 220,000 men. The
additional force necessary to my plan, was then to have been
raised by ballot, which, however, has since been effected, SQ
far as numbers go, by Lord Castlereagh's Local Militia Bill.
Should 200,000 men be deemed insufficient, or too far within
the powers of our population, they may be increased indefi-
nitely, on the same principles as are here detailed.
3. As
}
( 103 )
3. As a large surplus body of the present
local militia will remain, after the whole force
now proposed shall have been completed, we
submit the expediency of holding such super-
numeraries bound to fill up in their several
counties the first vacancies that shall arise, and
thus to supply, pro tanto, the place of a new
ballot.
4. Let every corps throughout Great Britain,
comprehended under class 1, and amounting in
the whole to 50,000 men, be assembled at some
town within its own or a neighbouring county,
and there continue on permanent duty, and
under constant discipline, for six months, from
the 1st January, 18–.
5. At the expiration of those six months,
let the whole of class 1 be disembodied, and
one-fourth of its number be discharged, the
oldest men being first selected for that purpose,
but under an obligation to rejoin their standards
at the first summons, in case of rebellion, inva-
sion, &c.
Class 2 to succeed class 1 for the next six
months, to be then similarly disembodied, and
in the same proportion discharged, as likewise
the classes 3 and 4, in their respective turns.
6. The classes successively disembodied shall
H 4 be
( 104 )
be bound to re-assemble on three days notice,
and at the discretion of the crown, should any
emergency arise.
7. Towards the expiration of the second year,
viz. while class 4 is on permanent duty, (suppos-
ing the supernumerary local militia-men out of
the question,) there shall be a ballot throughout
the several counties, to supply the place of those
discharged from class 1, as above, amounting to
12,500 men; and also to fill up whatever vacan-
cies may have been occasioned by death, deser-
tion, enlisting into the line, &c. since that class
was first disembodied. The men so raised
under such new ballot, shall be in readiness to
join their respective corps on the day of re-
assembling, at the commencement of the third
year; and, on their being again disembodied, at
the expiration of their six months service, ano-
ther fourth, or 12,500 men more, are in like
manner to receive their discharge. The same
regulations to be observed by all the other classes,
respecting their gradual discharge, and due com-
pletion from the counties.
It results from this arrangement, that each
militia-man will have six months of service
within his own county, for eighteen months of
absolute freedom,
That
( 105 )
That one-fourth of each class (except in cases
of emergency, such as invasion, &c. &c.) will
be exempted from all claim on their future ser-
vices, after the first six months of permanent
duty. One-half after the second six months,
three fourths after the third six months, and the
whole of each class after two years of duty. In
other words, that a militia-man may be dis-
charged after six months, and must be dis-
charged after two years service.
To the publicit results, that 25,000 men must
be raised by ballot every year, to supply the
place of those discharged, over and above the
supply of contingent vacancies, occasioned by
death, enlistment in the army, &c. So that at
the expiration of eight years, from the first crea-
tion of this body, the whole of it will have been
renewed.
It follows, moreover, that since only one-
fourth of the whole establishment will be at
once under arms, the industry of the re-
mainder will be employed for the benefit of the
country, leaving every where a light and equal
pressure.
8. The fine to be levied in commutation for
service
( 106 )
service shall vary with the means of the de-
faulter, bearing a certain proportion either to
the property or assessed taxes. The lowest fine
ought to be five pounds, payable into the King's
Exchequer. But great allowances ought to be
made in favour of married men with large fa-
milies.
9. The vacancies occasioned by defaulters
ought to be filled up by a recurrence to the
ballot, so long as a single man fit for service
remained undrawn. It being of essential conse-
quence, for a variety of reasons, to abolish the
service by substitute altogether, no part of the
fines should be applied to the payment of boun-
ties for substitutes, until the whole active popu-
lation of the district had undergone the ordeal
of the ballot. - f
10. The fines of the militia may form a noble
fund for recruiting the regular forces, and the
marketable part of the community, that is to
say, all who are to be purchased by a bounty,
finding the army their only resource, would fill
its ranks to a degree of which the nation has yet
had no experience.
11. Every militia man, except while on perma-
nent duty, or within one month of the period at
which he would be regularly called out, shall be
at liberty to enlist into his Majesty's regular
forces;
( 107 )
forces; on naming to the attesting magistrate
and to the recruiting party, the militia corps to
which he has belonged, otherwise to be punished
as a deserter. The officer commanding the
recruiting party, shall be bound to give notice
to the lieutenancy of the county, that such a
man, belonging to such a corps, has been en-
listed by him. His vacancy of course to be
filled up by the county. * *
- 12. No officer commanding a battalion of
militia, shall have any higher rank than that of
lieutenant colonel. And the only persons re-
ceiving constant pay, while such battalion is
disembodied, shall be the adjutant, quarter
master, serjeant major, armourer; one serjeant
per company, to take care of the clothing; and
the corps of drums.
13. The clothing ought to be of the cheapest
sort. A great coat, a perfectly plain scarlet
jacket and waistcoat, with long blue or grey
trowsers, a round hat with a leaf to throw off
Wet, and two pair of shoes; are all that need
ever be supplied by government. Each suit of
clothing, with the addition of a third pair of
shoes, might well serve for two periods (or 12
months) of permanent duty; when the battalion
was disembodied, it must be lodged in store, and
now and then aired by the permanent serjeants.
14. Arms
( 108 )
14. Arms of the best quality ought to be fur-
nished, and the men taught to feel a pride in
preserving them; an immense quantity of ball
cartridge ought also to be afforded. The light
infantry exercise and movements ought to be
diligently taught; for besides their superior in-
trinsic use, they would be learned with the
greatest pleasure, and therefore with the greatest
rapidity. Firing at a mark ought to be a per-
petual practice, and honorable distinctions stu-
diously conferred upon those who excelled as
marksmen. t
15. At the end of fifteen months from the
day on which it was disembodied, each batta-
lion ought to assemble for four days, to muster
its strength; make out lists of vacancies and
deficiencies in clothing, accoutrements, and
arms, that every want might be supplied,
before the recommencement of their permanent
duty.
16. The allowances now granted to the wife
and family of the old militia-man, while the
husband and father is far removed from all Com-
munication with his home, may on the adop-
tion of the measure. here recommended, be re- *
duced by at least one-half; whence it is coff-
ceived a valuable saving may be effected in a
branch
( 109 )
branch of the public expenditure, not at pre-
sent susceptible of any serious diminution,
The above clauses may perhaps suffice to de-
lineate the outline of a defensive institution,
capable, I would flatter myself, of much sub-
stantial good; where they want clearness, it will
be for the author to explain them, according to
the best of his humble abilities; where they want
comprehensiveness, it will be for the wisdom of
government to add the necessary provisions.
Unless my partial judgment deceive me, this
system will be found productive of a species of
force, which will save to the public almost the
whole expense incurred by the existing local
militia; together with some incidental expenses,
attendant on the old militia itself.
A species of force which shall overturn the
service by substitute, so far as is possible, and
thereby leave open the whole saleable part of
the population, to reinforce the regular army;
which shall at once abolish that competition of
bounties wherein the state has been so uniformly
and so ruinously outbid ; and by which the
recruiting market has been altogether drained
of men, to furnish substitutes for the militia
regiments,
( 110 )
regiments, instead of soldiers for the regiments
of the line.
A species of force so easily and rapidly.
brought forward in that kind of discipline, which
only is adapted to the surface of this inclosed
and intersected country, as by an exercise of
not more than six months duration, to excel in
action, though not in ostentatious mechanism,
the stateliest battalions of the old militia.
There may, finally, be deduced from it a spe.
cies of force, of which, while one-fourth is em-
ployed in protecting the country, the remainder,
though equally capable of defending, may be
securely occupied in enriching it; which, for
the same charge at which we now maintain
50,000 men, shall give his Majesty the use of
200,000, ready to act at an hour's notice; and
which, by a fixed, though gentle, rotation of
service, shall relieve, periodically, from the bur-
then of arms, a fair quota of those, who have
earned that exemption, while it gradually trains
our whole active population to their use.
The author would not be understood to assert,
that a French invasion could be successfully
resisted
( 111 )
fesisted by irregular infantry alone. The pre-
sence and countenance of some steady regi-
ments of the line, ought to be provided as a
rallying point for the less experienced levies.
But they need not act in heavy masses, nor be
of large amount. One battalion, covering
*three or four of militia, would suffice to ani-
mate and direct their movements; and these,
with perhaps the reserve of the army, would be
all the veteran infantry we should require. Every
officer must likewise admit the vast, indeed the
primary importance, of two other branches of
force, in which we are beyond all comparison
superior to the enemy. He can never cope with
us in light artillery, or in light dragoons; for he
can neither transport them in sufficient numbers,
nor does he possess them of equal excellence
with ours. The flying artillery, the matchless
cavalry of England, flanked and supported on
all sides, by swarms of light infantry, familia-
rized to the scene of operation, and sheltered,
themselves, by the fences with which it abounds,
would outmarch the invader in every direction;
nor is it rational to believe that the French
infantry could advance from the very outset,
* The advantage of mingling new and old battalions has
been conspicuous in Portugal on every occasion.
above
( 112 )
above one league in a day, Let it be remember.
ed that in his attacks on Prussia, Austria, and
Russia, Bonaparte seldom failed to push on
against these powers with superior bodies of
artillery, of light troops and of horse; but that
we should employ against him those precise ad-
vantages, which were the bases of his ascendency
over other nations,
*mºm-->
ºpiº. It was natural to reflect with much anxiety,
on those means by which the standing army
could best be supported, in the degree of force
required by the magnitude of the French em-
pire, no less than of our own. In doing so, the
author could hardly shut his eyes to the prospect,
that if we increase in nothing but size, while
our enemy, each moment, grows in power, we
must not only maintain our army, at the full
amount of its actual numbers, but we must
try some more efficacious system of recruiting,
or augment it even by coercive methods, when
voluntary enrolment shall fail; nor was he at all
blind to the opprobrium which, in England,
ever attaches itself, to him who states an alterna-
tive as between liberty and commerce. If offi-
cers are to be the soul of an army, and are
bound to direct the intellect of others, it is diffi-
cult
( 113 )
cult not to infer that they should themselves be
gifted with intelligence. After investing, them
with a power to think, the next step is to pro-
vide them with a stimulus to act; the policy
therefore of rousing them by judicious encou-
ragements, rests nearly on the same ground as
that of forming them, by ample acquirements;
though the specific plans herein recommended,
for the attainment of both these objects, are,
from their nature, exposed to controversy or to
CenSure,
It is not a complaint of one day's standing,
that our various descriptions of domestic force
are complicated, vexatious, expensive, and un-
manageable, in the extreme. To propose (or
to clear the way for others to propose) some
means of rendering them more simple and
economical, less injurious to the army, and
more efficient in themselves, has been the care
and ambition of the author.
Let us conclude with expressing an ardent
hope, that right measures may be promptly, but
deliberately, embraced, to carry us in safety
through this, our last and solemn trial; to rec-
tify abuses, where they are ascertained to exist,
and to silence faction, where they are not.
K That
( 114 )
That we may preserve unshaken the indepen-
dence of an illustrious people; the dignity of
our government; the integrity of our laws, our
privileges, and our morals. That the same un-
daunted spirit which has animated our Sove-
reign, and protected the empire, through the
perils of a long and eventful reign, may hover
round the throne of his posterity to all succeed-
ing ages—may fulfil that bright prospect of re-
lief from barbarous despotism, which the ener-
gies of this nation have opened for mankind—
and fix the sceptre, or the sword, of England,
as a lever to raise the prostrate world.
APPENDIX
( 115 )
APPENDIX No. I.
COPY OF A LETTER
FROM
MR. JOSEPH LANCASTER,
In reply to some enquiries made by the author, on the subject
of the Lancasterian system of Education; and of the origin,
progress, and effects, both past and probable, of its intro-
duction into the British Army, through the medium of the
School established in the 1st Regiment (or Royal) under the
Patronage of His Royal Highness the Duke of Kent.
Royal Free School, Borough Road,
5th Month, (May) 81st, 1811.
MY KIND FRIEND,
A weight of public business has pre-
vented my attention earlier to thy wishes; I am
much obliged by both thy letters, and only la-
ment I have not had time to reply at length.
The views of the Duke of Kent, as thou wilt
readily believe, were purely of a benevolent na-
I 2 ture.
( 116 )
ture. About autumn, 1809, he visited my in-
stitution in the Borough Road. The first time,
he came with a view to see and judge for him-
self, designing to introduce the plan into his
regimental school, if he found it worthy: he
spent near two hours in school, and minutely
examined every thing, paying at the same time
the kindest attention to the children and their
employments. He then arranged to call the at-
tention of his officers to the subject, as to their
merit he paid the highest deference; this he
did in a short time, and when I visited the De-
pôt Battalion, then quartered at Malden, I
found Lieutenant Colonel Barnard and the offi-
cers at Malden much interested in it.
The school-master, Munns, was a serjeant in
the regiment, and billeted some time in London
to learn the plan, for which purpose he attend-
ed my school, and was instructed personally by
myself.
Some time after I had seen the organization
of the school completed at Malden, the regi-
ment moved quarters to Dunbar, where last au-
tumn I visited the school, and was much de-
lighted with its happy success. By the Duke's
especial desire, sanctioned by Lord Cathcart, a
-- ~ * dozen
r J’
*. "..
‘. . ." 3.
*... *.*
§§
**
* > * ...
*
* f
*
( 117 )
dozen of the most forward pupils in the Royals,
were marched up to Edinburgh, to attend my
lecture in the Theatre Royal there; the effect of
their practical elucidation of the subject was
grand and electric.
The auditory consisted of eighteen hundred
persons, of the first respectability in Edinburgh,
both university and town; the effect was such,
that it was difficult to say, whether blessings,
or applauses, on the Royal Duke, predominated
in that enlightened assembly.
After this, the boys and their master had a
feast at Oman's Hotel, and I gave twenty gui-
neas, part of the produce of the lecture, towards
fitting up the school-room with new desks.
Since then the regiment has been removed to
Stirling Castle.—The school has gone on with
the greatest success, and been visited conti-
nually by many clergy, gentry, and magistrates
in Scotland.
The master and pupils do high credit to the
system, and honour to themselves. Munns be-
haves in a very excellent manner, and the Duke
of Kent has already given him a gold medal
I 3 worth
( . 118 ' )
worth ten guineas; the die made, and medal
cut at his own expence. This is to encourage a
useful man in a princely purpose, by a present
worthy of a prince. º
The satisfaction afforded to the magistrates of
Stirling has been so great, that they have unani-
mously offered the Guildhall to be fitted up as
a school-room, on condition that the children of
the townsmen should participate in the advan-
tages of the system, with the young soldiers,
and under the same master; this has been ac-
ceded to, and when the soldiers are at drill, he
conducts the school for the townsmen's children.
Lieutenant Colonel Macleod has only recently
stated to me the very happy and rapid progress
made by the regimental scholars, and he de-
clares that the finish it has given to the non-
commissioned officers, is equally useful and
admirable. He speaks of it as a wholesale
manufactory of non-commissioned officers, and
strongly recommends in other schools the ap-
pointment of the best scholars as shadows of
the serjeants, &c. as it operates as a rallying:
point of emulation, and at the same time esta-
blishes a nursery for the supply of vacancies.
Near
(, 119 )
Near 800 young persons have been suc-
cessively instructed in school during about two
years that it has been established. Being a de-
pôt battalion, and allowed to enlist boys, they
muster very strong in scholars, and therefore the
number of non-commissioned officers finished in
this school are not confined to this battalion;
being drafted out for service, they supply the
foreign as well as the home battalions; the num-
ber therefore must be considerable. The Duke's
object was not only good in itself for his own
regiment, but was intended as an example to
other regiments of the line, and arleady it has
spread to several of the first rank; but as the
number of respectable officers, who are follow-
ing the example, are daily on the increase, it
will be well to let their names remain till we get
a phalanx strong as the Macedonian host; and
then bring them into the field for public view at
Oil Cés
I have eight boys from the Duke's regiment,
who live on my premises, and attend school to
learn the plan; their orderly conduct affords a
striking proof that decorum and morality are
not inconsistent with the character of the pri-
vate soldier; for I would as soon on those ac-
counts they should sit down at my table, as any
I 4 child
child I have in my family. They are to go out
to different regiments, to aid the organization
of other schools, and as they will live and mess
with the soldiers of the regiments they go to be
of service to, they will be a very cheap kind of
assistants—they will be in readiness for service
in another month.
I have had great pleasure in answering thy
questions; and have only to add, that as the
boys go out, the Duke of Kent will give a silver
medal to each of them.
The Duke liberally contributed to the funds
of the regimental school, nor have the officers
been backward in rewarding the most deserving
boys.
The conduct of Munns has been extremely
satisfactory; and I am sure that the discern-
ment of the Duke of Kent could not have been
more strongly manifested than in encouraging a
deserving young man to distinguish himself, in
setting an example which will be of service to
the moral character of the soldiery in general,
and prevent in this almost armed nation, a de-
praved state of morals in the army; which would
render it a curse and scourge to the nation, if
its
( 121 )
its immorality and numbers should encrease in
any thing like the same proportion.
Among many other instances, I may mention,
that the Duke of Gloucester has followed the
Duke of Kent's example, and has sent his school
and schoolmaster altogether, from the 3d regi-
ment of guards, to learn the plan.-The Duke
of Cambridge has promised the same in the
Coldstream.—Colonel Dalton is about to intro-
duce it into the West Kent; Lieutenant Colonel
Thomas Pritzler has established it in the cavalry
depôt at Maidstone.—Lieutenant Colonel New-
digate has introduced it in the King's own Staf-
ford; the Duke of Kent lately did me the ho-
nour to let me accompany him in a visit to the
school in the Stafford, at the Barracks, Wind-
sor, and was much delighted. Major Hearn is
going on satisfactorily in the 43d, and he
informs me Sir John Craddock has subscribed
liberally.—The officers of the battalion of that
regiment quartered at Colchester, are enthusias-
tic in their admiration of the plan, and equally
so in its support.
Thus thou seest the work is spreading, and
will spread. I have lately had an account of a
large
( s. )
*
large school in the Cavan Militia,” in Ireland,
which is going on well. I hope the paperst I
send with this will be acceptable, and remain
Thy obliged Friend,
Jose PH LAN CASTER.
} #.
To Captain Sterling,
&c. &c.
* Commanded by Colonel Barry, member for the county of
Cavan.
+These papers were-the report of Mr. Lancaster's progress
from the year 1798, &c. and a comparison between the Lan-
casterian system and that of Dr. Bell—the first a noble testi-
mony to the wisdom and benevolence of the system, and its
supporters. The second calculated to remove some preju-
dices, by the diffusion of which its progress might be obstructed.
They both merit the widest circulation.—E. S.
=-\
No. II.
( . 123 ) .
No. II.-(See Ch. II.)
º
OBSERVATIONS, &c.*
FRoM the time of the revolution to the present
day, the people of England have been afflicted
! with
* Most of the observations contained in this mémoire,
which relate to the general question of the policy of expedi-
tions, and also those relating to the Spanish war, made part of
a letter which was published separately very early in last
August, when the prevailing sentiment of the public was strik-
ingly unfavourable to expeditions, and desponding on the sub-
ject of Spain. Expeditions, whatever be their aim, form a
standing topic in this country, and are at all times entitled to
discussion. The glorious defence of Portugal by Lord Welling-
ton, with the battles by which it has been illustrated and en-
riched, though they were not necessary to render it immortal,
has astonished Europe, and confounded the military govern-
ment of France. Prince Ferdinand of Brunswick, who has
usually been regarded as a model in defensive war, had less
embarrassing difficulties to contend with, was attacked by an
army not so numerous, under commanders of very inferior
reputation, and obtained results of far less value.
Deep and provident sagacity laid the seeds of this well-
timed and momentous triumph—unwearied vigilance, inces-
sant activity, and heroic fortitude, matured the growth, and
reaped the fruits of victory. Spain has been roused to a more
efficient discharge of her duties; receiving a new impulse of
# feeling
( 124 )
with a severe jealousy of all attempts made by
their government to take a military part in the
wars of Europe, without much regard either
to those principles which justified such a ge-
neral disposition to interfere, or to those particu-
lar occasions by which it was called into action.
To raise an outcry, therefore, against every ea-
pedition, (unless it was undertaken for a mere
commercial purpose,) has often proved an easy
task, and a popular engine of annoyance against
every minister. But as the question of justice
does not seem to have had much influence on
the authors or propagators of these discontents,
we may confine ourselves to the question of po-
licy alone, and let the matter rest on this plain
footing—“whether, and in what cases, Great
feeling towards her friends, and of action towards her invaders.
England must learn from it, to view, with more complacency,
a full developement of her yet unexerted powers—and Europe,
with more confidence, an approaching vindication of her rights.
We ought not to forget, that the graceful qualities of calm-
ness and moderation, with the tenderest humanity, have tem-
pered and adorned every act of Lord Wellington, towards his
soldiers, his allies, and his brave, though undeserving, enemies,
The great events of the last four months, however, cannot
be said to have enhanced the unalterable merits, either of the
Spanish cause, or of the British General.-May the author be
permitted to add, that they have not affected, in the slightest
degree, his sentiments, respecting the ultimate success of both.
Britain,
( 125 )
Britain, already maintaining a numerous army,”
can be said to gain or lose most, by the active
employment of that army on the continent of
Europe?” To enter into but a small part of the
elucidations of which this subject is suscepti-
ble, would be an arduous, and, for me, a pre-
sumptuous effort; I shall therefore be satisfied
with endeavouring to enforce three propositions,
as clearly and concisely as I can, leaving a num-
ber of collateral, but important topics, to the
leisure and ability of others.
1st, While England is at war, and threatened
with invasion by an enemy, who encircles nearly
two thirds of her coast, she ought not to con-
fide in her navy alone, but ought to strain every
sinew to create an efficient army, and therefore,
without any more immediate motive, she ought to
seek all opportunities of fighting her antagonist
abroad, in order to prepare her troops for the final
struggle, on ground more critical and decisive.
When government are not disquieted by fears
for the internal tranquillity of the united king-
dom, the whole of the army is a dead expense
* It is a whimsical fact, that many people may be found
who will admit the necessity for keeping up a large army,
provided we make no use of it.
to
( 126) )
to the nation, unless it be actively employed,
in direct, offensive war; but whether in Spain,
Portugal, Italy, Holland, nay France herself,
in this view of the subject it matters not—in
whatever quarter of Europe a French force can
be found, so as to be susceptible of destruction,
or even of alarm, a British corps dispatched
against it, and conducted with ordinary skill,
cannot fail to engage the attention of the hostile
government; partially at least to exhaust its re-
sources, and to retard the consolidation of its
power. The particular object of each expedi-
tion is that to which the public solicitude of this
country has hitherto been most industriously,
but as it appears to me, most erroneously, di-
rected; for, independent of each particular suc-
cess, enterprizes of this nature are pervaded by
an influence, beneficial, general, and lasting. If
natural courage be ripened into habitual cool-
ness; if original talent be cultivated by scienti-
fic knowledge; if from twenty thousand recruits
sent out, but fifteen thousand veterans return,
to train their countrymen, and teach them how
to conquer—I confess it does seem to me that
those who talk of impeaching the ministers, and
cashiering the generals, under whom these, if no
other, advantages have been gained, are guilty
either of hardened injustice, or of gross infatua-
tion. Are British troops never to act except on
fields
( 127 . )
fields where they can march to bloodless vic-
tory P Is no spot of earth to be occupied as a
camp, where the merchant cannot erect his ware-
house? Are we so spell-bound in the acquisition
of money, that we overlook both the multitudes
by whom it may be plundered, and the means by
which it may be secured 2 Commerce never can
defend herself. The golden hilt and burnished
scabbard rest for protection on a blade of steel.
The tide of power flows in a steady course,
transferring dominion from ease to indigence.
Since the earliest dawn of history, the crown of
empire has dropped from the brow of wealth, and
settled on that of courage.
The formation of soldiers, therefore, ought to
be regarded as our fundamental and eternal po-
licy; that which government ought to prescribe
to themselves as an incessant labour; that which
should be impressed upon the people of Eng-
land as almost a law of nature—upon manhood,
as a passion—upon childhood, as next in order
to an instinct. Every possible occasion of op-
posing our countrymen to those dire antagonists,
with whom, first or last, they will unavoidably
have to contend, for all that is dear to honour
and to virtue; every scene of arduous difficulty,
of fruitful experiment, of novel danger, ought
to
( 128 )
to be selected and seized on, as the nurse of
heroism, and the school of military genius.
Let us reflect on the legislation of Lycurgus,
and on its consequences. Divesting Sparta of
her walls, at a time when each inhabited village
was a fortress, he denounced the languor of long
continued peace, not only as an ignominious,
but a perilous indulgence; and enjoined the cul-
tivation of a martial spirit, by perpetual enter-
prizes against the neighbouring states. Strip-
ped of every vulgar protection, she found an
impenetrable rampart in the breasts of her hardy
warriors; nothing adverse could approach the
naked city; nor, whilst her primitive institu-
tions remained in force, did the smoke of a hos-
tile camp obscure the horizon, or menace the
virgin modesty of Sparta. “Justice,” says Mr.
Burke, “is the great standing policy of civil
society.” Let us not, therefore, be supposed
to maintain that the maxims of a ferocious age
should now be revived, and still less by the
British government. Great Britain need not
emulate either the lawgivers of antiquity, in
their savage foresight; or the lawbreakers of the
present day, in their foul spoliations. It is not
that she should commence a war unjustly, but
that being commenced, she ought to prosecute it
wisely;
( 129 )
wisely; and thence it can never be repeated with :
too much emphasis, that setting aside all contract-
ed objects, mere fighting, for the sake of fighting
the French, ought, of itself, to be considered a
paramount advantage, and worth any probable
risk of men or money. Centuries of prosperous
but inglorious peace, unnerved, at one period, the
arms of our ancestors, and when Rome withdrew
her stationary legions, the lot of England was
harsh and inexorable bondage. Vainly do we
boast of still holding out unconquered, after a war
with France of seventeen years. Our population
know nothing of war, but the name. Our army
has never, since the days of Marlborough, been
engaged on a scale commensurate with the
power of this country. Yet it is by seeking our
foe upon the Continent, that we shall learn to
beat him, when he seeks us here.
The campaigns of Flanders, at the outset of
the terrible Revolution, were not without their
useful influence on the military character of
Great Britain. The campaign of Holland,
though unsuccessful, in 1799, helped to furnish
instruments, both physical and moral, for the
glorious recovery of Egypt. The spirit engen-
dered, the confidence imbibed, the superiority
asserted, by our cavalry under Sir John Moore,
K WCTC
( 130 T)
were cheaply bought by the final destruction of
their horses; as were the sacrifice of treasure,
and the other disasters of a retreat, nobly re-
deemed by our infantry in the battle of Corun-
na. Though Cuesta hung like an incubus on
the neck of Wellington, and though Graham
was devoted by La Pena—what Englishman can
wish to erase, or what Frenchman to transmit,
the records of Talavera and Barrosa? Were no
heroes formed, to indemnify their country for
those who fell? Even had the exquisite skill
developed on the fifth of May, failed to secure
the fortress of Almeida—or had the fierce intrepi-
dity of Albuera ended by forcing the allies to
abandon finally the siege of Badajoz—was there
nothing gained by proving, in the first case, that
the antagonist of Massena could exhibit a mas-
ter-piece of manoeuvre 2–or, in the second, that,
under a British officer, the Spaniards knew how
to fight? If there be any person who will deli-
berately assert, that the present service in Por-
tugal, end how it may, can be otherwise than
permanently beneficial to our army, such a man
reflects to little purpose. If it be said that we
instruct our enemy, by the same process through
which we propose to gain instruction, it should
be remembered that he is already master of his
business; that Prussia, Austria, and Russia,
Were
( 131 )
were his camps of exercise; that all these were
so many military academies for the French, to
which we could not, or did not, resort; that if
our troops be not trained in a series of actual
conflicts, they can hardly be deemed superior to
a militia; and that if we do not practise, so as
to become acquainted with the play of Bona-
parte, on the shores of the Mediterranean and
the ocean, we must at once throw up the game,
when he lands his myrmidons in Sussex.
2dly, If it should be granted that the pro-
spect of inuring the British army to war will,
fairly justify the employment of it on foreign
service, this policy derives much additional
weight, when we are enabled to combine, with
such a general object, the specific hope of reliev-
ing a distressed neighbour, on the brink of sub-
jection to a common enemy—and of forming
with that neighbour, on the basis of congenial
interest, a permanent and powerful alliance.
I admit that, in order to state this contingen-
cy in terms strong enough to build any argument
upon it, there must be a rational hope that the
country which we support will both repel the
invader by our assistance, and afterwards main-
tain, by itself, the freedom so acquired. If the
K 2 former
( 132 )
former hope exist not, our troops still fight for
mere honour and instruction—if the latter, a
perpetual (unless it be a reciprocal) obligation of
defence, confers an equitable right of conquest—
he only, in that case, having a claim to govern,
who only is able to preserve.
Such an ally we have in the Spanish nation.
They struggled to get free before their chains
were riveted. There existed from the beginning
a reasonable hope, that with the aid of England
they would achieve their liberty—and no doubt
exists, that, when achieved, they will alone be
competent to defend it.
All parties in Great Britain seemed agreed from
the first that we should support the Peninsula to
the utmost; and whatever controversies arose
were on the nature of the assistance; scarcely any
on its amount. Numbers, who felt warmly for
the Spanish cause, recommended the supply of
officers, arms, and money; actually persuading
themselves that it would be superfluous to re-
inforce the Spanish army, and prodigal to expose
our own. But were we sincere in our attach-
ment to Spain P If so, why make our succours
narrower than our means ? If not sincere—why
grant her any P Officers whom they would not
obey—
( 138 )
obey—money which ran the risk of being mis-
applied—and arms for those who threw them
down before the enemy Sir John Moore
complained that there was no Spanish army in
being—an English army was, therefore, the
more indispensable; and an exclusive supply of
stores and arms more absurd.
Spain and Portugal, in the present state of
Europe, form the only outwork of the British
empire—and let it never be forgotten, that their
western face commands a portion of our citadel.
Justly was it asserted by the noble Secretary for
Foreign Affairs, that it was a cause in which the
highest sentiments of our nature were sanctioned
by the voice of practical wisdom, and by the
most solid calculations of policy. Let not Bri-
tain, therefore, be the first to set a pusillanimous
example, to shrink from a common danger, or
to resign a common interest; for, in pouring
out men and treasures at the shrine of Spanish
liberty, the chief reward will be her own. -
The author of a celebrated pamphlet, in
speaking of this country, has declared, “that
both the Government and the people have cor-
responded, by the exuberance of their succours,
to the liberal and disinterested zeal with which
| K 3 they
( 134 )
they embraced the Spanish cause, and completed
a picture on which mankind will hereafter love
to dwell.” We may sympathize with the senti-
ments of the American author, more, I trust,
than we can rely on his prognostics. Although
he pities and applauds the people of Spain, he
condemns their indolence, and despairs of their
success. Almost as soon might he despair of an
over-ruling providence. A diffused feeling of
national presumption, with provincial habits of
alienation from each other, were the rods which
most cruelly scourged the Spaniards. The time
to tremble for Spanish independence, was when
a few unlooked-for, and, in a military sense, un-
merited successes, led to the entertainment of
puerile hopes, to the neglect of essential prepara-
tions, and to such a disregard of their ties to
Great Britain, founded on a confidence in their
own power, as led them to depreciate her most
important services, to slight her most earnest
admonitions, and to reject, in some cases, her
most equitable demands. The surrender of Du-
pont contributed both to palsy their own efforts
on the Ebro, and to deny us admission within
the walls of Cadiz. Now their energies have
been roused by their losses. Defeat and disas-
ter have schooled their minds into a grateful es-
timate of their obligations to this country, a
* frank
(. 135 )
frank reliance on her friendship, and a more
temperate opinion of themselves.
The line of the Ebro, with Pampluna and the
Pyrenees on its right, is the only regular mili-
tary base which that whole kingdom can afford
to a hostile army. But we may vary indefinite-
ly the basis of our operations, for we can attack
the coast wherever we please, and preserve the
communication with our shipping unbroken.
Thirty thousand English soldiers, hovering
round the Spanish coast, would agitate and ex-
haust 100,000 Frenchmen. Should the enemy
abandon the Castiles, to repel the British from
the shore, he leaves the interior alive to insurrec-
tion. Does he retire to strengthen himself in
the inland provinces—he leaves the sea-ports
at our mercy, with an unlimited power of en-
couraging our allies, and of supplying them
with the sinews of war; nor is it possible that
the French force should be equally strong, both
in the centre, and at the circumference, of so
vast a circle.
Bonaparte cannot raise a single Spanish re-
cruit, except by the horrid engine of conscrip-
tion, in the towns which he garrisons; and in
the recruits so raised, he dares not confide. But
K 4 while
( 136 )
while the influence of a French corps ends with
the ground it covers, that of the British army is
sensibly felt throughout the mass of the neigh-
bouring population. The army of Gallicia has
loeen formed on the left of Lord Wellington—
the army of Romagna on his right—the Spanish
and Portugese guerrillas have been lighted into
life and action by the vicinity of the British
camp; so that it were erroneous to calculate the
powers of England and France on the Peninsula,
by the respective numbers of their troops alone.
Great indeed ought to be our satisfaction,
and confident our hope, when we survey the
rising form of Spain, and when we justly appre-
ciate the noble race of her inhabitants. In no-
thing has their courage yet abated, while their
military prowess has been conspicuously ripened,
since the first irruption of their invaders. Gift-
ed by nature with perseverance and fortitude,
they have begun to derive wariness and activity
From experience. Beaten to the earth, they re-
bound in the face of their oppressors, and, call-
ing to their aid the vigorous attributes of adver-
sity, they prepare, undisturbed, for renovated
toils and dangers. But it is difficult to estimate
the boldness with which the Spaniards have met
this awful contest, or the patience with which
they
( 137 )
they have borne up against its weight of mise-
ries, if we consider them merely as one great na-
tion repelling the invasion of another; or if we
confine our view to the numbers by whom they
have been assaulted, or to the stake for which
they fight. Justly to value the character now
exhibited by the Spanish nation, we must revert
to the history of their forefathers. The Spani-
ards are not a new people, desperate from pover-
ty, nerved for adventure, and thirsting for ag-
grandisement or renown—nor have they ad-
vanced in greatness as they have in age, and be-
come terrible from the pride of habitual glory.
They are a people who once were prosperous, and
have declined; who were foremost in the spirit,
as in the art of war; but have for many genera-
tions lost their armies, their military leaders, the
remenbrance of victory, and the ambition of
conquest. All, indeed, that could be inflicted
on the political and moral feeling of the human
race, by the decay of empire, or the growth of
civil and religious tyranny, they have long en-
dured. Yet, although the sentiment of national
honour might seem to dwindle, as its memorials
receded from the view ; although the govern-
ment, old and absoluté, was void of order; al-
though a revolution, without a revolutionary
mind, came equally unlooked for by sovereign
and
( 138 )
and subject, not proceeding from the will of the
nation, but from the torpid weakness of the
crown; although there was neither the energy
of youth to impel, nor the wisdom of maturity
to guide them, yet is it our duty to describe the
Spaniards as a people, with whom, beneath the
yoke of heartless despotism, the love of liberty
has survived the habit of subjection—who have
discovered, in the reverses of their untaught
patriots, the elements of future triumph; and
have fed the sacred fire of enthusiasm, in the
temple, and amidst the idols, of the meanest and
most abject superstition.
This tribute of unfeigned applause to the
bulk of the Spanish nation, may bespeak indeed
on the part of those who offer it, a warm dis-
position towards their interests, and may even
administer consolation in the event of a dis-
astrous issue to the alliance. But all this, of
itself, would scarcely justify a British statesman
for committing so large a portion of our life and
treasure on the success of the war in Spain, un-
less there appeared, as I said before, a fair pro-
bability of thereby rescuing an important pro-
vince from the enemy, and establishing, for this
country, a faithful and lasting friend.
3dly, I
( 139 )
3dly, I now proceed to the third position
which I had in view at starting—viz. That, al-
though it may be quite essential to have soldiers
disciplined in war, and although it be an imperi-
ous duty to protect our struggling friends, by the
same means which contribute to the amelioration
of our own armies; yet since it would be wise to
obtain for the consumption of men and money,
some more solid indemnity than mere discipline
—and since it would be much wiser to augment
our own strength, than to rely implicitly on any
foreign friendship—the most valuable of all ob-
jects to be attained by the application of the
British arms, would be the conquest of some
territory now in the hands or under the avowed
controul of France, and the permanent anneva-
tion of it to the British empire.*
This being a subject, not only with which our
vital interests are connected, but on which some
of our most stubborn prejudices have been in-
dulged, I shall take the liberty of discussing it
at considerable length.
To most objects, associated with the foreign
* The subject of foreign conquest, as treated of in the
“Military Policy,” is well worthy of public attention.
policy
( 140 )
policy of Great Britain, there has long existed
in the English nation a degree of indifference
altogether unaccountable, considering the vigi-
lance, anxiety, and profound attention, with
which questions that concern our internal policy
are at all times meditated amongst us. We can-
not, therefore, be much surprised, if the states-
man, who has raised himself by his influence
with such a community, should betray some
tincture of the mass from which he has emerg-
ed; and still less if the soldier, subordinate and
instrumental to the other, should partake more
grossly of the same character.
Questions affecting the foreign relations of
this country, constitute not a tythe of those, by
agitating which, within the walls of parliament,
or through the medium of the press, a political
adventurer can struggle for reputation, and
fight his way to power. Nor is it perhaps of
much importance, that the Major-General, who
is employed by such a minister to seize and colo-
nize a sugar island, should be deeply versed in the
politics of foreign states. All that England seems
to require, on such an occasion, is the presence of
troops enough to occupy the works towards the
sea—together with that of a custom-house offi-
Cer,
( 141 )
cer, or commercial agent, to pry into the ware-
houses, and calculate the duties | But ought
this to be the sole aim or scope of an empire,
whose establishment, by land and sea, exceeds
five hundred thousand men? Ought this to
satisfy the honour of a people, whose annals
have afforded, at no distant time, such lessons
of humiliation to their enemies? Just a cen-
tury has now elapsed since England bore away
from every rival the palm of military glory—
that crown for which the ignoble prudence of
modern war ministers has deemed it arrogance
or folly to contend. In the face of France, and
on behalf of Europe, England then stood for-
ward, a principal in the continental war, which
upheld victoriously the balance of power. She
found a leader worthy of her cause; and the
triumph of Blenheim vibrated on every bo-
som, save those of her own directors of the
negociation at Utrecht. Under the presiding
genius of Marlborough, whose counsels pe-
netrated yet deeper than his sword, such was
once the station of the British empire—less
affluent, less populous, less consolidated, than
at present; while the resources of France
were guided by statesmen who have not yet
ceased to rank as masters in political Ceconomy,
and
( 142 )
and while her armies were marshalled by a
Iuxembourg, a Catinat, or a Villars—heroes
whose names are not to be aspersed by a compa-
rison with the boasters and “prize-fighters” of
her ferocious revolution. If such were then our
station—why should we despair of recovering
that exalted eminence P Are we not still the
same enlightened and warlike people, with ene-
mies threatening our life, and whole nations
courting our dominion ?
In our more recent attempts to support that
same balance of power, I do not mean to say
that we have over-rated the importance of the
object; but falsely calculating, by the tables of
former times, we have under-rated the difficulty,
and mistaken the means of securing it. We
have erred both as to the nature and the extent
of those efforts which the last twenty years
have demanded of us, towards arresting the Ti-
mour of the age in the march and fury of his
devastations—spurring and provoking him by
petty wounds, when we ought to have aimed at
his vitals a mortal blow. -
All the little seizures which the world afforded
are ours already. On earth, or in the ocean,
France has not a single colony left; but, disen-
cumbered
( 143 )
cumbered of his outer garments, the limbs of
the gladiator become more vigorous for the con-
test, or lighter for the race.
We possess, indeed, the whole maritime com-
merce of the world; and if, during our exclu-
sion from the continent of Europe, the buying
and selling amongst ourselves, and being, for
the most part, our own customers, can be fairly
said to have increased our riches, the colonial
successes of England have unquestionably pro-
moted that increase—occasioning, however, a
dispersion of her force; while she bribes foreign
governments for leave to fight their battles, and
to shed, for their interests, her own blood. The
conquests of France, on the other hand, have
given her a continuity and easy interchange of
force, supplying, at their proper charge, the con-
sumption of life and treasure which they cost
her. Needy, rapacious, and desperate, she
makes other nations pay and perish in her cause.
To clothe the executioner, she strips the corpse;
and the vital functions of her victims are re-
newed, but to feed this Promethean vulture.
Striking as may be the contrast between these
modes of war, there is not more in their guilt
than in their policy; this country having little
pretension
( 144 )
pretension to dispute either characteristic with
her rival. Of two great nations, inveterately
hostile, one robs the enemy by scraps, acquiring
opulence, but adding little to her safety. The
other finding the enemy, in his own person, not
immediately assailable, robs the actual or proba-
ble allies of that enemy by wholesale, and there-
by accumulating tremendous physical power,
converts all these collateral acquisitions into en-
gines of her main design. The subjugation of
Great Britain, and universal empire, are syno-
nimous terms. In every speculation on the
subject, therefore, it ought to be taken for
granted, that the ambition of France will stop
short at no inferior purpose. To preserve his
throne may be the policy of Bonaparte—to re-
cover it may be the vision of the Bourbon—
Bourbon or Bonaparte, in this point, it matters
not—the scheme of France is the dominion of
the world. It may be interrupted by partial de-
feats; or baffled by the temporary terrors of a
superior navy; a hollow peace may cover and
accelerate its machinations—but until the
strength of this giant be utterly broken, or bar- .
riers, fixed and insurmountable, be erected
against him, neither we nor our posterity shall
enjoy the blessings of repose.
It
( 145 )
It is not, therefore, to the vast extent of the
British empire that any reasonable objection can
be offered; it is to the extent combined with the
nature of it. The enlargements which it has
received have given us more points to defend,
without adding to the means of defending
them. The garrison is scattered, but not in-
creased. Our military population has not been
materially reinforced, except in India, and
thence the distance is so great, and its local wars
have been so frequent, that there is on record
only a single experiment wherein our numerous
and martial Asiatic force has been brought for-
ward to co-operate in relation to the hostilities
of Europe.*
It
* Certain preliminaries being settled, we are to look, it is
said, for a partition of Turkey. But the Bear may not be
so easily caught; and the hunters seem likely to quarrel before
the spoil is secured. Should, however, such a partition take
place, or any other event require that we should possess our-
selves of Egypt—should we, by the repeated perfidies of those
in whom we trust, be driven at length to seize the golden soil
of Sicily—or should circumstances demand so large an in-
crease of the British forces in the southern parts of Spain, as
could not be supplied from the population of the United
Kingdom—does there, in any of these three cases, exist an
obstacle, sufficient to deter the British government from call-
ing in aid the services of twenty, thirty, or forty thousand of
L the
( 146 )
It is needless to argue the obvious truth, that
France will tolerate neither rival nor neutral na-
tions. With the exception of Spain, Portugal,
and (possibly) Sweden, all the states of Europe
have yielded to her cajoleries or her force. Few,
indeed, wilfully, many pusilanimously, but all
injuriously, towards Great Britain, have thrown
themselves into the arms of her deadliest foe, in
the character of allies, of agents, or of subjects.
The right of England, therefore, to invade and
conquer (with the above exceptions) any given
portion of the continent of Europe, is clear
and incontestible; and if its practicability
could be determined a priori, the immediate
policy of such an attempt would be no less ap-
parent than its justice.
the native troops 6f India? The troops of the three presiden-
cies are little less numerous than the whole regular army of
Britain; India, I trust, may at length enjoy a season of pro-
found tranquillity; and the route by Suez and the Mediterra-
nean is not so very terrible to traverse. Let it not be said that
this nation had courage to conquer Asia, without sense to de-
rive from her victories almost the only benefit they could pro-
duce. Above all things, let it not be set down as preposter-
ous, that the remote Sepoy should be brought, in conjunction
with the British, to influence the fate of European war, when
the remote Englishman is sent to unite with the Sepoy in ex-
pelling every other European power from Hindostan.
Knowing
( 147 )
Knowing the designs of France against this
country to be rooted and implacable, peace with
her, on any conditions likely to grow out of the
present juncture, would be, indisputably, worse
than war; for while it would disarm Great Bri-
tain, it would release the enemy from his ports.
A moral necessity, therefore, urges us to conti-
nue the war, even though that war should carry
with it the prospect of an undefined duration.
But the dominions of the enemy have been
absolutely doubled, and the influence exercised
by him over the surrounding states, has been
multiplied an hundred fold since the commence-
ment of hostilities in 1793—while England has
obtained prodigious accessions of opulence, but
none of actual military power; thereby enhanc-
ing the temptation to plunder and destroy her,
much more than the difficulty of the task. It
follows, therefore, that she must not only pro-
long the present contest, but that, in order to
keep pace with a growing adversary, she must
carry on the war upon new principles, and direct
her efforts to different objects. Natural, not
artificial greatness, must be her aim—and that
greatness will be found far less in the manufac-
ture and the transfer of luxurious accommoda-
tions, liable to be rejected by the caprice of fo-
L 2 reigners,
{ 148 )
reigners, to be depreciated by their poverty, or
supplanted by their industry, than in obtaining
a reinforcement to the empire of an active and
vigorous population—the true ground-work of
intrinsic wealth, of lasting commerce, and un-
conquerable power.
It has been asked whether England, compara-
tively with France, “be really weaker than at
any former period?” and the misplaced confi-
dence of this nation is prone to answer in the
negative—“for if our enemy be stronger than
ever, so is the British fleet.”—Now the more di-
rect inquiry would be this—“Does the dispose-
able force of France bear an exact proportion to
the breadth of territory over which she tramples
—or to the numerical multitudes whose strength
she apparently wields?”—The answer to this
question depends ultimately on England herself;
and it is the precise point to which we ought to
bring the discussion.
I reply, then, that the real power of France,
if judiciously probed by her antagonist, would
prove neither so deep seated, nor so extensive, as
her apparent power; for although she compels
the ostensible movements of that immense and
various population whom she has first made the
victims,
( 149 )
victims, and afterwards the instruments, of her
ambition, we ought to recollect that over all
their voluntary movements, the French govern-
ment is obliged to exercise an apprehensive,
painful, and self-exhausting, controul. The
never ending series of abandoned perfidies; the
wild and unsated lust of usurpation; the deso-
lating, revolting, and remorseless cruelties,
which equally mark the character of France,
whether in the success of her arms, or the spirit
of her policy, have alienated from her the feel-
ings of the whole race of man.
Most sovereignties of which we read, though
sprung from deeds of violence, have been admi-
nistered with more or less regard for the van-
quished, and have gradually gained upon their
affections.
With modern France alone, of those nations
which rank amongst the civilized of the world,
has systematic vengeance followed the car of
victory, and fear become, not only the final
sanction of her laws, but the avowed and inde-
fatigable genius of her government. That tre-
mendous image erected by the bloody work-
manship of Robespierre, was neither perishable
in the tempests of the Revolution, nor dissolu-
L 3 ble
( so )
ble in its fires—swept away, indeed, by the whirl-
wind which destroyed its maker, the palladium
of tyranny for a moment disappeared—but now
re-cast at the imperial furnace, the terrible idol,
in form more gigantic, again overshadows the
earth, and frowns on mankind with more har-
dened and composed malignity. If such were
not the truth, the fortunes of Europe would be
hopeless—if the vassal states of France were in
nature what they are in name, and linked to-
gether in a virtual, as they are in a formal
union, I know not where is the human wisdom
that could provide a remedy, or the courage that
could avert our fate. Happily, time is yet be-
fore us. If the attempt be made where it ought,
and not too long deferred, few countries, now
groaning under the double wretchedness of mi-
litary despotism and commercial” famine, will
fail
* It is curious to observe how the evil genius of Bonaparte
seems to co-operate with events, in defeating his own most
settled purposes. By proscribing commerce universally
amongst the nations under his controul, he has given a mono-
poly of it to those whom he cannot controul, and with the prin-
cipal of whom he is at war. This is playing the very game of
England. If the trade of fifty or sixty millions of people,
comprizing the population of France and her vassal states,
were to meet with fair encouragement from their own ruler–
were it even left to shift for itself, and to contend against no
other
( 151 )
fail to offer negative or active diversions in be-
half of England.—Add hope to hatred, and the
work is done. +
In such a contest, numberless moral advan-
tages are on the side of England. In them she
is not only a first rate power—she reigns with-
out a rival. But in the grand physical quality,
her population, when compared with Russia,
other obstacles than those which England alone either would
or could oppose to it, the nations of the Continent would in-
evitably acquire wealth, sailors, and fleets. Colonies would
follow, still farther to enrich them, and to multiply their
fleets and seamen, and the invasion of Britain would be a
chimera no longer. As it is, without meaning to depreciate
the sufferings of individual merchants, much less those of our
poor manufacturers in the North, we may assert, with perfect
truth, that the body of our revenue remains untouched by
the anticommercial system of this profound oeconomist.
The mere English politician may then rejoice, that the ene-
mies of his country are borne down by a despot, under whom
the public interest goes rapidly to decay, while the warlike
spirit must, in the end, degenerate with the spirit of Freedom.
The philosopher, dreading the consequences of successful
crimes, satisfies himself with having found their natural limits,
either in the mental constitution of the criminal, or in (the
philosopher's last refuge) the brevity of human life. An il-
lustrious and lamented statesman is reported to have said,
that “Great Britain had little hope, except from time and ac-
cident.”—But his heart had then almost ceased to beat I
L 4 Austria,
( 152 )
Austria, or France, she can scarcely claim the
second rank. Yet it is by her population alone
that she will be mainly qualified to support a
struggle, against the assaults of her enemies,
and the vicissitudes of time.
, If, then, we admit the necessity of some great.
effort towards extending the basis of our mili-
tary force, we may next inquire to what point of
continental Europe good policy demands that
effort to be directed. 3.
1st, The more dangerous to this country any
given position may be in the hands of her an-
tagonist, the more desirable it is for her.
2dly, The nearer home the more valuable to
Britain, both on account of its danger to her se-
curity, and because she could transport, and
supply, her troops, thereby completing and
maintaining her conquest, more expeditiously,
and at less expense.
3dly, The more galled by French exactions
and conscriptions, and the more akin to English
character, the inhabitants may be, the greater
their alacrity to shake off the yoke, and to
unite themselves under the British standard.
4thly, The more habituated and addicted to.
commercial pursuits, now that commerce has
- been
( 153 ).
been proscribed by France, and flourishes only
under the auspices of England, the more na-
turally will such a people feel disposed to incor-
porate with the British nation. . . .
5thly, The more productive of soldiers and
seamen, and likewise the stronger in its geogra-
phical boundary, the more secure-will be the ac-
quisition, when once obtained.
Now if we survey the map of Europe from
Stockholm to Naples, and from Lisbon to Con-
stantinople, it does not appear to me that it will
be difficult to decide where the greatest number
of such qualities are united.
Spain and Portugal will stand unconquered;
and their friendship, as well from sentiment as
from circumstances, is, in all human probability,
already secured; but their freedom must be se-
cured likewise, before we move our arms else-
where. Italy is too remote from England, and
too much within the grasp of her conquerors.
Austria is out of the question, Prussia, would
not be tenable for a British force. We have, in
the Swedish nation, unchanged by the eccentri-
cities of their government, a brave and stub-
born friend. Petersburgh, with Finland, would
be a wild, and Copenhagen, alone, a mean ambi-
tion.
( 154 )
tion. The scene of operations, therefore, for a
British army, will be found between the isle of
Zealand, in the Baltic, as its northern limit, and
that of Walcheren, at the mouth of the Scheldt,
including those two islands;" with a very con-
siderable portion of the circles of Lower Saxony
and Westphalia, the Duchy of Holstein, the
Electorate of Hanover—and the whole of the
united provinces.
Of this fine region it is sufficient to assert,
that one flank supports itself on the Baltic sea,
the other almost on the English channel, with
the mouths of the Elbe, the Weser, and the
Scheldt between them ; that it contains from
5 to 6 millions of industrious and warlike in-
habitants, together with the commercial opu-
lence and maritime spirit of Amsterdam, Ham-
burgh, and Lubeck. This territory seems to
me not only to invite the attacks of England by
the perils with which it surrounds her while in
the possession of her foe, but by the facilities
which it offers towards effectually terminating
that possession. To no part of Europe could
an army be transported with so much expedi-
* Suppose Flushing were made a free port, under the pro-
tection of the British monarchy, would it require the con-
sumption of an English garrison? e
thon
( 155 )
tion from the English coast; and in none could
it be so commodiously maintained. A com-
mon origin, attested by innumerable features of
national resemblance; common habits, the re-
sults of a nearly similar geographical position;
sufferings the most grievous, engendering a
mortal hatred of that enemy who is no less
the enemy of England; an industrious people,
plundered of their wealth; a maritime people
disinherited of their native shores; the youth of
the interior torn from the bosom of domestic
peace to fatten the kites of Spain or Russia with
their bodies, that the violaters of innocence, and
the spoilers of age, may fulfil in safety the un-
resisted mission of debauchery,” rapine and
despair;-these are grounds of confidence suffi-
cient, in the feelings of the Dutch, and of the
Northern Germans. The entire country in
question is a commercial country, or one deeply
affected by the vicinity of maritime commerce.
* The middle classes of the Germans were probably the
most moral people of Europe, before their country was de-
luged by French troops. All travellers through Germany,
whose former knowledge of its inhabitants enabled them to
make comparisons on the subject, agree, that although the
successive inundations retired, the seeds of licentiousness were
deposited in the soil—and their fruits melancholy beyond ex-
ample—thus poisoned from their birth, the children of ages to
come are marked out for national degeneracy.
If
( 156 )
If it be offered a participation in the trade of
England, and a title to protection by the British
arms, as the price of its submitting to the British
crown, and assisting in its own defence against
the future designs of the enemy—can any ra-
tional being doubt its acceptance of such an in-
vitation, provided a fair reliance can be placed
both on the power and the sincerity of this
government? I do not mean to insist that the
Danish dominions would be ours without re-
sistance. The avowed enmity of Great Britain,
the comparative forbearance of France towards
Denmark, and the nominal possibility of her
remaining under the sway of her hereditary
monarchs, have disguised to the Danish nation
that alternative which stares their neighbours in
the face. But I do most devoutly believe, that
if 50,000 British troops were to land in Hol-
land, under a General qualified to engage the
confidence of the Dutch, and pledged to pro-
cure for them the rights of British subjects, he
would find it no laborious task to raise in the
country almost as many soldiers as he took
there, and not less zealous in his cause. Is
the iron despotism of Bonaparte more tolerable
than the legitimate, though haughty, supremacy
of Philip 2 Was it in the ordinary march of
Philip's government to enforce a conscription,
OT
( 157 )
or to annihilate commerce P Was Holland, in
the reign of Philip the 2d, a state of the highest
rank in wealth, liberty, and naval greatness, tor-
tured by its tyrant into unprovoked beggary
and ruin P Was there brought against that mo-
narch a single charge, or did there exist in op-
position to him a single passion, of which Bona-
parte is not the object in a tenfold degree, ex-
cept the solitary (though I admit the weighty)
one of religious phrenzy? I would ask then, is
the supposition so very untenable, that the pro-
posal of subjection to England, which was de-
clined by Elizabeth, would now find an echo in
the hearts of the wretched Hollanders, if the
British government of the present day were to
encourage by the only rational means, namely,
by the protection of a powerful army, the na-
tural expression of their wishes? -
But the grand auxiliary to such an effort
would be found in the martial and loyal popu-
lation of Hanover, of which every man capable
of bearing arms would become on the first ap-
pearance of the British force, a voluntary sol-
dier. Hanover contains above a million of inha-
bitants, no braver race in Europe; and those of
her natives who now form part of the British
army, are amongst its brightest ornaments.
Recollecting
( 138 )
... Recollecting the weight of continental wars
under King William and Queen Anne, and that
the trophies of their valour had been abandoned
by the imbecility of their counsels, the English
nation* felt more of jealousy than of pride, when
the Electorate of Hanover was added to the
British crown. Instead of regarding it as the
noble patrimony of a common sovereign, and
avowing to all Europe their determination to
cover it with the imperial shield of Britain, the
terror was, lest they should be called upon to
quarrel for a spot not worth defending! Those
who could justify their readiness to consume
the blood and treasure of the nation, on a ques-
tion about a few sticks of logwood, a wretched
zzº blockhouse in the deep me of North America,
or the liberty of a creek in the Pacific Ocean, of
which scarcely a geographer could tell the lati-
tude, or a mariner the name—those profound po-
liticians could smile at the loss of an extensive
territory in the heart of Europe, guarding the
mouths of the finest rivers of Germany, con-
taining mines and manufactories, seamen and
soldiers, the choice of a population within one-
* The interposition of England in the wars of Europe, has
been the inevitable result of her own greatness; the roots of
which have spread themselves during the last century into
every kingdom of the earth, Hanover had no influence on the
question.
third
( 159 )
third equal to that of Scotland. Had Hanover
been less the subject of jealousy in our wars,
and more the object of regard in our negocia-
tions, it might by this time have grown into a
powerful kingdom, capable of standing by the
side of England, and jointly laughing at all the
potentates of Europe. If the Electors of Bran-
denburgh had been kings (I will not say of
Great Britain, for then they must have given
way to the mercantile caprices of Great Britain)
but of some island equally powerful and similarly
placed with this, would they have thrown away
Brandenburgh, and with it the foundation of
the Prussian name? If the British government
had made peace and war, much more with re-
ference to the state of Germany, and much less
out of consideration to remote settlements across
the Atlantic, she would have more truly con-
sulted her own power. She might, by making
this the steady aim of her politics, have paved
the way for holding, in her own hands, the ba-
lance of Europe, instead of pensioning other
governments, to support them in the impunity
of their depredations. By the treaty of Aix
la Chapelle, she guaranteed Silesia to the Prus-
sian monarch; an act of impolicy and injustice
towards the House of Austria, which was not
atoned for either in the western hemisphere or
lil
( 160 )
in Europe—for abroad we restored every thing,
and on the part of Hanover we gained nothing.
Brandenburgh advanced on all sides into a
splendid monarchy. Hanover remained a de-
preciated province. By the treaty of Paris we
kept Canada, and otherwise enlarged that vast
excrescence, which, on being severed from the
body of the empire, left England bleeding al-
most to death. Had Hanover been more
strengthened, and the North American colonies
not so strong, we might now have been masters
of them both.
But this implies no censure on any particular
ministry. The fashion of the times was to grasp
at the fruits of greatness, and to overlook the
soil from which they sprung. The preceding
century, we must admit, did not afford such fa-
vourable occasions of extending the European
influence of the British crown; nor was this
country furnished with such glaring proofs of
its necessity, as have been established since the
war of the French revolution. We were almost
uniformly at peace with those nations from
whom alone an accession of German territory
could have been acquired; and the plan of uni-
versal empire had neither been so matured, nor
so frightfully developed, much less had it been
SO
( 161 )
so boldly acted on, as to sanction the aggran-
dizement of England in every possible quarter, on
the mere ground of precaution and self-defence.
. . Since the revolution of France, likewise, no
time has occurred so fortunate for an enter-
prize of this momentous nature as the period to
which we are probably approaching. Some-
thing might, perhaps, have been attempted dur-
ing the campaign on the Vistula; but wºmm
the British government had not then a sufficient
disposable force; and whether, at all events, there
was sufficient time foºsuch an undertaking, may
very well be questioned, while we must confess
that nothing could be less desirable than “the
attempt, and not the deed.” From the peace of
Tilsit to the second invasion of Spain, any attack
by England on either Holland or Germany would
have been wild and hopeless, and since the Spa-
nish war became general, such an application
of our forces would have been misplaced.
When the situation of the Spaniards shall have
been so far improved as to offer them a fair
chance of maintaining successfully their proper
quarrel, then the British army may be recalled
to a theatre more directly its own, and the ge-
nius of its leader be crowned with fresh wreaths
of glory.
W M The
( 162 )
The mode of the attack, as well as the time,
must be determined by circumstances. To fix one
point d'appui on the Baltic, and another on the
Scheldt, may appear at first view the two preli-
minary measures. Beginning with Danish Zea-
land and then proceeding by a direct invasion
of Holland, would, if successful, involve the
dominion of the rest; for Hanover constitutes a
large proportion of the intermediate country,
and of its attachment the King of England is
SCCUll'C.
Considering the electorate as the nucleus of a
military and maritime kingdom, a noble out-work
to the British empire on the east, as Ireland might
be rendered towards the Atlantic—no fear, no
prejudice, no impediment, either fanciful or sub-
stantial, should divert the mind of an English
war minister from commencing the work of its
restoration to this country,” and of its subse-
* Nearly the last memorial of his political sentiments, which
was left by Mr. Fox to his admiring country, was that high
and eloquent state paper, in which he desired the nations of
the Continent not to delude themselves with the belief, that
England would tamely submit to the loss of Hanover. This
is the bold language of a British statesman. Hanover must be
kept; but we must not hear of any colonial sacrifices, that
traffic has been tried too often.
quent
( 163 )
quent improvement and defence. The fourth
part of a century may pass away before this sys-
tem of continental power can be accomplished;
but see what we have done in India, and what
France has achieved in Europe, and if we make
this scheme our standing policy, the ultimate,
perhaps the speedy completion of it may be with
certainty predicted. An increase of six mil-
lions of people, would form the basis of an army
of 100,000 men. Touching the confines of
Pomerania, we should rest upon the friendship
of Sweden, as interposed between us and the
eastern powers; or punish her enmity by carry-
ing our frontier to Stralsund. Magdeburgh on
the south east, an impregnable fortress in the
hands of a powerful nation, would command the
respect of all its neighbours, and secure the navi-
gation of the Elbe. Holland, with a loyal po-
pulation, a combined army, and a line of for-
tresses on the south, would bid defiance to any
hostility from the side of French ambition; and
Britain, no longer beholding in every harbour
of the Continent an asylum for those who had
sworn her death, would calmly recline on the
consciousness of imperishable grandeur, breath-
ing towards her enemies the spirit of modera-
tion, and tendering to mankind the sweets of
peace.
MI 2 NO.
( 164 )
No. III.-sº Mil. Ref. c. 11)
THE following paper may serve to indicate
the mode in which the assiduity of French ge-
nius seldom fails to employ itself on the eve of
a war with foreign states. “Le Tableau Statis-
tique de la Monarchie Autrichienne,” was pub-
lished at Paris, partly from official documents
of the Austrian government, laid hold of by
French agents; and in part from the personal
inquiries and local knowledge of the spies of
that nation, dispersed through the provinces of
Austria, previous to the last invasion by Bona-
parte. This quarto volume really is, what it
imports to be, a complete statistical account of
the monarchy noted down for destruction. No
source of power or of weakness has escaped ex-
posure. The amount of every tax; the pro-
duce, the manufactures, the circumstances of
every village; each object of public regulation
and of private industry; all is laid open, to the
bone. There never was displayed a more per-
fect anatomical preparation, for the study of the
French staff, those eager pupils in the art of
probing, trepanning, bleeding, tapping, jugu-
lating, or beheading, an empire, -
. . " - The
( 165 )
The only extracts which I have made, and
somewhat abridged, are a few relative to the
amount of the population, and to the composi-
tion of the army. I have taken the liberty of
inserting them here, both because of their con-
nexion with the subjects of this work, and be-
cause they are in themselves no less interesting
than authentic. -
Eartraits du Tableau Statistique de la Monarchie
Autrichienne, &c. au Commencement de la
Guerre de 1809. Par M.M. Raymond &
Roth, Paris.
A. Population . . . . . . . . . . . 122,930,000
1. Les états hèréditaires . . . . 8,356,000
2. Les états héréditaires de Gallicie 4,940,000
3, de Hongrie 9,634,000

| Hommes. Hommes, Hommes.
B. Militaire.
Pied de paix de 1804. . . . . 370,945
Pied de guerre de 1805 . . . . . . . . . . . . . 471,312
1. Infanterie . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .271,871
Reg. Batt. Comp.
a. Troupes de Ligne 63 189 1,008|193,587
e & ©
b. Grenadiers . . . 0 21 126 14,364
c. Chasseurs . . . . 1 2 10| 2,140
d. Troupes de fron-
.."" iſ 46 14, 33,000 |
e. Troupes de garn" 3 7 28 7,000
J. Invalides . . . . O 5 O 1,780
gºsſil
Chaque
( 166 )
| Chaque régiment de ligne est composé de
deux compagnies de grenadiers-deux batail-
lons de campagne, de six compagnies, and un
bataillon de dépot, de quatre compagnies. Cha-
que compagnie de grenadiers est de 99 hommes ;
de fusiliers, de 182 hommes ; le régiment entier
est de 3,175 hommes. Les grenadiers forment
un corps separé; l'élite de l'armée. Les grena-
diers sont choisis dans les compagnies de fusi-
liers. - •>
La Hongrie a douze régimens ; qui forment
un corps de 46,284 hommes; qui se recrutent
dans ce royaume. Chaque régiment a 40 sur-
numéraires par compagnie. Ces régimens ont
donc 640 hommes, de plus que les autres. Les
troupes nationales des frontières sont un corps
régulier & exercé, auquel, au lieu de solde, on a
assigné des terres, sur les frontières de Turquie.
Elles sont divisées en dix sept régimens. Leur
force n'est pas déterminée, & se règle d'après la
population des districts militaires. En général,
on compte 3,000 hommes pour chaque régi-
ment.
2. Cavalerie
( 167 )
Hommes.l Hommes.
2.Cavalerie . , . , . . .. . .. . | . . . . | 50,800
- Regs. Divs.
a. Cuirassiers . . . 8 24 . . . ' .. | 9,600
b. Dragons 6 18 . . . . | 7,200
c. Chevau-légers 6 24 . . . . | 9,480
d. Hussards . .. .. 12 48 . . . . | 18,980
e. Ulahns . 3 12 . . . . | 4,740
f Dragons . . - 0 3 . . . . 800
•-s/-ee
| 50,800
La Hongrie seule fournit des recrues à dix
régimens, formant 16,980 hommes. Les troupes
légères appartiennent, presque toutes, aux mi-
lices des frontières, organisées militairement.


Hommes.l Hommes.
3. Artillerie . . . . . . • | . . . . | 15,994
Regt. Bns. Com. -
a.Artillerie de campagne, 4 16 64 12,800
| b. Artilleurs . . . . .. . . . . | 1,274
c. Mineurs . . . . . . . . . . 640
d. Sapeurs . . . . . . . . . . 280
e. Bombardiers . . . ' . . . . . . 200
f Pontonniers . . .. : . . . . . . 6OO
g. Génie . . . . . . . . . . . 200
L'Artillerie se recrute dans l'Infanterie. 15,994
4.Corps Particuliers . . . . . . . | . . . . | 12,000
a. État Major General . . . .. . . 800
b. Charrois . . . . . . . . . . 8,000
c. Bataillon des Tschaikes . . . . . | 1,200
d. Reserve . . . . . . . . . . | 2,000
12,000
5. Gardes . . . . . . . . 280
à Noble Allemande . . - . . . | | | | io2
b. Noble Hongroise . . . . . , . 69
c, Garde du corps à pied . . . . . 109
•-•s •s
280
A com-
( 168 )
A complete analysis of this military structure,
with the reflexions to which it might give rise,
would now take up too much room; I shall
therefore briefly remark, that there appears to
be a very scanty proportion of artillery allotted
to the Austrian army, and indeed that the whole
of the scientific establishment is on too con-
fined a scale. The amount of the regular light
infantry also (two battalions) is quite melan-
choly; and the attempt to supply that defect
by a feudal militia on the Turkish frontier, is as
weak as it has proved fatal. The last battle in
Hungary, under the Archduke Jóhn, having
been lost through the misbehaviour of that de-
scription of force, in spite of the regular troops,
whose discipline and bravery were acknow-
ledged. The transformation of the Cröats,
once the finest light troops in the world, into
infantry of the line, is said to have deeply in-
jured the Austrian army; which may be com-
pared to a great body, well supplied with hands—
but often destitute both of head and feet.
ſ FINIS.
London. Printed by C. Roworth,
Bell-yard, Temple-bar.
sºmºmºmºmºmºmº
>
D.
∞º
±w.، • .
。、。・、、 -ſzºrºſº] - '';· •
№-№ºr---№-zrae<aerae;=~№.•*?&gt;
****
، ، ،º
3.№. ！！* **~~~--~
|
|
|
A C#| | (, AN
|
|||
| ||||||
|
§§§§§
§§§§§§
Ë
}}
§§
3.§ſae
§§§§
ſae.
§§§
×

|
|
|
|-
ſ']
* * *-ºs ººº-ººse ºr ex- ºr ºssº