MILITARY TACTICS.
THE art of war may be considered as coeval with the history of the world. The evil passions inherent in hu man nature,—hatred, envy, covetousness, ambition, and revenge, first gave birth to this destructive art, which, however rude in its commencement, has, in the course of time, gradually advanced to the importance and dig nity or a science.
At first, the art was probably limited to the display of individual strength, courage, and address, in wrestling, boxing, and the employment of the most simple offen sive arms. But as civilization advanced, and societies became more extensive, larger bodies of men were em ployed in warlike enterprises; the advantages of a cer tain degree of order and combination soon became ob vious; and experience gradually suggested the use of various instruments, to render more efficient the natural force and activity of the limbs in close conflict, or to an noy the enemy from a distance. The art of war now at tained to that state nearly, in which it is still found among the Asiatic tribes, consisting of a mass of rude principles, which could scarcely yet be honoured with ;he name of science. :Meanwhile, there arose men of great talents and ambition, who, being occupied during the greater part of their lives in warlike enterprizes, brought the art to a greater state of perfection, and made use of it as the instrument of their glory and aggran disement.
Guibert distinguishes five or six great epochs, in which important changes were effected in the princi ples of military tactics. It was among the Asiatic na tions, and particularly among the Persians, that the art appears to have first assumed a systematic form. The Egyptians, attached to the peaceful sciences, made lit tle progress in the military art ; and, excepting under Sesostris, they never were a conquering people. After the death of Cyrus, the military art passed to the Greeks ; and this brave and ingenious people reduced it to systematic principles, and brought it to a great de gree of perfection. Alexander extended it still far ther ; and, in his time, the Macedonian phalanx was esteemed the most perfect order of battle which had ever been invented by military science.
The principal weapon of the Greeks was the spear or pike, which they used with great skill -kncl dexterity.
When in order of battle, the Greeks and Macedonians were frequently drawn up on a depth of sixteen, and even thirty-two men, placed in files, one behind another. This deep and dense order, while it could be perfeeth, preserved, enabled them not only to resist the most vi gorous att4cks of their enemies, but to penetrate and lay open whatever opposed them.
The Romans adopted other arms, and a different mode of fighting. Their favourite weapon was a short cut and-thrust sword, easily manageable in the hand, and admirably adapted to give effect to the courage and acti vity of their soldiers in close conflict. They rejected the dense order of the Greeks, as incompatible with the use of that weapon, and drew up in long full lines of three men in depth, much the same as in our present European armies ; with this difference, that the men were arranged, not in files one behind another, as is now done, but each man in the succeeding rank was placed diagonally, so as to cover the interval between the two men in the rank before them. Besides, the Roman sol dier, in order to have the full play of his short sword and buckler, required a great deal more room in all direc tions than either the Macedonian or modern European soldier. Such were the arms and discipline of the Ro mans, which, seconded by their courage and skill, ena bled them to triumph over the Grecian phalanx, and to maintain for ages the sovereignty of the world.
During the decline of the Roman empire, the science of military tactics was almost entirely neglected, and the empire itself gradually became a prey to those numerous swarms of barbarians the hopes of plunder in vited to its conquest. For a long period the military history of Europe only presents to our view armies with little discipline and less science ; battles gained by num bers, by valour, or by chance ; and conquests equally rapid and destructive. Even the invention of gunpowder, although it necessarily occasioned considerable changes in the mode of fighting, does not appear to have imme diately led to any very important improvements in tactics.