necessity required, he would have collected these companies under the command of the senior captain with the rank of major-commandant, and would have left it to the general to appoint a field officer from the regulars to command each regiment when marched against the enemy. It would," says he, counter argument that his discretion "would induce him to consuli officers of intelligence. He has a power, which ought to be delegated to no- nan, onto "whom such a charge could not, onsistent ~ with the rules of the service, be tommit be lamented that corps were ever registed That there may be heaven orn gèmented, if the high rank which has been 66 granted to unprofessional men was the only bad consequence: so many self-evi"dent evils are connected with this mista "ken indulgence to gratify false pride, that men unacquainted with the secret springs "of goverument must be astonished at the motives which influenced their consent; bur actual warfare being the most serious. "of all human operations, should never be offered as a subject for folly and levity to "play their antics with, and when the con"test is about to be for such an awful stake arrangement, much less expose to injury "the public service.The volunteers as"suredly now prefer to be directed by their "own chieftains; but in the day of battle "will they insist upon these leaders retain. ❝ing the command? When life is upon the die, will they collect votes for their "retention from those who might with great willingness and propriety commit « the constitution to their discretion? But let us not believe that gentlemen would "insist upon high military rank to gratify 66 a vanity which cannot give them any ad"ditional real distinction; that they ever i ken, which in one of so much more im. portance are deemed insignificant. "Six years must an officer serve in the British army before he can obtain the rank "of a field officer, before he is esteemed as qualified (notwithstanding all that time he may have been on actual service) to "undertake the responsibility of the com"mand which attaches to his situation; but "the volunteer at once assumes the rank of "full colonel, by virtue of which high sta<tion be commands nearly every regiment "in the king's service; and if invasion ab*solutely should take place, may find him "nerals among the volunteer officer is pos "sible. In the French revolution there were many proofs that there may b great "officers without a regular initiatio into "the army, but such incidents do not stify so wide a deviation from established rac ❝tice, nor have the officers proved tem"selves so unworthy of fulfilling theirwa "duties. When once high rank wasj. "ven, every nobleman and gentlemanof "equal station in society, required the sa "concession, and thus jealousy became "true lever of the mischief which puts a "thority and responsibility where ther " is no possible experience, and pre "vents the militia and the volunteer "from being commanded by the gentlemei "of the country."--Sir Robert observes that it is extraordinary that a clause in the last bill for regulating the volunteers posi tively directed, that no officer of the army under the rank of a general officer should, in any case, command them. That the bill did and does, so provide is certain enough, but by no means extraordinary, as any one must allow, who has been an observer of the constant aim of the ministry, past and present, to flatter and wheedle the volunteers and militia-officers, and thereby gain them as political partisans. To contemplate the possibility of a volunteer officer, some London broker or barber, perhaps, falling into the command of the wing of an army, on which the fate of the kingdom might depend, and that, too, in a moment of great emergency, in a moment, possibly, when victory and defeat might be nearly balanced, is something so terrible, that one can hardly refrain from the se. verest reproaches against those, who have exposed the country to such a risk, especially when one thinks of the motives, from which alone they appear to have acted. If this system is to be persevered in, even for a few months longer, the author of this inquiry suggests the necessity of some immediate alterations as to cloathing, from which he would abolish all the expensive foppery at present in vogue, all the red, all that tends to make the men look like what they are not. He would reduce them to sober grey, put a round hat upon their heads, give them a pair of overails, and a great coat. He says, and with great truth, that they should have no camp equipage; that it can be of no service, and may be highly derimental. Each volunteer com 66 pany is now allowed a cart to carry bag66 gage. What a Persian array will be "their ine of march! What a fatal indul gene may this not prove!" This must have seen in the press at the very moment that ur friend Sir Brook was haranguing his each-masters, and that Lord Hawkesbur was holding his meetings at the Thatched-house! If Sir Robert calls the vointeering baggage-carts a Persian atray, wft would he have said of the car-project? I served to Sir Brook, that the baggage oan army was a most troublesome and inious appendage; and, it requires not ilitary experience or military study to tove, that the nearer you can come to the point of rendering the soldier self-dependent for all the purposes of moving and of halting, the nearer your army comes to perfection, and the more powerful it must be in proportion to its numbers. After describing, several months ago, the dress that I would have given to the volunteers, I added: "thus equipped a man may pass 66 แ "But if parliament had known that the great proportion of many corps were the "servants and lowest labourers of farmers, "without a shilling of fixed property, or any horse but that which occasionally "<was lent to obtain the exemption from "the horse tax, I must doubt whether the indulgence would have been extended so far; and I am confident that it ought "not to have been, consistent with the "rights of the volunteers. The yeomanry 66 66 system, as at present conducted, costs "the nation an enormous, sum of money, " and will still more, for the officers now "require pay; whereas, if only the real yeomanry of the land had been admitted, no other demand would have been made upon the nation, collectively, than some "allowance for horse appointments and "forage for the horses when on duty.”With the alterations which he proposes, he thinks the yeomanry may be made very useful; but these alterations, which necessarily suppose a reduction of numbers, a breaking down the corps into smaller bodies, and a submission to the command of field officers of the regular army, must take place before even the yeomanry can be regarded as adding much to our national security against the consequences of an invasion. This part of his performance concludes with the following remark and most apt reference to the battle which decided the fate of that famous people, whom the French have chosen for our prototype. "The yeomanry force will be highly use an English winter without fire, and al"most without a house." It would have been Sir Robert Wilson's aim to render the volunteers as little burthensome as possible; as little expensive to themselves and to the public treasure; as little noisy and annoying; instead of which, there really seems to have been some pains taken, and some ingenuity employed, to effect pur-"ful, if conducted ably they must, at poses exactly contrary "The yeo manry," says he, "are susceptible of "the same improvements. Great advantage would result to that service if the corps were, at least, broken into squa drons. At the present moment there is the greatest difficulty in procuring proper efficers; and to complete the required "number for the formation of a regiment, "all descriptions of persons are admitted, 6 without any consideration of the princi"ple of the establishment. The yeomanry "should be men of property associated to"gether for the purpose of preserving in. "ternal tranquillity, and performing those "irregular duties in case of actual service, which would enable the regular cavalry "to direct their whole attention to offen"sive operations against the enemy. "When parliament decreed that the yeo manry should be exempted from the pe ❝nalties of martial law, it presumed, that the yeomanry were men composed of the most respectable class of the nation. 66 "all events render some service to the "country, and this body would not, if "properly formed, be any detriment to more general service: but, as to the "volunteers, the battle of Zama should "be a warning to England. Hannibal "drew up his army in three lines; in front "were placed the mercenaries, in the se"cond the volunteers and national levies, "in the third the veterans and troops on "whom he could depend. The mercena"ries fought bravely, but, being pressed "by numbers required support from the "second line: but the second line began "to run away, which so exasperated the "mercenaries, that they ceased to fight "with the Romans, and turned their arms "upon the fugitive volunteers, slaughter“ing a great many. The gallant exertions "and talents of Hannibal, aided by the "intrepid courage of the veteran army, "could not repair this misfortune; and "Rome thus fulfilled the insulting nienace “ which she had for so many years vaunted." "Has England not her mercenaries (Hanoverians), her volunteers and militia, " and her small corps d'élite, the regular army-the resemblance is painfully accurate!The remaining three heads of inquiry cannot now be analysed; the mention of some detached and important facts must not, however, be delayed. Sir Robert states, that, with all the efforts of government and of individuals, not above 17,000 men have been raised for general service, that is to say, for the regular army. He states, that the military-project bill will not produce, in a year, more than 13,000 men, and in this no one will deny that he has been sufficiently liberal in his allowance, for the bill has produced no men worth speaking of yet. He says that the men raised by the military-project bill, supposing the number to be 13,000 in a year, will not repair the common wear and tear of the army in Europe without a continental war. If the men be thus raised by driblets, England, he observes, can never have a disposable force, for the supply is not equal to the present expenditure. Finally, he says that 30,000 men are wanted to complete the present establishment; that is to say, to fill up the regular regiments already in existence: so that, to say nothing about an augmentation of our army, the men are not now raised fast enough to supply the daily wear and tear, and, of course, the present vacancies cannot, if the present wretched d-system be persevered in, ever be filled up.-At the appearance of statements like this, how quickly the exaggerations and deceptions of the ministers vanish! and ought we not to blush at our folly for having been so deceived? The pompous enumeration, contained in Lord Castlereagh's speech of the 9th of December last (see Parl. Debates, vol. 1. p. 202), indeed, the whole of the speech, has, as I once before stated, been published in French and Italian, and has been distributed abundantly in all the courts of Europe! Gracious heaven have mercy upon the nation that is committed to the rule of such men! Did the ministers think, that, by this paper array, they should gain allies, or that they should frighten Napoleon Buonaparté? There is something at once so cunning and so foolish in the attempt; something so much like the 'cuteness of idiocy, that one hardly knows whether to laugh at, or to pity, the operators. The French know exactly the state of our army. They know what every species of our force is worth. Lord Castlereagh cannot deceive them, if he can deceive us; and, as Sir Robert Wilson observes, they would not, with the consciousness that 500,000 volunteers are enrolled in Great Britain, hesitate one moment to land their army, if the safe passage of the Channel could be secured. "If," says he, "they should land, however, it is to be hoped "that Marshall Turenne's proverb, that "the bon Dieu generally takes the side of "the most numerous battalions,' will prove 66 strue; for a miracle most, indeed, be "worked, if any early success can otherwise prevent a considerable French force from 66 penetrating very far towards the capital, if "that point be their object."The obser vations under the heads, militia, army of reserve, and regulars, are all of great importance, though not of importance so ins mediate as those which relate to the volunteers. An analysis of them shall be submitted to the reader in the succeeding sheet, or sheets, of the Register, as a sequel to the present article, which I shall now proceed to close with a remark or two on that part of the work, which relates to military distinctious, and which I regard as being of the utmost consequence. "Military distine"tions," says he, is a subject more conge"nial to the military character than an inves"tigation of pay, although in the British “service these honourable feelings have not "been much encouraged, nor has this cheap "defence of nations been sufficiently esti "mated. Much has been done to destroy this generous ardour, to direct the atten❝tion of the soldier to more substantial but "not equally satisfactory remunerations. "Distinctions, which were considered as "such, because they were the appendages "of meritorious services, have ceased to re"tain their value since they no longer resti"fy as the positive evidence of any merit. "There are now so many Royal uniforms in the different corps of our heterogenous "army, that to see a regiment without the "blue-facing is a matter of surprise: The "Parliament of England has even been in"duced to bestow the thanks of the nation "for anticipated service, where such an ap“probation should only follow. the most dis "tinguished good conduct. The army has hitherto been disposed to regard the "thanks of the British Senate as a conse. "crated eulogy-as the most gratifying and "highest reward which could be conferred. "But the sanctity of the act has been vio"lated, and the charos much weakened, if "not altogether dissolved."—It will be re rol ected, that, when the "Royal Pimlico Volunteers" were formed, under the comrand of that gallant captain, my Lord Ho bart, having Lords Hawkesbury and Castle. nials of persons in these professions wearing the same marks of distinction as their maters, nor any part of those marks. The uniform coat, &c. is of much less importance than the cockade, which is the peculiar mark of the profession of arms. But, if the lavishing of this mark of distinction upon the menials of officers of the army be injurious to the profession, what must be the effect of extending the abuse to the volunteer system, which includes aboutseventy or eightythousand officers, not a hair-dresser of whom, who is able to keep a ScRus, but will deck him off in a cockade? The effect is, indeed, visible: go where you will, your sight is offended by these party-coloured gentry in cockades; you see them swarming at the corners of streets and aboat Innyards; there is hardly a hat to be seen be hind a carriage without a cockade in it. Afd this frequency of the military atray is what the Cockneys think will make us "a mili "tary people!" It has, as Mr. Windham has so ingeniously and yet so clearly shown, a directly contrary tendency; and, it would be by no means difficult to prove, that it is. to the want of a military spirit; that it is to the reluctance to become a military people; that it is to the propensity to trade and its concomitant indulgences prevailing over every other feeling that we owe the volume teer system. In considering the symptom of the lavishing of rank and distinction, Sir Robert Wilson appears loath to draw the natural inference." The inference," says he," which I am about to draw is certainly "not strictly applicable; but, it is extra"ordinary, that the well-informed proposer " of the vote of thanks to the volunteers "did not remember, that the best historians "have observed, that, as states are declining, "honours are lavish'y distributed. Thus, "when Cicero demanded for Sulpicius, "who died on a journey, the same honours reagh in the ranks as privates, that I put in my protest against this prodigal distribution of the honour of Royal Regiments, I explained the nature of the distinction, and showed how injurious the bestowing of it upon corps that have never seen service, and, of course, can have acquired no claim to it, must be. But, what I have said is of small weight how often, how ably, and how eloquently, has Mr. Windham pointed out the evils of thus destroying the value of all military distinctions and of degrading the military profession! Sir Robert Wilson does, indeed, make honourable mention of the obligations which the country owes to Mr. Windham for his exertions as to the means of our defence, and, certain I am, that, if it be not the fate of this kingdom to be subdued by France, it can be preserved only by the system which Mr. Windham would have adopted, and would still adopt. Had Mr. Windham been, for the last two years, in a situation to direct in the formation of the army, I have not the least doubt, that we should, at this time, have had 40,000 men to spare for any foreign enterprize that might have offered, while our home defence would have been such that we might indeed have laid down our heads to rest." How different would our situation have been from what it now is ! We might, then, have, in reality, out-threatened the threatener." Forty thousand men, ready to embark from England at a day's notice, would have prevented Napoleon from becoming an Emperor. But, we are now in the hands of stock-jobbers and quibbling lawyers. Mr. Pitt's triumph over his political opponents, and not England's triumph over her enemies; Mr. Pitt's place at the Treasury and in the cabinet, and not England's place in the world, appears to be the primary object of all the measures of government, and of all the sacrifices which we are called upon to make. To return to the subject of military distinction: there is one way, in which the lavishing of military honours, rauk, and clothing degrades the profession tering condition of the commonwealth." of a soldier, which no one that I know of The case is not, indeed, exactly in point, has yet dwelt upon: I allude to the wear- because the Roman honours were lavished ing of cockades by menial servants. The on an ambassador; but, that circumstance cockade is the ancient, the standing, the does by no means obstruct the course of the invariable symbol of the military profession; principle, which goes on directly to the fair and, it appears to me, that the fashion of giv-and unavoidable inference, that, as to those ing cockades to the menials of officers of the army, must have been introduced by person's who did not entertain too high a veneration for the name of soldier. What other profession is thus lavish of its emblems of distinction? The Law, the Priesthood, the Magistracy? No you find none of the me as were decreed for those ambassadora "who were killed at their post, it was re "garded as a certain indication of the tot qualities by which a nation maintains its independence, Great Britain is upon site decline, and has already gone so far, as to be in a tottering condition; an inference the truth of which, if it wanted any confirmation, would certainly need no other than that which is so abundantly afforded by the shameless boastings that fill our pub. lic prints, and that are uttered upon the boards of our theatres to applauding aus diences. The peculiar characteristic of Englishmen has always been modesty, modesty bordering upon sheepishness. The French call it mauvaise boute. For this sin we no longer deserve reproach, as every one must be convinced who has had the mortification to read, to hear of, those acts of heroism, which our volunteers are daily performing, and the relations of which are so disgustingly vain-glorioas, so intolerably base in their flattery, that it is impossible that they could be committed to the press in any country not very far gone in degradation. It will be said, perhaps, that we must not judge of the mind of a nation from the effusions of the minds of editors of newspapers and writers of plays; but, without stopping to show that the same base propensity predominates in books and pamphlets, of almost every description, to say nothing of certain speeches that one might easily refer to; without stopping for this, we may be assured, that, whether we regard the public prints and the theatre as exhibiting a picture of the national mind, foreign nations will so regard them. And, indeed, so they ought to be, and so they must be regarded; for editors and play writers studiously consult the mind of the public, and, generally speaking, according to the state and taste of that mind they fashion their performances. What a dis graceful picture do we, then, exhibit to Europe; to all those nations who formerly envied our exalted state! Penned up here, as we are, with the spade ready to cut down our dykes and the torch ready to set fire to our beacons; living here as we do in constant alarm and agitation; regulating our sales and purchases and almost our lodging and our diet by the variation in our hopes and our fears relative to the power and the threats of the enemy; thus situated, the slaves of our own selfishness, the pity of friends, and the sport and scorn of our enemies, we have still the strange perverseness to be the greatest boas ers that the world ever saw: The toast at the London Tavern, together with the subsequent apprehensions and alarms of the gentleman, who then wished for "a speedy meeting with Buona"parté on our own shores," affords a complete specimen of what we are capable of in this way; and, upon this occasion, it is impossible not to recollect, that, at the very time when the toast was given, the partisans of the toaster were insidiously compliment ing Mr. Windham upon his chivalrous "nature and his contempt of discretion!" The effect of such insinuation has, as was foretold, been done away by the events of the times: the nation has now seen too many of Mr. Windham's predictions fulfilled, even to the letter; they have now, in many ways, felt the consequences of his advice being rejected, and in none more sensibly than in the expenses and dangers they have incurred from the rejection of his counsel as to the formation of an army, as to which point, according to Sir Robert Wilson's statement, nine tenths of the military officers are de cidedly with Mr. Windham.-The importance of the subject is the only apology that can be offered for the length of this article, in which I have only to hope, that the tediousness of the comment may not impair the force and diminish the utility of the This topie text. REVIVAL OF JACOBINISM. has been again forced upon me by the language of the ministerial prints, in which it is insinuated, that SIR ROBERT WILSON is a jacobin, or, at least, acting, according to their jargon, jacobinically; and, one of them has not scrupled gently to hint at the propriety of dismissing Sir Robert from the King's service! Here, then, we have a complete exposition of their doctrine, Every one who dares to open his lips against the system of the minister, or, indeed, against any of his measures, is a jacobin. This is really too grossly absurd as well as impudent, to merit any thing so serious as indig nation. Not so, however, the hint for dismissing Sir Robert Wilson from the service! It will be said, and truly, that this hint has proceeded from some newspaper proprietor; but, it must not be forgotten, that the persons of that description who are connected with the Treasury, never even hint at any thing which they are not pretty certain will be quite agreeable in that quarter,-As being somewhat connected with this subject, I think it proper to say here a few words relative to a publication, consisting of Extracts from the Register, which has just appeared, and which I understand to have been published by the Middlesex friends of Sir Francis Burdett. It contains the whole of the article from p 331 to p. 351, of the present volume; the passage from the top of p. 376 0 the end of page 384; and the whole of the article from p. 412 to the end of p. 416. Let any man read those articles, and then say, if he can, that he believes the persons, by whom they have been circulated, to be jacobins; nay, I appeal to any candid man, whether persons so acting can possibly entertain notions, and |