tuation, alone prevented the appearance of fifty-four ships of the line in the Channel, and the landing within a week of Napoleon, at the head of 130,000 men, on the shores of Sussex. We had then 120,000 regular troops, 180,000 admirable militia, with 200 guns ready for the field in the British islands, besides 300,000 volunteers. With such means of defence the final issue of the contest at that time could not be considered as doubtful, with whatever damage, loss, and anxiety, it would unquestionably have been attended in the mean time. But what could be expected if the French, by the adoption of a similar plan for decoying our fleets away, or from having their naval forces better in hand and more ready, effected a landing with a similar force, or even one of half its amount, at this time, and we, without denuding our naval depôts, could not muster 10,000 men to oppose them, and preserve London from capture, and Woolwich, with the stores of an empire, from devastation?

Everything in such an emergency would depend, not upon the amount of force ultimately and in a prolonged contest at the disposal of either of the contending powers, but on the amount which either could immediately bring to bear upon the point of attack. Now, in this respect, there cannot be a doubt that the French, though inferior upon the whole in naval resources, would at first be greatly and to a most alarming degree our superiors. It is the maritime conscription which secures to them this great advantage; and till we have some corresponding maritime reserve force, of somewhat equal amount, to fall back upon in the event of a war suddenly breaking out with France, we never can be considered as in any degree secure from invasion. Louis Napoleon has 54,000 men on the coast of France enrolled in maritime corps, trained to gunnery and naval war, inured to the sea, and capable of being assembled in twenty-four hours, by orders sent down from Paris, at their different rallying points, from Bayonne to Dunkirk. What force have we, ready and at hand, to meet the ten or twelve sail of the line, twice as many war-steamers, and seventy ordinary steamers which

VOL. LXXII.-NO. CCCCXLI.

would be pressed into the service to transport troops from France into this country? Four or five guardships half-manned, and twice or thrice as many war-steamers, that could be immediately fitted out! How could they instantly withstand forces three times as great, which France at the moment could array against us? And if they got the command of the Channel by this sudden start for one week, what would avail us our fifty sail of the line lying unmanned in ordinary, our noble Mediterranean squadron, our 280,000 sable warriors in Hindostan, our magnificent colonial settlements which encircle the globe? 150,000 admirably disciplined troopswould be landed on our shores, London taken, Woolwich captured, our credit ruined, the Queen and Government flying into Scotland, and the nation in unutterable consternation-in sackcloth and ashes lamenting its former supineness, and, it would almost seem, judicial blindness. But it would all be in vain : the thing has been done, and cannot be undone; our empire has been taken from us, and given to another people.

If 30,000 or 40,000 French only, with seventy guns, were to be landed to-morrow on the coast of Sussex, it may be asserted, without the fear of contradiction, by any man capable of judging on the subject, that they might within a few days reach London, with or without a battle, and become masters of the seat of government, our treasuries and arsenals. Our generals, how determined and able soever, our soldiers, however resolute and patriotic, would be constrained to abandon the capital, as Kutusoff did Moscow, to preserve the nucleus of an army wherewith to contend, by the aid of the country, with the enemy in the interior. The Duke of Wellington and Lord Hardinge-the victors of Waterloo and Ferozeshah-the men whom nothing can daunt, would be forced to do this to save the empirefrom subjugation. The victors of Cressy and Azincour, those of Talavera and Vitoria if still alive, would be constrained, weeping and gnashing their teeth, to obey the terrible orders. Inferiority of force, produced by former blindness and the sway of pacific: ideas, would compel the grievous

R

alternative. And let any man, and most of all the members of the Peace Congress, figure to themselves the state of the country, with London taken, the Thames blockaded, Portsmouth besieged, Woolwich plundered, the Bank pillaged, the Queen and Government taken to flight, and a war contribution of £20,000,000 laid and levied by the threat of military execution on the metropolis!

What then is to be done in this emergency, exposed to this frightful danger, and with these slender and wholly inadequate means to ward it off? France has troops enough on her seaboard, or within twelve hours' transport of it, to embark 100,000 men. She has steam vessels in plenty to bring them over: one single night would suffice for the passage-a day for disembarkation. At Boulogne, in 1805, Marshal Ney repeatedly embarked his corps of 25,000 men, with all their horses and artillery, in ten minutes and a-half." Our navy, on its present reduced Peace Establishment, cannot be relied on to prevent the enemy eluding their vigilance, or to resist them, in the first instance at least, (and there is no second instance here,) with success if their approach is descried. The risk of the most dreadful loss and suffering, in such an event, is certain: ultimate ruin to the empire, in the most favourable view for us, by no means improbable. What then is to be done to avert a calamity so dreadful, and menacing, not only incalculable loss, if not total destruction, to the British empire, but irreparable injury to the interests of humanity in every part of the globe?

No man of sense, or even in his senses, can make but one reply: A large addition to our armed force, capable of being brought immediately into action, both by sea and land, is the one thing needful. Without this all our resources, how great soever, are useless, or worse than useless, for they only invite seizure without giving us the means of averting it. Doubt less, if Parliament could be prevailed on to vote the necessary supplies, and we could get money enough to raise

fifteen sail of the line and thirty warsteamers, perfectly manned, sailing in the Channel, and an army of 60,000 regular troops, and 140,000 regular militia, ready in the south of England to march to any point which might be seriously menaced, this would be by far the most effectual way of providing for our safety. And if Mr Cobden and the Peace Congress can persuade their friends in Parliament to adopt these really efficient means to prevent the flames of war breaking out, we have no doubt the Duke of Northumberland, the Duke of Wellington, and Lord Hardinge, will be too happy to adopt their plans, and abandon their own designs now and for ever. But if this is impossible, and if it is notorious that a majority in Parliament cannot be prevailed on by any consideration, however urgent, or any danger, however pressing, to vote an addition of more than £400,000, or £500,000 for additions to our national defences— and since, despite all our boasted riches derived from Free Trade, we are constantly told that more cannot be afforded by 28,000,000 of British subjects, though during the war 18,000,000 provided funds for the army and navy to three times the amount now annually voted-the only question that remains is, What is next best? We do not hesitate to say, in answer to this all-important question, that the next best is the Militia Bill which Government, on the advice of the Duke of Wellington and Lord Hardinge, have brought forward; and that, unless the constituencies return such a Parliament as will enable them to carry that measure into full operation, our days as a people are numbered, and our empire is given over to the Medes and Persians.

Much is said by persons unacquainted with military matters, (but very little by such as are,) of the nation rising up en masse to crush an invader, if he should audaciously appear amongst us; and of the needlessness, in consequence, of making any preparations, or being at any expense in the mean time. We will answer this idea of the nation rising en masse

and crushing the invader if unprepared. They would rise up and most of them run away. They would do so, though possessing each individually the courage of Wellington or Hardinge, simply from being unacquainted with fighting, and destitute of the confidence which conscious skill and training in that art can alone confer. A few of the bravest would stand and be shot or cut down-the immense majority would seek to save themselves by flight. The first round of cannister, the first biting fire of Tirailleurs, the first thundering charge of horse, would send them, with the exception of a few gallant men, to the right about. It is no imputation on the courage of our countrymen to say they would, while unskilled, do this: all mankind in similar circumstances would do the same. The Romans of the Tenth Legion, the Old Guard of Napoleon, when undisciplined, would have acted in exactly the same manner. Self-confidence is the foundation of resolution in every crisis, civil or military, and it can only be acquired by conscious skill and prowess. Look how a mob of men, especially Englishmen, individually brave, stand the onset of a handful of disciplined soldiers.

Sharpshooters or riflemen trained to the use of the Minié rifle, and practised in firing at the target, would be much more efficient than any levée en masse, and, as auxiliaries of regular troops, might be of considerable service; but it requires no serious argument to show that it is as auxiliaries only they could be trusted to; they never could be trusted to stand the shock of regular troops in the field. In truth, although, if accumulated in sufficient numbers, they would, in a protracted campaign, prove a great impediment to the movements of an invading army, and might inflict a considerable loss upon him in desultory skirmishes; yet to withstand a sudden forced march from the coast to London, which is the thing to be dreaded, they would be of little real service. Suppose ten or fifteen thousand of them could be assembled by beat of drum in the metropolis and counties immediately adjoining, to aid in repelling the invader, they would be immediately encountered by an equal number of the French

Tirailleurs or Chasseurs de Vincennes, as individually brave, armed with as good rifles, at least as good marksmen, aud far more experienced in their military duties. Supposing that our rifle clubs neutralised, by their fire, that of an equal number of French light troops-and that is surely the most favourable view to take of the case-what would remain to stop the advance of the main army of 80,000 men and 120 guns, which would advance under cover of the cloud of sharpshooters who preceded its columns ? Nothing could do so but regular troops, nearly as numerous and as well disciplined as themselves.

There is no doubt that the militia whom the bill of Lord Derby proposes to embody would be very different from regular soldiers, and could by no means be relied on to move under fire, or in presence of the enemy in the field. But the great advantage with which their organisation would be attended, would be that they might, like the Prussian Landwehr, be intrusted with the garrison duty with the aid of a few regulars, and thus liberate the troops of the line now absorbed in that service. Three good artillerymen, with five militia moderately instructed in their duties, could work each gun. Twenty-five thousand men would be liberated from the fortresses by the marching an equal number of militia into them. FOR

THE COST OF FIVE THOUSAND REGULAR SOLDIERS WE WOULD ADD

THIRTY THOUSAND TO OUR EFFECTIVE FORCE. This is an immense, in fact an incalculable, advantage. It would raise the force available to cover London at once from ten thousand to forty thousand men;-a small force indeed to be turned out by so great an empire to defend its existence, its glory, its wealth, its possessions, but still as much as in the present supine and infatuated state of the public mind it is possible to get Parliament to agree to. Certain it is, that in no other way than this bill proposes would it be possible, at so little a cost, to produce so great an addition to our effective force.

There is no soldier will doubt that he would rather, in the field, have fifty thousand men who had been

drilled for ninety days, than eighty thousand who had been drilled for fifty; but that does not solve the question. The point is not which is most serviceable in the field and for the duties of a campaign, but, which is most likely to render the whole regular force in the country available against the enemy. The larger number is indispensable for this. Eighty thousand men would be little enough to garrison the fortresses, keep quiet the manufacturing towns, guard the railway posts, keep up the communications, and restrain rebellion in Ireland. If, by discharging those various most important duties, they could enable nearly the whole of our regular force to be advanced to the front to meet the enemy, the country might be saved, even if sixty or seventy thousand invaders were landed on our shores. But as, at least, the whole of the eighty thousand would be required in such an event, for the duties of the fortresses or interior, any lesser force, though better disciplined, would compel the deduction of a large part of the regular army, and therefore more than neutralise all the service it could render. Every military man, every man even moderately acquainted with military affairs, knows that if forty thousand regular troops are to be assembled to meet the enemy in the field, in defence of a country, at least double that number must be stationed in garrisons or left behind to guard depôts, protect convoys, and keep up communications. Napoleon invaded Russia with five hundred thousand men, but he never had more than a hundred and thirty thousand men in any one field; and out of two hundred and forty thousand effective men who composed the military force of Louis XIV., he never was able to draw together above eighty thousand in the field to make head against the armies of Eugene and Marlborough, who, on their side, were equally weakened by the necessary garrisoning of fortresses and detachments to their

rear.

We cannot conclude without quoting the following admirable and just observations from a most able and experienced military officer, whose father taught British seamen the breaking of the line in Rodney's

battle in 1784, and who himself has done so much to instruct his country and all Europe in gunnery.

"What has been said above," says Sir Howard Douglas, "relates only to the protection afforded by the naval forces of Great Britain; to which alone, and irrespective of the internal defence and secubeen confined. The author is, however, rity of the empire, the present work has fully aware that it would be unsafe to rely solely on either the naval or the military resources of the country for the preservation of her independence, in the event of her being threatened with foreign invasion, and that it can only be by means of both that we can, in all times and under all circumstances, maintain our position as a first-rate European power.

"It would be out of place, in a work relating essentially to gunnery, to enter at large on the consideration of the insufficiency of the military force of the nation, and the want of fortified positions, by which the progress of an invading army might be arrested, or even retarded. This may be a matter for future discussion. But the author is induced to touch incidentally upon this important subject by the perusal of a remarkable pamphlet which has just appeared, entitled 'De la Défense Nationale en Angleterre,' by Baron Maurice (Paris, 1851 ;) in which that writer (an officer of Engineers in the service of the Swiss Confederation,) after making an enumeration of the naval and military strength of Great Britain, and comparing the artillery of this country with that of France (pp. 58-60,) estimates briefly the chances of success for France in an invasion of England, (p. 68, &c.,) and gives a project for putting the invasion in execution;-disclaiming at the same time any intention of predicting a fatal issue for this country, for which he professes the highest esteem.

"Describing the fundamental principles on which the defence of a country depends,

M. Maurice states, (page 115, &c.,) that if the country attacked be like France or England, one whose existence depends on the security of its capital, it is important that this metropolis should be protected at least from a coup-de-main after the loss of a battle; and he repeats the following observations by Napoleon in vol. ix. of his Memoirs :- If, in 1805, Vienna had been fortified, the battle of Ulm would not have decided the issue of the war;

the corps commanded by Kutusoff would, at Vienna, have waited for the other corps of the Russian army, which were then at Olmutz, and for the army of Prince Charles, which was advancing out of Italy.

If Berlin had been fortified in 1806, the army, which was defeated at Jena, would have rallied there, and the Russian army would have joined it. If, in 1808, Madrid had been a fortified place, the French army, after the victories of Espinosa, Tudela, Burgos, and Sommosierra, would not have marched upon that capital, leaving in its rear Salamanca and Valladolid, the English army of Sir John Moore, and the Spanish army of Romana: and these Anglo-Spanish armies might, under the fortifications of Madrid, have united themselves to the armies of Aragon and Valencia;'-and the author might have added what had been the fate of Lisbon as well as Madrid, and what, consequently, the issue of that righteous and retributive war in the Peninsula, independence of the nations in that part of the world, had not the Great Duke ordered the construction of the lines of Torres Vedras. Lastly, if Paris, in 1814 and 1815, had been fortified, so as to have been capable of holding out but one week, what an influence would it not have had on the destiny of Europe! And what is now the state of the French metropolis in that respect ?

which Great Britain undertook for the

"In conclusion, M. Maurice tells the world that England has reason to place confidence in her good fortune, and in the maritime supremacy which a long struggle has given her; but that it would be wise in her to consider that she is not invulnerable. Steam-navigation, railroads, and the electrical telegraph, he continues, have powerfully increased her defensive resources; but at the same time they increase the means of attacking her, and prepare the way that leads to her shores. England, trusting to the prospect of a

long peace, has enormously extended her commercial enterprises; but thirty-five years of peace have passed, and if a war should suddenly break out, is she prepared to meet it? Such, he adds, is the thought which has presented itself to the minds of some of the most eminent men of Great Britain."-(P. 138.)

It is often asked in Parliament, how it happens that, with the large sums annually voted in Parliament for the army, we have so few efficient men to produce; and how does it happen that, while a French soldier costs £38 per annum, an English one costs, taking everything into view, £82? We answer in one word, because we are twice as rich as they, and therefore money will only go half as far.

Long ages of peace and pro

sperity - the last interrupted only within these few years-have inured the English to so much comfort, and such good living, that no one could be got to enter the army who was put on the Continental pay and fare. A out of which he is obliged to furnish Cossack gets Ss. 6d. a-year of pay, himself with white-starched neckcloths. A French soldier's pay is under 5d. a-day, and, after deducting what is stopped off for rations, &c., he has somewhat about d. a-day to enjoy himself! What a temptation to such brave disciplined starving men, London with its £20,000,000 in the bank in solid gold! When Free Trade has made us as poor as the French, and money, in consequence, goes as far, we shall be able to raise our armies as cheaply, because our people will be reduced like them to the lowest point consistent with existence; but we cannot hope for a similar reduction till it has worked that melancholy change upon our people.

Let it not be supposed that there is any danger, in stating the facts we have now brought forward in regard to our unprepared state, of making the French acquainted with them. They know them perfectly already, as well as any of our officers at the Horse Guards or Ordnance Office. There is not a gun mounted, nor a battery traced out, nor a ditch cleared, nor a glacis levelled at Portsmouth, Plymouth, or Sheerness, that information is not immediately forwarded to Paris by French officers or agents on the spot. The only people who are ignorant of, or rather, though aware, insensible to them, are Mr Cobden and the Manchester school of politicians. They are so infatuated with the belief of universal peace that nothing will open their eyes till London is taken, or Plymouth in flames. Our real danger is not in Paris, but in Manchester; it is not the strength of our neighbours, but our delusive idea of security, which is our real danger. The nation has within itself ample means of averting all danger, if it would only make use of them; if it is ruined, it will not be from its want of strength, but from its want of foresight.

To conclude, let the people of England reflect, and reflect deeply, on