y sciences; there are regularly kept
up small bodies of infantry and cavalry, weak in numbers, but capable of
soon making good soldiers of a population so well versed as ours is in
the use of the musket and the horse; an artillery force, proportionally
much larger, is also regularly maintained, with a sufficient number of
men and officers to organize and make good artillery-men of citizens
already partially acquainted with the use of the cannon. But an
acquaintance with infantry, cavalry, and artillery duties is not the
only practical knowledge requisite in war. In the practical operations
of an army in the field, rivers are to be crossed, bridges suddenly
erected and suddenly destroyed, fieldworks constructed and defended,
batteries captured and destroyed; fortifications are to be put in order
and defended, or to be besieged and recaptured; trenches must be opened,
mines sprung, batteries established, breaches made and stormed;
trous-de-loup, abattis, palisades, gabions, fascines, and numerous other
military implements and machinery are to be constructed. Have our
citizens a knowledge of these things, or have we provided in our
military establishment for a body of men instructed and practised in
this branch of the military art, and capable of imparting to an army the
necessary efficiency for this service? Unfortunately this question must
be answered in the negative; and it is greatly to be feared that the
future historian will have to say of us, as Napier has said of the
English:--"_The best officers and soldiers were obliged to sacrifice
themselves in a lamentable manner, to compensate for the negligence and
incapacity of a government always ready to plunge the nation into a war,
without the slightest care of what was necessary to obtain success.
Their sieges were a succession of butcheries; because the commonest
materials, and the means necessary to their art, were denied the
engineers_."[43]

[Footnote 43: The subjects discussed in this chapter are also treated by
most authors on Military Organization and Military History, and by the
several writers on Military Engineering. Allent, Vauban, Cormontaigne,
Rocquancourt, Pasley, Douglas, Jones, Belmas, Napier, Gay de Vernon, may
be referred to with advantage. Pasley, Douglas, Jones, and Napier, speak
in the strongest terms of the importance of engineer troops in the
active operations of a war, and of the absolute necessity of organizing
this force in time of peace. A li