Baldwyn Leighton

“ I cannot do that with middle-class men, who will lose nothing among their equals whether they fail or not. My officers shall give me a material guarantee in pledge, their honour,—that to them shall be more than their life." Thus spoke Frederick the Great; and in effect this is so provided by the Prussian system, which maintains such aristocracy by a process of selection to a regiment not very dissimilar to our election to a club, and also by other means. ”

“ A crass, selfish, and timorous Plutocracy, destitute of convictions or politics, incapable of greatness or of government, and careless of national honour that costs money, has so usurped the position and the power of the old Aristocracy,—has so fooled with "liberal sentiments" and Cant the new Democracy, that we have now come to this;—nothing but this—Anarchy plus Bobus!—or in case of actual invasion, it may be—Anarchy minus Bobus! ”

“ Such being the case, amid much doubt and uncertainty, caused by a revolution in the art of war, a strong and otherwise intelligent Government, having the bugbear of Bobus greatly before their eyes, conceives the idea that, if it could but abolish a system which has never yet failed us in war, and which somehow (rudely enough maybe) provides a sort of aristocracy for the officering of our army, every thing will settle itself without further trouble or organization. ”

“ There are others: but if these, or some of these, were closeted together, they might, perhaps within a week or less, set forth the general outlines of a plan which, at a comparatively small cost, as in Prussia, should practically make this country secure, and render us no longer a laughing stock and a prey to foreigners. If you wanted to build a house, you would not go to a sausage-maker for plans; if you required to construct a railway, you would not apply to a merchant-tailor; and if you want a system of national defence, you shouldn't ask Bobus. ”

“ In view of the possible destruction of our fleet and disaster to our army, a complete plan of earthwork defence must be surveyed and prepared, behind which an army might stand for six weeks, or as long as it would be required to prepare a second fleet and another army. The possible defence of every large harbour by torpedo or otherwise must be organized, and some three or four great earthwork strongholds made, or prepared to be made, at such points as shall be decided on, such as round the capital and round our chief arsenals. ”

“ There is a general whom we have lately delighted to honour, who is said to have studied the Prussian system on the spot, and to regard with some contempt our amateur organizations. There is yet another commander, a man of singular modesty, for whom lately scarce any press epithet was too severe, because at a certain mixed review of Volunteers and Regulars he dared to say that Volunteers so organized would be of hardly any appreciable use in actual warfare. ”

“ If, taking as many men as would volunteer from the militia (and raising the rest, if required) 50,000 or 100,000 men were permanently embodied for one year at a time, we should in two or four years respectively have passed 200,000 through the military mill. The 100,000 a year would be preferable if it did not too much disturb the labour market. By enlisting these men to serve with the colours one year and to be liable for five or ten years as first and second reserve, to be called out in case of war ”

“ He said, "There are or may be occasions in the life of every officer, when the slightest wavering may cost me the destruction of an army:—I will so make it that in addition to the loss of official rank and advancement, every officer that so fails me shall lose honour and social caste. ”

“ There is a man who once made Ireland safe by a system of military organization, and persuaded thereby sundry Fenian scarecrows, and American officers who had seen strategy, that invasion or rising would be madness. ”

“ Any one conversant with human nature and the lower orders, any one who has studied practically the annals of vagrancy and crime, must be aware that to a vast number of young men between the ages of seventeen and twenty, a spirit of independence, unsettlement, roving, vagrancy, call it what you will, comes almost irresistibly. ”

“ Tracy, and again and again approved by Committees and Commissions, the army might in time become a vast national university or training school, where every man would be compelled to learn not only reading and writing, but Industrial work, which is of even more necessity. ”

“ Population, including India, the largest civilised empire in the world; and it has yet to be shown that Indian levies, led by British officers, could not stand in line with British troops.
Natural School of Military Practice.—A vast territory, thousands of miles away, held by the sword, and by British troops. ”

“ In addition to this there must be a reserve of older trained men, say from twenty-five to thirty-five years old, capable of filling up casualties, or, in the event of some huge disaster, of presenting the same numerical front to an enemy. ”

“ For this purpose every Command-district must be embodied at least once a year for a week or a fortnight, and everything so practised as though the enemy were in the country. Every third year at least the Command-districts should be combined into armies of 80,000 or 100,000 men, and manoeuvred and practised accordingly against each other. ”

“ The report might go further to describe how the expenses and the levying of the men might be made practicable and easy: tolerable to the taxpayer, attractive to the men, and advantageous to the whole community. ”

“ The earthworks that might have to be immediately constructed would furnish work for the recruits, as well as for those not enlisted, and If payment were made for work and employment encouraged throughout the army, as has been urged repeatedly in the House of Commons by Mr. ”

“ Their dress should be made more practical, and their equipment more complete; this also applies to the regular cavalry. They should all be able to move at the rate of forty miles a day, without baggage, on occasion, if required. ”