"Hard pummelling," said the Duke of Wellington to the Guards at Waterloo, "Hard pummelling, Gentlemen! Well, we must just see who'll pummel the hardest."  
During the reign of Brown Bess the great battles of Europe were decided very much in the manner above described.
 
Two armies met on a battle-field, or two fleets on "the wide, rude sea," as in England two prize-fighters have entered a small space encircled by ropes, to "see who'll pummel the hardest." In all three cases, endurance, 207indomitable courage, and physical strength sooner or later conquered.
 
As, however, in mechanics, a timid, puny boy, with the assistance of a pulley, could drag towards him Mars or Hercules, so must the new arms of precision lately invented, give victory, not to the bravest or the strongest, but to whichever of two combatant armies shall exercise their deadly weapons with the greatest amount of science.
 
And, as fortification has justly been defined "the art of enabling a small body of men to resist for a considerable time the attack of a greater number," so will, in future, the science of war consist in the art of concealing by every possible artifice the general commanding, his staff, his artillery, cavalry, and infantry, from the fire of rifled cannon and Minié muskets, of which, when properly directed, it may be said that almost "every bullet will have its billet."
 
On this principle, if England were to be invaded, it would be the endeavour and the duty of the general on whose intellectual powers the destiny of the empire would hang, to direct his army to take against their enemy (after, in spite of his utmost efforts, they had effected a landing), not, as in by-gone days, "the field," but rather possession of the banks, hedges, and ditches thereof; to make every great mansion, building, or village, by loop-holing their walls, a Hougoumont; every railway embankment 208a covert-way and parapet; every hollow road a protector or ambuscade for cavalry or infantry; the scarped summit of every hill a battery; in short, by avoiding exposure, and by every means that ingenuity can devise, to make the invaders, during every step of their advance, smart under a lash, and fall from blows, administered by a nimble, intellectual army which they feel, which they are literally dying to see, but which is skilfully continuing, out of their reach, to decimate their ranks, in order that when the great battle is given, the invading army—though infinitely superior when it disembarked—shall be reduced to a force inferior in number to that of the stern, steady, stalwart defenders of their native soil.
 
It is evident, however, that to carry on war on the above principle, it will be necessary that cavalry, in their equipment as well as drill, should undergo a complete revolution, with a view to enable them in future, in addition to the use of their sabres, to help artillery with their lassos,—act as mounted infantry,—in short, make themselves generally useful; for, at present, they form on a field of battle so large a target, that under existing circumstances they would have, either out of harm's way to sit on their horses all day long waiting for an opportunity not likely to occur, or be destroyed by rifled guns and muskets before their services could be required: in fact,209 as it would be impossible for them to charge men in squares, or even in position armed with muskets of unerring aim, they could be of little use until after the battle was won, by following up the enemy in their retreat.
 
Now, instead of being the dearest and the most useless, they would become the cheapest and most efficient branch of the army, if, besides occasionally using their lassos to help our Armstrong guns, &c., they had power to skim along hollow roads, &c., to the vicinity of the summit of a hill or any other position, from which, half or wholly hidden, they could, with short Minié rifles, direct a deadly fire upon an overwhelming amount of advancing troops, from whom they could gallop away—only to re-attack them—the instant it became prudent to do so.
 
But to enable cavalry or volunteer mounted yeomanry to act in this manner, how, it will be asked, could they manage to leave their horses?
 
To this important question we will reply, not by any theoretical project, but by a statement of facts, which, though generally unknown in England, have for many generations been in constant practice in other parts of the world.
 
1. Throughout Russia, the Cossacks,—whenever for any reason, small or large, they have wished to leave one horse, or a regiment of horses, to stand alone, to ruminate210 either in the snow or on a verdant plain—have, for ages, been in the habit of, as it were, riveting them to the ground, by tying together their two fore fetlocks by a pair of hobbles, to the centre of which is affixed a narrow strap that buckles over the hock of one hind leg. By this triangular apparatus (weighing less than one pound), which out of four legs leaves only one at liberty, the animal physically and morally is completely paralysed; indeed he is not only unable to move away, but after his first fall is afraid again to try to do so.
 
2. In South Africa, farmers and sportsmen of all descriptions have long been in the habit of what they term "anchoring" their horses by a lump of lead, from three to five pounds in weight, carried in a small pocket buckled to the outside of their near or left holster.
 
To this "anchor" is attached a piece of cord about ten feet long, which, passing and running freely through both rings of the curb bit, and hanging from them like a loose rein, is fastened to a =D= or ring on the off-side of th............