to the necessary preparations for carrying the plan of the campaign, and the operations resolved on by the general-inchief, into effect. In a battle they were only employed in directing movements, and superintending their execution. But in the late European wars the officers of the staff were frequently entrusted with the command of a column of attack, or of large detachments, when the general-in-chief feared to disclose the secret of his plans by the transmission of orders or instructions. Great advantages have resulted from this innovation, although it was long resisted. By this means the staff have been enabled to perfect their theory by practice; and they have acquired, moreover, the esteem of the soldiers and junior officers of the line, who are easily led to think lightly of their superiors, whom they do not see fighting in the ranks. The generals who have held the arduous situation of chief of the staff during the wars of the French revolution, have almost always been employed in the different branches of the profession. Marshal Berthier, who filled so conspicuously this appointment to Napoleon, was distinguished by all the essentials of a general; he possessed calm, and at the same time brilliant courage, excellent judgment, and approved experience. He bore arms during half a century, made war in the four quarters of the globe, opened and terminated thirty-two campaigns. In his youth he acquired, under the eye of his father, who was an engineer officer, the talent of tracing plans and finishing them with exactness, as well as the preliminary qualifications necessary to form a staff officer. Admitted by the Prince de Lambesq into his regiment of dragoons, he was taught the skilful management of his horse and his sword, accomplishments so important to a soldier. Attached afterwards to the staff of Count Rochambeau, he made his first campaign in the United States, where he soon began to distinguish himself by his valour, activity and talents. His subsequent history is connected with the wars of Napoleon.

LXX.

Napoleon says, Gustavus Adolphus, Turenne, and Frederick, as well as Alexander, Hannibal and Cæsar, have all

acted upon the same principles. These have been, to keep their forces united-to leave no weak part unprotected-to seize with rapidity on important points. He then advises his generals to peruse again and again the campaigns of Alexander, Hannibal, Cæsar, Gustavus Adolphus, Turenne, Eugene and Frederick: to model themselves upon them as the means of becoming a great captain, and of acquiring the secret of the art of war.

LXXI.

Such are the war maxims which have resulted from the experience of the great warriors of ancient and modern times in the old world.

The maxims of our warriors will be given practically hereafter, when it will be seen that our fundamental maxim is to give a sound beating to any nation that sets a hostile foot on our shores, or insults our flag on the sea, according to circumstances!-Illustrations. Revolution, the late War, &c.

Principles of Dispositions at the Battle of Waterloo.

The battle of Waterloo, unquestionably the most decisive event of the late awful contest, offers so many instructive circumstances, and so much matter for deep meditation, in the position and manœuvres, and in the exhibition of the soundest maxims of war, that it may be considered as a general illustration of the advanced state of the art of war at the present period. Without entering into details, the minutia of which are apt to confuse, we shall content ourselves with merely pointing out the principal dispositive features which it displays. As there are many plans more or less correct, and the ground is generally known, the remarks which we are about to offer will be readily understood by those who have any elementary knowledge of war. When Blucher had retreated from Ligny, and the Duke of Wellington had fallen back from Quatre Bras, he occupied the position of Mont St. Jean, determined to risk a battle with the forces he could collect on that point. Exclusively of the Prussians, whose severe loss in killed, wounded, and stragglers, could not immediately be re-organized or replaced, but by the expected

arrival of the corps of Bulow, the duke's army consisted of about eighty-one battalions and eighty-seven squadrons, which, with the artillery, may have amounted to 66,700 men: of these, upwards of thirty battalions and as many squadrons had never been in action.

This mass of forces was posted with the centre diagonally across and in front of the forking of the two causeways from Brussels to Charleroy and to Nivelles; the right centre behind the chateau of Goumont, and the left, considerably refused, passed in the rear of La Haye Sainte, along the crossroad, in the direction of Ohain: behind the right centre, Lord Hill placed his corps, en potence, in columns, prepared to manœuvre on his right, on the small plain of Braine la Leud; or, to his left, to sustain the centre. In and about Braine la Leud was a Netherland division, with the right thrown forward, and covered by the rivulet Hain, and leaving the small plain open; a kind of gorge to tempt the enemy between the two sides of the re-entering angle of the right wing. The Prussians were expected to debouch through the woods of Lasne, towards Planchenois, which would form the left into another gorge, or re-entering angle. Thus the position formed a kind of open W (Fig. 15, AA AABB), with the chateau of Goumont at the summit of the salient angle, covered by a plantation of wood and enclosures, occupied by six or eight battalions; so that the enemy could not enfilade, from behind that plantation, either of the faces of the centre, nor approach on either of the causeways which passed through the centre, without presenting his flank. Besides this point, La Haye Sainte, a stone farm, close to the Chaussé of Charleroy, and farther on the left the farm of Papelotte and chateau of Frichermont, were occupied. The whole front offered a gentle slope towards the enemy, and in the rear the cavalry was distributed in brigades, each in two lines, covered by the rising ground; and the artillery, all the field-pieces of which were nine-pounders or twelves, formed a line of almost contiguous batteries along the front, interspersed with howitzers and rockets.

By the returns found after the battle it appears that the

enemy had debouched from Charleroy with 122,000 men, exclusive of the reinforcements that joined after the 15th of June of these he produced on the field of battle about 80,000 men, formed in concentrated masses on both sides of the Chaussé of Charleroy, and gradually advancing the right parallel to the British left (C C C C); but as he was jealous of the woods on the right, he formed an angle to the rear, and kept his reserves far back. He had made a demonstration with a corps of cavalry beyond the British right, towards Hal, where he found the corps of General Colville, and Prince Frederick of Orange, with two divisions posted at Tubise, Clabbeck, and Braine le Chateau, to cover that avenue to Brussels. Another corps, 42,000 strong, under Grouchy, was detached to his right upon Wavre, to turn the allies, pursue or arrest the Prussians, and prevent the timely junction of Bulow. Thus the dispositions of both the commanders were combined with consummate ability; Napoleon operating on the system of throwing two-thirds of his masses alternately on either side, and the allies in combining manœuvres to bring a superior mass on the decisive point. On the field, however, the problem was difficult to solve. The communication with France was open only by the roads of Charleroy and Nivelles, hence the enemy could not quit them in the attack; nor could he gain Brussels by any other avenue than that of Waterloo; therefore, to possess the Chateau of Goumont, without which he could not arrive at the position, was the natural object of the attack. As this was sustained by the mass of the allied army, and could not be enfiladed, his attacks failed. All those directed on the road of Charleroy to the left centre were necessarily oblique, and exposed to the fire in flank before they could reach their opponents. To have risked a general onset of all his masses, before the British were thinned and exhausted, he knew, under the circumstances of the moment, to be too hazardous. The plain of Braine la Leud appeared open; he could arrive by it; but that very circumstance proved that the enemy was prepared on that side. To have turned the force thither would, in the first place, have caused the loss of the communication by