Part 4

5. Hospitals and magazines.

6. Carriages and horses for stores and artillery.

Such is the outline of a military system adapted to the circumstances and necessities of the U. States. On a superficial glance, to timid or unreflecting men, this may appear to be surrounded with difficulties insuperable; there will be discordant opinions, envy, jealousy, folly will devise objections; no two men may concur, however equal and able; the objects are themselves too numerous and complex for any one man to prepare in time or in a satisfactory manner; the proposition itself will be said to arise from interested motives; from some lust of place or profit; it will require resolution to resist prejudice; and the requisite firmness to decide may not be found.

We shall close this part of our essay by stating generally, that whenever there shall appear a disposition to adopt this or any such system, means can be pointed out by which the insuperable difficulties shall be made appear easy to be overcome; discordant opinions reconciled and brought spontaneously to concurrence; envy, folly, and jealousy will be allowed to prey upon themselves, without danger of annoyance to the plan; the variety of the objects can be made subservient to render them more simple, practicable, and effective; and instead of the merit being ascribed to any one man, every officer in the army and the militia if they choose shall have an opportunity of laying his claim to a participation in the plan.

If the observations thrown out in this preface are well founded, the necessity of a work of this kind will be immediately perceived. Let it not however be imagined, says major James, that a Military Dictionary ought exclusively to belong to a camp or barrack, or be found in the closets or libraries of military men alone. The arts and sciences are so intimately connected together, that they eventually borrow language and resources from each other, and go hand in hand from the senate to the field, from the pulpit to the bar, and from the desk of the historian to the bureau of the statesman or politician.

We have a few words to say on certain parts of the work. The French phrases are adopted for their usefulness in reading, and often even in political reading: the words and phrases in the language of the East Indies, are adopted from the English Dictionary, in which however there were some errors which the editor of this work was enabled to correct, and to give more accurate explanations to many. Some subjects which might with more propriety be placed under one letter are placed under another; the course of reading which the editor commenced cotemporaneous with the preparation of the three first letters, not affording the illustrations until the letter to which they properly belonged had been printed. Thus under Valor will be found much of what would properly come under Courage; and under Topographical what would properly belong to Depot. There are several similar instances.

Should the disposition be manifested to cultivate the knowlege of military subjects generally, the editor proposes at some future day to publish gen. Grimoard’s treatise on the Staff of armies; the French Regulations for Cavalry of 1808; and the most modern and celebrated works on Tactics, the treatise of Jomini, the 4th volume of which was published in the beginning of 1810. All these works are already translated and ready to be put to press; beside a Dictionary of all the military actions recorded in ancient and modern history which is now in great forwardness.

Military men who may be desirous of adding to the stock of useful and correct knowlege, will oblige by pointing out any defects or errors, or recommending any additions that are pertinent to the nature of this work, addressed to the compiler.

JULY 4, 1810.

MILITARY DICTIONARY.

ABATIS, in a military sense, is formed by cutting down many entire trees, the branches of which are turned towards an enemy, and as much as possible entangled one into another. They are made either before redoubts, or other works, to render the attacks difficult, or sometimes along the skirts of a wood, to prevent an enemy from getting possession of it. In this case the trunks serve as a breast-work, behind which the troops are posted, and for that reason should be so disposed, that the parts may, if possible, flank each other.

ABLECTI, in military antiquity, a choice or select part of the soldiery in the Roman armies, picked out of those called extraordinarii.

ABOLLA, in military antiquity, a warm kind of garment, generally lined or doubled, used both by the Greeks and Romans, chiefly out of the city, in following the camp.

ABORD, Fr. attack, onset.

S’ABOUCHER, Fr. to parley.

ABOUT, a technical word to express the movement, by which a body of troops changes its front or aspect, by facing according to any given word of command.

Right ABOUT, is when the soldier completely changes the situation of his person, by a semi-circular movement to the right.

Left ABOUT, is when the soldier changes the situation of his person by a semi-circular movement to the left.

ABREAST, a term formerly used to express any number of men in front. At present they are determined by Files.

ABRI, Fr. shelter, cover. Etre à l’abri, to be under cover, as of a wood, hillock, &c.

ABSCISSA, in military mathematics, signifies any part of the diameter or axis of a curve, contained between its vertex or some other fixed point, and the intersection of the ordinate.

In the parabola, the abscissa is a third proportional to the parameter and the ordinate.

In the ellipsis, the square of the ordinate is equal to the rectangle under the parameter and abscissa, lessened by another rectangle under the said abscissa, and a fourth proportional to the axis, the parameter, and the abscissa.

In the hyperbola, the squares of the ordinates are as the rectangles of the abscissa by another line, compounded of the abscissa and the transverse axis.

But it must be remembered, that the two proportions relating to the ellipsis and hyperbola, the origin of the abscissas, or point from whence they began to be reckoned, is supposed to be the vertex of the curve, or, which amounts to the same thing, the point where the axis meets it; for if the origin of the abscissa be taken from the centre, as is often done, the above proportions will not be true.

ABSENT, a term used in military returns. It forms a part of regimental reports, to account for the deficiency of any given number of officers or soldiers; and is usually distinguished under two principal heads, viz.

ABSENT with leave, officers with permission, or non-commissioned officers and soldiers on furlough.

ABSENT without leave. Men who desert are frequently reported absent without leave, for the specific purpose of bringing their crime under regimental cognizance, and to prevent them from being tried capitally, for desertion.