MILITARY SYSTEMS. 483 



been going on this separation of the fighting body from the 

 community at large, this diminution in its relative mass, and 

 this establishment of a distinct headship to it, there has beeu 

 going on an internal organization of it. 



The fighting body is at first wholly without structure. 

 Among savages a battle is a number of single combats: the 

 chief, if there is one, being but the warrior of most mark, who 

 fights like the rest. Through long stages this disunited action 

 continues. The Iliad tells of little more than the personal en 

 counters of heroes, which were doubtless multiplied in detail 

 by their unmentioned followers ; and after the decay of that 

 higher military organization which accompanied Greek and 

 Roman civilization, this chaotic kind of fighting recurred 

 throughout mediaeval Europe. During the early feudal 

 period everything turned on the prowess of individuals. War, 

 says Gautier, consisted of &quot; bloody duels ;&quot; and even much 

 later the idea of personal action dominated over that of com 

 bined action. But along with political progress, the subjec 

 tion of individuals to their chief is increasingly shown by 

 fulfilling his commands in battle. Action in the field 

 becomes in a higher degree concerted, by the absorption of 

 their wills in his wll. 



A like change presently shows itself on a larger scale. 

 While the members of each component group have their actions 

 more and more combined, the groups themselves, of which 

 an army is composed, pass from disunited action to united 

 action. When small societies are compounded into a larger 

 one, their joint body of warriors at first consists of the tribal 

 clusters and family-clusters assembled together, but retaining 

 their respective individualities. The head of each Hottentot 

 kraal, &quot; has the command, under the chief of his nation, of the 

 troops furnished out by his kraal.&quot; Similarly, the Malagasy 

 * kept their own respective clans, and every clan had its own 

 leader.&quot; Among the Chibchas, &quot; each cazique and tribe came 

 with different signs on their tents, fitted out with the mantles 

 by which they distinguished themselves from each other.&quot; A. 



