HOPLISTICS. 487 



they require fortifications to strengthen them, and, at the expense of 

 being kept stationary, to enable them to withstand the foe. Fleets 

 require all these accessories ; their own good ships besides : and, still 

 more than armies, they are dependent upon wind and weather ; which 

 sometimes prove their most dangerous antagonists. In estimating 

 the probable results of warlike operations, great allowance must be 

 made for the various casualties to which they are exposed. This 

 difference has been happily expressed by an able writer on this sub- 

 ject, who calls it the "friction of war;" a deduction analogous to 

 that which must be made from mechanical forces, in allowing for the 

 friction of machinery. 



The Arts of War are mostly of very ancient origin ; as shown by 

 the Jewish Scriptures, and Egyptian Monuments ; which contain 

 numerous records and representations of battles and sieges. The 

 weapons of the early ages, were of the most simple kind ; to which 

 their rude tactics and fortifications corresponded : but in the days of 

 the Greeks and Romans, these arts had made considerable progress ; 

 and, accordingly, they invented weapons more complicated and pow- 

 erful, which occupied the place of our modern artillery, in naval as 

 well as in agral warfare. The greatest change that the arts of war 

 have ever undergone, is that resulting from the invention and 

 general introduction of fire arms ; by whose unseen force the bravest 

 general, or the strongest soldier, is alike exposed with the feeble and 

 the pusillanimous. This invention has enabled intellectual skill and 

 science to resist more effectually the impetus of mere physical 

 force ; though such force is still essential to the labors and fatigues 

 of war. The changes hence introduced in the different branches of 

 the military art, will be farther explained in the following chapters. 



We proceed to give some general ideas of Machetechnics, under 

 the branches of Hoplistics ; Fortification ; Geotactics ; Strategy, or 

 Grand Tactics ; and Navitactics, or Naval Warfare. 



CHAPTER I. 



HOPLISTICS. 



WE propose the name Hoplistics for that branch of the Arts of 

 War, which relates to the arms, ammunition, equipage, and provi- 

 sions, required for military operations. The name is from the Greek, 

 ortju^w, I arm, equip, or provide ; and this from o^xa, arms or wea- 

 pons.* In this branch, we would include the duties of the Ordnance 

 Corps, in our own service ; or the construction and repairs of arms, 

 and the preparation of ammunition ; in armories and arsenals, as well 

 as in the field. Here also we would describe the duties of the Quar- 

 ter Master's Department, in procuring, preserving, and distributing 

 equipage and ammunition ; and those of the Commissariat, or Pur- 

 chasing and Subsistence Departments, in furnishing clothing and 



* Ampere adopts the term Hoplismatics, (Hoplismatique) ; which he makes to 

 include both Hoplistics, as above defined, and Tactics, in all its divisions. 



