BAT 



345 



BAT 



Battery. 



Batrtchoi- sometimes they lose their way, and return to the very 

 d " spot from whic'i they set out 



The Batnians are remarkably cruel and ferocious. 

 They are robbers from their infancy ; and even when 

 they meet with no resistance, they do not scruple to mur- 

 der the unhappy victims whom they plunder. The 

 rajah himself participates in the booty of his subjects. 

 In their expeditions to the territories of Sahib-Sing, 

 Loll-Sing, and Bang-Sing, celebrated chiefs among 

 the Seiks, they have generally been successful ; and 

 they have alternately laid waste the country of the 

 Baloutchians, the district of Hurrianah,"and the pro- 

 vince of Beykaneer. 



The Batnian women are allowed to appear in pub- 

 lic unveiled ; and, excepting those of the chkfs, they 

 are permitted to remain in the company of the men, 

 whose flocks they tend. The Batnians are Mahome- 

 tans. They smoke tobacco to a great degree ; and 

 in all their occupations they are never seen without 

 their huhka in their mouth. The Batnians import 

 white cloths, sugar, and cloth , and export horses, 

 buffaloes, camels, and their superfluous rice. (q) 



BATRACHOIDES, m Zoology, a genus of ji 

 gular fishes established by Lacepede to comprehend 

 the gadus face and blennius raninus of Linnaeus. See 

 Ich i H . ol )GY. (J) 



BATRACHlA, (Fr. Batraciexs,) in Zoolo- 

 gy, an order of reptiles, established by the French na- 

 turalists, and adopted by Mr Macartney (Art. Clas- 

 sification in Rees' Cycloj.a'dia,) to comprehend those 

 tribes, which, like the frogs, have a naked body, and 

 either tivo or four feet. See Heiu'etology ; and 

 Dumeril, Traite Elemenla re d' Histoirc Naturelle, 

 torn. ii. (f) 



BATTA, a country in Sumatra, whose inhabitants 

 ate Anthropophagists. Mr Marsden maintains, that 

 the Battas eat human flesh as a kind of ceremony, to 

 shew their detestation of some particular offences, and 

 that the practice was confined only to prisoners of war, 

 and to persons condemned for crimes ; but our inge- 

 nious countryman, Dr Leyden, wlio visited Sumatra 

 in 180j, gives a very different statement. " When a 

 man becomes infirm," he observes, " and weary of 

 the world, he is said to invite his own children to eat 

 him, in the season when salt and limes are cheapest. 

 He then ascends a tree, round which his friends and 

 offspring assemble ; and as they shake the tree, join 

 in a funeral dirge, the import of which, is, " The sea- 

 son is come, the fruit is ripe and it must descend." 

 The victim descends ; and those that are nearest and 

 dearest to him deprive him of life, and devour his re- 

 mains in a solemn banquet. The Battas of Sumatra 

 have books which consist of bamboos, or the branch 

 of a tree, upon which they write with the point of a 

 r. There are nineteen letters in the Batta al- 

 phjbet, which is written from bottom to top, in a way 

 th- itrj reverse of the Chinese. See Marsden's Ac- 

 count of Sumatra ; and Leyden on the Languages and 

 Li'rralnre of the Indo-Chinese Nations, in the Asiatic 

 Rt i'. ' 1 1, vol. x. (o) 



BATTALION. See Military Tactics. 



BATTERING Ram. See R-. 



BATTERY. See Eli:ctujcity,Fokth'!catiox, 

 ! 



VOI :/. 



BATTLE. In a military sense, a battle implies Battle, 

 the encounter of two hostile armies, accompanied by / ' 



mutual slaughter, and contending for some important 

 object. The bad passions of men have ever been the 

 cause of animosities and quarrels, which, among the 

 individuals of civilized society, are generally decided 

 according to certain laws established for the welfare 

 of the community. But when differences arise among 

 nations, there is no tribunal to appeal to, and the 

 matter in dispute is often determined by force of 

 arms. They collect a number of men together, whom 

 they equip with the instruments of destruction, and 

 hence form what are called armies. When these 

 armies are brought in contact, and each endeavours 

 to destroy the other, their efforts for that purpose, 

 constitute what is denominated a battle. 



In early times, a battle was a fierce tumultuary 

 contest, the issue of which depended upon the physi- 

 cal strength of the combatants, because armies were 

 then an assemblage of men, without order or disci- 

 pline. But when arts and civilization had made some 

 progress among mankind, the military system was 

 improved, and battles were conducted with regularity, 

 and subjected to certain rules, that taught men to de- 

 stroy their species in a more dexterous manner than 

 formerly, or, in other words, armies were trained to 

 the art of war, which gave them a decided superiority 

 over an undisciplined multitude. The formation, or 

 mode of drawing up an army in the field of battle, is 

 an important branch of military science, as a victory 

 or a defeat may ensue from the proper or improper 

 disposition of the troops. It is, therefore, the busi- 

 ness of the commander to arrange the squadrons and 

 battalions of his army in such a manner, as to join 

 battle with the greatest possible advantage. 



The first battle, circumstantially recorded, is that Battle of 

 of Thymbra, between the Persians and Lydians, with Thymbra. 

 their respective allies, commanded by Cyrus and Croe- 

 sus. The army of the former consisted of 196,000 

 horse and foot, armed with cuirasses, bucklers, pikes, 

 swords, bows, and slings, besides chariots with 

 scythes, and moveable towers containing archers. 

 Cyrus drew up his army in five lines, with the ca- 

 valry on the flanks. The heavy armed infantry were 

 placed in the first line, twelve deep ; in the second, 

 the spearmen, light armed ; in the third, the archers; 

 in the fourth, troops similarly armed as the first line, 

 intended to support the preceding lines, and as a corps- 

 de-reserve ; and in the fifth, the moveable towers. 

 The armed chanuts were divided into three small 

 bodies, one of which was placed in front, and the 

 other two were stationed on the flanks of the lines. 

 Croesus' army was twice as numerous as the Persianj 

 and was drawn up in -one line, 30 men in depth, with 

 the exception of the Egyptian forces, which were 

 stationed in die centre, and adhered to their accus- 

 tomed order of battle. They were formed in square 

 battalions, consisting of 10,000 men, with proper in- 

 tervals between each battalion. The cavalry were 

 stationed on the flanks of the line. When Croesus 

 observed that his front extended so far beyond that 

 of the army of Cyrus, he halted the centre and ad- 

 vanced the flanks, that they might inclose the Per- 

 sians. But Cynu' cavalry and chariots briskly at- 

 2 x 



