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MINUTES OF PROCEEDINGS OF 
because in these times military history can hardly be said to have had an 
existence, 1 and plan-drawing—so necessary to the right understanding of even 
the simplest battle, so necessary for the study of the position and movements 
of artillery in action—is a comparatively recent invention. The battle-scenes 
of Homer and Livy are as intelligible and credible as those of most military 
historians previous to Marlborough's time, and their plans are inferior to 
their matter. Some notion may be formed of the state of military plan¬ 
drawing in England as late as the middle of the 17th century, from an 
inspection of the plan of the battle of Naseby, given in Sprigg's “Anglia 
Rediviva," a book published in London in 1647 ; 2 but it ought to be added 
that matters were in this respect somewhat better on the continent. 
Retarded by the obstacles that I have enumerated—the opposition of the 
church, feeble as its resistance may have been; the backward state of 
chemistry and metallurgy; the impossibility of possessing an efficient train 
of artillery unless it be kept up as a standing force, and the difficulty of 
maintaining a standing force in feudal ages, before finance became a science, 
or political economy was known; the adverse influence of mercenaries; the 
rudimentary state of tactics ; the reactionary prejudice against the arm, raised 
by its immobility; and the want of military history 3 —retarded by these 
obstacles, the artillery was at first either overlooked entirely, or regarded with 
contempt; and, under conditions so unfavourable, it was hopeless to expect 
that even professional artillerymen should dream of the possibility of such an 
attribute as mobility—for the discovery of Marshal Marmont's principle 
essentially depended upon experience, and the less the arm was valued, the 
less it was employed in the field. 
In spite of all opposition, however, the “new artifice of evil" 4 gradually 
gained ground. The resistance offered to its progress was formidable; but 
nothing could stop its advance, for the force that propelled it was moral force, 
and “ a la guerre les trois quarts sont des affaires morales. La balance des 
forces reeles n'est que pour un autre quart." 5 It moved forward ; but its 
onward steps were laboured and slow, and wheeled gun-carriages were only 
introduced towards the close of the reign of Louis XL of Erance, or the com¬ 
mencement of that of Charles VIII. 6 This important event forms the first 
great landmark in the history of field artillery, and from it dates the origin 
and rise of the mobility of the arm. 
Guns could now move, and it might be supposed that their destructive 
effect and mobility advanced, after this signal epoch, at equal rates along 
parallel lines. But such was not the case. Charles VIII., Francis I., and 
1 “Ce n’est guerre que sous Francois I., et sous l’Empereur Charles V., que les Italiens, les 
Francois, les Espagnols, et les Allemands ont commence a ecrire en detail sur la discipline militaire.” 
Daniel, “ Hist, de la Milice Fra^aise,” Vol. I. p. 380. 
2 There is a copy of this book in the Library of the Royal Artillery at Woolwich. 
3 I do not assert that these retarding influences acted either simultaneously, or with equal 
intensity; but I maintain that they were all in action, at one time or other, and with more or less 
intensity, during the first three centuries of the existence of field artillery. 
4 Hallam’s “Middle Ages,” Vol. I. p. 480. Gibbon’s “Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,” 
Vol. XI. p. 55. 
5 Napoleon’s Correspondence. 1809. 
6 Fave’s “ Hist, et Tact, des Trois Armes,” p. 12. Grewenitz’ “ Traite de l’Org. &c. de l’Art,” 
p. 28. 
