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LEFT TACK 226 TACTICS she is close-hauled with the wind on her starboard, the latter when close-hauled with the wind on her port side. To tack is to change the course of a ship by shift- ing the tacks and position of the sails from one side to the other; to alter the course of a ship through the shifting of the tacks and sails. Tacking is an opera- tion by which, when a ship is proceeding in a course making any acute angle with the direction of the wind on one of her bows, her head is turned toward the wind, so that she may sail in a course making nearly the same angle on the other bow. This is effected by means of the rudder and sails. A small sharp- pointed nail. TACOMA, a city and county-seat of Pierce co., Wash.; on the Puyallup river and Commencement Bay; at the S. ex- tremity of Puget Sound, and on the Northern Pacific railroad; 25 miles N. E. of Olympia. It is built on rising ground which reaches an altitude of 300 feet above the river. Here are Puget Sound University (M. E.), Pacific Uni- versity (Luth.), Annie Wright Seminary (P. E.), Tacoma Academy, the Academy of the Visitation (R. C), Masonic and public libraries, Ferry Museum of Art, city hall, court house, St. Joseph's, Fannie Paddock and County Hospitals, Seaman's Friend Society, Children's Home, etc. Near the city is the State Asylum for the Insane. The city con- tains waterworks, street railroad and electric light plants, a number of parks, numerous churches, National and State banks, and several daily, weekly, and monthly newspapers. There are many thriving industries. The city has an ex- tensive jobbing and wholesale trade, and large interests in coal, lumber, grain, and flour. Tacoma was settled in 1868, made the terminus of the Northern Pa- cific railroad in 1873, selected for the county-seat in 1880, and by the union of Old Tacoma and New Tacoma became a city in 1883. Pop. (1910) 83,743; (1920) 96,965. TACONIC MOUNTAINS, a range of mountains connecting the Green moun- tains of western Massachusetts with the highlands of the Hudson. The Taconic system, in geology, was named from the characteristic strata of this range, a metamorphic rock, now known to be of the Lower Silurian system. TACTICS, MILITARY, the science which enables one of two opposing bodies of troops to be stronger than the other at every crisis of an engagement. Strategy (q. v.), which has precisely the same objects, merges into tactics as the enemy comes within striking distance, and the latter science is therefore some- times defined as the strategy of the bat- tlefield. Modern writers use different terms for the various branches of tacti- cal science; grand tactics and manoeuvre tactics, for the marshaling of large masses (30,000 and upward) of men on the battlefield ; minor tactics, for the con- duct of small bodies, such as advanced and rear guards, outposts, patrols, etc.; fighting tactics, for the combat whatever the numbers of the force ; fire tactics, for the best use of guns and rifles, the mass- ing of their fire, and the selection of the target; and the special tactics of cav- alry, artillery, or infantry, combined tac- tics, siege tactics, and mining tactics. In Judges xx. we read of a favorite and dangerous manoeuvre, the Israelites feigning to retreat before the Benja- mites, so as to draw them on till their flanks and rear were exposed to the "liers in wait." Hannibal at Cannae and William the Conqueror at Hastings were among the many successful imitators of these tactics. Others, like the Duke of Burgundy in 1476 at Granson, lost their armies through attempting it with un- steady troops. Frederick the Great owed his victory at Mollwitz to the rapid fire and steady discipline of his men, and the former was chiefly due to the introduc- tion of iron ramrods. His later battles give us good examples of manoeuvre tac- tics. At Leuthen he engaged the Aus- trians, immovable in their chosen posi- tion, with his advanced guard, while his main body under cover of some hills and foggy weather marched in open column of companies round their flank, wheeled into line and rolled up their army. At Waterloo Napoleon showed an example of combined tactics on a large scale. By cavalry charges he obliged the British infantry to form squares, which then became targets for his massed artillery. When under stress of this "hard pound- ing" they opened out into line, a re- newed charge of cavalry obliged them to take the denser formation again. At Gravelotte the German armies (some 240,000 men) showed an unparalleled in- stance of grand tactics by marching to their positions across country in seven large masses, each consisting of one com- plete army corps. Fighting tactics must depend chiefly on the arms in use. The mail-clad horsemen of the 15th century never succeeded in defeating the solid phalanx of pikemen opposed to them by the Swiss Confederation till the employ- ment of artillery prevented the latter retaining such a massive formation. The English archer, protected in front by palisades and oh the flanks by spear- men, destroyed the chivalry of France at