Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 2.djvu/663

] real. At the very outset it was deemed necessary to reorganise and augment this army. Voluntary enlistment under the system of racoleurs or &quot; bringers,&quot; by which the army had hitherto been fed, was found insufficient. &quot; Compulsory service&quot; was proposed in 1789, but rejected as &quot; contrary to the liberty of the citizen.&quot; An appeal was then made to the patriotism of. the nation, and 200 bat talions of volunteers were enrolled ; but though many presented themselves, and these volunteers contained much of the best blood and highest intelligence of France, the zmmbers fell far short of the expectations, and the pro portion that reached the frontier was small. In the winter of 1792-3 the French armies, notwithstanding the unex pected successes of the preceding campaign, seemed on the point of dissolving altogether, and the Convention was driven to order a compulsory levy of 300,000 men. To eradicate the royalist element from the army, the old regiments were broken up and amalgamated by battalions with the volunteers ; and the name even of &quot; regiment&quot; was abolished. Promotions were made, not by seniority of rank, but length of service ; thus an old sergeant succeeded to the command of a regiment over the heads of all the captains. In August. 1793 the affairs of France were at their lowest ebb. Its armies had been driven from the Rhine and out of Belgium, and a dangerous. insurrection had broken out in La Vendee. The compulsory levy, slowly and imperfectly carried out, had not yielded the full number ; and those that were obtained deserted by hundreds. The nominal strength amounted in all to 480,000 men, but one army with a paper strength of 90,000 had really only 33,000 in the ranks, and the others were little better. Under the new system of promotion commands changed almost daily, and fell into the hands of men who had never before been entrusted with more than a section ; and confusion reigned everywhere. Such was the position when Carnot, then a captain of engineers, was called to the Ministry of War. A few days later a levy en masse of all the male population between the ages of 1 8 and 25 was ordered, and was carried out with more method and success than former levies. The muster- rolls of the armies filled rapidly, and by the end of the year the effective force had risen to 770,000. The amalgamation of the old army and the volunteers, which had been com menced, but imperfectly carried out, was effected on a different and more thorough principle ; the white uniform distinctive of the old days of royalty was abolished, the infantry organised in demi-brigades of three battalions (usually one of the old army to two of volunteers), and the men and cadres intermixed within the demi-brigacle. A permanent organisation in divisions, composed of all arms, was introduced, and able officers selected for the com mands. Jourdan, Hoche, Pichegru, Kleber, Moreau, were at the head of the armies of the republic. Arsenals and manufactories of warlike stores were created, schools of instruction were established; the republican forces were transformed from hordes to armies, well disciplined, organ ised, and equipped. The enemies of France were defeated at all points ; and in tracing the plan for the campaign of 1794 Carnot showed that his genius shone in strategy as much as in administration. &quot; Twenty-seven victories, of which 8 in pitched battles, 120 combats; 80,000 enemies /tors de combat; 91,000 taken prisoners ; 11G fortresses or important towns taken, 3G of them after siege or blockade ; 230 forts or redoubts carried ; 3800 guns, 70,000 muskets, 1900 millions of powder, and 90 colours captured;&quot; such was the account Carnot was able to give of eighteen months of office ; and at the close he returned to his duty as a simple major of engineers. And even this did not do justice to all he had effected. Himself of an almost Roman type of tnaracter, severe, but a true patriot and republican,- -he had succeeded in infusing much of his own spirit into the army ; he had given it not merely discipline and organisa tion, but honour and soldierly feeling. &quot;When Moreau promulgated to his army the decree of the Convention, which forbade them to give quarter to any Englishman or Hanoverian, he added, in general orders, &quot; I have too high an opinion of French honour to believe that such an in struction will be obeyed ;&quot; and he was right. In the year 179G Napoleon appeared on the scene, and by a series of brilliant victories enlarged the frontiers of France and secured a glorious peace. But the exhaustion of years of continuous warfare had made itself felt : the armies were reduced to mere skeletons, and no sufficient means existed of replenishing them, till in 1798 the con scription was introduced. From that time there was never a dearth of men : the whole male population of France was practically at her ruler s disposal ; and Napoleon had full scope for his genius in organising these masses. His principal improvements were effected in the interval between the peace of Amiens and the war with the third coalition, while threatening the invasion of England. His armies were collected in large camps on the coasts of the Channel, and there received that organisation which, with minor variations, they retained during all his campaigns, and which has since been copied by all European nations. The divisions, as organised by Carnot, consisted usually of two brigades (twelve battalions) of infantry, two regiments of cavalry, and two or three batteries of artillery. This was a great improvement on former organisation, and worked well in the comparatively small armies which then took the field. But in large armies of 150,000 men and upwards the number of isolated commands was too great. Further, it had been found by experience that the very completeness of the divisional organisation each division forming a miniature army complete in all branches tended to exces sive independence of action on the part of the divisional commanders. Napoleon therefore grouped two or three divisions into corps d armee, commanded by marshals. He withdrew the whole of the cavalry and a portion of the artillery from the divisions, and with the light cavalry and batteries so obtained formed a reserve corps under the immediate orders of the corps commander ; while he kept the whole of the heavy cavalry, amassed in cavalry divisions, his guards, and a certain proportion of artillery, in his own hands, as a reserve to the whole army. Thus was organised that &quot; grande armee &quot; which immortalised itself at Ulm, Austeiiitz, Jena, Friedland, Wagram, and Borodino ; and after planting the tricolor on every capital of Europe, perished at last in the snows of Russia. The frightful expenditure of life during Napoleon s wars almost drained France of her manhood, and his frequent calls on the country made the name of the conscription detested. One of the first acts of the Restoration was to abolish it, and return to voluntary enlistment ; but it was soon evident that this means of recruiting no longer sufficed, and within three years compulsory sen-ice had to be again resorted to. In 1818 the annual contingent was fixed at 40,000, and the period of service at six years ; in 1824 the contingent was increased to G0,000, and in 1832 to 80,000. Of this, however, a part only, according to the requirements of the service, were enrolled ; the remainder were sent home on leave or furlough. Up to 1855 certain exemptions were authorised, and substitution or exchange of lots amongst young men who had drawn was permitted, but the individual drawn was obliged either to servo personally or find a substitute. In 1855 the law of &quot; dotation &quot; or exemption by payment was passed, and put an end to personal substitution. The state now undertook to provide substitutes for all who paid a fixed sum, ami did so by high bounties to volunteers or to soldiers for re- 