Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 3.djvu/461

Rh justified by his instinctive knowledge of the demoralized state of the enemy whose position he undertook to force. Marlborough, who as a fighter of great battles has never been surpassed, and who, like Wellington, led a mixed army of English and allies, appears to have always had a decided preference for the offensive; so little does nationality supply any just rule for selecting either. Marlborough s choice, in all probability, was adopted from the compara tively passive attitude of his various adversaries at Blenheim, Ramillies, and Malplaquet, which tempted a bold offensive on his part. Lee, though certainly addicted to the strictly defensive, which was suited to his inferiority of numbers and to the strong nature of the ground he usually occupied, had the true instinct (as was especially shown in his great victory at Chancellorsville) of seizing any special opportunity offered by the carelessness of an adversary who brought against him apparently overwhelming forces. And in the late war, although the German generals elsewhere continually took that bold offensive which was justified at first by superior numbers, and later by the increasingly high spirits of their troops, yet in the most important and bloodiest action of the whole. Mars-la-Tour, they were con tent, after it had been well begun by their own attack, to pass to the completely defensive, it being evident that by merely maintaining the position they had taken up across the French line of retreat from Metz, all the immediate advantage possible from victory would be won. On the whole, therefore, it may be affirmed that no theory is sound which prescribes or forbids the use of any of the three methods, or lays down strict rules for the applica tion of any of them. Defence is, however, the natural attitude of the weaker party, as Clausewitz, the greatest of all theoretical writers on war, has carefully pointed out Under what conditions it is to be accepted, or how long ad hered to when once assumed, are problems which it requires true genius to grapple with successfully ; for they can only be solved rightly according to the circumstances of the hour, perhaps of the moment. To see a crucial instance illustrated by a failure, we may look at Gravelotte. There Bazaine was forced by the case to fight on the defensive. An opportunity occurred in the day, on the decided repulse of the German right-wing under Steinmetz, of striking such a counterblow as, from Napoleon s hand, would probably have forced a victory over even the great odds possessed by the German commander. But Bazaine had no spark of the instinctive genius needed. He lost the opportunity, and with it the battle, the loss entailing the last hope of rescuing his host from the dangerous and indeed ignominious position in which previous errors of judgment had placed it. In conclusion, in order to demonstrate the undying truth of the main principle of battle, which is that, the general conditions being equal, the moral advantage is invariably at the outset with the offensive rather than the defensive, with the army that feels itself moving forward rather than that which. stands still, it is well to refer to the recent discussion on the effect of breech-loading arms. It was almost universally assumed by theorists, especially by those of Prussia herself, when she first put the needle-gun into her soldiers hands, that the power of the new weapon would be most perceptible in defence, for which its more rapid fire seemed so specially adapted. The Prussian instructions, drawn up before I860, avowedly followed this view Those who compiled them overlooked the fact that the moral power of the weapon would of itself tend to carry those who bore it forward, and add an additional advantage to those the assailant had before in his greater show of vigour and activity, and his power of searching out the weaker parts of his enemy s position and throwing his troops in force upon them. History has reversed the Prussian theory, and proved afresh how powerful for victory is the moral element in the soldiers character. For, out of the opening events of 1866, and the vast encouragement the Prussians experienced in their first collisions with Benedek s army, has been evolved the most audacious and aggressive series of actions any nation ever fought. Certain Prussian writers have since the war of 1870-71 gone almost to the opposite extreme, and claimed absolute superiority for the offensive under all circumstances, forgetting that, against a stronger army, or even one perfectly equal in all other respects and well posted, it must inevitably be as dangerous as it proved when confidently tried by Napoleon s marshals against British troops under Wellington. The various so-called &quot; orders of battle &quot; of which theore tical writers treat, believing that they see a close similarity in the dispositions of well-led armies from the days of tho Grecians down to our own, are, so far as such similarity really exists, founded entirely on one or other of the moral elements already mentioned, above all, on the desire to gain the enemy s flank. The late General Winfield Scott, 0110 of the few commanders who could boast that he had more than once seen the back of English infantry in fair fight, declared that this desire is so instinctive that it is impossible to array two bodies of disciplined troops against each other without one at least soon striving for this advantage. But so far as this and other like universal principles are applied to the actual drawing up of an army at any period in a special order of battle, the arrangements must in practice vary with the arms and discipline. This subject, in fact, forms part of that special art which treats of the handling of troops in the presence of the enemy, and falls under the head of "tactics," for which see the article. The mechanism of battles must vary continually ; the great leading principles we have spoken of cannot change.

1em  BATTLE, a market-town in the county of Sussex, on the Sonth-Eastern Eailway, 56 miles from London. It is situated in a valley, and consists of one street. Its name is derived from the conflict in 1066, which insured to William the Norman the crown of England. The abbey founded by him forms a most magnificent pile of ruins, and the ancient gatehouse is still in good preservation. The place is now celebrated for its gunpowder manufac tories. Population of the parish in 1871, 3495.  BATTUS, the founder of the Greek colony of Cyrene in Libya, whither he had been directed by the oracle at Delphi (about 650 B.C.). The Greeks who accompanied him were, like himself, natives of Thera (Santorin), and partly des cended from the race of the Minyse. The origin of tho colony as told in Thera (Herodotus, iv. 150) was as follows:—

