Cæsar's Art of War and of Writing

IT is a very remarkable fact that one of the four preëminent generals of all time should have nearly reached middle age before he ever commanded an army, or even witnessed a regular battle.

Alexander, Hannibal, and Napoleon were students of war from childhood, and were prominent actors and leaders in it while still mere youths. But Julius Cæsar, their equal and sole equal in military ability and fame, saw only some trifling combats in his early days, and then waited for his thirty-ninth year before he headed legions in Spain, and for his forty-third before he commenced his astonishing career in Gaul. To many Romans of that day it must have been a great surprise to learn that this lated scholar in a most difficult art had gained decisive victories over the dashing Lusitanians and the stubborn Helvetians.

It is still a marvel. Very few cases at all like it are recorded in history. Cromwell, indeed, was forty-three years old when he became a soldier; and Marlborough was fifty-two when he first commanded a large army. But Cromwell was three years in growing up to leadership, and never once had to wrestle with a really able captain; while Marlborough was aided in his opening campaigns by the abundant experience and brilliant talents of Prince Eugene. Here, moreover, our list of parallels with Cæsar in this particular must end. All other eminent generals have seen much military service in early life, and the majority of the most eminent have come early to command. We need only to remember Alexander, Hannibal, the Scipios, Pompey, Gaston de Foix, Don John, Spinola, Maurice of Nassau, Gustavus Adolphus, Condé, Prince Eugene, Charles XII., Hoche, Prince Charles, and Napoleon to see how wonderfully Mars favors the young. In war, the moral qualities are at least as potent as the intellectual; in war, hope and confidence and audacity and pugnacity are very mighty; and these are the virtues of boyish heads rather than of gray ones.

Yet here is a novice in warfare, well on toward unpliable and cautious middle age, who exhibits every military quality. How could it be so? Of course he had drawn some soldierly education, both moral and intellectual, from the circumstances of his time and race. The human breed of which he sprang was eminently martial in history and character. Nearly every young Roman felt bound to be more or less of a soldier, and nearly every young gentleman of Rome sought to fit himself for an officer. Cæsar, like Lucullus, had no doubt studied the campaigns of great commanders, and had also, no doubt, learned something from his intimacy with military leaders. But for all that, when he entered upon his life as a general he was little more than a civilian. Pillow at Port Donelson and Butler at Fort Fisher had seen at least as much of war as the greatest of Romans when he set forth to arrest the Helvetic avalanche. How is it that he was instantly able to show himself a mightier chief than the world had seen since the days of Hannibal, or than the world was destined again to see until the days of Napoleon? The only possible reply is that every now and then nature makes a man who is a marvel and can do anything.

Copyright, 1879, by HOUGHTON, OSGOOD & Co.

A SPECIMEN CAMPAIGN.

In his very first operations he exhibited that instantaneousness of decision and swiftness of execution which mark the great commander, and without which a great commander is impossible. For the sake of showing clearly how inborn these talents were to the man, I shall sketch as briefly as possible his earliest well-known campaign, the famous struggle with the Helvetians. Western Europe was threatened with a formidable return of some of those fierce Celtic tribes who, centuries before, had conquered a position in Central Europe. Tired, at last, of fighting the still more savage Germans, they decided to seek the comparative peace of ancient Gallia. From Northern Switzerland, and from Bavaria or Bohemia, there streamed toward the passes of the Jura a host of three hundred and sixty-eight thousand souls, of whom one fourth were warriors.

Cæsar arrived on the scene of action, as he always did arrive, “ by the greatest possible journeys,” and instantly planned a stupendous system of defense. There was only one legion in the transalpine province. To this he added such small bodies of troops, probably colonial militia and auxiliaries, as could be levied at once. It was but a feeble array, yet in a fortnight the country between Geneva and the Jura bristled with earth-works, and the passage of the Helvetians by surprise had become impossible. Next, he flew back to Lombardy, drew three legions out of their winter quarters in Venetia, enlisted two more among the Roman colonies along the Po, led his twenty-five or thirty thousand men across the Graian Alps, routed the wild tribes of those mountains in several combats, and reappeared like magic on the scene of peril. It all reads like a fable, and yet we have Cæsar’s word that it was done, and there is no good reason to doubt it. It would be an amazing performance for speed, even in these days of railroads and telegraphs. Only a great genius, a man who can decide and order on the spur of the moment, a man who can infuse into other men his own intelligence and impetuosity, — only a natural ruler and handler of men can get things accomplished with such dizzying swiftness.

Then came new difficulties for this beginner in “ great warfare.” The Helvetians wheeled northward, and entered Gaul far away from Geneva. Cæsar must follow them, or the province would be turned, and the republic perhaps imperiled, He had an insufficient supply of food at hand, and probably but few corn-carts and sumpter-horses, while the Gallic corn-fields were still hardly sown, so that foraging was out of the question. But he collected boats on the Saone, loaded them with what stores there were, summoned his allies, the Æduans, to send him grain on the march, and set forth into regions which no Roman army had ever traversed. It must be remembered that he had a great host to feed : there were six legions, amounting to thirty or thirty-six thousand men; there, was also a considerable force of auxiliaries. No doubt, every man had his haversack, containing twenty-five pounds of corn; but this allowance would last only twelve days, and then he might have to face starvation. Already, at the very first field movement of this citizen general, it was evident that he had full enough of enterprise and audacity.

One is tempted, indeed, to say that he was overbold. But in this ease, as in so many other cases of the chanceful game of war, the result must justify the commander. On the eastern bank of the Saone he overtook and destroyed the rear-guard of the Helvetians, a famous and valiant tribe called the Tigurini. Then in one day he bridged and crossed a river which had detained the main body of the barbarians for twenty days. It must be observed that in this feat, as in countless others, Cæsar was greatly helped out by the superior quality of his soldiers, who were not less thoroughly drilled as engineers, mechanics, and laborers than as fighting men.

The energy, audacity, and skill of the pursuit already began to win a moral victory, foreshadowing the physical one which was to follow. The Helvetians asked for peace, and offered to settle where Cæsar should designate. He demanded that they should make restitution to the plundered Æduans, should return to their own country, and should furnish hostages. The brave barbarians rejected the terms, and continued to flow westward. Their cavalry, only five hundred strong, showed what Helvetians could do by entrapping and beating the whole of Cæsar’s Gallic horse, though eight times as numerous. Then came a slow pursuit of fifteen days, with never more than five or six miles between camp and camp, yet no opportunity for favorable combat. It is probable enough that the inexperienced general really dreaded his heroic foes, and was determined not to fight unless he could give his own men some great tactical advantage.

Meanwhile, almost lost in strange regions, and far away from the storehouses of the province, he was worried by shortness of rations. The Helvetians had diverged from the Saone, and he had been obliged to follow them, thus leaving behind his supply train of barges. No corn came from the Æduans; only promises on promises. Presently he discovered that there was a powerful faction among that fickle people which meant to starve his army and give the victory to their brethren in race. He exposed the plot, forgave the ringleaders on pledge of good behavior, but still got no supplies. Driven by necessity to decisive measures, he sought to force a battle. Some time before dawn, Labienus was sent, with two legions, to gain a height in rear of the Helvetians, and three hours later Cæsar, with the other four, took the road which would bring him upon their front. It seems to have been a hazardous manœuvre, and we know that it was never repeated by the great general, though he speaks well of it in his first Commentary. It had two faults: it dislocated the army in presence of a numerous and brave enemy; secondly, it depended for success, and even safety, upon the consentaneous action of isolated columns. It was the same over-hopeful plan which nearly ruined Frederick at Torgau, and quite ruined Custer in his last fight. It is a curious reflection that, had it been carried out, Cæsar’s first great conflict might have been a great defeat. Fortunately, its own inherent defects kept it from working at all; there was not rapport enough between the two columns to bring about even a skirmish. A blundering, or perhaps wisely timorous, officer reported that Labienus had failed to reach his position, and the barbaric host, unconscious, perhaps, of all these manœuvrings, was permitted to roll tranquilly away.

Cæsar was now at his wit’s end for a means of arresting the Helvetians. They carted with them supplies for a year, while he had only two days’ rations left, and the half-hearted Æduans brought in nothing. But Bibracte (Autun), the Æduan capital, was only eighteen miles distant, and there he might fill his haversacks, to resume the pursuit later, if it might be. With an anxious and wrathful heart, doubtless, be turned his back upon the foe, and made for Bibracte. Then the “ fortune of Cæsar ” came to Cæsar’s assistance. The Helvetians decided to pursue him, and give him on his own ground the decisive struggle which he desired.

It is well worth while to glance at Cæsar’s tactics in his first great conflict. He fought what is technically called a defensive battle with offensive returns; that is, he delivered as well as received assaults, and promptly followed up the retiring masses. It is the only defensive system used by first-class generals when they have troops capable of manœuvring. At Torgau, Daun tried the simple defensive, and was beaten, notwithstanding Frederick’s vicious plan of attack, At Gettysburg, Meade relied upon it, and gained only an indecisive advantage. At Waterloo, Wellington used the mixed system, and held his ground against the ablest of modern commanders. As for the preliminary dispositions of Cæsar, the posting and drawing up of the troops, they were entirely cautious and methodical, as was usual with the Romans. He seized an isolated hill, and secured his baggage on the crest. In front of the baggage, and apparently also in rear of it, he formed his two new legions and his auxiliaries. Some distance down the slope were his four veteran legions abreast, each marshaled in three lines, the first entire line consisting of sixteen cohorts, and the two others of twelve each. As Cæsar tells us that the whole mountain was covered with troops, there was no doubt the usual interval of one hundred and fifty or two hundred paces between the lines. He says nothing of archers and slingers, but they of course must have been there, posted in advance of the legionaries. In the van of all, struggling to impede the progress of the enemy, were the four thousand Æduan and Allobrogian horse.

It will be observed that there was no recklessness and no forgetfulness. Including cavalry, the lines were six in number, and the flanks and rear had been seen to as well as the front. However audacious Cæsar may sometimes have been in his plans, he was always remarkably minute and thorough in his preparations, and in fact took more precautions than many less enterprising generals. There came a time, indeed, when he acquired more confidence in his troops, and no doubt also in his own improvisations; there came a time when he dared to draw up legions in a single line of cohorts, with no reserve but his own ready brain and unshakable spirit. Probably his wild victory over the Nervii, snatched from the very jaws of defeat, was what revealed to him all the steadiness of the Roman soldier and all the power of his own genius.

I do not propose to make a picture of the battle. There was a front attack by a huge phalanx of brave barbarians, and it was repulsed by the far better armed and better handled legionaries. There was a flank attack, and that too was beaten back, probably by the reserve. There was a gigantic rally of wild heroes, and a general advance of drilled Romans. At last the Helvetians slipped back in blood to their wagon circle, not one man of them showing his back to the victors. The fight in the field lasted from noon till evening; the fight amid the wagons howled on till far into the night. Less than one third of the defeated army, if we may believe Cæsar’s terrible statement, marched away from the scene of conflict. Three days later they surrendered, and were sent back to their own country, to hold it against the Germans for the good of Rome.

The entire struggle against this horde of ninety thousand warriors, the levying and concentration of troops to meet them, the pursuit through strange and unfriendly regions, the overthrow, and the final disposition of the remnant still left Cæsar two months of summer. He marched upon the Germans, who had settled in Franche Comté and made themselves the rulers of Eastern Gaul. The conflict which ensued was in several tactical particulars a noticeable one. Cæsar forced the barbarians to fight by planting an advanced camp close to their position, and he used this work as a part of his line of battle by drawing up his auxiliaries in front of it. A turning movement against his left was defeated by wheeling his third line in that direction, and this manœuvre was directed by young Publius Crassus, commandant of the cavalry, Cæsar himself being occupied elsewhere. The host of Germans was routed with immense slaughter, and Gaul delivered for centuries from their marauding tyranny.

Then, as Cæsar tells us in his brief way, “having concluded two very important wars in one campaign, he conducted his army into winter quarters among the Scquani, a little earlier than the season of the year required.” In the next sentence we learn that he at once set out for Gallic Italy “to hold the assizes.” He was judge, it appears, as well as civil ruler and general. In these days we do not expect one man to do so many things. Let us suppose Grant beating Lee, and then presiding over a district supreme court, besides writing a brilliant history of his last campaign, and devoting spare time to preparation for the next. It is almost too much for one’s imagination.

TACTICAL SWIFTNESS AND MOBILITY.

Such was Cæsar’s first important campaign. It exhibits vividly his amazing promptness of decision and rapidity of execution. Everywhere throughout his wars we find these two qualities, so necessary to a commander. It was to them, probably, more than to anything else that he owed his almost uncheckered success. Obviously, too, he knew their value, for he records their exhibition. Over and over in the Commentaries we meet such phrases as “ forced marches,” “marching night and day,” “ marching without cessation.” He prevents Ariovistus from seizing Besançn by a “ forced march.” Ho obliges the Remi to join the Romans by “arriving among them unexpectedly.” He describes his clearing of the Menapian forests as a thing done “ with incredible speed.” To attack the Usipctes and Tenchtheri, he performed a march “in a short time.” His wonderful bridge over the Rhine was built “ within ten days after the timber began to be collected.” His first descent upon Britain was accomplished during “ the short part of summer which remained ” after defeating the Usipctes and Tenchtheri and invading the Suevi. In advancing to relieve the besieged Cicero, be “places the only hopes of the common safety in dispatch, and enters the territories of the Nervii by long marches. ” Another inroad upon the Nervii is made “unexpectedly,” and “the business is speedily executed.” In an attack upon the Carnutes, he “ seeks to gain success by rapid marches and the advantage of the moment.” To reach his main army, during the campaign against. Vercingetorix, he leads a light column over the Cévennes in winter, clearing the roads of six feet of snow, and thus " surprises those people.” Then he “ marches to Vienne by as long journeys as he can, arriving when his own troops did not expect him.” Next, taking a body of cavalry, and “marching incessantly night and day, he advanced rapidly through the territory of the Æduans into that of the Lingones, where two legions were wintering.” Once there, he “ sends word to the rest of the legions, and unites all his army before his coming was announced to the Arverni.”

I have not space more than to allude to the surprising rapidity of his invasions of Italy, Spain, and Africa. But one of his feats of dispatch, accomplished during the siege of Gergovia, is remarkable enough to demand narration. Vercingetorix was endeavoring to relieve the city, and Cæsar had sent to the Æduans for reinforcements. They marched, but when about thirty miles from Gergovia they were persuaded by one of their leaders, Litaviccus, to strike for Gaul and attack the Romans. This alarming news was brought to Cæsar by a fugitive “a little before midnight.” Without hesitation, he left two legions in his widely extended works, drew out the other four in light-marching order, with all his cavalry, made a continuous push of twenty-five miles, and surprised his faithless allies. They tried to fly, but he intercepted their retreat, captured nearly all of them without bloodshed, listened kindly to their plea for pardon, and sent them home friends of the Roman people. After three hours of rest, the return march of twenty-five miles commenced, and was completed before the following sunrise, just in time to deliver the camp from an overwhelming sally. In less than thirty hours he had traversed fifty miles of evil roads, captured one army, and relieved another. It reminds one of Napoleon abandoning the siege of Mantua in a night, and getting far out of sight before morning, on his march against Wurmser. No wonder that the Gauls, the Germans, and everybody else eventually had to give way before Cæsar’s “ diabolical activity.” Making all allowance for his endless stratagems, and for the superior character of the soldiers whom he trained, his swiftness of decision and movement seems to have been the chief cause of his constant triumphs. There is no danger that any one will acquire the tremendous quality by reading about it. Naseitur, non fit.

In one respect Cæsar was the superior of the great modern commander with whom we most naturally compare him. His method of war was more various than Napoleon’s, more pliable to the unstable chances of warfare, and less open to the guesses of an opponent. The Corsican had a system, — the system of a great discoverer and genius, to be sure, but still a somewhat too constant system. He was quite irresistible only so long as his enemies failed to divine his leading principle of bringing, at. some important, point, a large force against a smaller one. Cæsar had no fixed system; he had the unforeseen. His artifices and contrivances were multitudinous, always suited to the passing situation, and almost always a surprise. The generals of the Holy Alliance learned at. last to calculate what would be Napoleon’s manœuvres, under given circumstances. But the Gauls, the Germans, and the Pompeians never could guess with any salvatory certainty what Cæsar would do. He might assault their front, or he might move on their rear, or he might entangle them in field-works. If occasion demanded, he might bury himself in fortifications; and then, if chance favored, he might leap out like a tiger from his jungle. He attacked tlie vast host of the Usipetes and Tenehtheri suddenly and by surprise, if not with real perfidy. On the other hand, he patiently and ingeniously and delicately amused himself with manœuvring the powerful army of Afranins into a surrender without fighting. There have been few offensive campaigns so audacious as that of Pharsalia. There has perhaps never been a defensive campaign so near to a miracle of patience and precaution as that of Alesia. In each case Cæsar was enormously outnumbered: in the one he conquered by field tactics and a bold initiative ; in the other, by such intrcnchments as no other general ever conceived.

In short, there is little doubt that Cæsar was the most various and incalculable of all great commanders, not even excepting Hannibal. His opponents had some such intellectual task on their souls as if he had been at once the most cautions of generals and the most audacious, — as if he had been in one person Fabius Maximus and Pyrrhus, the Duke of Parma and Charles the Twelfth. To a military leader this many-sidedness is a terrible advantage, as uniformity of policy may easily be made a disadvantage. When Sherman heard that Hood had replaced Johnston, he instantly decided to cover his front with breastworks, and await assaults; and the result proved that he had correctly judged the temper and divined the tactics of his new antagonist ; the assaults came and were repulsed. But there was no making any such calculations as to this amazing Roman, who had begun to practice the art of war at the age of forty. He had no characteristic method; his plans were the children of circumstances, and not of his own humor; he drew on the inexhaustible, and brought forth the unimaginable.

BATTLE FORMATIONS.

In one circumstance of warfare Cæsar’s mobility seems to have been overruled by the methodical character of his countrymen. His dispositions for combat were noticeably uniform, compared with the great variety of modern battle formations. Once, indeed (in the African war), confiding in the steadiness of his veterans, he drew up his little army in a single line of cohorts, without supports or reserves. But such novelties were of rare occurrence in his tactics. The general rule was, four cohorts of a legion in the first line, three in the second, and three in the third, with the archers, slingers, and darters in front of all, and the cavalry on each wing of the army. The intervals between the lines varied from one hundred and fifty to two hundred paces, making a total depth of, say,ten or twelve hundred feet; there were also narrow intervals from right to left between the cohorts, and wider ones between the legions. The depth of each cohort was usually four ranks,¹ though it might be eight. The men might be in close order, with shield lapped over shield, but they were more frequently in open order, standing three feet apart. In the latter case, a line of eight legions, with its front of thirty-two cohorts (averaging, say, four hundred men each), would cover at least sixteen thousand feet, or about three miles.

The contest began with a skirmishing of light troops. When these had done their utmost, the front line of legionaries advanced, at first slowly, but finally on a run, throwing their heavy javelins, and then closing with their swords. Sometimes, as in the battle with Ariovistus, one wing of this line charged alone, while the other was withheld. If there was danger in flank or in rear, the cohorts of the third line wheeled, or faced about, to meet it. In smaller combats, or in the confusion and melee of a long struggle, charges of individual cohorts were often made. A successful cohort would be supported, or a damaged one disengaged, by the assault of another. In general, however, the four cohorts of a legionary van, and frequently all the cohorts of the whole battle front, made a simultaneous attack. If beaten, they retreated as they could, and reformed in rear of the second line, which now advanced rapidly to cheek the triumphing enemy. So the battle went on, as methodically as it could he made to go, and with constant supervision of mounted officers, until it was won or lost.

These regular and carefully-supported engagements were sometimes quite protracted. The battle of Pharsalia lasted through a whole forenoon; the victory over the Helvetians cost an afternoon and evening. It must be noted that the pilum, with its long, thin, and pliable point, was not a very effective weapon for killing; as Cæsar observed in his Helvetic fight, and as others had observed before him, it was chiefly useful in cumbering the hostile bucklers. When the combat came to close quarters, moreover, the legionary had his corselet and huge shield to cover him, so that he might really tire himself out before he got a scratch, or gave one. No doubt, too, there were many partial recoils, many pauses to glare at each other, many almost bloodless fluctuations, in these hand-to-hand scufflings. Nearly all the slaughter occurred after one army or the other broke, and was overtaken by the paralysis of panic, suffering itself to be butchered without resistance.

An ancient, battle differed from a modern one in two important characteristics: first, it was fought with hand weapons, and oftenest at close quarters, instead of with missiles thrown by mechanical forces, usually at long range; second, there was generally continuous fighting all along the line, without much regard to the nature of the ground, instead of seemingly isolated (though really interdependent) attacks, dictated by the ground. We rely less on minor tactics than Cæsar, and more on large, distinct movements. The soldier counts for less now, and the general for more; formation for very far less, and topography for more. At Ligny Napoleon left the left wing of the Prussians entirely alone, and assaulted only their right and centre. At Waterloo he pounded the British right for two hours before he struck at any other part of their line. At Austerlitz he pounced upon the centre of the allies, while they were trying to march around his right. At Leuthen Frederick brought nearly his whole army to bear upon the Austrian left. At Rossbach he threw himself suddenly across the front of the French, while they were moving in column of march to turn his left. It must be admitted that such manœuvres are a great deal more artful and striking than Cæsar’s uniform line of battle, almost always parallel to the enemy’s.

To find among the ancients anything like the modern tactical mobility and dexterity in handling large masses, we must look to Hannibal alone. At Thrasymene he engaged his right for a long time before he even revealed the rest of his array. At Cannæ he advanced his centre, and forced the Romans to concentrate most of their troops against that, before he brought his wings forward upon their flanks. But while Hannibal, Frederick, and Napoleon were sometimes beaten in set battles, Cæsar never was. Why? It is not easy to say: partly, perhaps, because he saw to it that his men should be better than other men; partly, because be overlooked minor movements with minute and sagacious oversight, like Wellington at Waterloo; partly, too, no doubt, because chance is mighty in war, and he was favored by it. It may be that, with such excellent troops as he had, a methodical disposition was safer in the long run than a variable one. It left less to accident, and less to the skill of subordinate officers, always an uncertain quantity. It enabled his soldiers to see more clearly what they were about, and to feel more confident that they would be supported. If result justifies a general, Cæsar stands abundantly justified, for his result was always victory.

COMMISSARIAT, ETC.

With all Cæsar’s swiftness and artfulness, there was no lack of forethought, no defect of preparation. The Commentaries show us that his warfare was scientific throughout, and that the means to carry it on were carefully calculated beforehand. No other great general who has written the history of his own campaigns gives us so much information concerning his methods of covering, moving, and supplying troops. In modern armies these duties are assigned entirely to special officers. But among the Romans a commander seems to have been his own chief engineer, quartermaster, commissary, and even paymaster. His powers for collecting stores and money were great, and his responsibility for using them was undivided. If Marcus Antonius was treasurer for the army in Gaul, it was because Cæsar made him treasurer; if other lieutenants collected beasts of burden and magazines of grain, it was because Cæsar appointed them to that duty.

It is extraordinary that many modern writers should have supposed that the Greek and Roman armies depended for food on foraging, and had no regular commissariat. Aside from the plain improbability of this theory, there is distinct evidence against it. In the Anabasis we find constant mention of sumpter animals, which must have been used to carry provisions, for nothing else was so necessary. The warfare of Alexander was remarkably methodical, careful, and even prudent, notwithstanding the popular impression to the contrary. After the battle of the Granicus, he spent a year in reducing Asia Minor and in strengthening his army, before he advanced upon Syria. After the battle of Issus he passed another year in conquering, organizing, and garrisoning Syria and Egypt. After Arbela, he was busy for a like period with the valleys of the Tigris and Euphrates. He was seven years in conquering Persia, including the Bactrian provinces. At each forward step he left no enemy behind him; only settled government, depots of troops and sources of supply. Is it likely that such a leader had no rations besides what his hoplites could pick up from day to day? The supposition is gratuitous and ridiculous.

As for Cæsar’s haversacks, and the storehouses and trains from which they were filled, we know a great deal about them, thanks to the Commentaries. We learn that he lived mainly on subjugated or auxiliary communities, but that this was done only in small part by means of the daily foragings, and chiefly through contributions or enforced harvestings of corn, which was carefully garnered in fortified camps or cities, and regularly issued. It was largely a commissariat of plunder and exaction, but still an official, orderly, and calculated commissariat. In the Helvetic campaign he demanded supplies of the Æduans, but got none, and subsisted entirely, so far as we know, out of his bateau train, which was no doubt filled from the government magazines in the province. In the Ariovistan campaign he seized Besançon, and halted there a few days “ on account of corn and provisions.” Before marching against the Usipetes and Tenchtheri he “ provided corn.” In savage Britain he lived somewhat by foraging, like Sherman on his march to the sea, but he also exacted breadstuffs of the conquered tribes. In bis fifth Gallic campaign he dispersed his legions for winter quarters, “ to remedy the scarcity of corn.” After the overthrow of Vercingetorix he stationed two lieutenants among the Æduans, “to procure supplies of corn.”

Over and over Cæsar has to cut short some expedition, in order that he may get back to some fortified camp and issue rations. Now and then we hear of great collections of sumpter-horses, meant, no doubt, for the carriage, of food as well as other stores. In the first Spanish campaign, we are informed that the Afranians had “laid in a great stock of corn long before,” that “ a large quantity was coming in to them from the whole province,” and that they had “ a good store of forage.” Meantime Cæsar was expecting “ convoys from Italy and Gaul; ” and a little later we learn that these were “great convoys,” with a long train of baggage, more Gallico ; for the escort consisted of Gauls, and they had their usual swarm of beasts and wagons. As food remained scarce with Cæsar, he continued to send out foraging convoys, and also demanded of his allies “ cattle in lieu of corn. ” When more states submitted to him, he “ required them all to assist him with corn,” and received from them “ all the cattle in their country.” Later on we hear of a forced march, “ without wagons or baggage,” showing that in the usual movements the army had wagons. Another passage reveals the fact that the Afranians carried their baggage in packs on sumpter cattle.

The story of the Pharsalian campaign has equally interesting references to the question of food supply. We learn that Pompey’s men were abundantly furnished from maritime convoys, while the Cæsareans, for lack of a fleet, and being on hostile territory, were reduced to live on cattle. Wagons and sumpter-horses appear again as means of transportation; and what could a starving army have needed to carry so much as provisions ? In the narration of the field-work struggle around Dyrrhachium we discover what was the main purpose of that foraging which so many writers have regarded as the only source of the legionary rations. Among various reasons for investing Pompey, Cæsar wanted to “ prevent him from foraging, and thereby render his horse ineffective.” Pompey endeavored to counteract this trick by inclosing in his lines fields of corn lately sown, and eventually by feeding his beasts on leaves and twigs mixed with barley. Other passages in the Commentaries confirm this explanation of the object, or at least the principal object, of the daily forage. It was a duty done by the legionaries and camp followers for the benefit of the cavalry and baggage horses, and for the sustenance of the commissariat droves of cattle. If the reader will remember that the Roman horsemen were originally gentry, and that the plebeian foot-soldiers were largely their clients, he wilt understand the origin of the service.

It must be added that the haversack played a much more important part in Cæsarean warfare than it does in our era of abundant roads and railways. The usual ration issued was twenty-five pounds, and this was expected to last twelve days. In the first Spanish campaign, however, the Afranians received at one time a ration for twenty-two days, which must have been at least forty-six pounds. This ration was grain; if the soldier wanted aught beside, he gathered it; the foragings gave him frequent chances for that. Mills for grinding were carried by the legionary wagons or beasts of burden, and pans for baking by the men themselves. Metallic ovens may have been wagoned, also, or temporary ones masoned as they were needed. Such was the legionary’s outfit in the matter of food supply. Napoleon, whose authority is very great, judged it a better system than ours, and declared that the soldier was incomplete till he could back his corn and make his bread. Davoust, during the Russian campaign, carried out this idea to the letter. As a result of it, coupled, doubtless, with his severe discipline, he reached Borodino with fifty thousand men left out of eighty thousand, while no other corps commander had more than thirty thousand.

After all our boasting, then, over the immense and complicated machinery of the modern commissariat, it may be that we should do well to revive the Roman grain-sack, hand-mill, and bake-pan. An army furnished with Afranian rations, and with two burden mules to each company for extra cartridges, would carry its own “ base ” with it for at least three weeks, and during that time could manœuvre with absolute freedom, an advantage of inestimable importance. On the other hand, the load would certainly be a heavy one, and even discipline might fail to make our men bear it well and faithfully. One cannot help pausing to marvel over the toughness of the Roman infantryman. How could he possibly march under forty-five, or even twenty-five, pounds of rations, besides his very considerable weight of weapons and armor? Niebuhr may be right in asserting that the southern European is stronger than the northern one. The Turkish porters carry burdens beyond the force of any other men known to us. Lieutenant Shipp, in Constantinople, was surprised to see a Turk whip with ease one of his burliest sailors. In Italy, Hawthorne observed a slender peasant shoulder and bear off the trunk of a considerable tree. The Italian organ-grinder travels with a load which reminds one of the Afranian haversacks. Colonel Baker, in Soudan, discovered that his black troops could march all day under packages of seventy and even ninety pounds. But, in the case of the Romans, habit no doubt went for a great deal. Cæsar tells us that, while the Afranian legionaries had plenty of food, the men of the Spanish and other auxiliary cohorts were starving, " because their bodies were not accustomed to bear burdens,” — from which we may infer that they had thrown away their rations.

VALUE OF THE VETERAN.

As we have already noted, Cæsar’s theory of war differed in one foundation principle from that now in vogue. Napoleon’s first rule was that two men will beat one ; Cæsar’s was that one good man will beat two inferior ones. This diversity of principle arises, of course, from the difference between the ancient and the modern method of combat. In our style of fighting almost exclusively by machinery, success depends more on the number of missiles projected than on the character of the projectors; so that the veteran and the recruit are more nearly on a par than when they fought hand to hand. It is one of the foremost proofs of Napoleon’s genius that he first took full note of this fact, and devoted both strategy and tactics to the problem of concentrating two machines (guns) upon one. It may be observed, too, that he failed at Waterloo, partially, because he did not carry his principle far enough; because he clung to the old Gallic preference for phalanxes, and sent narrow-fronted columns against the broad sweep of English file-fire. To understand the entire folly of this attack of the column against the line, let us suppose that both armies had been composed of archers instead of musketeers. Who would think of forming bowmen into a deep phalanx, where four fifths of them could not bend their weapons, nor see to take aim? Who would advance a corps of arbalests, or of artillery, in column? Modern warfare tends entirely toward the use of the line, and even of the skirmish line.

But the Roman battles were decided at close quarters, man against man ; and there the experienced soldier was really a match for two or more novices or bunglers. He had coolness and manual skill; he was a sagacious fencing-master, — a practiced duelist; he expected to kill his man without getting hurt. Moreover, as the Romans frequently attacked in open order, a style of formation which requires long and severe drilling, he could charge or manæuvre far better than the recruit. Finally, he had learned to bear great burdens; he could dig earth-works every day, and build a bridge or a ship; he knew how to feed and even to arm himself, including the making of military engines; he was a good forager, baker, mechanic, and engineer, as well as swordsman. There was no question of his immense superiority over the novice in every branch of war, from commissary duty to fighting. Hence, Cæsar’s first principle, that one tried soldier would whip two new ones, and might be used with confidence for that purpose. It was with his old legions mainly that he fought his battles ; he used his freshly raised ones to guard baggage, dig trenches, and hold posts. Over and over, in his succinct but emphatic way, he expresses his admiration for the veteran. In the Gallic war he tells us how three hundred scarred invalids fought their way through the Germans, while five cohorts of a young legion flinched from the charge, and were nearly annihilated. In the Civil war we hear of two hundred old soldiers saving themselves by their obstinate valor, while two hundred and twenty recruits surrendered only to be massacred. “ Here it might be seen what security men derive from a resolute spirit,” moralizes the great general.

Every Roman commander, however, and even every Roman citizen, recognized this mighty difference between the tried and the raw soldier. The thirteenth legion was not one of Cæsar’s oldest; it was headed by a general who, even when he crossed the Rubicon, was less famous than Pompey ; yet the clank of its swift coming scared the patrician party out of Italy. At Pharsalia Labienus sought to strengthen the souls of his comrades by asserting that the conquerors of Gaul were no more, and that their places were filled by novices. Pompey, who knew the falsity of this tale, had no hope of winning the battle with his infantry, and fled in despair as soon as he saw the repulse of his great flank movement of cavalry. In the Commentaries and in Tacitus there are many passages which show that even the disbanded veteran was held to be a noteworthy man, and that in troublous times his opinion and preference carried weight with the public.

Meantime, the real veteran was a rara avis: it took no small service to make him; it took years and years of service. In Hirtius book of the Gallic war there is an extremely curious passage on this point. “ Cæsar,” he says, “ had with him three Veteran legions of distinguished valor, the seventh, eighth, and ninth. The eleventh consisted of chosen youth of great promise, who had served eight campaigns, but who, compared with the others, had not yet acquired any great reputation for experience and bravery.” Eight years of fighting under Cæsar, — more than twice the time of our great civil war, — and not vet veterans!

So precious, indeed, was the pure metal of old soldiers in Cæsar’s eyes that he would not mix it with recruits. If he wanted more troops, he raised new organizations, and kept the old ones as they were, enfeebling them by no padding of inexperience. The normal or paper strength of a legion was either five or six thousand men. When Cæsar marched to relieve Cicero, in the fifth year of the Gallic war, the two legions which he had with him “ numbered scarcely seven thousand men,” or an average of 3500 each. At Pharsalia the average strength of his eight legions was but 2750. The two which he carried to Alexandria amounted to only 3200 present for duty, or 1600 apiece. Later on, we find the sixth “reduced, by its many labors, the length of its marches and voyages, and the frequent wars in which it had fought, to less than a thousand men.” Yet all this time Cæsar was raising multitudes of men in Italy and the colonies, while after Pharsalia he had Pompey’s troops to call upon, many of them old soldiers.

At first thought, one marvels that organizations never recruited could continue to exist at all through ten or fifteen years of incessant fighting. But the well mailed and drilled Romans, if they were only victorious, suffered little in battle. Cæsar’s men were nearly always victors, and so had few killed outright. The battle of Pharsalia cost them only 230 dead, though many were wounded. At Gergovia a list of 700 slain really shocked the great general, and caused him to lecture his legions smartly for their indiscipline and recklessness. At Dyrrhachium a death-roll of about a thousand temporarily dismayed the whole army, and brought from Cæsar a second oration, in which he mingled reproof with words of cheer. Imagine Grant issuing an advisatoiy and consolatory general order because a corps some 25,000 strong had lost 960 killed! In short, Cæsar’s legions could keep their organization without being recruited, because they fought only successful battles, and in those suffered small mortality.

NATIONALITY OF THE TROOPS.

It is an interesting question, considerably debated of late, as to what race furnished these marvels of toughness and soldierly cleverness. There was no debate about it in Cæsar’s time. Everybody knew then that they were Roman citizens, born either in Italy or in the “ colonies.” Eighteen hundred years or so after the last of them was sepulchred, certain scholars of modern Celtica discovered that they were not Romans, but Celts. It is curious to note the confidence with which a French historian or an Irish reviewer will state that “ the famous tenth legion was composed of Gauls,” and that " Cæsar, at the head of an army of Gauls;, subdued his own country.” I must frankly admit that I do not know where this information is picked up. It surely is not to be found in the Commentaries.

Cæsar’s original legions were the seventh, eighth, ninth, and tenth, three of them quartered in Gallic Italy, and one in the province of Further Gaul. The tenth was early his favorite; probably, therefore, it was the one which first served under him, — the one which he found near Geneva, and used in fortifying the frontier against the Helvetians. Now it was certainly a fact that the troops which garrisoned a province were sometimes raised in the province itself, and hence, perhaps, the modern Celtic inference that Cæsar’s three senior legions were Cisalpine Gauls, and the tenth Gauls from ancient Gallia. This same inference also covers his four subsequent legions, the eleventh, twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth, all of which were raised in Northern Italy, or, as he sometimes phrases it, “ the country beyond the Po.”

But, if we read the Commentaries carefully, we shall find that at this period legions were not recruited among the aborigines at large of a province, but only in the Roman colonies. If Cæsar’s men had been foreigners, would Labienus have failed to mention the fact, when he undertook to depreciate them in his speech previous to Pharsalia? He merely says that the old soldiers had disappeared, and that their places had been supplied by “ recruits from Hither Gaul, and the greater part from the colonies beyond the Po,” One might go so far as to infer from this passage that the original troops were not even colonists, but Romans of Italian birth. If the men of the thirteenth legion had been foreigners, would Cæsar have talked to them as he did (Civil War, I. 7th) concerning innovations upon the republic, suppression of the intercession of the tribunes, the fate of Saturninus and the Gracchi, and the secession to the Aventine? What would a pack of Gauls and non-citizens know or care about such matters? Fancy a British general trying to fire the hearts of a division of Sepoys by discoursing of Magna Charta, the right of petition, and the death of Hampden! If we cannot imagine such idiocy in Sir Eyre Coote, we surely cannot impute it to the great Julius.

The legion was a peculiarly Roman institution ; it was connected with the earliest history of the holy city; it was a revered and almost sacred thing. Down to the time of Cæsar, and for some time later, it was not considered proper to embody in that form any but Roman citizens.² Afranius and Petrcius had eighty Spanish cohorts, but no Spanish legions. Varro, seeking to defend Bætica, raised thirty Spanish cohorts, and also two legions: but one of these was the vernacula, or natives, meaning natives of Italy resident in the province; the other was the colonica, meaning citizens of the colonies. The nine legions with which Pompey began the Pharsalian campaign were, as Cæsar tells us, made up of Roman citizens. One of them, “raised in Crete and Macedonia, was composed of veterans who had been discharged by their former generals, and had settled in those provinces.” His legions from Asia, Cilicia, and Syria, and his recruits from Epirus and Greece, were probably of a similar character. From the Alexandrian War we learn that Cassius Longinus, proprætor in Africa, “ instituted a levy of Roman citizens from all the municipalities and colonies.” In the African War we find Scipio’s Getulian horse claiming to be descendants of the fourth and sixth legions of Caius Marius. Later on, Roman citizens appear at Zama, serving in arms against Cæsar. Everywhere the colonists take personal and manful part in the war.

It was not until both parties had become greatly exhausted that legions of foreigners were embodied. During the final struggle of the Pompeians (Spanish War, xii. and xx.), we read for the first time of “ Spanish legionaries.” Caesar himself raised one Gallic legion, the Alauda, but at his own expense, as if it were an unlawful thing to draw on the public treasure for such a purpose. This, so far as we know, was his only legion of Gauls, and it was certainly not one of his veteran organizations. It is noteworthy that the Alauda was not allowed to bear the eagle of Rome as an ensign, and that the irregularity of levying it was expiated, as it were, by granting citizenship to its soldiers when they were disbanded.

In fine, it appears that all of Cæsar’s earlier legions were enlisted either in Italy proper, or in the “ colonies beyond the Po.” What the Roman colonies were we know well enough. Originally they were establishments of citizens, organized outposts of the republic, little Romes. From the time of Sulla onward they were in many cases settlements of discharged veterans. ” The members of a Roman colony preserved all the rights of Roman citizens.” They were warlike communities; the military spirit there was aboriginal and hereditary; soldiers and sons of soldiers naturally flowed into the legions. The Transpadane colonies were among the oldest and most flourishing outside of Italy proper. Aqnilea, for instance, at the period of the Helvetic war, had existed for a century and a quarter. That any large number of Cisalpine Gauls had acquired citizenship in those municipalities is, considering the jealousy of Romans on this subject, exceedingly doubtful. At all events, the great majority of their burghers must have been of Italian stock; and this fact settles the ethnic descent of Cæsar’s earliest and most famous troops.

Another item of evidence in the same direction is the nature of the legionary rations. In several passages of the Commentaries we learn that the legions must have bread, or they suffered what they considered destitution. At the siege of Avarieum “ the soldiers were for several days without corn, and satisfied their extreme hunger with cattle.” In Spain Cæsar levied supplies of cattle only because he could not possibly get grain. At Dyrrhachium, being without wheat, the troops “refused neither barley nor pulse, and held in great esteem cattle,” and furthermore made bread out of roots, for all which Cæsar praises them, as if it were something wonderful. Imagine an army of Gauls going very hungry, rather than live on beefsteaks and mutton-chops. Bread was specially an Italian staple of food, and was comparatively little used by the Celts.

But while Cæsar’s regular infantry was Roman, his light troops and cavalry were undoubtedly foreign. We read constantly of Numidian darters, Balearic slingers, Cretan and Syrian archers, Spanish targeteers, and troopers of all strange peoples. The Cæsarean horse was always either Gallic, or Aqnitanian, or German. Of Italian mounted men we find no trace on either side. Plutarch’s story, to the effect that the Pompeian cavalry was composed of young dandies, presumably Romans, is not borne out by Cæsar. He shows that it was a wonderful medley of mercenaries and auxiliaries, including freed slaves, Gauls, Germans, Cappadocians, Thracians, Egyptians, Galatians, Syrians, Dardanians, Bessians, Thessalians,“ and troops from other nations and states.” Not one Roman appears, not even an exquisite of an officer, the very chiefs being foreigners. It is probable that the easy defeat of these seven thousand troopers was owing largely to their mixed composition, and consequent lack of mutual confidence and of unity in action.

CHARACTERISTICS OF THE COMMENTARIES.

We are indebted to Cæsar for something more than a lucid and vivid history of his military operations. A sharpeyed man, and interested in everything human, he sketches with great liveliness the strange countries which he traversed and the strange peoples whom he vanquished. No ancient historian has given us more shrewd and seemingly truthful accounts of such matters. Unlike the author of the Germania, who at times appears to be lecturing the Romans on morals instead of furnishing them accurate information, Cæsar evidently wants to tell only the actual facts. And how very acute he is, as well as honest! In his pictures of the Gauls we get the very Irish of to-day, and not a little of the French, too, made over as they have been by much foreign mixture.

That Gallic reverence for parents which he notes may still be found beautifully vigorous in France. Nor has the old martial spirit died out of the breed, nor, altogether, the liking for more women than one. Nothing can be more Irish than this: “The nation of the Gauls is extremely devoted to superstitious rites.” Or this: “Their funerals, considering the state of civilization among the Gauls, are magnificent and costly.” Or this: “ Throughout Gaul there are only two orders of men of any rank or estimation: one is that of the priests, and the other that of the gentry.” Here is an Irish panic, or a French sauve qui peut: “The van, because they were out of danger and restrained neither by necessity nor command, broke their ranks at the first uproar and sought safety in flight.” Here we have the gossiping sociability, the credulity, and the inconsiderate vivacity of the race : “ It is the custom of this people to compel travelers to stop, even against their inclination, and inquire what they may have heard concerning any matter. Often, induced by these reports and stories alone, they engage in the most important enterprises, of which they must necessarily, erelong, repent, since they yield to mere unauthorized rumors.” Again: “ The nature of this people is such that they are full of credulity, and accept an unaccredited report as an authentic fact.” And again: “ The Gauls themselves add to the rumor, and invent what the case seems to require.” One is reminded of Thackeray’s remark that “ if the Irish do tell a great many more fibs than the English, on the other hand they believe a great many more.” We could hardly decide, from these judgments alone, whether the Roman general lived in our time, or the English satirist two thousand years ago.

Cæsar seems to have been particularly struck by the clan devotion and the political insubordination of the Gauls. “ Litaviceus,” he tells us, “ fled to Gergovia with his vassals, who, after the Gallic fashion, held it a crime to desert their patron, even in extreme misfortune.” When Orgetorix is to be tried for treason by the Helvetian magistrates, he gathers all his following, his “ tail,” and breaks up the court. We learn also that Vercingetorix, the great leader of the Auvergnats, was not the legal chief of the nation, but only the head of a party which had risen against the elder nobles, and that his first rising was made at the head of his personal dependents alone. In another place Cæsar explains that “in Gaul there are factions, not only in all the states and in all the cantons and their divisions, but almost in every family.” The result of such a state of society, as well as of the credulity and vivacity of the race, was a constant ebullition of political passion and fluctuation of political purpose, such as we still often see in Celtic lands, when they are not ruled by military force. Here we have the modern French: “ The Gauls are easily prompted to take up resolutions, and much addicted to change.” Also here: “ Others of them, from a natural fickleness and instability of disposition, were anxious for a revolution.” And revolutions there were everywhere: now the foreign party in the ascendant, and now the home rulers; now the seniors handing over insurgents to the Romans, and now the youth and their followers murdering the seniors; armies marching to help Cæsar, deciding to attack him, and before night becoming his allies again; plottings and risings against the Germans, the Sequani, and the Æduans, as well as against Rome,—such a perpetual facing about as never was seen except in a population of mere tribes and clans.

We cannot marvel that Cæsar should thrash and crush such a people with severity, to end the countless, fruitless, noxious uproars arising from their character and institutions. We cannot wonder, either, that the contest ended as it did. The Gallic communities were established, like the Italian communities which Rome had beaten in its youth, upon the narrow and enfeebling idea of blood relationship. The principle that if a man is your tenth cousin you must stand by him, right or wrong, and that if he is not your cousin you may rob and kill him, is obviously incapable of producing a quiet, industrious, populous, and civilized community. In the Gallic wars a nation founded on the broad idea of contract encountered a host of states founded on the limited idea of cousinhood. The former was sure to crush the latter, and mankind should be thankful that it did so.

THE STYLE OF CÆSAR.

Concerning the literary merits of the Commentaries, one dares say but little, after all that has been said thereupon by so many great scholars and critics. Their famed lucidity of style is rather a clear and logical arrangement of matter than a perfectly perspicuous arrangement of words in a sentence. Not even a good Latinist can read Cæsar at sight without discovering that he must pay close attention, or he will understand but incompletely. Aside from certain dislocations and entanglements of inversion, the periods frequently contain a good many words, and each word is meant to express a great deal. Details to which we would assign a paragraph are crammed into an adjective or a participle. A sentence is like memoranda, tied together by juxtaposition, and closing with a verb (jubet, for instance) to show what was done about all those matters. No translation into our modern uninflected languages can give any adequate idea of this density. Considering how much is told in few words, the diction of the Commentaries is lucid, but only in that sense.

This dense style is quite common in Latin, and must have been suited to a Latin public. One reason, perhaps, was that manuscript was expensive to both the writer and the reader; another, that books were addressed not to the million, but to a class of high intelligence. Cæsar could well be concise, for he wrote only for the eye of statesmen and soldiers and scholars, men who would comprehend him at a word. Officers and gentlemen did not need long-winded explanations to make them understand military movements and political measures. It is noticeable, moreover, that this compact, lucid, business-like way of writing is characteristic of great soldiers. In the Memoirs of Napoleon and the Despatches of Wellington you will discover the same logical order, unfailing selection of causative facts, indifference to uninfluential particulars, and apparent scorn of mere diction which you find in the Commentaries. I have no doubt that Napoleon’s rapid Summary of the Campaigns of Frederick would have delighted military Romans, and that Wellington’s two-page dispatch concerning Waterloo would have seemed to them abundantly long enough. I also believe that if we had commentaries by Alexander and Hannibal, we should find in them this same crystalline statement, without a wordy paragraph. The constant composition of orders and instructions teaches a general to be lucid and short, and leads him to look upon the contrary qualities with distaste. Moreover, the great soldier is by birthright a clear and quick thinker, and his literary utterance is naturally a reflex of his mental operations.

Extreme simplicity and naturalness of manner is another characteristic of the style of Cæsar. Nothing could be more high bred, more thoroughly like the speech of a finished gentleman, and less given to points and artifices of rhetoric. It has naught of that balancing of clauses and that sedulous modulation of closes which mark the writing of our so-called classic authors, the imitators of Isocrates and Quintus Curtius rather than of Xenophon and Cæsar. Translated literally into English, and somewhat expanded, as in English it must be, it reads more like Bunyan or Defoe than like Addison.³ Nor is there ever the slightest attempt at impressiveness, or what the French call emphase. Cæsar never “ bears on ” and never struts, not even when he is relating sublime deeds of heroism, — not even when he is explaining wonderful strokes of genius. At first it strikes one with complete astonishment that any human being who had taken a leading and passionate part in such great performances could write about them in a tone of such entire simplicity. We can understand it only when we remember that here was a very extraordinary man, who necessarily looked upon his extraordinary labors and achievements as the most natural things in the world. On the whole, taking into consideration the professional value of the matter in the Commentaries, and the perfectly perspicuous and gracefully simple manner in which that matter is presented, we must allot to Cæsar the singular distinction of having produced the best military narrative that ever was written.