Alexandria advertiser and commercial intelligencer. [volume] (Alexandria [Va.]) 1800-1803, 1801-10-09
FROM A LATE LONDON PAPER.
MILITARY DOLLEGE.

relative fltuStion OF Great Britain and the
other European powers, and is inteyetted in
the fa,ure deitiny of the former State, can
nor have avoided feeling very great fats
faction in feeling parliament giving its
ianttion and it. fupport to the military col
lege eta liihed at Baeconsfeld. The funds
which have been Aligned by parliament
Tor the fupport oft, will admit of its be-
ing pue on more exteniiye fcalc, and
more fold foundation than it has hitherto
had.
Although our troops have at all times
performed an honorable part, and aitho'
they have furnifhcd US with generals wor-
thy to command them, it cannot be diff
fembled chat it is rather owing to their
courage and TO their patriotifm, than to the
pofeilion of any military means equal to
thofe of the enemy with whom they had to
contend. We have certainly been for more
than halfa century greatly behind hand
with the other powers of Europe in every
thing relative TO the arts of encampment,
and of fertilization, the application of en-
gineering to field fervice, the theory Of
great movements of an army--in fhort, in
all that belongs TO the duties Of the gene
raj &af. For iixty years Europe confined
itfelf, in its military career, to the pur-
lnit, more or leis clofely, of the fyRem in
PRODUCED by Outlaws Adolphus, and carri-
ed to the higheit degree of perfection by
Turenne, MontecalIi, Marlborough
Condo, Calinat, and Villars. Frederick
appeared, and his genius Immediately in
vented other means, and chalked out new
roads in which all haRened to tread, and
the young folders in other countries were
modelled upon the plan laid down by him.
Wherefo much was to be reaped, it is rea
ionabie to fuppofe that much was TOWN.
A great number of officers were formed,
particularly In France ard Aufria, who
fnpplied the generals with good aid de-
camps, and, what was of much greater i'm
portance, with an intelligent military taft
the mott valuable, and the mott indifpen-
fable part of an army. 1t is we'll known
how much suwarrow regretted his inabili-
ty to find this grand de/faeratum in the
Ruilian army, and that he coniidered his
troops as incapable from the want of it, of
acting without the aGifance of an ally who
was provided with it,. Amid this ala,oi}
general emulation which was excited in the
continental powers, our own country en-
joying It's peculiar felicity, confding in its
itrength, and ientible ofits maritime iupe-
riority, relied almof wholly on the unim-
peached valour of its troops, and If il dill
not remain wholly ttarionary il the career
OF improvements-it at leaf made much
lefs ftrides than other countries. For the
plan of bringing us to a level with, and G.
ven of making as ouritrip Others, we are
indebted to our preient commander in
chief. 1t was he who planned it, and it is
he who has inceGantly laboured to carry
it inro effect. All the Improvement which
could be male Immediately, fuch as thofe
which related to the inhruttion, the difci-
pline, and the equipment of the folder, he
had made; but he was ienGble that there
were fill others which time alone could
produce and bring TO majority. In this
view of the fubjets, he laid the plan Of the
Military College, the exiaencc of which
las been confirmed by parliament, which is
now become really national-objed.-
Henceforth we fhall no longer hsyei TO en-
Wy the ichools Of Po,ldan, Vienna, and
Paris, that Of Beaconsdeld will be nur-
fiery, fertilized by the patronage of the
country, by authority oil the commander in
chief, and by the care of the Secretary at
War.
The cafe is the fame with refpea to an
other objection which partly arifes out of
the former. Ifhas been alledged, that the
preient French generals received no eIe-
mentary initru6tior, and that they were
yet able to defeat the mott experienced
generals Of other nations. This propofi-
tion which proves the contrary of what
thofe who advance it are defrous Of infer.