armies, had taken place according to Landsknecht custom, at the risk of the Colonels. The Colonel concluded a contract with the Prince; he filled and sold the captains' commissions; the Prince paid the Colonel the money contributed by the district. Thus the regiments were essentially dependent on the Colonel, and this was a power which might be used against the Prince. The discipline was loose; the officers' places occupied by creatures of the Colonel, and at his death the regiment was dissolved. The rogueries of Colonels and leaders of companies, which were already complained of in 1600 by the military writers, had attained a certain virtuosoship in their development. Seldom were all the men whose names stood on the rolls, really under the banner. The officers drew the pay for numbers who were not there, who were called "Passevolants," or "Blinde," and they appointed their grooms and sutlers, from the baggage-waggons, to be non-commissioned officers. In the Imperial army, also, complaints were endless of the most reckless selfishness from the highest to the lowest. In the midst of peace the officers plundered the hereditary States in which they were quartered; they fished and hunted in the environs, and claimed a portion of the city tolls; they caused beasts to be killed and sold; and set up wine and beer taverns. In like manner as the officers robbed, the soldiers stole. This continued still in 1677; and this plague of the country threatened to become lasting. The enlisting of recruits was still little organised in this early period; and the rogueries, which could not fail to accompany it, were at least unsanctioned by the highest authorities.

In Brandenburg the great Elector, immediately after his entrance on the government, reformed the connection between the regiments and the Sovereign; the enlistment was from thenceforth in his own name; he appointed the Colonel and the officers, who could no longer buy their commissions. Then first did the paid troops become a standing army, clothed, armed, and equipped alike, with better discipline, obedient instruments in the hands of the princes. This was the greatest advance in the military system since the invention of fire-arms; and Prussia owes to the early and energetic introduction of this new system its military preponderance in Germany. The commissariat, also, was reorganised; the men received, at least in war, their daily food in rations, and the provisions were supplied from great magazines. Through the efforts of Montecuculi, and later of Prince Eugene, Austria also, shortly before 1700, acquired a better disciplined standing army.

The whole complement of these troops could, up to 1700, be procured almost exclusively by free enlisting; for long after the great war the people continued in a state of restlessness, and had imbibed an adventurous spirit, to which military work was very enticing. This altered gradually. During the war-like period of Louis XIV., and from the increase of the French army, the German princes were compelled to a greater increase of their paid armies, and the loss of men occasioned by the incessant war had carried off many of the useless and bold rabble that collected round the banners. Even before the great war of succession the deficiency of men began to be felt; voluntary enlistment could nowhere any longer be obtained; complaints of the deeds of violence of the recruiting officers became at last troublesome. The military ruler, at last, began to scrutinize the men who seized under him, and sometimes had them exercised in companies. To use the militia for his warlike expeditions was impossible; they were too little trained, and, what was more important, they consisted more especially of respectable residents, whose labour and taxes could not be dispensed with by the State, as the nobility, and, in Catholic countries, the ecclesiastics, contributed nothing to his income. Besides this, it was an unheard-of thing for the people to be compelled by force into military service. However much he might feel himself the master, this was an innovation too much against the general feeling; the people bore their taxes and burdens expressly that he might carry on war for them. The peasant rendered service and soccage to his landlord, because in the olden time the latter had gone into the field for him. He then rendered taxes and service to the Sovereign because he had gone with his paid soldiers into the field for him, when his landlord was no longer willing to bear the burden; but now the peasant was to render the same service to landlord and Prince, and besides this to march himself to battle. This appeared impracticable; but again the pressure of bitter necessity was felt, and help must be found. Only the most indigent were to be taken—vagrants and idlers; but all whose labour was useful to the State, all who raised themselves in any sort out of the mass, were not to be disturbed.

Cautiously and slowly began the enlistment of the people for the military service of their Prince before 1700. It was proclaimed for the first time, but without success, that the country must supply recruits. The innovation was first attempted, it appears, by the Brandenburger in 1693: the provinces were to enlist and present the number of men wanting, yet not villeins; and the leaders of companies were to pay two thalers earnest money to each man. Soon they went further; and first, in 1704, called upon particular classes of tax-payers, and then in 1705 upon the community, to supply the necessary men. The recruits were to serve from two to three years, and those that willingly enlisted for six years and more were preferred. Exactly the same arrangement was made in Saxony in 1702 by King Augustus. There the communities had to provide for the Sovereign, as well as for the militia, an appointed number of young sound men, and to decide what individuals could be dispensed with. The enlistment-place was the Town-hall; the high-constables of the circles had the inspection. The man was delivered over without regimentals,—four thalers ready money were given,—the time of service two years,—and if the officer refused his discharge after two years, he who had served his time had the power to go away. Thus, timidly, did they begin to bring forward a new claim; and, in spite of all this caution, the opposition of the people was so violent and bitter that the new regulation was given up, and they returned again to enlistment. In 1708 forcible recruiting was abolished, "because it was too great an exaction." The iron will of Frederic William I. accustomed his people gradually to submit to this compulsion. After 1720 registers were made of children subject to military service, and in 1733 the "canton"^[3] system was introduced. The land was divided among the regiments; the citizens and peasants were, with many exceptions, declared subject to military service. Every year were the deficiencies in the regiments filled up through levies, in which, it must be remarked by the way, the greatest despotism on the part of the captains remained unpunished.

In Saxony they first succeeded, towards the end of the century, in carrying on the conscription together with the enlisting. In other parts, especially in small territories, that prospered less.

Thus the military system of Germany presents to our view this remarkable phenomenon, that at the same time in which increased intellectual development produced in the middle classes greater pretensions, together with higher culture and morals, the despotism of the rulers gradually effected another great political advance in the life of the people—the beginning of our common feeling of the duty of self-defence. And it is equally remarkable that this innovation did not begin in the form of a great and wise measure, but in conjunction with circumstances which would