[Footnote 60: Vegetius finishes his second book, and the description of the legion, with the following emphatic words:--"Universa quae ix quoque belli genere necessaria esse creduntur, secum Jegio debet ubique portare, ut in quovis loco fixerit castra, arma'am faciat civitatem."]
[Footnote 61: For the Roman Castrametation, see Polybius, l. vi. with
Lipsius de Militia Romana, Joseph. de Bell. Jud. l. iii. c. 5. Vegetius,
i. 21--25, iii. 9, and Memoires de Guichard, tom. i. c. 1.]
Whenever the trumpet gave the signal of departure, the camp was almost instantly broke up, and the troops fell into their ranks without
delay or confusion. Besides their arms, which the legendaries scarcely considered as an encumbrance, they were laden with their kitchen furniture, the instruments of fortification, and the provision of many
days. [62] Under this weight, which would oppress the delicacy of a
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modern soldier, they were trained by a regular step to advance, in about six hours, near twenty miles. [63] On the appearance of an enemy, they threw aside their baggage, and by easy and rapid evolutions converted the column of march into an order of battle. [64] The slingers and archers skirmished in the front; the auxiliaries formed the first line,
and were seconded or sustained by the strength of the legions; the cavalry covered the flanks, and the military engines were placed in the rear.
[Footnote 62: Cicero in Tusculan. ii. 37, [15.]--Joseph. de Bell. Jud.
l. iii. 5, Frontinus, iv. 1.]
[Footnote 63: Vegetius, i. 9. See Memoires de l'Academie des
Inscriptions, tom. xxv. p. 187.]
[Footnote 64: See those evolutions admirably well explained by M.
Guichard Nouveaux Memoires, tom. i. p. 141--234.]
Such were the arts of war, by which the Roman emperors defended their extensive conquests, and preserved a military spirit, at a time when
every other virtue was oppressed by luxury and despotism. If, in the consideration of their armies, we pass from their discipline to their numbers, we shall not find it easy to define them with any tolerable accuracy. We may compute, however, that the legion, which was itself a body of six thousand eight hundred and thirty-one Romans, might, with its attendant auxiliaries, amount to about twelve thousand five hundred
men. The peace establishment of Hadrian and his successors was composed of no less than thirty of these formidable brigades; and most probably
formed a standing force of three hundred and seventy-five thousand men.
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Instead of being confined within the walls of fortified cities, which
the Romans considered as the refuge of weakness or pusillanimity, the legions were encamped on the banks of the great rivers, and along the frontiers of the barbarians. As their stations, for the most
part, remained fixed and permanent, we may venture to describe the distribution of the troops. Three legions were sufficient for Britain.
The principal strength lay upon the Rhine and Danube, and consisted of sixteen legions, in the following proportions: two in the Lower, and
three in the Upper Germany; one in Rhaetia, one in Noricum, four in Pannonia, three in Maesia, and two in Dacia. The defence of the Euphrates was intrusted to eight legions, six of whom were planted in Syria, and the other two in Cappadocia. With regard to Egypt, Africa, and Spain, as they were far removed from any important scene of war, a single legion maintained the domestic tranquillity of each of those great provinces. Even Italy was not left destitute of a military force. Above twenty thousand chosen soldiers, distinguished by the titles
of City Cohorts and Praetorian Guards, watched over the safety of the monarch and the capital. As the authors of almost every revolution that distracted the empire, the Praetorians will, very soon, and very loudly, demand our attention; but, in their arms and institutions, we cannot
find any circumstance which discriminated them from the legions, unless
it were a more splendid appearance, and a less rigid discipline. [65]
[Footnote 65: Tacitus (Annal. iv. 5) has given us a state of the
legions under Tiberius; and Dion Cassius (l. lv. p. 794) under Alexander Severus. I have endeavored to fix on the proper medium between these two periods. See likewise Lipsius de Magnitudine Romana, l. i. c. 4, 5.]
The navy maintained by the emperors might seem inadequate to their
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greatness; but it was fully sufficient for every useful purpose of
government. The ambition of the Romans was confined to the land; nor was that warlike people ever actuated by the enterprising spirit which had prompted the navigators of Tyre, of Carthage, and even of Marseilles, to enlarge the bounds of the world, and to explore the most remote coasts
of the ocean. To the Romans the ocean remained an object of terror rather than of curiosity; [66] the whole extent of the Mediterranean, after the destruction of Carthage, and the extirpation of the pirates, was included within their provinces. The policy of the emperors was directed only to preserve the peaceful dominion of that sea, and to protect the commerce of their subjects. With these moderate views,
Augustus stationed two permanent fleets in the most convenient ports of
Italy, the one at Ravenna, on the Adriatic, the other at Misenum, in the Bay of Naples. Experience seems at length to have convinced the ancients, that as soon as their galleys exceeded two, or at the most three ranks of oars, they were suited rather for vain pomp than for real service. Augustus himself, in the victory of Actium, had seen the superiority of his own light frigates (they were called Liburnians) over the lofty but unwieldy castles of his rival. [67] Of these Liburnians he
composed the two fleets of Ravenna and Misenum, destined to command, the
one the eastern, the other the western division of the Mediterranean; and to each of the squadrons he attached a body of several thousand marines. Besides these two ports, which may be considered as the principal seats of the Roman navy, a very considerable force was stationed at Frejus, on the coast of Provence, and the Euxine was guarded by forty ships, and three thousand soldiers. To all these we add the fleet which preserved the communication between Gaul and Britain, and a great number of vessels constantly maintained on the Rhine and Danube, to harass the country, or to intercept the passage of the
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barbarians. [68] If we review this general state of the Imperial forces; of the cavalry as well as infantry; of the legions, the auxiliaries, the guards, and the navy; the most liberal computation will not allow us
to fix the entire establishment by sea and by land at more than four hundred and fifty thousand men: a military power, which, however formidable it may seem, was equalled by a monarch of the last century,
whose kingdom was confined within a single province of the Roman empire. [69]
[Footnote 66: The Romans tried to disguise, by the pretence of religious awe their ignorance and terror. See Tacit. Germania, c. 34.]
[Footnote 67: Plutarch, in Marc. Anton. [c. 67.] And yet, if we may
credit Orosius, these monstrous castles were no more than ten feet above
the water, vi. 19.]
[Footnote 68: See Lipsius, de Magnitud. Rom. l. i. c. 5. The sixteen last chapters of Vegetius relate to naval affairs.]
[Footnote 69: Voltaire, Siecle de Louis XIV. c. 29. It must, however, be
remembered, that France still feels that extraordinary effort.]
We have attempted to explain the spirit which moderated, and the strength which supported, the