These examples from our history must fully demonstrate the great value of a militia when properly employed as a defence against invasion, and ought to silence the sneers of those who would abolish this arm of defence as utterly useless.  In the open field militia cannot in general be manoeuvred to advantage; whereas, in the defence of fortified places their superior intelligence and activity not unfrequently render them even more valuable than regulars.  And in reading the severe strictures of Washington, Greene, Morgan, and others, upon our militia, it must be remembered that they were at that time entirely destitute of important works of defence; and the experience of all other nations, as well as our own, has abundantly shown that a newly-raised force cannot cope, in the open field, with one subordinate and disciplined.  Here science must determine the contest.  Habits of strict obedience, and of simultaneous and united action, are indispensable to carry out what the higher principles of the military profession require.  New and undisciplined forces are often confounded at the evolutions, and strategic and tactical combinations of a regular army, and lose all confidence in their leaders and in themselves.  But, when placed behind a breastwork, they even overrate their security.  They can then coolly look upon the approaching columns, and, unmoved by glittering armor and bristling bayonets, will exert all their skill in the use of their weapons.  The superior accuracy of aim which the American has obtained by practice from his early youth, has enabled our militia to gain, under the protection of military works, victories as brilliant as the most veteran troops.  The moral courage necessary to await an attack behind a parapet, is at least equal to that exerted in the open field, where movements generally determine the victory.  To watch the approach of an enemy, to see him move up and display his massive columns, his long array of military equipments, his fascines and scaling-ladders, his instruments of attack, and the professional skill with which he wields them, to hear the thunder of his batteries, spreading death all around, and to repel, hand to hand, those tremendous assaults, which stand out in all their horrible relief upon the canvass of modern warfare, requires a heart at least as brave as the professional warrior exhibits in the pitched battle.

But we must not forget that to call this force into the open field,—­to take the mechanic from his shop, the merchant from his counter, the farmer from his plough,—­will necessarily be attended with an immense sacrifice of human life.  The lives lost on the battle-field are not the only ones; militia, being unaccustomed to exposure, and unable to supply their own wants with certainty and regularity, contract diseases which occasion in every campaign a most frightful mortality.