AN OLD WAR MANUAL.
[To TEM EDITOR OF vas 4.8rseravos."1 Son,—The writer of the following letter to the New York Evening Post is a very well-known member of the New York Bar.—I am, Sir, Ste., S. R. H.
" In 1762 there was published in London, 'printed for Becket and P. A. do Hondt in the Strand,' a little volume entitled ' Military Instructions Written by the King of Prussia for the Generals of his Army. . . . Translated by an Officer.' I have a well-worn copy of this book. An inscription in it shows that it was presented in 1777—' Pignus amicitire parvum non indignum' —to Frederick Thomas, First Regiment of Guards. This gentle- man wrote in the inside of the cover from time to time the places where he served and the dates of service. In 1777 he was in camp at Brunswick and afterwards at Elk Head, Germantown, and Philadelphia, in 1778 in camp and garrison on New York Island and in the Jerseys, and in 1779 at Portsmouth, Virginia, and the camp at Verplanck'a Point. During these wanderings Mr. Thomas apparently studied this little treatise with diligence, marking many passages es tactically instructive to a subaltern, and others (one may imagine) because the strategic theory of Frederick so little resembled the practice of Sir William Howe. But there are three or four of the ' Instructions' which did not meet the student's approval. Across these broad pen strokes have been drawn to show, as it would seem, that they are unfit to be found in a book carried in the baggage of an officer and a gentleman. Let me quote these passages. At page 70 the King says 'When you find it very necessary, yet very difficult to gain any intelligence of the enemy, there ie another expedient, the' a oriel one. Yen take a rich Burgher, possessed of lands, a wife and children. You oblige him to go to the enemy% camp, as if to complain of hard treatment, and to take along with him as his servant, a spy who speaks the language of the Country; assuring him at the same time that in case he does not bring the spy back with him, after having remained a sufficient time in the enemy's camp, that you will set fire to his house and massacre his wife and children. I was forced to have recourse to this cruel expedient when wo were encamped at —; it answered my purpose? At page 75: • When we make war in a neutral country. . . . It may not be improper likewise to accuse the enemy of the meet pernicious designs against the inhabitants. If you are in a Pro- testant country, as in Saxony, for instance, you are to act the part of a zealous protector of Lutheranism ; and to inspire the common people, whose simplicity is easily imposed upon, with religious enthusiasm. If the people are Roman Catholics, you are to talk of nothing but toleration and throw all the blame of the violent animosity between the different sects of Christians, upon the priests of each; who, notwithstanding their disputes, are agreed In the fundamental articles of faith. . . . I repeat, that all you can do with the people of these Countries is judiciously to touch the string of religion ; and to convince them how they aro oppressed by the priests and the nobility.' And at page 165 it is said: The Commander-in-Chief will forbid pillage, 'but there is no necessity for being too strict with regard to any trifling profit which the officers may make.' All these passages were expunged from the book which belonged to Mr. Frederick Thomas, sometime of his Britannia Majesty's Guard. What a pity that some modern military instructions might not be expurgated by a man of honor and humanity.
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