CONSTITUTIONAL FORCES — THE MILITIA.
PrtoPosALs for diminishing the numbers of the militia are ,generally met by the argument that the militia is a constitutional force.' Take from the power or the pay of the regular troops, if you will ; but spare the militia—spare the constitutional force of the empire. We should like very much to receive some explanation of this distinction. The troops of the line are English, and inlisted for a limited period as well as the militia. Nay, the service of substitutes in the latter ends with the war only, if they happen to be raised in war ; and four-fifths of the militia are always substitutes. A soldier may be defined "a man employed to shoot the King's enemies, when so ordered—his brethren, or foreigners, as the case may be." Militia-men are admitted to be less efficient in the latter process ;—are they more efficient in the former ?: In one point of view they arc. Ever as we descend in the scale of discipline, do we find the force we employ more difficult to be kept within due hounds: the watchman uses his bludgeon much more, freely than the constable his staff'; and the constable will break you a hundred unotfending heads, for every thief that is winged by the horse patrol. In the same way, the volunteer draws his trigger oi pushes his bayonet on a provocation that would not ruffle the equanimity of the militia-man ; while the militia-man will charge in double quick time where the regular soldier will not budge though the fiend bid him. It ought, indeed, to be added, that precisely in the ratio of their advance is the capability of retreat possessed by those several gradations of heroes. The true meaning, therefore, of consti tutional force, seems to be—ono which, relatively speaking, is leas' under the command of reason and its officers, and pro tanto least fitter for the purpose for which it was raised. The militia are sanguinary it success, because little accustomed to victory; easily daunted, becaus little accustomed to danger ; never useful, but when, from being lom embodied, they have approached the condition of regular troops. Th, constitutional force, whose preservation is called for, is to be value( only when it most intimately resembles the non-constitutional force for whose reduction so patriotic efforts are every session made. The danger of a standing army to the principles of freedom is a sepa rate question, on which we do not now enter : all we mean to insist oi is, that if we must have guns and swords, they ought to be as true ant trenchant as possible.
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