The Weston Democrat

Military Resources.

In a new edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica the following tribute to the patriotism of the United States is found in the article on "Army," by Colonel Loyall: The military history of the United States is as strange as the rise and rapid growth of the nation. In 1790 the rank and file of the army, as fixed by act of Congress, amounted to 1,216 men; and in 1814 an English expedition of 3,500 men was able to seize and burn Washington, the capital of a country which even then numbered 8,000,000 of inhabitants. In 1861, at the commencement of the war, the whole regular force amounted to only 14,000 men. In April of that year the President called for 75,000 volunteers for three months to defend the capital, which was threatened; and in May a further call for 42,000 was made. In July two calls for 500,000 each were authorized by Congress, and as even this vast force proved insufficient for the gigantic struggle which America had now embarked in, it was found necessary to introduce the conscription. In October, 1863, a levy of 300,000 was ordered, and in February, 1864, a further call for 500,000 was made. Finally, in the beginning of 1865, two further levies, amounting to 500,000 men, were ordered, but were only partially carried out in consequence of the cessation of hostilities. The total number of men called under arms by the government of the United States between April, 1861, and April, 1865, amounted to 2,752,049, of whom 2,656,053 were actually embodied in the armies. If to these be added 1,100,000 men embodied by the Southern States during the same time, the total armed forces reach the enormous amount of nearly 4,000,000, drawn from a population of only 32,000,000—figures before which the celebrated uprising of the French nation in 1793, or the recent efforts of France and Germany in the war of 1870-71, sink into insignificance. And within three years the whole of these vast forces were peaceably disbanded, and the army had sunk to a nominal strength of only 30,000 men.