It is farther urged with great vehemence, that these troops of Ruffia and Heffe are not hired in defence of Britain; that we are engaged in a naval war for territories on a diftant continent; and that these troops, though mercenaries, can never be auxiliaries; that they increase the burden of the war, without haftening its conclufion, or promoting its fuccefs; fince they can neither be fent into America, the only part of the world where England can, on the prefent occafion, have any employment for land forces, nor be put into our fhips, by which, and by which only, we are now to oppofe and fubdue our enemies.

Nature has ftationed us in an inland inacceffible but by fea; and we are now at war with an enemy, whose naval power is inferior to our own, and from whom therefore we are in no danger of invafion: to what purpofe then are troops hired in fuch uncommon numbers? To what end do we procure ftrength which we cannot exert, and exhauft the nation with fubfidies at a time when nothing is difputed, which the princes who receive our fubfidies can defend? If we had purchased ships, and hired feamen, we had apparently increafed our power, and made ourselves formidable to our enemies, and, if any increase of fecurity be poffible, had fecured ourselves ftill better from invafions: but what can the regiments of Ruffia or of Heffe contribute to the defence of the coafts of England; or by what affiftance can they repay us the fums which we have ftipulated to pay for their coftly friendship?

The King of Great-Britain has indeed a territory on the continent, of which the natives of this ifland scarcely

knew

knew the name till the prefent family was called to the throne, and yet know little more than that our King vifits it from time to time. Yet for the defence of this

country are thefe fubfidies apparently paid, and these troops evidently levied. The riches of our nation are fent into distant countries, and the strength which should be employed in our own quarrel confequently impaired, for the fake of dominions, the intereft of which has no connection with ours, and which, by the act of fucceffion, we took care to keep feparate from the British kingdoms.

To this the advocates for the fubfidies fay, that unreasonable stipulations, whether in the act of fettlement or any other contract, are in themselves void; and that if a country connected with England by subjection to the fame fovereign, is endangered by an English quarrel, it must be defended by English force; and, that we do not engage in a war for the fake of Hanover, but that Hanover is for our fake expofed to danger.

Those who brought in these foreign troops have still fomething further to fay in their defence, and of no honeft plea is it our intention to defraud them. They grant, that the terror of invafion may poffibly be groundlefs, that the French may want the power or the courage to attack us in our own country; but they maintain, likewife, that an invafion is poffible, that the armies of France are so numerous that she may hazard a large body on the ocean, without leaving herself expofed; that she is exafperated to the utmost degree of acrimony, and would be willing to do us mischief at her own peril. They allow that the invaders may be intercepted at sea, or that, if they land, they may be defeated by our native

troops.

troops. But they fay, and fay justly, that danger is better avoided than encountered; that those ministers confult more the good of their country who prevent invafion, than repel it; and that if thefe auxiliaries have only faved us from the anxiety of expecting an enemy at our doors, or from the tumult and diftrefs which an invafion, how foon foever repreffed, would have produced, the public money is not spent in vain.

These arguments are admitted by fome, and by others rejected. But even those that admit them, can admit them only as pleas of neceffity; for they confider the reception of mercenaries into our country as the defperate remedy of defperate diftrefs; and think with great reason, that all means of prevention fhould be tried to fave us from any fecond need of fuch doubtful fuccours.

That we are able to defend our own country, that arms are most safely entrusted to our own hands, and that we have strength, and fkill, and courage, equal to the best of the nations of the continent, is the opinion of every Englishman who can think without prejudice, and speak without influence; and therefore it will no be easy to perfuade the nation, a nation long renowned for valour, that it can need the help of foreigners to defend it from invafion. We have been long without the need of arms by our good fortune, and long without the use by our negligence; fo long, that the practice and almost the name of our old trained-bands is forgotten. But the ftory of ancient times will tell us, that the trained-bands were once able to maintain the quiet and safety of their country; and reafon without hiftory will inform us, that thofe men are most likely to fight

bravely,

bravely, or at leaft to fight obftinately, who fight for their own houses and farms, for their own wives and children.

A bill was therefore offered for the prevention of any future danger or invafion, or neceffity of mercenary forces, by re-establishing and improving the militia. It was paffed by the Commons, but rejected by the Lords. That this bill, the firft effay of political confideration as a fubject long forgotten, fhould be liable to objection, cannot be ftrange; but furely, justice, policy, common reafon require that we should be trusted with our own defence, and be kept no longer in fuch a helpless state as at once to dread our enemies and confederates.

By the bill, fuch as it was formed, fixty thousand men would always be in arms. We have shown how they may be upon any exigence eafily increased to an hundred and fifty thousand; and I believe, neither our friends nor enemies will think it proper to infult our coafts when they expect to find upon them an hundred and fifty thousand Englishmen with fwords in their hands.

See Literary Mag. No ii. p. 63.

PREFACE

PREFACE

ΤΟ ΑΝ

INTRODUCTION to the Game of DRAUGHTS.

By WILLIAM PAYNE, Teacher of Mathematics *.

T is natural for a man to think well of the art which

IT

he profeffes to teach, and I may therefore be expected to have fome efteem for the play of DRAUGHTS. I would not, however, be thought to over-rate it. Every art is valued in a joint proportion to its difficulty and usefulness. The ufe of DRAUGHTS is the fame with that of any other game of skill, that it may amuse those hours for which more laudable employment is not at hand and happy is the man whofe equability of temper and conftancy of perfeverance in better things, exempt him from the need of fuch reliefs.

Whatever may be determined concerning its ufe, its difficulty is inconteftible; for among the multitudes that practise it, very few understand it. There are indeed not many who by any frequency of playing can attain a

First published 1756.

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