ON MODERN SYSTEMS OF FORTIFICATION, INCLUDING THAT PROPOSED BY M. CARNOT, AND A COMPARISON OF THE POLYGONAL WITH THE BASTION SYSTEM; TO WHICH ARE ADDED, SOME REFLECTIONS ON INTRENCHED POSITIONS, AND A TRACT ON THE BY GENERAL SIR HOWARD DOUGLAS, BART., G.C.B, G.C.M.G., D.C.L., F.R.S., AUTHOR OF A TREATISE ON NAVAL GUNNERY,' ETC. With numerous Illustrations. LONDON: JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET. 1859. 231. A. 30. The right of Translation is reserved. PREFACE. On the occasion of offering to the world a reprint of a work published more than forty years since, the author is desirous of explaining the reasons which have induced him to revert, at this distance of time, to a subject then justly thought to be of much importance; but which to many has appeared since to have lost its interest, and, for the object originally proposed in its publication, not to admit of being revised with any practical advantage. One of the reasons, as the author hopes to show, is that the subject, far from having lost any of its interest, assumes now a degree of importance greater than ever. What was, nearly fifty years since, only a theory has now been reduced to practice: the principles of M. Carnot having been extensively adopted by Prussian and Austrian engineers, in re-modelling the fortresses of their countries, and in constructing new ones. The strength and security of these, are objects of the most vital importance to all those nations by whose exertions, in one common alliance, the great war arising out of the French Revolution, in 1793, was brought to a successful termination. Europe was delivered from a state of humiliating subjugation, and rendered capable of repressing any aggressive attempts which might hereafter be made by France to extend her dominion beyond the limits to which she was then restricted. We are now, near the end of 1859, arrived at a most eventful period. Throughout the whole of Europe the minds of men are in a most unsettled state as to the question of peace or war. Commercial rivalry, the ambition of dominion, and a desire on the part of the great Continental powers to provide, respectively, for their national security, have induced those powers to put their fleets and armies on a full war establishment, even during a time of peace, as if in anticipation of a coming storm. No one can pretend to divine in what quarter it may arise; yet everyone feels that the state of Europe, with respect to the question of peace or war, depends upon the will of an absolute monarch. The present Emperor of the French was raised to his high station by the suffrages of the people and the army of France; apparently in the expectation that, by treading in the footsteps of his great predecessor, he would restore the military glories of France, retrieve and avenge the disasters of the war which terminated in 1815, and make to recoil on the powers of Europe the consequences resulting from the parts they had taken in the overthrow of the first empire: and, in this, Napoleon III. has in a great measure succeeded. It remains to be seen whether the French people will be satisfied with what has been done: whether the Imperial Army will be contented with the laurels it has so |