axe and the two-handed sword; but they relied mainly on the lance. This was a heavy weapon, eighteen feet in length, balanced by the weight of its butt end, which was often a foot in diameter at twenty inches from the extremity, and made to fit the arm of the champion as it was laid in rest. The infantry carried at this time the famous cloth-yard bow; the bills, like a heavy scythe blade, set erect on a four-foot shaft- the leaden mallets and long knives of the Anglo-Normans; the pikes and halberds of the Swiss; the crossbows of the Genoese; and the Scottish spear.
Modern arms begin with the battle of Pavia in 1525, when the matchlock was first used so as ,to be of any real service, though it was awkward and had to be used from a rest. It was gradually improved, and at the beginning of the 17th century the bayonet was added, which made it much more complete, as it gave the musketeer a means of defense at close quarters. The rifle was brought into prominence in the American Revolution and in the Revolution in France. Since that time improvement has been rapid, and the invention of the simple modern percussion lock, of the minie-rifle bullet, of revolving-chamber pistols and of breechloading of every kind has greatly increased the destructive character of warfare.
The greatest attention and most experimenting are given to field artillery. Old systems and types passed away with 1892, and in 1900 the weapon used in 1890 was not considered good enough. Machine-guns that load, fire and extract by machinery are the weapons of to-day. Some are operated by hand-power, others by the action of the powder-gases on a piston or through the recoil of the barrel. The invention of smokeless powder, the application of electricity and the use of powerful explosives in shells have in recent years doubled the efficiency of arms. The speed at which they can be discharged has also increased greatly, the U. S. warship Georgia, five years younger than the Oregon, being able to fire nearly three and a half times faster. Smoke and fouling have been done away with. The size of weapons and their recoil from firing have been lessened. Pressure in the ammunition chamber has been diminished. Soldiers as well as gunners can aim now without exposing themselves, for not only is the telescope used for sighting, by fastening it to the weapon, but there is an invention, called the hyposcope, consisting of a series of mirrors in a tube below the line of sight.
To-day, the United States regular infantry and cavalry are armed with the short U. S. rifle, Springfield model 1903, which superseded the Krag-Jorgensen. See Artillery and Gunnery.
Armstrong, Samuel Chapman, an educational philanthropist, was born in 1839 in the Hawaiian Islands, where his father was a missionary, and died at Hampton, Va., May n, 1893. I*1 *862 he entered the Union army and rose to the rank of brigadier-general. During the war he took a hearty interest in the Freedmen's Bureau, and in 1868 he founded and became principal of the Hampton Institute of Virginia for the education of negroes and Indians.
Ar'my, a body of armed men, so organized and disciplined as to become a vast, movable military engine.
Ancient Armies. Sesostris of Egypt, about sixteen centuries before Christ, is the first conqueror who is said to have maintained a regular army. He divided his kingdom into thirty-six military provinces, and established a militia with which he overran Asia as far as India. Some centuries later the great Persian kings formed a vast standing army, apportioned as garrisons among the provinces, under control of military governors. In time of war this army was increased by a general levy from the barbarian peoples that had been conquered. The Greeks, who alone could resist these vast barbarian hosts, kept no standing army, but maintained militia in each small state which united in times of foreign war. They did much, however, for military science; the Spartans invented the phalanx; the Athenians added their light-armed troops and cavalry to cover the front and to harass the enemy in the rear. Miltiades is said to have first used the "double step," to increase the momentum of attack, while the Thebans first made use of the long and narrow column to pierce the lines of the enemy. The rise of the great Macedonian power marks the next standing army, which under Philip and Alexander conquered the world. Rome introduced changes in army matters that have influenced the whole civilized world. About 200 B. C. every Roman from the age of seventeen to forty-six was liable to be called upon to serve as a soldier. The levies passed through a severe course of discipline. Every year the magistrates sent up the names of the men liable to service, from which their legions were chosen, and the Roman legion in its best days excelled all other troops in discipline and valor.
Armies of the Middle Ages. When the feudal system arose, national armies gave place to the small armies gathered around each chief, whose little conflicts make up the greater pact of the wars of the middle ages. The crusades first united these troops into an army against a common foe, and showed the ne®d of organization and discipline; and from this time foot-soldiers began to take the place of the
