incident, and in the long war of the Spanish Succession both the army
and the _ordenanza_ found almost continuous employment. They were now
organized, as were most other armies of Europe, on the lines of the
French army, and in 1714 the old _tercios_, which had served in the
Spanish Netherlands under Marlborough, were brought to Spain. The
king's regiment "Zamora" of the present army descends from one of
these which, as the _tercio_ of Bovadilla, had been raised in 1580.
The army underwent few changes of importance during the 18th century,
and it is interesting to note that there were never less than three
Irish regiments in the service. In 1808 the _Irlanda, Ultonia_ (=
Ulster) and _Hibernia_ regiments had come to consist (as had similar
corps in the French service before the Revolution) largely of native
soldiers. At that time the Spanish army consisted of 119 Spanish and
foreign (Swiss, Walloon and Irish) battalions, with 24 cavalry
regiments and about 8000 artillery and engineers. There were further
51 battalions of militia, and the total forces numbered actually
137,000. The part played by the Spanish standing army in the
Peninsular War was certainly wholly insignificant relatively to these
figures. It must be borne in mind, however, that only continued wars
can give real value to long-service troops of the old style, and this
advantage the Spanish regulars did not possess. Further, the general
decadence of administration reacted in the usual way, the appointment
of court favourites to high command was a flagrant evil, and all that
can be urged is that the best elements of the army behaved as well as
did the Prussians of 1806, that the higher leading and the
administration of the army in the field were both sufficiently weak to
have ruined most armies, and that the men were drawn from the same
country and the same classes which furnished the _guerrilleros_ whom
it became fashionable to exalt at the expense of the soldiers. In the
later campaigns of Wellington, Spanish divisions did good service, and
the corps of La Romana (a picked contingent of troops which had been
sent before the war to Denmark at Napoleon's instance), though often
defeated, always retained some cohesion and discipline. But the result
of this war, the second French invasion, and the continued civil wars
of the 19th century was the destruction of the old army, and the
present army of Spain still bears traces of the confusion out of which
it arose.
The most important changes were in 1870, when conscription was
introduced, and in 1872, when universal service was proposed in its
place. The military virtues of the rank and file and the devotion of
the officers were conspicuously displayed in the Spanish-American War
of 1898, and it cannot be claimed even for the Germans of 1870 that
they fired so coolly and accurately as did the defenders of S. Juan
and El Caney.
TURKISH ARMY