6. Skirmishers should be accustomed to _lie down_ at a given signal; as it is sometimes very important that both our artillery and infantry should be able to fire over them. 7. In retreat, skirmishers occupy every favorable point for _holding the enemy in check_. D. RULES FOR INDIVIDUAL SKIRMISHERS. 1. In advancing, in retreat, or at a halt, use _every cover_ that presents itself. 2. Preserve _the alignment and the intervals_, so far as possible. On open ground, this may be done perfectly. In woods, skirmishers should never, for a moment, lose sight of each other. 3. The security of the _flanks_ should be looked out for by the men near them. 4. Run over _exposed ground_ as quickly as possible. 5. Approach the _crest of a hill_ with great caution. 6. If threatened by _artillery alone_, advance and kill off the men and horses before they get into battery. When the pieces have got into battery, lie down, if on exposed ground, till they limber up again, and then recommence the fire. 7. A skirmisher, with the new rifled arms, ought, at five hundred yards, to be _more than a match for a gun_; for, in men and horses, he has a much larger target than the gun has in him. Again, with the new rifle shells, he may be able to blow up a caisson. 8. Neither should a skirmisher have much to fear from a _single horseman_. With his bayonet fixed, he would usually be able to defend himself successfully against the trooper, whose sabre is the shorter weapon of the two; more especially, if he will take care to keep on the trooper's left, which is his exposed side. 9. Never lose your calmness. Your power consists, not in rapid firing, but in the _accuracy of your aim_. Avoid all hurried and violent movements; and never raise your gun till sure of a shot. 10. The aim, according to the Tactics, is made by bringing the gun down, instead of raising it up. However little the soldier may be excited, he will be apt to pull the trigger more or less too soon; that is, while the muzzle is yet too elevated. This is the reason why infantry missiles usually _fly too high_. The difficulty would not be obviated by causing the aim to be made by raising the piece; for then the same disturbing cause already mentioned, the soldier's excitement, would make the shots fly as much too low, as they now fly too high. Rapid firing is another cause of this incompleteness of aim. Infantry firing is already too rapid to be effective; so that what is claimed for the new breech-loading weapons as an advantage, that they increase the rapidity of fire, furnishes, on the contrary, a strong objection to them. The effectiveness of the fire of a sharp-shooter, especially, will be usually in inverse, instead of direct proportion to the number of shots he delivers in a given time. In view of this, and of the tendency to pull the trigger before the muzzle is sufficiently depressed, it has become an established maxim, to "Aim low, Fire slow" TACTICAL USE OF ARTILLERY.