The supply trains must, therefore, be able to march at least as fast as the troops themselves, for only on this condition is there any guarantee that even under difficult circumstances the necessary supplies will be forthcoming; yet though experience most abundantly demonstrates the difficulties of maintaining the supplies of the Infantry in spite of the fact that, as a rule, their columns can cover the ground faster than the men can march, there appears to be a tacit assumption that with the Cavalry the trains will always arrive in time, although they move far slower than the troops they follow and supply. There was, indeed, a certain amount of justification for this idea in the days when Cavalry were more or less tied to the movements of the rest of the Army; but nowadays, when Cavalry operates independently, and must cover long distances in the shortest time, it has become simply preposterous. We have only to consider that we have now to reckon with average daily marches of from twenty-five to thirty miles, and that a beaten or evading force may have to retrace the same distance, perhaps even on the very same day, at a much faster rate than that at which it advanced, to perceive its absurdity. What chance would there be for waggons which could not go out of a walk, and cannot reverse on the road itself, which check at every hill, and sink to the axles in mud or sand? How can strategically independent Cavalry provide for the security of its baggage when it must often be left some days' marches behind? And yet it is precisely when operating against an active opposing Cavalry or an insurgent population that protection for the baggage becomes most indispensable. Again, how are such trains to be cleared away from the front when the main bodies of the two armies are closing on one another for battle? or how, after it is decided, can they be brought forward again to follow their Cavalry in pursuit, and convey to it the supplies which in such moments it will most need, and on whose prompt arrival its striking radius will depend? How, with insufficient mobility, will they maintain the connection between the combatants in front and the standing magazines, or even with the movable supply depots following behind the marching Army?