Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, "Armour Plates" to "Arundel, Earls of"

Switzerland, which has no regular army, but trains almost the whole nation as a militia. The system, with many serious disadvantages, has the great merit that the maximum number of men receives a certain amount of training at a minimum cost both to the state and to the individual. Mention should also be made of the system of augmenting the national forces by recruiting "foreign legions." This is, of course, a relic of the _Werbe-system_; it was practised habitually by the British governments of the 18th and early 19th centuries. "Hessians" figured conspicuously in the British armies in the American War of Independence, and the "King's German Legion" was only the best and most famous of many foreign corps in the service of George III. during the Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars. A new German Legion was raised during the Crimean War, but the almost universal adoption of the _Krumper_ system has naturally put an end to the old method, for all the best recruits are now accounted for in the service of their own countries. ARMY ORGANIZATION