To STEP short, is to diminish or slacken your pace. On the word, step short, the foot advancing will finish its pace, and afterwards each man will step as far as the ball of his toe, and no further, until the word forward be given, when the usual pace of 24 inches is to be taken. This step is useful when a momentary retardment of either a battalion in line, or of a division in column, shall be required. See Am. Mil. Lib.
To STEP out, is to lengthen the step to 30 inches, by leaning forward a little, but without altering the cadence. It is also called the charging step, or accelerated pace. This step is necessary when a temporary exertion in line and to the front, is required; and is applied both to ordinary and quick time.
These phrases are frequently used in military movements, when it is found necessary to gain ground in front, or to give the rear of a column &c. time to acquire its proper distance. The officer who leads a head division should be particularly attentive, when he is ordered to step out or step short, especially in the different wheelings, not to lose the precise moment when either may be thought expedient; and in marching in open column, every successive officer should watch the seasonable moment, after a wheel, of preserving his relative distance.
To STEP off, in a military sense, to take a prescribed pace from a halted position, in ordinary or quick time, in conformity to some given word of command or signal.
Stepping off to music. In stepping off to music, or to the tap of the drum, it will be recollected, that the word of command is the signal to lift up the left foot, and that it comes down, or is planted, the instant the tap is given, or the music completes its first bar, so that the time must be invariably marked with the left foot, and not by the right, as has been practised by the British guards and the artillery, until a recent regulation.
Balancing STEP. A step so called from the body being balanced upon one leg, in order to render it firm and steady in military movements, &c. Men at the drill should be frequently exercised in this step. The manner in which it is executed is as follows:
At the word march, the left foot is advanced firmly, but without a jirk, the body is kept perfectly erect, the knee straight, the toe pointed out, the shoulders square to the front, and the whole weight of the body bearing on the right foot. Great care must be taken that the foot is thrown straight forwards, and that the shoulders do not go with it. When the men have remained in this position just long enough to make them perfectly steady, the word right, must be given. Upon which the left foot is planted firm, the body quite steady, and whole weight rests à plomb upon the left foot; the right foot is of course advanced as the left foot was before, and so on, the feet being thrown forward, alternately, at the words Right, Left. The drill serjeant or corporal must see, that the toe of each man comes rather first to the ground, that he rests on the flat of the foot that is planted, and by no means on the heel, that both knees are straight, and that his arms are kept close to his side without constraint.
When a recruit has been rendered tolerably steady in this step, he must be made to stand on one leg, and move the other to front and rear gently; he must then bring that leg to the ground, and do the same with the other. He must be frequently practised in this until he becomes quite steady on his legs, and has acquired a free motion from his hips without working his body.
Lock Step. See [Lock].
The side or closing Step. A step which is taken in order to gain ground to the right or left, without altering the front of the battalion, or of closing it to its centre, whenever a chasm occurs in the line after it has wheeled from column, &c. This step is performed from the halt, in ordinary time, by the following words of command:—