Hayes,

May be some truth to your pun! I read somewhere (famous last words I know; never-the-less) that "light Infantry" or skirmish companies preferred smaller men because it was felt they could generally move faster.

I believe in pre-war military theory at least "light infantry" was to be armed with the "rifle" (shorter two band such as the "Mississippi rifle") and "heavey infantry" was to be armed with the musket or "rifled musket" (longer
3 band weapons) Of course in practice it usually did not work out this way.