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MORE CONFIDENCE IN THE SWORD THAN IN THE PISTOL.

only in war, but also all affairs, whether publick or private, make bargains, conferr, entertain, take the air, and all on horse-back; and that the greatest distinction betwixt free-men and slaves amongst them, was, that the one rode on horse-back, and the other went on foot: an institution of which, King Cyrus was the founder. There are several examples in the Roman history, (and Suetonius more particularly observes it of Cæsar) of captains, who in pressing occasions commanded their cavalry to alight, both by that means to take from them all hopes of flight, as also for the advantage they hop'd for in this sort of fight. "Quo haud dubie superat Romanus.”—Liv. 7. 3. "Wherein the Romans did questionless excel:" so says Livy; however the first thing they did to prevent the mutinies and insurrections of nations of late conquest, was to take from them their arms and horses: and therefore it is that we so often meet in Cæsar: "Arma proferri, jumenta produci, obsides dari jubet." "-Cæsars Com. "He commanded the arms to be produc'd, the horses brought out, and hostages to be given." The Grand Signior to this day, suffers not a Christian, or a Jew, to keep a horse of his own, throughout his empire. Our ancestors, at the time they had war with the English, in all their greatest engagements, and pitch'd battels, fought for the most part on foot, that they might have nothing but their own force, courage and constancy, to trust to, in a quarrel of so great concern, as life and honour. You stake (whatever Chrysantes in Xenophon says to the contrary,) your valour, and your fortune, upon that of your horse, his wound or death brings your person into the same danger; his fear or fury shall make you reputed rash or cowardly; if he have an ill mouth, or will not answer to the spur, your honour must answer it: and therefore I do not think it strange, that those battels I spoke of before, were more firm and furious, than those that are fought on horse-back.

Their battels were much better disputed: now adays there are nothing but routs : 66 primus clamor, atque impetus rem decernit." "The first shout or the first charge puts an end to the business :" and the arms we choose to make use of in so great a hazard, should be as much as possible at our own command: wherefore I should advise to choose them of the shortest sort, and such of which we are able to give the best account. A man may repose more confidence in a sword he holds in his hand, than in a bullet he discharges out of a pistol, wherein there must be a concurrence of several executions, to make it perform its office, the powder, the stone, and the wheel, if any fail, it endangers your fortune: a man strikes much surer than the air directs him.

But of that weapon I shall speak more fully, when I come to compare the arms of the ancients with those of modern use, though by the way, the astonishment of the ear abated, which every one grows familiar with in a little time. I look upon it as a weapon of very little execution, and hope we shall one day lay it aside. That missile weapon which the Italians formerly made use of both with fire and without, was much more terrible: they called a certain kind of javeline armed at the point with an iron three foot long, that it might pierce through and through an armed man, Phalarica, which they sometimes in fieldservice darted by hand: sometimes from several sorts of engines for the defence of beleagured places: the shaft whereof being roul'd round

with flax, wax, rosin, oyl, and other combustible matter, took fire in its flight, and lighting upon the body of a man, or his targuet, took away all the use of arms and limbs. And yet coming to close fight, I should think they should also endamage the assailant, and that the camp being as it were planted with these flaming truncheons, should produce a common inconvenience to the whole crowd.

They had moreover other devices which custom made them perfect in (which will seem incredible to us who have not seen them) by which they supply'd the effects of our powder and shot. They darted their piles with so great violence, as oft-times transfixt two targets, and two armed men at once, and pinn'd them together. Neither was the effect of their slings less certain of execution, or of shorter carriage: "Saxis globosis funda, mare apertum incessantes: coronas modici circuli magno ex intervallo loci assueti trajicere: non capita modo hostium vulnerabant, sed quem locum destinassent."-Liv.1.38. "Culling round stones from the shoar for their slings; and with them practising at a great distance to throw through a circle of very small circumference, they would not only wound an enemy in the head; but hit any other part at pleasure." Their pieces of battery had not only the execution, but the thunder of our cannon also: "ad ictus monium cum terribili sonitu editos, pavor, et trepidatio cœpit.”—Id. Ibid. "At the battery of the walls, which is performed with a dreadful noise, the defendants began to fear and tremble within." The Gauls our kinsmen in Asia, abominated these treacherous missile arms, it being their use to fight with greater bravery hand to hand. "Non tam patentibus plagis moventur, ubi latior, quam altior plaga est, etiam gloriosius se pugnare putant: iidem quum aculeus sagittæ aut glandis abditæ introrsus tenui vulnere in speciem urit: tum in rabiem et pudorem tam parva perire pestes versi, prosternunt corpora humi.”—Id. Ibid. "They are not so much concern'd at large wounds; when a wound is wider than deep, they think they have fought with greater glory: but when they find themselves tormented within, under the aspect of a slight wound, with the point of a dart, or some concealed glandulous body, then transported with fury and shame, to perish by so small, and contemptible an officer of death, they fall to the ground;" an expression of something very like a harquebuse shot. The ten thousand Greeks in their long and famous retreat, met with a nation who very much gall'd them with great and strong bows, carrying arrows so long, that taking them up one might return them back like a dart, and with them pierce a buckler, and an armed man through and through. The engines of Dionysius his invention at Syracusa, to shoot, vast massy darts, and stones of a prodigious greatness with so great impetuosity, and at so great a distance, came very near to our modern inventions. But in this discourse of horses and horsemanship, we are not to forget the pleasant posture of one Maistre Pierre Pol, a doctor of divinity, upon his mule, whom Menstrelet reports always to have rid aside through the streets of Paris like a woman. He says also elsewhere, that the Gascons had terrible horses, that would wheel, and make the pirouette in their full speed, which the French, Picards, Dutch, and Brabanters lookt upon as a miracle, having never seen the like before; which are his very words. Cæsar speaking of the Swedes; in the charges they make on horse-back, says he, they often throw them

192 SCYTHIANS, IN DISTRESS, FED ON THE BLOOD OF THEIR HORSES.

selves off to fight on foot, having taught their horses not to stir in the mean time from the place, to which they presently run again upon occasion; and according to their custom, nothing is so unmanly, and so base as to use saddles, or pads, and they despise such as make use of those conveniences: insomuch that being but a very few in number, they fear not to attack a great many. That which I have formerly wondered at, to see a horse made to perform all his airs with a switch only, and the reins upon his neck, was common with the Massilians, who rid their horses without saddle or bridle.

"Equi sine frœnis deformis ipse cursus, rigida cervice, et extento capite currentium."-Liv. l. 35. "The career of a horse without a bridle must needs be ungraceful, his neck being extended stiff, and his nose thrust out." King Alphonso, he who first instituted the order des Chevaliers de la Bande, or de l'Escherpe in Spain, amongst other rules of the order gave them this, that they should never ride mule or mulet, upon penalty of a mark of silver; which I had lately out of Guevara's letters, which whoever gave them the title of golden epistles, had another kind of opinion of them than I have, and perhaps saw more in them than I do. The courtier says, that till his time it was a disgrace to a gentleman to ride one of these creatures: but the Abyssines on the contrary, as they are nearer advanc'd to the person of Prester John, do affect to be mounted upon large mules, for the greater dignity and grandeur. Xenophon tells us, that the Assyrians were fain to keep their horses fetter'd in the stable, they were so fierce and vicious: and that it requir'd so much time to loose and harness them, that to avoid any disorder this tedious preparation might bring upon them, in case of surprise, they never sat down in their camp, till it was first well fortified with ditches and ramparts. His Cyrus, who was so great a master in all manner of horse service, kept his horses to their ordinary, and never suffer'd them to have any thing to eat till first they had earn'd it by the sweat of some kind of exercise. The Scythians when in the field, and in scarcity of provisions, us'd to let their horses bloud, which they drank, and sustain'd themselves by that diet.

Those of Crotta being besieg'd by Metellus, were in so great necessity for drink, that they were fain to quench their thirst with their horses urine and to shew how much better cheap the Turkish armies support themselves than our European forces, 'tis said, that besides that the soldiers drink nothing but water, and eat nothing but rice and salt flesh pulveriz❜d (of which every one may easily carry about with him a months provision) they know how to feed upon the bloud of their horses, as well as the Moscovite and Tartar, and salt it for their use. These new discover'd people of the Indies, when the Spaniards first landed amongst them, had so great an opinion both of the men and horses, that they look'd upon the first as Gods, and the other animals enobled above their nature. Insomuch that after they were subdu'd, coming to sue for peace, and to bring them gold and provisions, they fail'd not to present of the same to the horses, with the same kind of harangue to them, they had made to the other; interpreting their neighing for a language of truce and friendship. In these nearer Indies, to ride upon an elephant was the first place of honour, the second to ride in a coach with four horses, the third to ride upon a camel, and the last to be

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carried, or drawn by own horse only. Some one of our late writers tells us, that he has been in a country in those parts, where they ride upon oxen with pads, stirrups, and bridles, and very much at their ease. Quintus Fabius Maximus Rutilianus in a battel with the Samnites seeing his horse, after three or four charges, had fail'd of breaking into the enemies battalion, took his course, to make them unbridle all their horses, so that having nothing to check their career, they might through weapons and men, open the way to his foot, who by that means gave them a bloudy defeat. The same command was given by Quintus Fulvius Flaccus against the Celtiberians: "Id cum majore vi equorum facietis, si effrænatos in hostes equos immittatis: quod sæpe Romanos equites cum laude fecisse memoriæ proditum est. Detractisque fronis bis ultro citroque cum magna strage hostium, infractis omnibus hostis, transcurrerunt.”—Liv. l. 40. "You will do your business with greater advantage of your horses strength, if you spur them unbridled upon the enemy, as it is recorded the Roman horse to their great glory have often done. And their bits being pull'd off without breaking a launce, to have charg'd through and through, with greater slaughter of the enemy." The duke of Muscovie was anciently oblig'd to pay this reverence to the Tartars, that when they sent any one embassy to him, he went out to meet them on foot, and presented them with a mazer, or goblet of mares milk (a beverage of greatest esteem amongst them) and so great, that if in drinking, a drop fell by chance upon the horses main, they thought themselves indispensably bound to lick it off with their tongue: the army that Bajazet had sent into Russia, was overwhelm'd with so dreadful a tempest of snow, that to shelter, and preserve themselves from starving, many ript up, and embowell'd their horses, to creep into their bellies, and enjoy the benefit of their vital heat. Bajazet, after that furious battel wherein he was overthrown by Tamerlain, was in a hopeful way of securing his own person by the fleetness of an Arabian mare he had under him, had he not been constrain'd to let her drink her fill at the ford of a river in his way, which render'd her so heavy and indispos'd, that he was afterwards easily overtaken by those that pursu'd him: they say indeed that to let a horse stale takes him off his mettle, but I should rather have thought that drinking would have refresht her, and reviv'd her spirits: Crœsus marching his army through certain commons near Sardis, met with an infinite number of serpents, which the horses devoured with great appetite, and which Herodotus says was a prodigy of ominous portent to his affairs. We call a horse Cheval entier, that has his main, ears, and other parts entire, and no other will pass muster. The Lacedæmonians having defeated the Athenians in Sicily, returning triumphant from the victory into the city of Syracusa amongst other insolencies, caus'd all the horses they had taken to be shorn, and led in triumph. Alexander fought with a nation call'd Daæ; a people whose discipline it was to march two and two together, arm'd on horse-back to the war, and being in fight one always alighted, and so they fought one while on horse-back and another on foot, one after another by turns. I do not think that for graceful riding, any nation in the world excells the French; though a good horseman, according to our way of speaking, seems rather to respect the courage of the man than his horsemanship and address in riding.

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194 MEN WALK THE PATH THEIR ANCESTORS TRODE BEFORE THEM.

CHAP. XXXVIII.-OF ANCIENT CUSTOMS.

I SHOULD willingly pardon our people for admitting no other pattern, or rule of perfection, than their own peculiar manners and customs. It being a common vice, not of the vulgar only, but almost of all men, to walk in the beaten road, their ancestors have trod before them: I am not content when they see Fabritius or Lelius, that they look upon their countenance and behaviour as barbarous, seeing they are neither cloath'd nor fashion'd according to our mode. But I find fault with their singularity, when it arrives to that degree of indiscretion, as to suffer themselves to be impos'd upon by authority of the present usance, as every month to alter their opinion, if custom so require, and that they should so vary their judgment in their own particular concern: when they wore the belly-pieces of their doublets up as high as their breasts, they stifly maintain'd that they were in their proper place: some years after they were slipt down between their thighs, and then they could laugh at the former fashion as uneasie and intolerable. The fashion now in use, makes them absolutely condemn the other two, with so great indignation, and so universal contempt, that a man would think, there was a certain kind of madness crept in amongst them, that infatuates their understandings, to this strange degree. Now seeing that our change of fashions is so prompt and sudden, that the inventions of all the taylors in the world, cannot furnish out new whimwhams enow to feed our vanity withal; there will often be a necessity, that the despised ones must again come in vogue, and even those immediately after fall into the same contempt, and that the same judgment must in the space of fifteen or twenty years, take up not only different, but contrary opinions, with an incredible lightness and inconstancy : there is not any of us so cautious and discreet, that suffers not himself to be gull'd with this contradiction, and both in external and internal sight to be insensibly blinded. I will here muster up some old customs, that I have in memory, some of them the same with ours, the others different, to the end, that bearing in mind this continual variation of human things, we may have our judgments clearer, and more firmly settled the thing in use amongst us of fighting with rapier and cloak, was in practice amongst the Romans also, "Sinistris sagos involvant, gladiosque distringunt."-Cæsar de bello civili, lib. 1. They wrapt their cloaks upon the left arm, and handled the sword with the right," says Cæsar; and I observe an old vicious custom of our nation, which continues yet amongst us, which is to stop passengers we meet upon the road, to compel them to give an account who they are; and to take it for an injury, and just cause of quarrel, if they refuse to do it: at the baths, which the ancients made use of every day before they went to dinner, and as frequently as we wash our hands, they at first only bath'd their arms and legs; but afterwards, and by a custom that has continued for many ages in most nations of the world, they bath'd stark naked in mixt and perfum'd waters, looking upon it as a great simplicity to bath in meer water: the most delicate and affected, perfum'd themselves all over three or four times a day. They often caused their hair to be pincht off; as the women of France have some time since, taken up a custom to do their foreheads.

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