Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1827) Vol 1.djvu/40

CHAP. I.
-----as ranks^[1]. A body of troops, habituated to preserve this open order, in a long front and a rapid charge, found themselves prepared to execute every disposition which the circumstances of war or the skill of their leader might suggest. The soldier possessed a free space for his arms and motions, and sufficient intervals were allowed, through which seasonable reinforcements might be introduced to the relief of the exhausted combatants^[2]. The tactics of the Greeks and Macedonians were formed on very different principles. The strength of the phalanx depended on sixteen ranks of long pikes, wedged together in the closest array^[3]. But it was soon discovered by reflection, as well as by the event, that the strength of the phalanx was unable to contend with the activity of the legion^[4].

Cavalry.The cavalry, without which the force of the legion would have remained imperfect, was divided into ten troops or squadrons ; the first, as the companion of the first cohort, consisted of an hundred and thirty-two men ; whilst each of the other nine amounted only to sixty-six. The entire establishment formed a regiment, if we may use the modern expression, of seven hundred and twenty-six horse, naturally connected with its respective legion, but occasionally separated to act in the line, and to compose a part of the wings of the army^[5]. The cavalry of the emperors was no longer composed, like that of the ancient republic, of the noblest youths of Rome and Italy, who, by performing their military service on horseback, prepared themselves for the offices of senator and consul ; and solicited, by deeds of valour, the future suffrages of

1. See the beautiful comparison of Virgil, Georgic. ii. v. 279.
2. M. Guichardt, (Memoires Militaires, torn. i. c. 4. and Nouveaux Memoires, torn. i. p. 293 — 311.) has treated the subject like a scholar and an officer.
3. See Arrian's Tactics. With the true partiality of a Greek, Arrian rather chose to describe the phalanx of which he had read, than the legions which he had commanded.
4. Polyb. 1. xvii.
5. Veget. de Re Militari, 1. ii. c. 6. His positive testimony, which might be supported by circumstantial evidence, ought surely to silence those critics who refuse the imperial legion its proper body of cavalry.