Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume I.djvu/781

ARMY 745 much less than the effective range of the old smooth-bore musket. The arrow penetrated a one-inch board, and would even pass through a breastplate. Thus it long maintained its place even against the first small firearms, especial- ly as six arrows could be shot off while the musket of that epoch could be loaded and fired once ; and as late as the end of the 16th cen- tury Queen Elizabeth attempted to reintroduce the national longbow as a weapon of war. It was especially effective against cavalry ; the arrows, even if the armor of the men-at-arms was proof against them, wounded or killed the horses, and the unhorsed knights were thereby disabled, and generally made prisoners. The archers acted either in skirmishing order or in line. Cavalry was the decisive arm of the middle ages. The knights in full armor formed the first effective body of heavy cavalry, charg- ing in regular formation, which we meet with in history ; for Alexander's cataphracti, though they decided the day at Arbela, were so much an exception that we hear nothing more of them after that day. The only progress, then, which the middle ages bequeathed to us, was the creation of a cavalry, from which our modern mounted service descends. And yet, what a clumsy thing this cavalry was, is proved by the one fact that during the whole middle ages the cavalry was the heavy, slow-moving arm, while all light service and quick move- ments were executed by infantry. The knights, however, did not always fight in close order. They preferred duels with single opponents, or spurring their horses into the midst of the hostile infantry ; thus the mode of fighting out a battle was carried back to the Homeric times. When they did act in close order, they charged either in line (one deep, the more lightly armed esquires forming the second rank) or in deep column. Such a charge was under- taken, as a rule, against the knights (men-at- arms) only of the opposing army ; upon its in- fantry it would have been wasted. The horses, heavily laden with their own as well as their riders' armor, could run but slowly and for short distances. During the crusades, there- fore, and in the wars with the Mongolians in Poland and Silesia, this immovable cavalry was constantly tired out, and finally worsted by the active light horsemen of the East. In the Austrian and Burgundian wars against Switzerland, the men-at-arms, entangled in difficult ground, had to dismount and form a phalanx even more immovable than that of Macedon ; in mountain defiles, rocks and stumps of trees were hurled down upon them, in consequence of which the phalanx lost its tactical order, and was scattered by a resolute attack. Toward the 14th century a kind of lighter cavalry was introduced, and a portion of the archers were mounted to facilitate their manoeuvring; but these and other changes were soon rendered useless, abandoned, or turn- ed to different account by the introduction of that new element, which was destined to change the whole system of warfare, gunpowder. From the Arabs in Spain the knowledge of the composition and use of gunpowder spread to France and the rest of Europe; the Arabs themselves had received it from nations fur- ther east, who again had it from the original inventors, the Chinese. In the first half of the 14th century cannon were first introduced into European armies heavy, unwieldy pieces of ordnance, throwing stone .balls, and unfit for anything but sieges. Small arms, however, were soon invented. Perugia supplied itself in 1364 with 500 hand-guns, the barrels not more than eight inches long ; they subsequently gave rise to the manufacture of pistols (so called from Pistoia in Tuscany). Not long afterward longer and heavier hand-guns (arquebuses) were manu- factured, corresponding to our present musket ; but, short and heavy in the barrel, they had but a restricted range, and the matchlock was an almost absolute hindrance to correct aim. Toward the close of the 14th century there was no military force in western Europe with- out its artillery and arquebusiers. But the in- fluence of the new arm on general tactics was not yet perceptible. Both large and small firearms took a long time in loading, and what with their clumsiness and costliness, they had not superseded the crossbow by 1450. In the mean time the general breaking up of the feu- dal system, and the rise of cities, contributed to change the composition of armies. The larger vassals were either subdued by central authority, as in France, or had become quasi-in- dependent sovereigns, as in Germany and Italy. The power of the lesser nobility was broken by the central authority in conjunction with the cities. The feudal armies no longer existed ; new armies were formed from the mercenaries whom the ruin of feudalism had set free to serve those who would pay them. Thus, some- thing approaching standing armies arose ; but these mercenaries, men of all nations, difficult to keep in order, and not very regularly paid, committed great excesses. In France, King Charles VII. therefore formed a permanent force from native elements. In 1445 he levied 15 compagnies d? ordonnance of 600 men each ; in all, 9,000 cavalry, stationed in the towns of the kingdom, and paid with regularity. Every company was divided into 100 lances; a lance consisted of one man-at-arms, three archers, an esquire, and a page. Thus they formed a mixture of heavy cavalry with mounted arch- ers, the two arms in battle acting of course separately. In 1448 he added 16,000 francs- archers, under four captains general, each com- manding eight companies of 500 men. All the archers had crossbows. They were re- cruited and armed by the parishes, and free from all taxes. This may be considered the first standing army of modern times. At the close of this first period of modern tactics, as they emerged from medifflval confusion, the state of things may be summed up as follows : i The main body of the infantry, consisting of