488 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



poor wretches whom they had mustered to attend them to the field. 

 King Philip of France opened the battle of Crecy, in 1314, by charg- 

 ing bis Genoese cross-bowmen with his chevaliers, and slaughtering 

 them right and left ! 



The only men who resisted successfully these mounted ravagers 

 and maintained for themselves some of the rudimentary rights of hu- 

 manity were the merchants and artisans in the walled cities of Italy 

 and Flanders ; the Swiss, in their mountain fastnesses ; and the insular 

 English, whose dreadful long-bows would send arrows a cloth-yard in 

 length through the best Milanese plate-armor. In consequence of the 

 excellence of the English archery the Man on Horseback throve there 

 BO poorly that the worst condition of the English people in the middle 

 ages was always better than the best condition of those on the Conti- 

 ent. Nor could the Man on Horseback's charge avail against the 

 Italian and Flemish burghers, behind their solid walls. 



In 138G a horde of Austrian cavaliers, who were striving to reduce 

 the Swiss mountaineers to serfdom, penetrated some distance into the 

 Canton of Unterwalden. The ground was so rugged that they had to 

 dismount, and proceed on foot. They were compelled to cut off the 

 long toes of their shoes in order to be able to walk. They were sud- 

 denly confronted at Sempach by a small band of determined peasants. 

 Arnold Struth von Winkelried performed his immortal act of self- 

 sacrifice, by breaking with his naked breast the firm front of lances, 

 and his companions rushed in and slew the clumsy dismounted horse- 

 men. This and similar victories secured the freedom of the dwellers 

 among the Alps, and bred there a race of men who were to become 

 the flails to help beat feudalism to fragments. 



With these exceptions the print of the war-horse's hoof was on 

 every fertile acre in Europe. The long lance of his rider was the 

 sickle which reaped the fruit of every man's labor. Greedier and 

 greedier every year grew the hungry horde of steel-clad riders. Less 

 and less of the comforts of life they left the abject peasantry. Nearer 

 and nearer the condition of the laboring cattle sank those who delved 

 and planted, and reaped and garnered. 



The horsed harpies knew themselves well. They delighted in the 

 character of birds and beasts of prey, and were proud to make lions, 

 tigers, bears, eagles, and hawks, the cognizances by which they were 

 known. 



The sole mitigation of this reign of misery for the many was that, 

 in spite of their armor, these rapacious harriers occasionally devoured 

 one another. The strongest slew the less strong ; the lions killed off 

 some of the hyenas and jackals ; the eagles tore to pieces the kites and 

 hawks. The strongest and craftiest lord of some single hill-top killed 

 off a number of his associates in the robbery business, or seized their 

 lands after they had drunk and gorged themselves into the grave, and 

 became lord of all the hill-tops commanding the entire plain or valley 



