Ill] AND HISTORIC TIMES 359 



having to bear a proportion of the expense. But even thus 

 the native supply was not sufficient for the needs of the French 

 war, for on the eve of the campaign of Crecy Sir John de 

 Brocaz and his son Oliver were employed to buy horses for 

 the King in Gascony. Indeed it is not without significance 

 that the great English victories over the French were due 

 rather to the bowmen than to men-at-arms. 



We get a glimpse of the horses ordinarily in use in England 

 at that time from Chaucer, though unfortunately he describes 

 only a few of the steeds ridden by that immortal company of 

 pilgrims who rode forth from the Bell at South vvark on a fine 

 April morning. The knight rode on a good horse, no doubt a 

 'great horse' able to carry a man in armour, whilst of the Clerk 

 of Oxenford it is said that "as leane was his horse as any rakeS" 

 The Wife of Bath wearing 'great spurs' rode astride of an 

 'amblere^' and the Shipman from Dartmouth sat on "a rouncy 

 as he couth V' the Ploughman rode 'a mereV the Reeve "sat 

 upon a fit good stot that was all pomely gray, and highte 

 Scot^" On the other hand in the Knight's Tale the poet 

 represents the "king of Ynde as riding on a horse of baye^." 



The improvement in the breed of English great horses seems 

 to have been counteracted by the Wars of the Roses, for during 

 that troublous time both factions seized without ceremony any 

 horse suited for military purposes, and accordingly the owners 

 of such to save themselves seem to have exported them to the 

 Continent, as is proved by the preamble to the Act passed in 

 the eleventh year of Henry VII' (1496) forbidding the export 

 of horses and of any mare of the value of six shillings and 

 eightpence, for it is stated that " not only a small number 

 of good horses were left within the realm for the defence 

 thereof, but also that great and good plenty of the same were 

 in parts beyond the sea which in times past were wont to be 

 within this land." In consequence of this enactment horses 

 became much more numerous, and Polidore Virgil says that at 

 this time the English were wont to keep large herds of horses 

 in pastures and common fields; and when the harvest was 



1 Prolonue, 1. 286. '^ 1. 469. ^ i. 88. * 1. .541. 



5 1. 615. 6 1299—1300. '' Gilbey, op. cit. p. 20. 



