CHAP, v.] 



CHIVALRY. 



157 



as all nations fought on the same principles, they did not 

 perceive the necessity or advantage of manoeuvring. The 

 generals were not tacticians, but were simply the warriors 

 most noted in the armies for their personal skill and 

 bravery in hand-to-hand fighting. 



The training in peace, as already mentioned, was very 

 severe and incessant — the gymnastic exercises being of 

 the most' difficult and laborious type — so that it is certain 

 that at no period before or since was individual prowess 

 and perfection of personal training so completely attained 

 as during the palmy days of chivalry. The object of 

 life, from early youth upwards, was to obtain the fullest 

 development of strength and skill in the use of arms and 

 horsemanship of which the human frame was capable. 

 The business of life was the preparation for, and the accom- 

 plishment of feats of arms in war ; the amusements and 

 recreations of peace were found only in the chase and in 

 the mimic conflicts of the tournament. 



But the military art was lost for the time. Each 

 knight, aided by his squires, fought a small battle on his 

 own account, and instead of a general action being guided 

 by scientific rules, it was but an aggregation of confused 

 combats between chiefs, who were all on a dead level of 

 equality with each other. 



The immense social influence of chivalry, the great 

 protection given by armour, the neglect of the infantry 

 service, and the contempt into which that service naturally 

 fell when composed only of the lowest classes, all tended 

 to give the knights an exalted idea of the cavalry service, 

 and a contempt for the infantry that was not justified. 



A good infantry, well armed with powerful pikes, and 

 carefully disciplined, could have always defended them- 

 selves against the attacks of the undisciplined and ill- 

 combined bodies of heavy armed horsemen, whose efforts 

 must have lacked solidity of order and unity of direction. 

 But when all Europe relied on the mounted knights, 

 when no man of position or influence dreamt of serving 

 in anything but the cavalry, who was to take the lead 1 

 Who to organise the infantry of the classes fit for soldiers, 

 and to arm them with the weapons fit for service ? 



