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238 



A HISTORY OF CAVALRY. 



[period III. 



ranks, and about 1633, the squadrons were placed in 

 regiments, and were ranged in four or three ranks.' 



According to the Cavalier Melzo, a custom was in use 

 in the early part of the sixteenth century of ranging 

 arquebusiers-^-cheval before the lancers. They fired 

 upon the enemy, and when they had shaken their order 

 by the fire, or when the enemy were approaching too 

 closely, they retired through openings in the line, or 

 around the flanks, and enabled the lancers to charge, 

 followed by a line of cuirassiers who supported them, 

 and pursued the fugitives in the event of success.* 

 Behind these again were another line of arquebusiers-^- 

 cheval. 



This was soon followed by the practice of intermixing 

 bodies of infantry musketeers with the cavalry. As the 

 horsemen by this time had adopted the trot as the pace 

 for charging, the musketeers were expected to keep up 

 with them, and by their fire aid in breaking the ranks of 

 the enemy. This, like most compromises, reduced the 

 effective force of the cavalry, which could only be 

 thoroughly attained by a charge at speed ; and yet did 

 not give the mixed force either the weight of fire, or the 

 steadiness of formation which a well-organised body of 

 infantry of the same strength would have had. 



These facts all serve to show how completely the 

 soldiers of that age misunderstood the real value and 

 uses of a cavalry force — and how completely the inven- 

 tion of firearms had upset the whole principles of 

 warfare. 



At the battle of Pavia in 1525, the Marquis of 

 Pescara. used (for the first time) this system of inter- 

 mingling infantry with cavalry.^ The great mistake made 

 by Francis I. was in charging with his hea'^y men-at- 

 armS; into the midst of the imperial army, at a time 

 when his artillery had checked their advance, and was 

 just about driving them back in disorder. He led his 

 horsemen to the attack, and his movement at once 

 masked the fire of the cannon. The imperialists rallied 

 and attacked and surrounded him — 1,500 Basque arque- 



' Nolan, 16. « Ba.-din, 2155. " Daniel, i. 233. ♦ Nolan, 16. 



