CHAP. XXIII.] WARS OF THE REVOLUTION. 



357 



With matchless bravery, however, they penetrated 

 the intervals between the French divisions, and riding 

 around with daring recklessness, attacked every face at 

 once. Unable to break the solid and steady formation 

 of the French infantry, they wheeled their horses round, 

 and reined them back upon the bayonets, hoping in that 

 way to force an entrance into the firm masses of the 

 foot-soldiery. They fired their pistols and carbines at 

 the distance of a few feet, and furious at their ill success, 

 hurled the weapons at the heads of their foe. After a 

 desperate struggle in which those who had lost their 

 steeds creeping along the ground cut at the legs of 

 the front ranks with their cimeters, the Mamelukes, 

 thoroughly beaten, fled in confusion, leaving a rampart 

 of dead men and horses around the squares, terrible 

 ]iroofs of the pertinacity and bravery with which they 

 had fought. The losses of the Mamelukes were very 

 heavy, while the French loss was only about 200.^ 



This action settled the question decidedly as to the 

 capacity of the French infantry to withstand the 

 Egyptian horsemen, and forms a good illustration of 

 the necessity of thorough discipline in the cavalry 

 service, as well as individual skill in the use of arms. 

 Had the Mamelukes been well drilled, to charge in order 

 in large masses, and been properly supported by a 

 sufficient force of horse artillery, who can doubt that 

 they Wk uld have swept the French infantry like chaff 

 before them ? As it was, with their imperfect tactics, 

 and their total want of artillery, they were very nearly 

 successful, a very few batteries of horse artillery would 

 have caused frightful losses in the massive formation the 

 French were obliged to adopt, and if they had deployed 

 to avoid the artillery fire, they would have been exposed 

 to the charge of the horsemen. 



In the combat of Sediman, shortly after the battle 

 of the Pyramids, during General Desaix's expedition 

 into Upper Egypt, an incident occurred which serves to 

 prove that it is the fire of an infantry square that alone 

 can save it against good cavalry, and not the bayonets. 

 ' Alison, i. 509, 510 ; Due de Rovigo's M^moire&, i. 56, 57. 



