The Essays, vol 8 | Page 5

none
but his master, and that he was so honoured after his death as to have a
city erected to his name. Caesar had also one which had forefeet like
those of a man, his hoofs being divided in the form of fingers, which
likewise was not to be ridden, by any but Caesar himself, who, after his
death, dedicated his statue to the goddess Venus.
I do not willingly alight when I am once on horseback, for it is the
place where, whether well or sick, I find myself most at ease. Plato
recommends it for health, as also Pliny says it is good for the stomach
and the joints. Let us go further into this matter since here we are.
We read in Xenophon a law forbidding any one who was master of a
horse to travel on foot. Trogus Pompeius and Justin say that the
Parthians were wont to perform all offices and ceremonies, not only in
war but also all affairs whether public or private, make bargains, confer,
entertain, take the air, and all on horseback; and that the greatest
distinction betwixt freemen and slaves amongst them was that the one
rode on horseback and the other went on foot, an institution of which
King Cyrus was the founder.
There are several examples in the Roman history (and Suetonius more
particularly observes it of Caesar) of captains who, on pressing
occasions, commanded their cavalry to alight, both by that means to
take from them all hopes of flight, as also for the advantage they hoped
in this sort of fight.
"Quo baud dubie superat Romanus,"
["Wherein the Roman does questionless excel."--Livy, ix. 22.]
says Livy. And so the first thing they did to prevent the mutinies and
insurrections of nations of late conquest was to take from them their

arms and horses, and therefore it is that we so often meet in Caesar:
"Arma proferri, jumenta produci, obsides dari jubet."
["He commanded the arms to be produced, the horses brought out,
hostages to be given."--De Bello Gall., vii. II.]
The Grand Signior to this day suffers not a Christian or a Jew to keep a
horse of his own throughout his empire.
Our ancestors, and especially at the time they had war with the English,
in all their greatest engagements and pitched battles fought for the most
part on foot, that they might have nothing but their own force, courage,
and constancy to trust to in a quarrel of so great concern as life and
honour. You stake (whatever Chrysanthes in Xenophon says to the
contrary) your valour and your fortune upon that of your horse; his
wounds or death bring your person into the same danger; his fear or
fury shall make you reputed rash or cowardly; if he have an ill mouth
or will not answer to the spur, your honour must answer for it. And,
therefore, I do not think it strange that those battles were more firm and
furious than those that are fought on horseback:
"Caedebant pariter, pariterque ruebant Victores victique; neque his fuga
nota, neque illis."
["They fought and fell pell-mell, victors and vanquished; nor was flight
thought of by either."--AEneid, x. 756.]
Their battles were much better disputed. Nowadays there are nothing
but routs:
"Primus clamor atque impetus rem decernit."
["The first shout and charge decides the business."--Livy, xxv. 41.]
And the means we choose to make use of in so great a hazard should be
as much as possible at our own command: wherefore I should advise to
choose weapons of the shortest sort, and such of which we are able to

give the best account. A man may repose more confidence in a sword
he holds in his hand than in a bullet he discharges out of a pistol,
wherein there must be a concurrence of several circumstances to make
it perform its office, the powder, the stone, and the wheel: if any of
which fail it endangers your fortune. A man himself strikes much surer
than the air can direct his blow:
"Et, quo ferre velint, permittere vulnera ventis Ensis habet vires; et
gens quaecumque virorum est, Bella gerit gladiis."
["And so where they choose to carry [the arrows], the winds allow the
wounds; the sword has strength of arm: and whatever nation of men
there is, they wage war with swords."--Lucan, viii. 384.]
But of that weapon I shall speak more fully when I come to compare
the arms of the ancients with those of modern use; only, by the way, the
astonishment of the ear abated, which every one grows familiar with in
a short time, I look upon it as a weapon of very little execution, and
hope we shall one day lay it aside. That missile weapon which the
Italians formerly made use of