numbers were written upon their Helmets in great Characters calling them the first second third and fourth c. And not content with this every Soldier had the number of his File and the number of his place in that File engraven upon his Buckler Your Companies being in this manner made distinguishable by their Colours and accustomed to their Ranks and Files by practice and experience it is no hard matter though they be disordered to rally and reduce them suddenly again for as soon as the Colours are stuck down in the ground they are immediately visible and the Captains and Officers knowing which are their own repair themselves and dispose their Soldiers immediately to their places and when those on the left have placed themselves on the left hand and those which belong to the right hand on the right the Soldiers directed by their rules and the difference of their Colours fall immediately into their Ranks as easily as we put together the Staffes of a Barrel when we have marked them before These things if learned with diligence and exercise at first are quickly attained and hardly forgot for your raw men are directed by the old and in time a Province by these exercises might be made very fit for the War It is necessary therefore to teach them how to turn all together when to face about in the Rear or the Flanks and make Rear and Flank of the first Ranks when occasion is offered And this is no hard matter to do seeing it is sufficient that every man faces to that side he is commanded and where they turn their faces that is the Front True it is when they face to the Flank their Ranks do not hold their proportion because the distance betwixt the Front and the Rear is thereby much lessened and the distance betwixt the extremity of the Flanks is much encreased which is quite contrary to the genuine order of a Battalia for which cause great practice and discretion is required to rectifie it and yet this may be remedied by themselves But that which is of greater consequence and which requires more practice is when an Officer would turn his whole Company together as if it were a single man or a solid and massy body of it self And this requires longer experience than the other For if you would have it turn to the left the left corner must stand still and they who are next them march so leisurely that they in the right may not be put to run if they be it will breed confusion But because it always happens that when an Army marches from place to place that the Companies which are not in the Front are forced to fight in the Flanks or Rear so that one and the same Company is many times compelled to face about to the Flanks and Rear at one and the same time that these Companies therefore may in this exigence hold their old proportion according to what is said before it is necessary that they have Pikes in that Flank which is most likely to be attacked and Capidieci Captains and other Officers in their proper places CHAP. X. To range a Company in such order that it may be ready to face the Enemy on which side soever he comes Fabr. WHen you have marshalled your fourscore Files five in a File you are to put all your Pikes into the first twenty Files and place five of your Corporals in the head of them and five in the Rear The other 60 Files which follow are Bucklers all and consist of 300 men So then the first and last File of every Company are to be Corporals The Captain with his Ensign and Drum is to stand in the midst of the first hundred of Bucklers and every Centurion at the head of his Division When they are in this order if you desire to have your Pikes on the left hand you are to double them Company by Company from the right Flank if you would have them on the right you are to double from the left and this is the way by which a Company turns with the Pikes upon one Flank with their Officers at the Head and the Rear of them and their Captain in the midst and it is the form which is observed in a march But upon the approach of an Enemy when they would make a Front of a Flank they have no more to do but to command that all of them face about to that Flank where the Pikes are and in so doing the whole Battalia turns with its Files and Officers at the same time in the manner aforesaid for unless it be the Centurions they are all in their old places and the Centurions can quickly be there But when a Battalia marches in the Front and is in danger to be engaged in the Rear the Files are to be so ordered that the Pikes may be readily behind and to do this there needs no more but whereas usually in every Battalia every Century has five Files of Pikes in the Front those five Files may be placed in the Rear and in all other places the same order to be observed as before Cosimo If my memory fails not you said that this way of exercise is in order to the uniting these Battalia's into an Army and that this practice is sufficient to direct them in that But if it should happen this Squadron of 450 Foot should be to fight singly and by its self how would you order it then Fabritio He who commands them is to judge where his Pikes are to be disposed and place them as he thinks fit which is not at all consistant with what I have prescribed before for though that be a way to be observed in Battel upon an union or conjunction of several Squadrons yet it may serve as a rule in what ever condition you fall into But in showing you the two other ways which I recommended for the ordering of a Battalia I will satisfie you farther CHAP. XI To draw up a Company with two horns or another with a Piazza or vacuity in the middle TO come to the way of drawing up a Battalia or Squadron with two horns or points I say you must order your 80 Files five in a File after this manner In the midst you must place a Centurion with 25 Files two of Pikes to the left and three of Bucklers to the right when those five are disposed bring up the other twenty with twenty Files and File-leaders all of them to be placed betwixt the Pikes and the Bucklers only those who carry Pikes are to stand with the Pikes After these twenty five Files are so placed draw up another Centurion with fifteen Files of Bucklers after which the Constable or Captain is to draw into the middle with his Drum and his Colours with other fifteen Files of Bucklers This being performed the next to march up is the third Centurion who is to be at the head of 25 Files of 5 in a File three Bucklers to the left
one rank and the other so as there remains but six yards that can be used In the third rank for the same reasons there remains but four yards and an half in the fourth three yards and in the fift but one and an half The other ranks therefore are not able to reach the Enemy yet they serve to recruit the first ranks as we have said before and are as a rampart and bulwark to the other five If then five of their ranks are sufficient to sustain the Enemies horse why may not five of ours do as much having other ranks behind to reinforce them and give them the same support though their Pikes be not so long And if the ranks of extraordinary Pikes which are placed in the flanks should be thought too thin they may be put into a square and disposed in the flank by the two Battalia's which I place in the last squadron of the Army from whence they may with ease relieve both the front or the rear and give assistance to the horse as occasion requires Luigi Would you always use this order when-ever you were to give the Enemy Battel Fabr. No by no means for the form of your Army is to be changed according to the situation of the place and the strength or number of the Enemy as I shall shew by example before I finish my discourse But this form or model is recommended to you not as the best though in effect it is so but as a rule from whence you may take your other orders and by which you may understand the other ways of drawing up an Army for every Science has its Generalities upon which it is most commonly founded Only one thing I would press upon you to remember and that is That you never draw your Army up so as that your front cannot be relieved by your rear for whoever is guilty of that error renders the greatest part of his Army unserviceable and can never overcome if he meets with the least opposition and courage Luigi I have a new scruple that is risen in my mind I have observed that in the disposing of your Battalia's you make your front of five Battalia's drawn up by the sides one of another your middle of three and your rear of two and I should think it would have been better to have done quite contrary because in my opinion an Army is broken with more difficulty when the Enemy which charges it finds more firmness and resistance the further he enters it whereas it seems to me that according to your order the farther he enters it the weaker he finds it Fabr. If you remembred how the Triarii which were the third order of the Roman Legions consisted only of 600 men you would be better satisfied when you understood they were placed always in the rear for you would see that I according to that example have placed two Battalia's in the rear which consist of 900 men so that I choose rather in my imitation of the Romans to erre in taking more men than fewer And though this example might be sufficient to content you yet I shall give you the reason and it is this The front of the Army is made thick and solid because it is that which is to endure the first shock and insult of the Enemy and being not to receive any recruits from elsewhere it is convenient that it be well man'd for a few would leave it too weak and the ranks too thin But the second Squadron being to receive its friends into it before it is to engage with the Enemy it is necessary that it has two great intervals and by consequence must consist of a less number than the first For should it consist of a greater number or be but equal to the first either there must be no spaces or intervals at all which would occasion disorder or by leaving of spaces they would exceed the proportion of the first Squadron which would make your Army look very imperfect As to what you say touching the impression of the Enemy That the farther he enters your Army the weaker he finds it it is clearly a mistake for the Enemy cannot engage the second body before the first is fallen into it so that he finds the middle Battalion rather stronger than weaker being to fight both with the first and second together And it is the same thing when the Enemy advances to the last Squadron for there he has to encounter not only two fresh Battalia's but with all the Battalions united and entire And because this last Battalion is to receive more men it is necessary the distances be greater and by consequence that their number be less Luigi I am very well satisfied with what you have said but pray answer me this If the five first Battalia's retire into the three Battalia's which are in the middle and then those eight into the two Battalia's in the rear I cannot conceive it possible that the eight Battalia's first and afterwards the ten can be comprehended when eight or ten in the same space as when they were but five Fabr. The first thing I answer is this That the space is not the same for the five Battalia's in the front were drawn up with four spaces in the middle which were closed up when they fell in with the three Battalia's in the midst or the two in the rear Besides there remains the space betwixt the Battalions and that also which is betwixt the Battalia's and the Pikes extraordinary which space altogether do give them room enough To this it may be added That the Battalia's take up another place when they are drawn up in order before their retreat than they do after they are pressed for in their retreat they either contract or extend their Orders They open their orders when they fly they contract them when they retreat so that in this case it would be best to contract Besides the five ranks of Pikes in the Van having received the first charge are to fall back thorow the Battalia's into the rear of the Army and give way to the Scudati or Shields to advance and those Pikes falling into the rear of the Army may be ready for any Service in which their Captain shall think fit to employ them whereas did they not retire after the Battel was joyned they would be altogether useless And by this means the spaces which were left to that purpose are made big enough to receive all forces that are remaining And yet if those spaces were not sufficient the flanks on both sides are men and not walls which opening and enlarging their ranks can make such distances as will be able to receive them Luigi The ranks of Pikes extraordinary which you place in the flank of your Army when the Battalia's in the front fall back into the Battalia's in the middle would you have them stand firm and continue as two wings to the Army or would you have them retire with the Battalia's If you
the Romans marched in an Enemies Country and in what manner they are to be imitated Fabr. I Have shown you how an Army is drawn up and marshalled in order to a Battel I have told you how an Enemy is overcome and several circumstances which occur therein So that it is time now to inform you how an Army is to be ordered which has not an Enemy in view but is in continual probability of an assault This may happen when an Army marches in an Enemies Country or at least a Country that is suspected And first you must understand the Roman Armies had always some Troops of Horse which were scouting abroad in order to the discovery of the Roads After which followed the right Wing and after them the Carriages which belonged to that Squadron Then followed a Legion and after them their Carriages Then another Legion and their Carriages and after them the left Wing and the remainder of the Cavalry after them This in short was the manner in which the Romans marched most commonly and if it hapned in their march that their Army was assaulted either in the front or the rear they caused all their Carriages to withdraw to the right wing or the left as they found it convenient and most agreeable with the nature of the place and then when they were cleared of their Baggage and disincumber'd all of them unanimously make head against the Enemy If they were assaulted in the flank they drew their Carriages on that side where they were like to be most safe and then addressed themselves against the Enemy This way being good and well govern'd ought in my judgment to be imitated by sending your light Horse to scout about the Country and having four Battalions of Foot they are to follow one the other successively each of them with its Carriages in the rear And because Carriages are of two sorts one belonging to particular persons and others for the common use of the Camp I would divide the publick Carriages into four parts and assign one to every Battalion I would likewise divide the Artillery and the followers of the Camp into four parts that each Battalion should have equal share in their impediments and Carriages Bnt because it happens many times that you march thorow a Country not only suspected but so openly your Enemy that you expect every hour to be assaulted it will be necessary that to secure your self you change the form of your march and put your self into such a posture as that neither the Paisants nor the Enemies Army may be able to offend you though they come upon you never so suddenly In these cases your Generals of old were wont to march in a square order which they called a square not that it was exactly of that figure but because it was ordered so as it was able to fight in four places at once and by that means they were always ready either to march or to fight I shall follow this model for ordering my two Battalions which I have chosen to that purpose in stead of a compleat Army CHAP. II How an Army is to be Marshalled to march in an Enemies Country Fabr. TO march therefore securely in an Enemies Country and to be able to make good every part when surprized and assaulted by the Enemy I am to reduce my Army into a square according to the model of the ancients I would have a square whose area or vacuity within should consist of 212 yards in this manner I would first place my flanks distant one from the other 212 yards I would have five Battalia's in each flank marching length ways in files and at three yards distance the one Battalia from the other so that each Company taking up forty yards all of them together with the spaces betwixt them shall take up 212 yards Between the front and the rear of these two flanks I would dispose the other ten Companies in each of them five ordering them so that four of them should be placed in the front of the right flank and four in the rear of the left flank leaving a space of four yards betwixt each Company and of the two Companies that are left I would have one placed at the head of the left flank and the other in the rear of the right And because the space betwixt one flank and the other consists of 212 yards and these Battalia's drawn sideways in breadth rather than length will take up intervals and all 134 yards there will remain a space of 78 yards betwixt the four Companies in the front of the right flank and the same space will be possessed by the four Companies in the rear nor will there be any difference but that one space will be behind towards the right wing and the other before towards the left In the space of 78 yards before I would put my ordinary Velites in the space behind my Velites extraordinary which would not amount to a thousand for each space But to contrive it so that the great space within should consist of 212 yards square it would be convenient that the five Companies which are placed in the front and the five Companies in the rear should take up none of that space which belongs to the flanks wherefore it is necessary that the five Companies behind should with their front touch the rear of the flanks and those five Companies in the Van with their rear should touch the front of the flanks so that there should remain on each side of the Army a distance sufficient to receive another Company And because there are four spaces I would take four Ensigns of the Pikes extraordinary and place one in each of them and the two Ensigns which would remain I would place in the midst of the space of my whole Army in a square Battalion at the head of which the General of the Army should stand with his Officers about him But because these Battalia's thus ordered do march all of them one way at once but do not so when they fight when they are drawn up those sides are to be put into a fighting posture which are not guarded by other Battalia's And therefore it is to be considered that the five Battalions in the front are defended on all sides but just in the front so that they are to be drawn up in great order with the Pikes before them The five Companies behind are guarded on all sides but behind so as they are likewise to be ordered with Pikes in their rear as we shall show in its place The five Companies in the right flank are guarded on every side but only on the right flank The five in the left flank are the same only on the left flank they are open and therefore in the managing your Army you must observe to place your Pikes so as they may turn about to that flank which is naked and exposed and your Corporals are to be in the front and in the rear that being to
repulse but to relieve one another they observe this order they put their Battalions one in the flank of another but somewhat behind it towards the right hand so that if the first be in any distress the second advances to relieve it The third Battalion they place behind the other two but at the distance of the shot of a Harquebuss that if the two Battalions should be worsted the third might advance in their rescue and that which advances and the other which retire may have space to pass by one another without any clashing or collision for gross bodies cannot be received so commodiously as little and therefore small bodies disposed at a distance as they were in the Roman Legions might better receive and relieve one another upon occasion And that this order of the Swisses is not so good as the ancient order of the Romans is demonstrated by many examples of their Legions when they were engaged with the Macedonian Phalanxes for these were still worsted by the other The fashion of their Arms and their way of Reserves being more effectual than the closeness and solidity of a Phalanx CHAP. IV. How the Author would make use of both Greek and Roman Arms for his Battalion and what was the ordinary Army of the Romans BEing therefore according to these Models to range and marshal an Army I think it best to retain something of the Arms and Orders both of the Phalanx and Legion For this reason I have said in a Battalion I would have 2000 Pikes which were the Arms of the Macedonian Phalanx and 3000 Scudi or Shields and Swords which are the Arms of the Romans I have divided a Battalion into ten Battalia's or Companies as the Romans divided their Legions into ten Cohorts I have ordered the Velites or light-arm'd to begin the fight as they did formerly And because as the Arms are mix'd they participate of the one Nation and the other that they may participate likewise in their orders I have appointed that every Company may have five files of Pikes in the front and the rest of Bucklers that the front may be enabled to keep out the Horse and break more easily into the Foot having Pikes in the first charge as well as the Enemy by which they may be fortified to sustain it bravely till the Bucklers come up and perfect the Victory And if you consider the strength and vertue of this Order you will find how all these Arms perform their office exactly For Pikes are very useful against Horse and against Foot too before the Battels be joyned but after they are joyned they are utterly useless For this reason behind every third rank of Pikes the Swissers put a rank of Halbards which was to make room for their Pikes though indeed it was not enough Placing therefore our Pikes before and our Bucklers behind them they are enabled to sustain the Horse and when they come to charge they do open and press hard upon the Foot but when the fight is begun and the Battels are joyned the Bucklers succeed with their Swords as being manageable more easily in the crowd Luigi We desire now to understand how with these Arms and Orders you would manage your Army to give the Enemy Battel Fabritio I shall show you nothing at present but this You must know that in an ordinary Army of the Romans which they called a Consular Army there were no more but two Legions of Citizens consisting in all of 600 Horse and about 11000 Foot They had besides these as many more Horse and Foot sent them in by their Friends and Confederates These Auxiliaries were divided into two parts the right wing and the left for they would never suffer them to exceed the number of the Foot of their Legions though their Horse indeed they permitted to be more With this Army consisting of 22000 Foot and about 2000 Horse a Roman Consul did all his business and attempted any thing Yet when they were to oppose a greater power they joyned two Consuls together and their two Armies You must know likewise that in the three great Actions of an Army their march their encampment and engagement they placed the Legions in the middle because the force in which they reposed their greatest confidence they thought fit should be more united and compact as I shall show you more at large when I come to treat of those things These Auxiliary Foot by vertue of their conversation with the Legionary Foot grew to be as Serviceable as they because they were train'd and disciplin'd with them and upon occasion of Battel drawn up in the same figure and order He therefore who knows how the Romans marshalled one single Legion in the day of Battel knows how they disposed of them all When I have told you therefore how they divided a Legion into three Squadrons and how one Squadron received another I shall have told you how a whole and entire Army is to be ordered when it is to be drawn up for Battel CHAP. V. The way of drawing up a Battalion according to the intention of the Author BEing to prepare for a Battel according to the method of the Romans as they had two Legions so I would take two Battalions and by the ordering of them you may guess how to order a compleat Army For to add more men is only to multiply their ranks I think it unnecessary to repeat what foot there are in a Legion what Companies what Officers what Arms what Velites in ordinary what in extraordinary what Pikes and what other things For it is not long since I told you distinctly and press'd it upon your memories as a thing very necessary for the understanding all other Orders wherefore I shall pass on without farther reflection It seems to me best that one of the ten Battalions or Companies of a Battalion be placed in the left flank and the other ten of the other Battalion on the right Those on the left are to be ordered in this manner Put five Battalia's one on the side of the other in the front so as there may remain a space of four yards betwixt each draw them up so as they may possess in breadth 140 yards of ground and in depth forty behind these five Battalia's I would place three others distant in a right line from the first about forty yards of these three I would have two follow directly the Companies which are upon the two extremities or corners of the five first and the third should be disposed in the midst by which means these three Companies should take up as much ground both in breadth and depth as the other five which have only five yards distance betwixt the one and the other whereas the three last should have thirty three This being done I would cause the two Companies remaining to advance and place themselves behind the three former in a right line and at the distance of forty yards but it should be in such a sort
that each of these two Companies should be ranged directly behind the extremity of the three precedent Companies and the space left betwixt them should be 91 yards By these means all the Companies thus disposed should extend themselves in front 161 yards and in depth 20. After this I would extend the Pikes extraordinary along the flanks of all the Companies on the left hand at about twenty yards distance and I would make of them 140 ranks of seven in a rank so that they should secure all the left flank in depth of the ten Battalia's drawn up as I said before and I would reserve forty files of them to guard the Baggage and the unarmed people in the rear distributing their Corporals and other Officers in their respective places The three Constables or Captains I would place one at the head of them another in the midst and a third in the rear who should execute the Office of a Tergiductor who was always placed in the rear of the Army But to return to the front of the Army I say that after the Pikes extraordinary I would place the Velites extraordinary which are 500 and allow them a space of forty yards By the side of these on the left hand I would place my men at Arms with a space of 150 yards after them I would advance my light Horse at the same distance as I allowed to my men at Arms. As to the Velites in ordinary I would leave them about their Battalia's which should take up the space which I left betwixt each Company unless I found it more expedient to put them under the Pikes extraordinary which I would do or not do as I found it more or less for my advantage The Captain General of the Battalion should be placed in the space betwixt the first and second orders of Battalia's or else at the head of them or else in the space betwixt the last of the first five Battalia's and the Pikes extraordinary as I found it most convenient he should have about him 30 or 40 select men all brave and experienc'd and such as understood how to execute their Commission with prudence and how to receive and repel a charge and I would have the Captain General in the midst of the Drums and the Colours This is the order in which I would dispose my Battalion on the left wing which should contain half the Army and take up in breadth 511 yards and in depth as much as I have said before without reckoning the space that was possessed by the Pikes extraordinary which should be as a Shield to the people without Arms and take up a space of about a hundred yards The other Battalion I would dispose on the right side leaving betwixt the two Battalions a distance of about 30 yards having order'd it as the other At the head of that space I would place some pieces of Artillery behind which should stand the Captain General of the whole Army with the Drums the Standard or chief Ensign and two hundred choice men about him most of them on foot and amongst them ten or more fit to execute any command The General himself should be so mounted and so arm'd that he might be on Horseback and on foot as necessity required As to the Artillery ten pieces of Cannon would be enough for the taking of a Town In the Field I would use them more for defence of my Camp than for any Service in Battel My smaller pieces should be of 10 or 15 pound carriage and I would place them in the front of the whole Army unless the Country was such that I could dispose them securely in the flank where the Enemy could not come at them This form and manner of ranging an Army and putting it in order may do the same things in a Battel as was done either in the Macedonian Phalanx or the Legion of the Romans for the Pikes are in the front and all the foot placed in their ranks so that upon any charge or engagement with the Enemy they are able not only to bear and sustain them but according to the custom of the Phalanx to recruit and reinforce their first rank out of those which are behind On the other side if they be over-power'd and attack'd with such violence that they are forced to give ground they may fall back into the intervals of the second Battalia behind them and uniting with them make up their body and charge them briskly again And if the second Battalia is not strong enough to relieve them they may retire to the third and fight all together in conjunction so that by this order as to the business of a Battel we may supply and preserve our selves according to the Grecian and the Roman way both As to the strength of an Army it cannot be ordered more strong because the two wings are exactly well fortified with Officers and Arms nor is there any thing weak but the rear where the people which follow the Camp without Arms are disposed and they are guarded with the Pikes extraordinary so that the Enemy cannot assault them any where but he will find them in very good order neither is the rear in any great danger because an Enemy can be hardly so strong as to assault you equally on all sides if you found he was so strong you would never take the Field against him But if he was three times as many and as well ordered as you if he divides and weakens himself to attack you in several places beat him in one and his whole enterprize is lost As to the Enemies Cavalry though they out-number you you are safe enough for the Pikes which encompass you will defend you from any impression from them though your own Horse be repulsed The chief Officers are moreover plac'd in the flank so as they may commodiously command and as readily obey and the spaces which are left betwixt one Battalia and the other and betwixt one rank and another serve not only to receive those who are distressed but gives room for such persons as are sent forward and backward with orders from the Captain Add as I told you at first as the Romans had in their Army about 24000 men I would have our Army consist of the same number and as the Auxiliaries took their method of Fighting and their manner of drawing up from the Legions so those Soldiers which you would joyn to your two Battalions should take their form and discipline from them These things would be very easie to imitate should you have but one example for by joyning either two other Battalions to your Army or adding as many Auxiliaries you are in no confusion you have no more to do but to double your ranks and whereas before you put ten Battalia's in the left wing put twenty now or else you may contract or extend them as your place and Enemy will give leave Luigi In earnest Sir I am so well possess'd of your Army that
they are great impediments to your sight one with its beams and the other by raising the dust and carrying the powder into your eyes besides the wind being contrary is a great disadvantage in rendring the blows which they give the Enemy more languid and weak and as to the Sun your must not only take care that it be not in your face nor does you no prejudice in the beginning of the Fight but that it does you no injury when it gets up wherefore the best way is when you draw up your men to have it if possible on their backs that many hours may pass before it can come about into their faces Hanibal knew this advantage very well and made use of it in the Battel of Cannas and Marius did the same against the Cimbrians If you be weaker in Horse it is your best way to draw up among the Vines or the Woods and such other impediments as in our times the Spaniards did when they beat the French in the Kingdom of Naples near Cirignuola And it has been many times seen that the same Soldiers which have been worsted and bastled before by only changing their order and shifting their ground have recovered the Victory Thus it was with the Cartbaginians who having been many times worsted by Marcus Regulus were afterwards Victorious by the Conduct of Kantippus the Lacedemonian who caused them to come down into the plain where they might have room for their Horse and their Elephants and by so doing they were too hard for the Romans According to the practice of the Ancients I have observed That all great Generals when they have known which quarter of the Enemy was the strongest and where they have fortified most they have not opposed the strongest part of their Army against it but have chose rather to confront it with the weakest of their divisions and with their strongest attack the weakest of the Enemies When afterwards they came to engage they commanded the strongest of their Squadrons that they should not only stand firm and receive the charge without making any advance whilst the weaker parts had orders to suffer themselves to be overcome and by giving ground gradually to fall behind the rear of the Army The Artifice procures two great disorders to the Enemy The first is that the strongest part of his Army is environ'd insensibly the other is that imagining their Victory certain by the retreat of their Enemy they fall frequently into disorder which many times robs them of that Victory of which they thought themselves so certain Cornelius Scipio being in Spain against the Carthaginians under the command of Asdrubal and knowing that Asdrubal understood very well that in the drawing up his Army he put the Roman Legions which were the strength and flower of his Army in the midst and that Asdrubal in probability would do the like When they came afterwards to Fight he changed his order put his Legions in the Wings and his light arm'd men in the Body When the Battel was joyned he commanded his Body to slacken their march on a sudden and the Wings to double their pace so that only the Wings on both sides engaged and the Bodies on both sides being at a distance one from the other came not up to one another and the strongest part of Scipio's Army fighting better than the weakest of Asdrubal's he overcame them In those days that stratagem was well enough but in our days by reason of our Artillery it is unpracticable for the space which would be left betwixt the two Bodies would give opportunity to the Artillery to play which as we said before would be very dangerous So then that way is to be laid aside and the way which I recommended before is to be used which is to charge with your whole Army and let your weakest Squadrons retire When a General finds his Army stronger than his Enemies if he would encompass it insensibly and that the Enemy may not prevent him let him draw up his Army to an equal front with the Adversary afterwards in the heat of the Fight let him order by little and little to retire in the front and let the Wings advance as gradually and it will always happen that the Enemy shall be encompassed before he is aware When a General would fight and be sure not to be routed let him draw up his Army near some place of retreat or security as either Fens Mountains or some strong inexpugnable Town for in that case he may pursue the Enemy but the Enemy cannot pursue him Hanibal made use of this cunning when his fortune began to decline and he began to apprehend the Conduct of Marcellus Some Generals to disturb the orders of the Enemy have commanded their light armed men to begin the Battel and when it is once joyned to retire among the ranks When afterwards it grows hotter and both sides are thorowly engaged they have had orders to draw forth out of the flanks of the Army and having flanked the Enemy unexpectedly they have disordered and broke him If any one finds himself weaker in Horse besides the ways proposed before he may place a Battalia of Pikes behind them and draw them up in such manner that in the heat of the Battel they may open and give way for the Pikes to pass thorow them and by so doing he shall be sure to prevail Several have accustomed their light armed men to fight among their Horse and they have been found to give the Horse very good assistance Of all those who are famous for drawing up Battels Hanibal and Scipio are the most renowned for the great skill that both of them expressed in their conflict in Africa but because Hanibals Army was composed of Carthaginians and Auxiliaries of several Nations he placed 80 Elephants in his front behind them he placed his Auxiliaries next them his Carthaginians and last of all his Italians in whom he could not safely conside and the reason why he ordered them so was because the Auxiliaries having the Enemy in their faces and finding themselves closed up with Carthaginians at their backs should not think of flying but being under a necessity to fight he did hope they might either overcome or so harrass the Enemy that when he came up with his fresh men he might the more easily overthrow them Against this order Scipio placed his Hastati Principes and Triarii in his accustomed manner so as upon occasion they might be received one into the other The front of his Army he made up with great spaces but that it might appear close and united to the Enemy he filled them up with his Velites with order that as soon as the Elephants come upon them they should retire and entring among the Legions by the ordinary spaces leave a way open for the Elephants to pass by which means the fury and execution of the Elephants being evaded they came presently to handy-blows and the Carthaginians were overcome Zanobi
advance than others Nevertheless in making a front of your right flank your Velites are to enter into the intervals betwixt the wings of the Army and the horse should approach to the left flank into whose place the two Companies of Pikes extraordinary which were placed in the middle should succeed but the carriages should remove and the unarm'd people by the great space and overture that is made and retire behind the left flank which is now become the rear of the whole Army and the other Velites who were placed in the rear at first are not to budge in this case because that place should not remain open being of the rear become the flanks all other things are to be done as in my first directions for the making of a front What is said before of making a front of the right flank will serve for making a front of the left flank for the same order is to be used if the Enemy comes upon you so strong that he is able to attack you on both sides you must fortify the places where you suspect he will charge by doubling your ranks from the place where he does not appear to fall on by dividing your Artillery your Velites and your Horse distributing them equally in both places If he assaults you in three or four sides at once you or he must be very imprudent for had you been wise you would never have put your self into a place where an enemy could have come at you on so many sides especially with a form'd and well ordered Army For to ruine you securely it is necessary the Enemy be strong enough to attack you on all sides and with as many men in every place almost as in your whole Army and if you be so indiscreet to march into his Country or put your self into the power of an enemy whose men are three times as many and as well experienced as yours if you miscarry you can blame no body but your self but if misfortune happens not by your fault but by accident of war no body will condemn you and it will fair with you as it did with Scipio in Spain and Asdrubal in Italy But if the Enemy be not much stronger than you and yet ventures to assault you in several places the rashness will be on his side and the success in all probability on yours for of necessity he must so weaken himself that you may receive him in one place and charge him briskly in another and then you will easily ruine him This way of ordering an Army against an enemy that is not in sight but is hourly expected is very necessary and it is very useful to accustom your Souldiers to close and change and march in this order and in their march to shew them how to fight according to my first front and then falling into their march again upon a new alarm in the rear to turn that into a front and then each of the flanks and so in their first posture again and these exercises are very necessary if you would have your Army ready and well disciplin'd For which cause I would recommend it to all Princes and great Captains to restore these practices of the ancients for what is military discipline but to know how to command and execute these things well what is a well disciplin'd Army but an Army train'd up well in these kind of exercises and he who in our times would but frame his discipline to this I am confident could never be worsted But to continue our discourse if this square figure be difficult it is not to be laid aside for that for that difficulty is necessary nevertheless exercise will make it easy for having learn'd how to draw your self up and preserve your figure you will easily understand afterwards how to maintain other figures in which there is not so much difficulty Zanobi I am of your mind that those orders are necessary and cannot tell as to my self what can be added or substracted Yet I would willingly be satisfied in two things One is when you would make a front of your rear or one of your flanks and would have your men face about how you do signify your commands whether by word of mouth or sound of trumpet The other is whether those you send before to plain the ways and make them passable for your Army are to be Souldiers drawn out of your Battalia's or other Country people designed on purpose for that work CHAP. IV. Of Commands derived by word of mouth by Drums and Trumpets and of the nature of Pioneers Fabr. YOur first demand is of very great importance for many Armies have been ruined when the Captain 's orders have been mistaken or not heard for which reason the words of Command in such great dangers ought to be clear and intelligible and if you would signify your commands by the sound of your Trumpets or Drums great care is to be taken that the sounds be so different and distinguishable one from the other that they cannot be mistaken If your commands are by word of mouth you must use particular and be sure to avoid general terms and in your particular words you must be cautious to use none that may be liable to an ill interpretation Many times the crying back back has been the loss of an Army wherefore that word is to be avoided and instead of it you are to say retreat If you would change your front and make it either in the flank or the rear you must not say turn but face about to the right or the left to the front or the rear and in like manner all the words of command are to be plain and intelligible as march on stand firm advance retreat and what ever may be done by word of mouth clearly and distinctly is to be signified that way what cannot be done that way is to be done by the Trumpet and Drum As to the Pioneers which is your second demand I would have that office performed by my own Souldiers as well because it was the practice of ancient times as because thereby I should have fewer idle persons in my Army and by consequence fewer impediments I would command out of every Battalia what number I thought necessary I would furnish them with Pickaxes and Spades and cause them to leave their arms with their next ranks who should carry them for them so that when the enemy appeared they should have no more to do but to fall back to their ranks and take them again Zanobi But who should carry their Pickaxes and Spades Fabr. There should be Waggons on purpose Zanobi I fear you would never prevail with your Souldiers to work Fabr. We will talk of that in its proper place at present I shall lay it aside and discourse of the way how they are to be supplyed with provisions for having tired them thus long 't is but reasonable to refresh them with victuals CHAP. V. Of the Provisions that are
their liberty with it and turn'd Subjects to the Latins Livy tells us the same thing for says he the Latin Army was in nothing inferiour to the Romans their courage the same their constancy the same and their numbers the same if the Romans had any advantage it was in their Generals which indeed were better than the Latins and it is expressed by several both Latins and Romans who have left an account of that Battel to posterity that where-ever Manlius had been that side would certainly have conquered In this Battel there were two things very exemplary and remarkable One of the Consuls to keep his Souldiers firm in their obedience and preserve their Military Discipline caused his own Son to be slain for transgressing his Orders though he gain'd the Victory by the means The other devoted himself freely to death for the good of his Country for the dispute was like to be very hard fighting against the Latins who as Livy tells us had the same Language the same Customs the same Arms the same Discipline with the Romans the Soldiers the Captains the Tribunes both in one Army and the other had been Comerades and served formerly together not only in the same Army or Garison but in the same Company and Band. It was necessary therefore being equal in their numbers and equal in their courage that something extraordinary should be done that might render the Soldiers fiercer and more obstinate to overcome upon which fierceness and obstinacy the whole hopes of the victory did depend for whilst there is any such in the breasts of the Soldiers they never think of running but press still on for victory and prize and because there was more of this constancy and fortitude in the breasts of the Romans than in the breasts of the Latins partly the destiny and partly the bravery of the Consuls effected that for the good success of their Army and the preservation of their Discipline Torquatus killed his Son and Decius himself Titus Livius in his description of the equality of their force gives us an exact account of the Orders which they observed in their Armies and Fights and he has done it so largely I need not repeat it all but shall only select what I think most particularly remarkable and what if observed by the Generals of our days might have prevented very great disorders I say then that according to Livy's description their Armies were divided into three principal Schieri or Squadrons The first consisted of their Hastati which were most of them young men in the flower of their age digested into Manipuli or small parties and disposed at a certain distance with Pikes or Darts in their hands from whence they were called Hastati The second Squadron was as numerous as the first and divided into as many Manipuli but their distance was something greater and it consisted of choice men from whence they were called Principes The third and last Squadron was the biggest of the three and had almost as many in it as both the other and this was made up of the ancientest and most experienced Soldiers whom they called Triarii They too had their certain distances but something greater than in either of the other In their Battels the Hastati were in the Van the Principes behind them and the Triarii in the Rear To every one of these Squadrons there was a body of Horse which being drawn up in two divisions and disposed one of the right and the other on the left hand of the Army represented two wings and were therefore called Ala. These three Squadrons preceded and followed one another exactly but the Hastati in the first Squadron were drawn up closer That being to receive the first impetus of the Enemy they might endure it the better The Principes that followed them was not in such close order but were disposed at more distance to the end that if the Hastati should be forced to retire they might be received into that Squadron without disorder or confusion But the Triarii were drawn up with greater spaces and intervals than both the other and for the same reason that if they were repulsed that might fall back among them and make an entire Body together Being drawn up in this order the Hastati began the sight if they were over-powred by the Enemy and forced to give ground they fell back to the Principes and uniting with them renewed the fight in one body if they were both of them too weak and unable to bear up against the Enemy they retreated gradually into the spaces betwixt the Triarii and then all the three Squadrons being joyned the whole Army charged in a body and if they were beaten farewel there was no more reserves but the Battel was lost and because whenever the Triarii was engaged the whole Army was in â—â—nger this Proverb grew very frequent Res reducta est ad Triarios Things are now at the Extremity The Generals of our times having laid aside all the old discipline of the Romans have neglected this among the rest to their no little prejudice For he that draws up his Army in a posture with two such reserves must be beaten three times before he can be utterly defeated whereas once beating will do the Enemies business But he that trusts only to the first shock as the Christian Armies do generally now may easily be broken the least disorder or relaxation of courage puting all to the rout And that which is the reason why our Armies are so quickly defeated is because they have lost the old way of falling back one body into another and rallying three times For whoever draws up his Army according to Modern Custom does it with one of these two inconveniences He either draws up his several Squadrons shoulder to shoulder and by enlarging his Ranks makes his Files very thin which weakens his Army very much by leaving the distance so small betwixt the Front and the Rear or else he draws them up deeper according to the manner of the Romans but then their Files are so close that if the Front be beaten there being no spaces in the Battel to receive them they entangle and confound one another so as the Front being repulsed falls foul upon the middle Squadron and both of them upon the third whereby they are embarrassed and hindred from advancing or receiving the Enemy in any order and the whole Battel is lost The Spanish and French Armies at the Battel of Ravenna where Monsieur de Foix the French General was slain fought very well being drawn up according to the mode of our times with their Fronts so extended that their Battalions were much more in wideness than depth and his was done in respect of the ground which in that place was very spacious and large for being sensible that retreats are more difficult where the Files are too deep they drew them up large in the Front to prevent it as much as possible But when they
you the way of ordering a Battel or Army you may not find your self confounded I say therefore that a King or Commonwealth is to order his subjects which he designs for the wars with these arms and into these divisions and raise as many Battalions as his Country will afford And when he has disposed them so being to exercise them in order he is to exercise them in their several divisions And although the number of each of them cannot bear the form of a just Army yet thereby every man may learn what belongs to his own duty because in Armies there are two orders observed one what men are to do in every battel or division distinctly and the other what they are to do when united with the rest and those men who know the first well will easily learn the other but without knowledg of the first they will never arrive at the discipline of the second Every one then of these Companies may learn by it self to keep the order of their ranks in all motions and places to open and close and understand the direction of their Drums by which all things are commanded in a battel for by beating of that as by the whistle in the Gallies every man knows what he is to do whether to stand firm to his ground to advance or fall back and which way they are to turn their faces and arms So that understanding the order of their files in that exactness that no motion nor no place can disorder them understanding the commands of their Officer derived to them by his Drum and how to advance fall back into their places these Companies as I have said before as soon as joyned may easily be taught what an united body of all the Battalions is obliged to do when they are drawn together into an Army And because this universal practice is of no slight importance in time of peace it would be convenient once or twice in a year to bring them to a general Rendezvous and give them the form of an Army exercising them for some days as if they were to fight a battel with an enemy drawing them up and disposing them into front flank and reserve And because a General orders his Army for a battel either upon the sight or apprehension of an enemy he is to exercise his Army accordingly and teach them how to behave themselves upon a march and how in a battel and how upon a charge either upon one side or other When they are exercised as if an enemy was before them they are to be taught how they are to begin the fight how they are to retreat upon a repulse who are to succeed in their places what Colours what Drums what words of commands they are to obey and so to train them up and accustom them to these false alarms and counterfeit battels that at length they become impatient to be at it in earnest For an Army is not made valiant and couragious for having brave and valiant men in it but for the good order which is observed for if I be in the forlorn and know being beaten whither I am to retire and who are to succeed in my place I shall fight boldly because my relief is at hand If I be of the second body that is to engage the distress or repulse of the first will not fright me because I considered it might happen before and perhaps desired it that I might have the honour of the Victory and not they Where an Army is new this way of exercising is absolutely necessary and where it is old it is convenient for we see the Roman Captains before they brought them to fight continually exercised their men after this manner though they had been brought up to their Arms. Iosephus tells us in his History that this continual exercising in the Roman Army was the cause that all the multitude of idle people which followed the Camp either for Traffick or gain were made useful and serviceable because they understood their orders and ranks and how to preserve them in time of Battel But if you have raised an Army of young men never in the Wars before whether you intend them for present Service or to establish them as Militia and engage them afterwards without this way of exercising by single Companies and sometimes a conjunction of them all you do nothing For order being perfectly necessary it is convenient with double industry and labour to teach such as are not skilful already and practise such as are as we have seen several excellent Commanders to practise and instruct their Soldiers take extraordinary pains without any respect to their dignities Cosimo It seems to me that this discourse has a little transported you for before you have told us the way of exercising by Companies you have treated of entire Armies and the managing of a Battel Fabritio You say right and the true reason is the affection I bear to those orders and the trouble I am under that they are no more used yet do not think but I will recollect my self and return As I told you before in the exercising of a Company the first thing of importance is to know how to keep your ranks to do this it is necessary to exercise them in that order which they call Chiocciole or the Snail order And because I have said that one of these Battalias or Companies is to consist of four hundred Foot compleatly armed I will keep to that number These four hundred men then are to be reduced into 80 files five in a file after which they are to be carried forward upon a quick march or a slow wheeling and doubling charging or retreating which indeed is more demonstrable to the eye than the understanding But this Snail way of exercising a Company is not so necessary because every one that knows any thing of an Army knows how 't is to be done and indeed it is not considerable in any respect but to teach Soldiers how to move their files but let us now draw up one of these Companies and dispose them into their ranks CHAP. VIII Of three principal ways of drawing up a Company and putting them into a posture to fight I Say that there are three principal forms of drawing up men the first and most useful is to draw them up close in the figure of two Squares The second is to draw them up in a square with two wings The third is to draw them up with a vacuity in the middle which they call Piazza To draw them up in the first figure there are two ways One is to double their files that is the second file entring into the first the fourth into the third the sixt into the fift and so successively so that whereas they were 80 files of five in a file they may become forty files of 10 ih a file After this you are to double them again in the same manner thrusting one file into another and then they will be
20 files and twenty men in a file This makes two squares or very near for though there be as many men on one side as the other yet towards the head they joyn together so as one flank may touch the other but on the other side their distance is at least two yards one from the other so that the square is longer from the Rear to the Front than from one flank to another And because we are to speak often of the fore part the hinder part and the sides of this Battalia or Company and of the whole Army when joyned you must know that when I say the head or the front I mean the fore part of the Battel when I say the shoulders I mean the hinder part and when I say the flanks I mean the sides The fifty Velites in ordinary do not mingle with the rest of the files but when the Battalia is formed they are disposed by its flanks The other way of drawing up a Company is this and because it is better than the first I resolve to describe it so plain that you shall understand it as well as it were before your eyes I suppose you remember of what number of men of what Officers it is composed and what Arms it is to carry The form therefore of this Battalia is of twenty files twenty men in a file five files of Pikes in the front and fifteen files of Bucklers in the rear Two Centurions in the front and two in the rear which the ancients called Tergiductores The Constable or Captain with his Colours and Drum is to stand in the space betwixt the five files of Pikes and the fifteen files of Bucklers Corporals upon the flank of every file one so that each of them may have his men by his side those who are on the right hand will have them on their left those on the left on their right the fifty Velites are to be drawn up on the flanks and rear Now that your Soldiers may put themselves into this posture in their ordinary march it is to be done in this manner You are first to reduce your Battalia into 80 files five men in a file leaving your Velites either in the front or the rear but they must be sure to be placed without this order Every Centurion is to be at the head of twenty files five of Pikes are to be immediately behind him and the rest Bucklers The Constable or Captain is to stand with his Drum and Colours in the space betwixt the Pikes and the rest of the Bucklers belonging to the second Centurion and may take up the place of three of the Bucklers Of the Capidieci or Corporals twenty are to stand in the flank of the files of the first Centurion upon the left hand and twenty upon the flank of the last Centurion upon the right hand And it is to be observed that every Corporal who leads the Pikes is to have a Pike in his hand and they who lead the Scudi are to have Bucklers in theirs Having put your files into this order and being desirous upon their march to reduce them into a Battalia to make head against an Enemy you must cause the first Centurion with his first twenty files to make a halt and the second Centurion to continue his march to the right all along by the sides of those twenty files which stand firm till he comes cheek by jole with the first Centurion where he also makes his stand and then the third marching on likewise on the right hand by the flank of the said files advances till he be even with the other two Centurions and then he making his stop and so the rest which being done two of the Centurions only are to depart from the front into the rear of the Battalia which by this means is in the same order as I said before The Velites are to be drawn up by the side as they are disposed in the first way which is called redoubling by a right line for the second way redoubles them in the flanks The first way is more easie this is more orderly and useful and may be better corrected and reformed to your mind for in the first you are obliged to conform to your number for five doubled make ten ten twenty twenty forty so that if you would double your files in a right line you cannot make a front of fifteen five and twenty thirty nor thirty five but you must go where the number will carry you And therefore it happens every day upon particular rencounters that it is necessary to make head with 7 or 800 foot and in so doing to double in a right line would undo you For these reasons this way pleases me best and the difficulties therein are easily removed by exercise and practice I say then that nothing is of greater importance than to have Souldiers which can put themselves instantly into their ranks and to learn that it is necessary to exercise them in these Companies at home to teach them the quick and the slow march to advance or retreat and to pass thorow streights and difficult places without disturbing their order For Soldiers that can do that well are good Soldiers and may be called old Soldiers though they never looked an Enemy in the face whereas on the contrary if a man has been in a thousand Battels and understands not that he is but a Novice and a fresh-water Soldier This is only as to closing their ranks upon a march when they are in small files but having closed their files and being afterwards broken by some accident either from the place or the Enemy to rally and recollect themselves then there lies the difficulty and importance which requires great exercise and practice and by the ancients was endeavoured with much industry In this case it is necessary therefore to do two things CHAP. IX The manner of rallying Soldiers after a rout and to make them face about a whole Company at a time Fabr. WHen a Squadron is broken to rally and bring them again suddenly into order two things are convenient first that several Colours or Countermarks be assigned to every Battalia and secondly to observe this rule that the same Foot stand still in the same Files For example if a Soldier 's place was formerly in the second File let him continue in that File and not only in that File but in the same place and in order to that as I said before several Countermarks are necessary And first it is convenient that the Ensigns and Colours of each Company be so handsomly distinguished that being joyned with other Squadrons they may know one another Next that the Captains and Centurions have Plumes of Feathers of Scarfs or something that may make them conspicuous and remarkable and last of all as being of more importance the Capidieci or Corporals are to be so accoutred that they may be known and of this the ancients were so extraordinarily curious that their
Companies and be appointed to make charges and counterfeit skirmishes with them rather to bring them acquainted than for any thing else What we have said already is sufficient for this part let us now come to marshal our Army and draw it up in a posture to fight and with hopes of success which is the great end of all kind of military discipline in which men employ so much study and diligence THE THIRD BOOK CHAP. I. The Order observed by the Roman Legions when a Battel was presented Cosimo SEeing we change our subject I shall yield my place of expostulating to another man for presumption being a thing which I condemn in other people I would not be too much guilty of it my self therefore I dismiss my self of that office and will transfer it to which of our friends will vouchsafe to accept it Zanobi It would have been very grateful to us all had you pleased to have continued but seeing 't is not your pleasure tell us at least which of us it is you will depute to succeed you Cosimo I shall leave that to the election of Signor Fabritio Fabr. I am content to undertake it and do desire that we may follow the Venetian custom by which the youngest of the company has the liberty to speak first and in this case not without reason for this being the proper exercise of young men I persuade my self young Gentlemen are the fittest to discourse of it as being most ready to follow it Cosimo 'T is then your province Luigi and as I do much please my self in my successor so you may be as well satisfied with his interrogation But that we lose no time let us return to our business Fabritio I am certain that to demonstrate how well an Army is to be marshall'd and prepared for a Battel it would be necessary to declare how the Greeks and Romans ordered The Troops in their Armies but because these things are sufficiently obvious in History I shall pass by several particulars and address my self only to such as I think most useful for our imitation and fittest to give perfection to the discipline of our times which will be the occasion that at once I give you a prospect how an Army is to be ranged in order to a Battel how they are to confront and charge one another in a real Engagement and how they may be exercised in a counterfeit The greatest disorders committed in the drawing up an Army for a Battel is to give it only a front because they leave them and their fortune to the success of one charge and this error proceeds from nothing but from having lost the old way of closing their ranks and thrusting one into another Without that way there is no relieving of the front no defending them nor no supplying their places in the heat of their Engagement which among the Romans was most accurately observed To the end therefore that you may comprehend this way I say that the Romans divided each Legion into three Bodies The first were Hastati the second Principes the third Triarii The Hastati were in the front of the Army in thick and firm ranks The Principes behind them but their ranks not altogether so close and after them the Triarii in so loose an order that they could receive both Principes and Hastati into their body upon any distress Besides these they had their Slingers their Bow-men and their Velites not drawn up in this order but placed at the head of the Army betwixt the Cavalry and the Foot These light arm'd Souldiers began the Fight and if they prevailed which was very seldom they followed the Victory if they were repulsed they fell back by the â—â—nks of the Army or thorow certain spaces appointed on purpose and retired among those who had no arms When they were retir'd the Hastati advanced against the enemy and finding themselves overpowred they retir'd softly to the Principes and fell into their ranks and together with them renewed the Fight but if they also were too weak to sustain the fury of the Battel they retreated all into the spaces of the Triarii and all together being consolidated into a firm mass they made another effort more impetuous than before if this miscarried all was lost for there was no farther reserves The Horse were plac'd at the corners of the Army like two wings to a body and fought sometimes on Horseback and sometimes on foot as occasion was offered This way of reinforcing three times is almost impossible to be master'd because fortune must fail you three times before you can be beaten and the Enemy must be so valiant as to conquer you as often CHAP. II. The form observed in their Battels by the Macedonian Phalanx THe Grecians ordered not their Phalanx as the Romans did their Legions and though they had many Officers among them and several ranks yet they made but one body or rather one front The way which they observed to relieve one another was not to retire one rank into another like the Romans but to put one man into the place of another which was done in this manner Their Phalanx being reduced into Files and let us suppose each File to consist of fifty men being afterwards with the front towards the Enemy of all the Files only the six first could charge because their Launces which they called Sarissae were so long that the sixt rank charged with the point of his Launce thorow the first ranst In the Fight therefore if any of the first rank was either killed or disabled he who was behind in the second rank supplyed his place and the vacuity in the second rank was filled up out of the third and so successively and on a sudden the ranks behind supplyed what was defective before so as their ranks remained always entire and no place left void but the last rank which was not reinforced because there was no body behind to supply them So that the loss in the first rank exhausted the latter and yet it self was continued entire So that these Phalanxes were sooner consumed and annihilated than broken because the closeness and grosseness of the body made them impenetrable The Romans at first used these Phalanxes and instructed their Legions in that way Afterwards they grew weary of that order and parted their Legions into several divisions viz. into Cohortes and Manipuli judging as I said before that body to be most vigorous and fullest of life that consisted of most members so constituted as that they could subsist and govern themselves CHAP. III. How the Swisses ordered their Battalions Fab. THe Swisses at present do use the same method with their Battalions as the Macedonians did anciently with their Phalanxes both enranging them entire and in gross and in relieving one another When they came to a Battel they disposed their Squadrons one in the Flank of another and not behind They have not the way of receiving the first into the second upon a
thing wide they disorder themselves and if they run on in a huddle it will be no hard matter for the Enemy to break them And therefore I ordered my Battel so that it might do both the one and the other for having placed 1000 of the Velites in the wings I commanded that as soon as our Artillery had fired they should advance with the light Horse to seize upon their Cannon for which reason our Artillery was shot off but once and that the Enemy might not have time to charge the second time and fire upon us again for we could not take so much time our selves but they would have had as much to do the same wherefore the reason why I fired not my Cannon the second time was that if the Enemy fired once they might not have leisure to fire any more To render therefore the Enemies Artillery unserviceable the best remedy is to attack it with all possible speed for if the Enemy deserts it 't is your own if he undertakes to defend it he must advance before it and then being betwixt it and us they cannot fire but upon their own men I should think these reasons sufficient without farther examples yet having plenty of them from the ancients I will afford you some of them Ventidius being to fight the Parthians whose strength consisted principally in their bows and arrows was so subtil as to let them come up close to his Camp before he would draw out his Army which he did that he might charge them on a sudden before they had leisure to shoot their arrows Caesar tells us that when he was in France being to engage with the enemy he was charged so briskly and so suddenly by them that his men had not time to deliver their darts according to the custom of the Romans You see therefore that to frustrate a thing in the field which is to be discharged at a distance and to prevent its doing you any hurt there is no better way than to march up to it with all speed and possess it if you can Another reason moved me likewise to fire my Artillery no more which may seem trivial to you yet to me it is not so contemptible There is nothing obstructs an Army and puts it into greater confusion than to take away or hinder their sight for several great Armies have been broken and defeated by having their sight obstructed either with the dust or the Sun now there is nothing that causes greater obscurity or is a greater impediment to the sight than the smoke of Artillery and therefore I think it more wisdom to let the Enemy be blind by himself than for you to be blind too and endeavour to find him These things considered I would either not fire my Artillery at all or else because that perhaps would not be approved in respect of the reputation which those great Guns have obtained in the World I would place them in the wings of my Army that when they fire the smoke might not fly in the faces of my front which is the flower and hopes of my Army And to prove that to trouble the sight of an Enemy is a thing of more than ordinary advantage I need bring no more than the example of Epaminondas who to blind the eyes of his Enemy before he advanced to charge them caused his light horse to gallop up and down before their front to raise the dust and hinder their sight which was done so effectually that he got the Victory thereby As to your opinion that I placed the Enemies Cannon and directed their bullets as I pleased causing them to pass over the heads of my Foot I answer that great Guns do without comparison oftner miss the Infantry than hit them because the Foot are so low and the Artillery so hard to be pointed that if they be placed never so little too high they shoot over and never so little too low they graze and never come near them The inequality of the ground does likewise preserve the Foot very much for every little hill or bank betwixt the Artillery and them shelters them exceedingly As to the Horse especially the Men at arms because their order is closer than the order of the light horse and they are to keep firmer in a body they are more obnoxious to the Cannon and are therefore to be kept in the rear of the Army till the Enemy has fir'd 〈…〉 This is most certain your small Field-pieces and your small shot does more execution than your great pieces against which the best remedy is to come to 〈◊〉 blows as soon as you can and though in the first some men fell as be sure there always will yet a good General and a good Army are not to consider a particular loss so much as a General but rather are to imitate the Swissers who never refused a Battel for fear of great Guns but punished them with capital punishment who for fear of them forsook their ranks or gave any other sign or expression of fear I caused my Artillery to be drawn off as soon as I had Fired them that they might leave the Field clear for my Battalions to advance and I made no mention of them afterwards as being quite useless when the Armies were joyned You have said likewise that in respect of the violence and impetuosity of those Guns many do judge the arms and the orders of the ancients to be altogether useless and it seems by that that the people of late have found out arms and orders which are sufficient to secure them if you know any such thing you will oblige me to impart it for as yet I know none nor can I believe that there is any to be found So that I would know of them why the Infantry of our times do carry Corslets of Iron upon their breasts and the horse are arm'd Cap a pied for seeing they condemn the ancient way of arming as useless in respect of the Artillery they may as well condemn what is practised now-a-days I would understand likewise why the Swizzers according to the custom of the ancients make their Battalions to consist of six or eight thousand foot and why other Nations have imitated them seeing that order is exposed to the same danger upon account of the Artillery as others are I think it cannot easily be answered yet if you should propose it to Souldiers of any judgment and experience they would tell you first that they go so arm'd because though their arms will not defend them against great Guns yet they will secure them against small Shot and Pikes and Swords and Stones and all such things They would tell you likewise that they keep that close order like the Swisses that they may more easily engage the Enemies Foot that they may better sustain their Horse and put fairer to break them So that we see Souldiers are afraid of many things besides Artillery against which they are to provide by their arms
has taken his part willingly I do not think Battista will refuse Battista Hitherto I have suffered my self to be governed and am resolved to do so for the future let me desire you therefore Seignor Fabritio to pursue your discourse and hold us excused if we interrupt you with these kind of demands Fabr. As I told you before you do me a very great kindness for this interruption and changing of persons rather refreshes than troubles my fancy But to follow our business I say that it is now high time that we dispose our Army into its quarters for you know every thing desires rest and security for to repose without security is not properly to repose I do fancy you would rather have had me lodg'd my Army first and march'd and fought them afterwards but we have done quite contrary and indeed not without necessity for being to show how an Army in a march was to quit that form and put it self into a posture to fight it was necessary first to show how they were to be drawn up for a Battel But to return I say that if you would have your Camp safe you must have it strong and well ordered The discretion of the General puts it in good order but it is art or situation that makes it defensible and strong The Grecians were so curious in this point that they would never encamp but where there was some River or Wood or Bank or other natural rampart to defend them But the Romans stood not so much upon the strength of the situation as their own ways of fortification nor would they ever encamp but where according to their own Discipline they could draw up their Army For this reason the Romans observed one constant form in their encampments for they would rather make the situation of the place comply with their methods than permit their customs to comply with the situation but with the Grecians it was otherwise because following the condition and form of the place it was necessary that they varied the manner of their encampment and the form of their Camp The Romans therefore where the situation was weak supplyed it by art and industry And because in this discourse I have proposed the Romans for a President I shall not leave them in my manner of encampment nevertheless I shall not follow their practice in every thing but picking and selecting such parts as I think most agreeable with our times I have told you often how the Romans in their Consular Armies had two Legious of Romans consisting of about 11000 Foot and 600 Horse they had moreover about 11000 more Foot sent in by their Friends and Allies to their assistance but this was a rule their Auxilaries never exceeded the number of the Legions unless it were in Horse and in them they were not so curious I have told you likewise how in all their battels their Legions were placed in the middle and their Auxiliaries in the flanks and it was the same in their encampments as you may read in such Authors as make any mention of their History I will not therefore be so exact in my relation I shall content my self only to tell you in what order I would lodge my Army at present and you will understand by that what I have borrowed from the Romans You know that in imitation of their Legions I have taken two Battalions consisting of 6000 Foot and 300 Horse of service for the Battalion you know into what Companies into what Arms and into what names I divided them You know how in ordering my Army to march and to fight I have said nothing of more men only what was to be done was to be done by doubling their ranks not by any reinforcement of men But being now to shew you the manner of encamping I think it not convenient to stick to my two Battalions but to unite our whole Army composed according to the model of the Romans of two Battalions and as many Auxiliaries which I do the rather that the form of our Camp may be the more compleat by the reception of a compleat Army which in my other demonstrations I have not thought altogether so necessary Being therefore to lodge a compleat Army of 24000 Foot and two thousand Horses of service to be divided into four Battalions two of Natives and two of Strangers I would take this way CHAP. II. The form of a Camp Fabr. HAving found a place convenient for my Camp I would set up my Standard in the midst of a square of fifty yards deep The four sides of that square should respect the four quarters of the World and look East West North and South In this square I would set up the Generals Pavilion and because I think it discreet and in part the practice of the Ancients I would divide my men which carry arms from them who have none and those who are free from those who are incumbred All or the greatest part of my arm'd men I would lodge towards the East my men that were disarm'd and incumbred I would lodge towards the West making my front towards the East and my rear towards the West and the North and South should be my flanks To distinguish the quarters of those which bore arms I would take this course I would draw a line from the Standard towards the East of 680 yards long Then I would draw two other lines with the first in the middle of the same length but each of them at a distance of fifteen yards from the first at the end of these lines I would have my Eastern Port and the space betwixt the two outward lines should make a Street which should go from that Gate to the General 's quarters and take up a space of thirty yards in bredth and 630 in length for the General 's quarter would take up fifty and this should be called the General 's street Then I would cause another street to be drawn out from North to South and it should pass by the end of the General 's street not far from the General 's quarter towards the East which should contain in length 1250 yards for it should take up all the bredth of the Camp and be called the Cross-street Having design'd the General 's quarters and these two Streets I would mark out quarters for the two Battalions that were my own Subjects and one of them I would dispose on the right hand of the General 's street and the other on the left And then passing over the Cross-street I would assign 32 lodgments on the left hand of the General 's street and as many on the right leaving betwixt the sixteenth and seventeenth lodgment a space of thirty yards wide as a traverse way to pass thorow all the lodgments of the Battalions I would lodge the Captains of the men at Arms at the front of those two orders of lodgments which joyn to the Cross-street and their men at Arms in the fifteen lodgments that are next
fight the whole Army and every Member of it may be in their proper places and the manner of doing it we have declared before when we discoursed of putting the Companies in order I would divide my Artillery and place part of it without my right flank and the other without my left My light Horse I would send before to scour the Country my men at Arms I would dispose part behind my right wing and part behind my left at about forty yards distance from the Battalia's And this general rule you are to observe by all means in the drawing up your Army that your Horse are to be placed either in the rear or upon the flanks for to place them before at the head of the Army would occasion one of these two things either they must be placed at such distance that upon a repulse they may have space and time enough to wheel of without falling foul upon the foot or else draw up the foot with such intervals that the Horse may pass thorow without putting them into disorder Certainly no body ought to look upon this as a thing of small importance for many have been ruined and routed by their own men for want of timely consideration But to return to our business the Carriages and the people unarmed are placed in the void place of the Army and so disposed that there is passage left for any to pass from one part of the Army to another These Companies without the Horse and Artillery do take up a space of 282 yards And because this square consists of two Battalions it is convenient to let you know what part of them makes one Battalion and what the other Now because Battalions are denominated from the number and each of them as you know consists of ten Battalia's or Companies and a Colonel I would have the first Battalion place five of first Companies in the front the other five in the left flank and the Colonel in the left angle of the front The second Battalion should place its five first Battalia's upon the right flank and the other five in the rear with the Colonel in the right corner to secure the rear and perform the office of him whom the Romans called by the name of Tergiductor CHAP. III. How to put an Army presently into order and draw it up so as if upon a march it should be attack'd it may defend it self on all sides Fabr. HAving put your Army into this posture you are to cause it to march and in its march observe the same order for without doubt it is safe enough against the tumults and incursions of the Peasants against which it is sufficient if the Colonel commands out parties of Horse or certain Companies of his Velites to repel them Nor is there any danger that those kind of people will ever come to handy strokes with you for men without order are always fearful of men in order and ' it s the practice of such people to alarm you with great shouts and crys but never to come near like little Curs that bark at a Mastiff but keep far enough off When Hanibal invaded Italy with so much detriment to the Romans he passed thorow France was frequently infested by the Bores but he valued them not But it is not sufficient to have your Army in this order but if you intend to march you must have Pioneers and such kind of people to plain the ways make your intrenchments c. and these Pioneers are to be secured by the Horse which you send up and down the Country In this order an Army may march ten miles a day and be time enough at their journeys end to Sup and take up their Quarters by day-light for many times an Army will march in one day twenty miles But if it happens to be attacked by a formed Army it cannot be so sudden but you will have time to put your self into a posture of defence because an orderly Army marches slowly and you will have leisure to draw your self up in Battalia and put your Army either into the same figures I have prescribed or into such another If you be assaulted in the Van you have no more to do but to bring your Artillery thither out of the flanks and bringing your Horse out of the rear into the Van to put them into the same place and distance as I have directed The 1000 Velites which are before may advance divide themselves into two parties of five hundred a piece and enter into their own place betwixt the Horse and the wings of the Army and then into their place are to succeed the two Companies of Pikes extraordinary which I placed before in the great vacuity of the Army The 1000 Velites in the rear are to remove from their post and dividing themselves repair to the two flanks and fortifie them and by the space and chasm which they leave at their departure the Carriages may march out and all those who are unarmed and put themselves behind in the rear The space in the middle being now void and every man in his place the five Battalia's which I ordered behind the Army may advance by the void space betwixt the two flanks and march towards those in the Van. Three of them may march up within 40 yards with equal intervals betwixt the one and the other and the other two may remain behind at the same distance of forty yards This is a form that may be ordered on a sudden and has some resemblance with the first model of an Army which we recommended before for thought it be streighter in the front it is firmer in the flanks and by consequence stronger But because the five Battalia's in the rear have Pikes with them for the reasons abovesaid it is necessary to cause them to advance to fortifie the front of the Army and therefore either you must cause your Companies to turn Company by Company as they were solid bodies or else pass them into the front thorow the files of the Bucklers which way is a better way and less disorderly than to cause them to wheel in whole Companies like a solid body and the same thing is to be done with those in the rear upon any assault as I have shown before If the Enemy presents himself in the rear you have no more to do but to face about with your whole Army and immediately the figure is altered the rear becomes the front and the front the rear after which you are to observe all the ways of fortifying your front as I have directed before If the Enemy appears upon your flank your Army is to face about to that side and do the same things to strengthen your front so that your Horse your Velites your Artillery may be in such places as are convenient for the making up that front and if there be any difference in this variation of fronts it is only this that some of those who are to remove have farther to