mit to the area which fortifications could enclose, and this again
limited the supplies for the garrison. Horsemen sweeping the country for
miles around had no difficulty in feeding themselves, and the surrender
of all beleaguered places through starvation was ultimately inevitable,
unless food could be introduced from allied towns in the vicinity. It
was of no use to introduce fighting men only into a place which
primarily required food (cf. Lucknow, 1857) to protract its resistance.
Hence some means had to be found to surround the supply-convoys with a
physically impenetrable shield, and eighteen-foot pikes in the hands of
powerful disciplined soldiers met the requirements. Against eight to ten
ranks of such men the best cavalry in the world, relying only on their
swords, were helpless, and for the time (towards the close of the 15th
century) infantry remained masters of the field on the continent of
Europe.

England meanwhile had developed on lines of her own. Thanks to her
longbowmen and the military genius of her leaders, she might have
retained indefinitely the command of the continent had it not been for
the invention of gunpowder, which, though readily accepted by the
English for sieges in France, proved the ultimate cause of their
undoing. It was the French who developed the use of siege artillery most
rapidly, and their cavalry were not slow to take the hint; unlike the
longbow and the crossbow, the pistol could be used effectively from
horseback, and presently the knights and their retainers, having the
deepest purses, provided themselves with long pistols in addition to
their lances and swords. These weapons sent a bullet through any armour
which a foot-soldier could conveniently carry, or his commander afford,
and if anything went wrong with their mechanism (which was complicated
and uncertain) the speed of his horse soon carried the rider out of
danger. A new form of attack against infantry, introduced by the French
at Cerisoles, 1544, thus developed itself. A troop or squadron, formed
in from twelve to sixteen ranks, trotted up to within pistol shot of the
angle of the square to be attacked and halted; then each rank in
succession cantered off man by man to the left, discharging his pistol
at the square as he passed, and riding back to his place behind the
column to reload. This could be prolonged indefinitely, and against such
tactics the infantry were powerless. The stakes carried by English
archers to