t them of their victuals, they are
necessary, and most profitable: but concerning for the daye of battaile,
and for the fighte in the fielde, whiche is the importaunce of the
warre, and the ende, for which the armies are ordeined, they are more
meeter to follow the enemie being discomfited then to do any other thing
which in the same is to be done, and they bee in comparison, to the
footemen much inferiour.

COSIMO. There is happened unto mee twoo doubtes, the one, where I knowe,
that the Parthians dyd not use in the warre, other then horses, and yet
they devided the worlde with the Romanes: the other is, that I woulde
that you should shewe, howe the horsemen can be withstoode of footemen,
and wherof groweth the strength of these, and the debilitie of those?

[Sidenote: The reason why footmen are able to overcome horsemen; How
footmen maie save them selves from horsemen; The exercise of Souldiours,
ought to be devided into thre partes; What exercises the auncient common
weales used to exercise their youth in, and what commoditie insued
thereby; How the antiquitie, learned their yong soldiours, to handell
their weapons; What thantiquitie estemed moste happie in a common weale;
Mouster Maisters; for thexercisyng of yong men unexperte.]

FABRICIO. Either I have tolde you, or I minded to tell you, howe that my
reasoning of the affaires of warre, ought not to passe the boundes of
Europe: when thus it is, I am not bounde unto you, to make accompte of
the same, which is used in Asia, yet I muste saye unto you thus, that
the warring of the Parthians, was altogether contrarye, to the same of
the Romanes: for as muche as the Parthians, warred all on horsebacke,
and in the fight, they proceeded confusedlye, and scattered, and it was
a maner of fighte unstable, and full of uncertaintie. The Romanes were
(it maye be sayde) almoste al on foote, and thei fought close together
and sure, and thei overcame diversly, the one the other, according to
the largenesse, or straightnesse of the situation: for that in this the
Romaines were superiours, in thesame the Parthians, whom might make
greate proofe, with thesame maner of warryng, consideryng the region,
which thei had to defende, the which was moste large: for as moche as it
hath the sea coaste, distant a thousande miles, the rivers thone from
thother, twoo or three daies journey, the tounes in like maner and the
inhabitauntes few: so that a Romaine armie heavie and slowe, by meanes
of