Genealogy of the family of Forbes

IX
tion well deserving the mention of that kind of troops made by
Froissart, who calls them " lusty varlets ;" and until the English
archery was ennobled by the days of Cressy, Poictiers, and Azin-
cour, even the archers were in very inferior estimation. When Ed-
ward the * Second fought the battle of Bannockburn, his most
dreaded force was his chivalry — and the Scotch army seems to
have had no adequate force of this noble description, but to
have chiefly depended upon its schiltronsf (battalions or columns)
ofpikemen.
Barbour describes Bmce's caution to his troops certainly froift
hearsay of good authority :
On horse arrayed will they ride,
And come upon ye in a hie,
"With yr. spears receive them manfully— =
Then think upon the muckle ill'
That they and theyr's did to ye still.
These pikemen were however able to perform wonderful marches,
being provided each man with a pony to carry himself and his pro-
visions ; so that when Bruce invaded England, under Edward the
Third, the English army was constantly baffled, and finally ruined
by their quick changes of position.:}; This great King of the Scots
* Many who admire Wallace, are perhaps ignorant that he wa? a
tnan of humour ; at Falkirk he thus addressed his schiltrons, after draw-
ing them up for battle, alluding ta dancing, " I haiff broght ye to the
" ring— hap gif ye can !"
f An old English author describes the schiltrons as follows :
" Ther formost couvay ther bakkis togidere sette,
Ther speres poynt over poynt so sare, so thikke
And fast togidere joynt, to see ic was ferlike,
Alsa castelle thai stode, that were walled with stone,
Ther wende no man of blode thorgh tham suld haf gone-
I The soldiers of Bruce are described to have each been furnished
■with a cow-horn, which they kept blowing all night like so many thou=
b