Before we close our account of the cavalier’s equipment, something must be said regarding his steed, his good steed, as he was fond of calling him. The horse of the knight was necessarily an animal of great power when his charge was a cavalier with his weighty armour. The horses of Spain were highly famed. In the country itself those of Asturia were preferred, but in other chivalric states they regarded not the particular province wherein the horse was bred.[124] The favourite steed of William the Conqueror came from Spain. The crusades were certainly the means of bringing Asiatic horses into Europe; and it was found that the Arabian, though smaller than the bony charger of the west, had a compensating power in his superior spirit. French and English romance writers were not from natural prejudices disposed to praise any productions of Heathenesse, yet the Arabian horse is frequently commended by them. That doughty knight, Guy, a son of Sir Bevis of Hampton,
——“bestrode a Rabyte,[125]
That was mickle and nought light,[126]
That Sir Bevis in Paynim lond
Had iwunnen with his hond.”
The Arab horse was the standard of perfection, as is evident from the romancer’s praise of the two celebrated steeds, Favel and Lyard, which Richard Cœur de Lion procured at Cyprus.
“In the world was not their peer,
Dromedary, nor destreer,
Steed, Rabyte, ne Camayl,
That ran so swift sans fail.
For a thousand pounds of gold
Should not that one be sold.”
The Arabian horse must have been already prepared for part of the discipline of a chivalric horse. On his own sandy plains he had been accustomed to stop his career when his fleetness had cast the rider from his seat; and in the encounter of lances so often were knights overthrown, that to stand firm, ready to be mounted again, was a high quality of a good horse. The steed of the Cid was very much celebrated in Spain; and, in acknowledgment for an act of great kindness, the owner wished to present him to the king, Alfonso of Castile. To induce the king to accept him, he showed his qualities.
“With that the Cid, clad as he was in mantle furr’d and wide,
On Bavieca vaulting, put the rowel in his side;
And up and down, and round and round, so fierce was his career,
Stream’d like a pennon on the wind Ruy Diaz’ minivere.
And all that saw them prais’d them,—they lauded man and horse,
As matched well, and rivalless for gallantry and force.
Ne’er had they look’d on horseman might to this knight come near,
Nor on other charger worthy of such a cavalier.
Thus, to and fro a-rushing, the fierce and furious steed,
He snapp’d in twain his hither rein:—‘God pity now the Cid;’
‘God pity Diaz,’ cried the Lords;—but when they look’d again,
They saw Ruz Diaz ruling him with the fragment of his rein;
They saw him proudly ruling, with gesture firm and calm,
Like a true Lord commanding,—and obey’d as by a lamb.
And so he led him foaming and panting to the king,
But ‘No,’ said Don Alphonso, ‘it were a shameful thing
That peerless Bavieca should ever be bestrid
By any mortal but Bivar,—mount, mount again, my Cid.’”[127]
It has been often said that the knight had always his ambling palfrey, on which he rode till the hour of battle arrived; and that the war-horse, from the circumstance of his being led by the right hand of the squire, was called dextrarius.[128] With respect to sovereigns and men of great estate this was certainly the custom, but it was by no means a general chivalric practice. Froissart’s pages are a perfect picture of knightly riding and combatting; and each of his favorite cavaliers seems to have had but one and the same steed for the road and the battle-plain. Even romance, so prone to exaggerate, commonly represents the usage as similar; for when we find that a damsel is rescued, she is not placed upon a spare horse, but the knight mounts her behind himself.[129]
The destrier, cheval de lance, or war-steed, was armed or barded[130] very much on the plan of the harness of the knight himself, and was defended, therefore, by mail or plate, agreeably to the fashion of the age. His head, chest, and flanks were either wholly or partially protected, and sometimes, on occasions of pomp, he was clad in complete steel, with the arms of his master engraven or embossed on his bardings. His caparisons and housings frequently descended so low that they were justly termed bases, from the French bas à bas, upon the ground. His head, too, was ornamented with a crest, like the helmet of a knight. The bridle of the horse was always as splendid as the circumstances of the knight allowed; and thus a horse was often called Brigliadore, from briglia d’oro, a bridle of gold. The knight was fond of ornamenting the partner of his perils and glories. The horse was not always like that of Chaucer’s knight;
“His hors was good, but he was not gay.”
Bells were a very favourite addition to the equipment of a horse, particularly in the early times of chivalry. An old Troubadour poet, Arnold of Marsan, states very grave reasons for wearing them. He says, “Let the neck of the knight’s horse be garnished with bells well hung. Nothing is more proper to inspire confidence in a knight, and terror in an enemy.” The war-horse of a soldier of a religious order of knighthood might have his collar of bells, for their jangling was loved by a monk himself.