[87] At Bannockburn, the Scots had made good use of their cavalry, which, though not strong, gave them an advantage wanting to the Swiss at Laupen.
[88] Similarly at the battle of the Standard the English knights dismounted to meet the furious rush of the Galwegians.
[89] The numbers which the Swiss Chroniclers allow to have been present at Sempach are evidently minimised. The whole force of four cantons was there, yet we are told of only 1500 men! Yet the three cantons seventy-one years before put the same number in the field, and the populous state of Lucern had now joined them.
[90] The Confederates were forming their column in Sempach Wood, when Leopold’s artillery opened on them--
‘With their long lances levelled before the fight they stood,
And set their cannon firing at those within the wood;
Then to the good Confederates the battle was not sweet,
When all around the mighty boughs dropped crashing at their feet.’
[Rough translation of Halbshuter’s contemporary ‘Sempacherlied.’]
[91] Sismondi, who writes entirely from Swiss sources as to this fight, gives a very different impression from Machiavelli. The later cites Arbedo as the best known check received by the Swiss, and puts their loss down at several thousands (Arte de Guerra, tr. Farneworth, p. 33). Müller evidently tries to minimise the check; but we may judge from our knowledge of Swiss character how great must have been the pressure required to make a Confederate officer think of surrender. Forty-four members of the Cantonal councils of Lucern fell in the fight: ‘The contingent of Lucern had crossed the lake of the four Cantons in ten large barges, when setting out on this expedition: it returned in two!’ These facts, acknowledged by the Swiss themselves, seem to show that the figure of 400 men for their loss is placed absurdly low.
[92] From a Lucern ‘Raths-Protocoll’ of 1422, ‘Da es den Eidgenossen nicht so wohl ergangen seie,’ etc.
[93] Yet even the Duke said, that ‘Against the Swiss it will never do to march unprepared.’ Panagirola, quoted by Kirk, vol. iii.
[94] ‘If we attack Romont,’ said Ulrich Kätzy at the Swiss council of war, ‘while we are beating him the duke will have time and opportunity to escape; let us go round the hills against the main-body, and when that is routed, we shall have the rest without a stroke.’ This showed real tactical skill.