Palantes post se miles ut excipiat.
The Normans dared not face the serried ranks of the English: the maxim that cavalry should not charge unbroken infantry was asserting itself already. But the only means of breaking those ranks, of throwing the English into confusion, was to gall them by archers and slingers till some of them should sally forth, when their assailants would turn tail and leave them to be caught in the open and ridden down. As Bishop Guy expresses it:
Præmisit pedites committere bella sagittis,
Et balistantes inserit in medio,
Quatinus infigant volitantia vultibus arma,
Vulneribusque datis ora retro faciant,
Ordine post pedites sperat stabilire Quirites
These tactics, says Baudri, were crowned with success; the maddened English, as they dashed forth to strike their tormentors to the ground, were cut off in every direction by the horsemen waiting their chance:
Tunc præ tristitia gens effera præque pudore
Egreditur palans, insequiturque vagos.