[7] Comines says, with some naïveté, in reference to the places in Naples which the Venetians had got into their possession, "Je croy que leur intention n'est point de les rendre; car ils ne l'ont point de coustume quand elles leur sont bienséantes comme sont cellescy, qui sont du costé de leur goufre de Venise." Mémoires, p. 194.
[8] Guicciardini, Istoria, lib. 3, p. 178.—Zurita, Hist. del Rey Hernando, lib. 2, cap. 44; lib. 3, cap. 13, 19, 21, 26.—Comines, Mémoires, liv. 8, chap. 23.
[9] Comines gives some curious details respecting the French embassy, which he considers to have been completely outwitted by the superior management of the Spanish government; who intended nothing further at this time by the proposal of a division, than to amuse the French court until the fate of Naples should be decided. Mémoires, liv. 8, chap. 23.
[10] Zurita, Hist. del Rey Hernando, lib. 2, cap. 26, 33.—Mariana, Hist. de España, lib. 26, cap. 16.—Salazar de Mendoza, Monarquía, tom. i. lib. 3, cap. 10.
[11] Mem. de la Acad. de Hist., tom. vi. Ilust. 6.—Zurita, Hist. del Rey Hernando, lib. 3, cap. 6.
The ancient Spaniards, who were as noted as the modern for the temper and finish of their blades, used short swords, in the management of which they were very adroit. "Hispano," says Livy, "punctim magis, quam caesim, adsueto petere hostem, brevitate habiles [gladii] et cum macronibus." (Hist., lib. 22, cap. 47.) Sandoval notices the short sword, "cortas espadas," as the peculiar weapon of the Spanish soldier in the twelfth century. Historia de los Reyes de Castilla y de Leon, (Madrid, 1792,) tom. ii. p. 240.
[12] Pragmáticas del Reyno, fol. 83, 127, 129.
The former of these ordinances, dated Taraçona, Sept. 18th, 1495, is extremely precise in specifying the appointments required for each individual.
Among other improvements, introduced somewhat earlier, may be mentioned that of organizing and thoroughly training a small corps of heavy-armed cavalry, amounting to twenty-five hundred. The number of men-at-arms had been greatly reduced in the kingdom of late years, in consequence of the exclusive demand for the ginetes in the Moorish war. Oviedo, Quincuagenas, MS.
Ordinances were also passed for encouraging the breed of horses, which had suffered greatly from the preference very generally given by the Spaniards to mules. This had been carried to such a length, that, while it was nearly impossible, according to Bernaldez, to mount ten or twelve thousand cavalry on horses, ten times that number could be provided with mules. (Reyes Católicos, MS., cap. 184.) "E porque si a esto se diesse lugar," says one of the pragmáticas, adverting to this evil, "muy prestamente se perderia en nuestros reynos la nobleza de la cauellería que en ellos suele auer, e se oluidaria el exercicio militar de que en los tiempos passados nuestra nacion de España ha alcançado gran fama e loor;" it was ordered that no person in the kingdom should be allowed to keep a mule, unless he owned a horse also; and that none but ecclesiastics and women should be allowed the use of mules in the saddle. These edicts were enforced with the utmost rigor, the king himself setting the example of conformity to them. By these seasonable precautions, the breed of Spanish horses, so long noted throughout Europe, was restored to its ancient credit, and the mule consigned to the humble and appropriate offices of drudgery, or raised only for exportation. For these and similar provisions, see Pragmáticas del Reyno, fol. 127-132.