deaths than might be found in a period of ten years of ancient warfare.
For excepting the Count Lodovico della Mirandola, who fell at Ferrara,
when the Venetians a few years ago attacked that city, and the Duke de
Nemours, slain at Cirignuola, we have no instance of any commander being
killed by artillery. For, at Ravenna, M. de Foix died by steel and
not by shot. Wherefore I say that if men no longer perform deeds of
individual prowess, it results not so much from the use of artillery,
as from the faulty discipline and weakness of our armies, which being
collectively without valour cannot display it in particular instances.

As to the third assertion, that armies can no longer be brought to
engage one another, and that war will soon come to be carried on wholly
with artillery, I maintain that this allegation is utterly untrue, and
will always be so held by those who are willing in handling their troops
to follow the usages of ancient valour. For whosoever would have a good
army must train it, either by real or by mimic warfare, to approach the
enemy, to come within sword-thrust, and to grapple with him; and must
rely more on foot soldiers than on horse, for reasons presently to be
explained. But when you trust to your foot-soldiers, and to the methods
already indicated, artillery becomes powerless to harm you. For
foot-soldiers, in approaching an enemy, can with more ease escape the
fire of his artillery than in ancient times they could have avoided
a charge of elephants or of scythed chariots, or any other of those
strange contrivances which had to be encountered by the Romans, and
against which they always devised some remedy. And, certainly, as
against artillery, their remedy would have been easier, by as much as
the time during which artillery can do hurt is shorter than the time
during which elephants and chariots could. For by these you were thrown
into disorder after battle joined, whereas artillery harasses you only
before you engage; a danger which infantry can easily escape, either by