Book XIX

., 267 note.

[96] _Bain_, ii., p. xxxix, note.

[97] _Welsh Wars_, p. 301.

I would suggest, therefore, for the English army the following round numbers: 3,000 to 4,000 horse of all sorts, 12,000 English and Welsh foot, 3,000 (?) Irish, 1,500 (?) foreigners, or, in a lump sum, 20,000 men of all arms, to which must be added a crowd of non-combatants--servants, traders, and camp-followers generally. Bain (as cited) proposes 50,000; Round, 30,000; Oman, 60,000 to 70,000. I consider 18,000 to 20,000 the most probable range. With even the lower of these numbers, the English commanders in organization and commissariat would have rather more than they could manage.

Barbour’s figure for the Scottish army must be similarly reduced. More than 30,000 would be a huge proportion of the Scottish population of that time, especially as the whole does not seem to have been drawn upon, and of that, as Barbour insists, a good many were still hostile.[98] William the Lion was credited in 1173 with a national host of 1,000 armoured horsemen, and 30,000 unarmoured footmen,[99] and the latter unit is surely over the score. At Halidon Hill, 1333, the Scots are said to have had 1,174 knights and men-at-arms and 13,500 light-armed men or foot;[100] and this chronicler consistently exaggerates. Yet these figures represent a united kingdom. Forty thousand at Bannockburn is the estimate for the Scots of the _Vita Edw._ writer, but the English writers, on their side, grossly overstate the numbers of the enemy, as witness what is said of Hemingburgh above. Bain’s figure of 15,000 to 16,000 is no doubt nearer the mark; “perhaps twenty-five thousand men in all” is Mr. Oman’s conjecture.[101] Possibly 6,000 to 7,000 is as near as we can go, adopting Barbour’s ratio, which gives a proportion of 1 to 3 of the English army. The non-combatants here, too, would be numerous. Up to this time Bruce’s men in the field could be numbered only in hundreds, so that as many thousands would represent a very special effort. And note that after Murray’s success over Clifford nearly the whole Scots army gathered round him to see him and do him honour--a fact which is suggestive[102] as to its size.

[98] See note on 46.

[99] _Chronique de Jordan Fantosme_, lines 328-9.

[100] _Hemingburgh_, ii., pp. 308-9.

[101] _Art of War_, p. 575.

[102] XII. 159-164.

APPENDIX D

THE THROWING OF THE HEART

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