"
The signal was given. Caesar's front rank advanced running. Seeing the
Pompeians did not move, they halted, recovered breath, then rushed on,
flung their darts, and closed sword in hand. At once Pompey's horse bore
down, outflanking Caesar's right wing, with the archers behind and between
them raining showers of arrows. Caesar's cavalry gave way before the
shock, and the outer squadrons came wheeling round to the rear, expecting
that there would be no one to encounter them. The fourth line, the pick
and flower of the legions, rose suddenly in their way. Surprised and
shaken by the fierceness of the attack on them, the Pompeians turned, they
broke, they galloped wildly off. The best cavalry in those Roman battles
were never a match for infantry when in close formation, and Pompey's
brilliant squadrons were carpet-knights from the saloon and the circus.
They never rallied, or tried to rally; they made off for the nearest
hills. The archers were cut to pieces; and the chosen corps, having
finished so easily the service for which they had been told off, threw
themselves on the now exposed flank of Pompey's left wing. It was
composed, as has been said, of the legions which had once been Caesar's,
which had fought under him at the Vingeanne and at Alesia. They ill liked,
perhaps, the change of masters, and were in no humor to stand the charge
of their old comrades coming on with the familiar rush of victory.
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