The Welsh, keeping up their hostilities to their Norman invaders, reserved their aggressive operations till the wet and stormy season of the year, when the land was unfit for the manœuvres of a heavy-armed cavalry, and the gloomy days favourable for the sudden onslaught of mountain warriors. "Videntes tempus hyemale madidum sibi competere," says Matthew Paris[312].
The rich cities of Italy, as we have seen, began about the middle of this century to employ stipendiary men-at-arms; and it seems probable that the first of these knightly soldiers were those of the equestrian class who, from political disgust or family feuds, had become refugees in the territory of their new masters. The good wages and the booty obtained by these gentle mercenaries induced others of a more humble class to take up the trade, and under skilful leaders (the well-known Condottieri) they obtained fame, fortune and honours.
The Basques were at this time among the most prominent of the mercenary troops, acting as a light corps, for which their mountain-life rendered them very apt. They were the Swiss of the thirteenth century.
Among our northern neighbours we obtain a glimpse of the Frieslanders, through the means of the indefatigable Matthew Paris. "These Frieslanders," he says, "are a rude and untamable people: they inhabit a northern country, are well skilled in naval warfare, and fight with great vigour and courage on the ice. It is of the cold regions of these people, and their neighbours the Sarmatians, that Juvenal says, 'One had better fly hence, beyond the Sarmatians and the icy ocean,' &c. The Frieslanders, therefore, having laid ambuscades among the rush-beds along the sea-coast, (in their war with William of Holland,) as well as along the country, which is marshy--and the winter season was coming on--went in pursuit of the said William, armed with javelins, which they call _gaveloches_, in the use of which they are very expert, and with Danish axes and pikes, and clad in linen dresses covered with light armour. On reaching a certain marsh they met with William, helmeted, and wearing armour, and mounted on a large war-horse covered with mail. But, as he rode along, the ice broke, although it was more than half a foot thick, and the horse sank up to his flank, becoming fixed in the mud of the marsh. The trammelled rider dug his sharp spurs into the animal's sides to a great depth, and the noble, fiery beast struggled to rise and free himself, but without success. Crushed and bruised, he only sank the deeper for his efforts, and at length by his struggles he threw his rider among the rough slippery fragments of ice. The Frieslanders then rushed on William, who had no one to help him from his position, all his companions having fled, to avoid a similar disaster; and attacking him on all sides with their javelins, despite his cries for mercy, pierced his body through and through, which was already stiffened with wet and cold. He offered his murderers an immense sum of money for ransom of his life, but these inhuman men, shewing no mercy, cut him to pieces. And thus, just as he had a taste of empire, was the Flower of Chivalry, William, king of Germany and count of Holland, the creature and pupil of the Pope, hurled, at the will of his enemies, from the pinnacle of his high dignity to the depths of confusion and ruin[313]."