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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from The Ancient Regime by Charles Kingsley: even, if we recollect that they preserved their country's freedom
for centuries against the superior force of England--were those
troops of Scots who, century after century, swept across the border
on their little garrons, their bag of oatmeal hanging by the saddle,
with the iron griddle whereon to bake it; careless of weather and of
danger; men too swift to be exterminated, too independent to be
enslaved.
But if horsemanship had, in these cases, a levelling tendency it
would have the very opposite when a riding tribe conquered a non-
riding one. The conquerors would, as much as possible, keep the art
and mystery of horsemanship hereditary among themselves, and become
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