The strength of the phalanx depended on sixteen ranks of long pikes, wedged together in the closest array.

[48] But it was soon discovered by reflection, as well as by the event, that the strength of the phalanx was unable to contend with the activity of the legion.

[49 [Footnote 41: See an admirable digression on the Roman discipline, in the sixth book of his History.] [Footnote 42: Vegetius de Re Militari, l.ii.c.4, &c.

Considerable part of his very perplexed abridgment was taken from the regulations of Trajan and Hadrian; and the legion, as he describes it, cannot suit any other age of the Roman empire.] [Footnote 43: Vegetius de Re Militari, l.ii.c.1.In the purer age of Caesar and Cicero, the word miles was almost confined to the infantry.
Under the lower empire, and the times of chivalry, it was appropriated almost as exclusively to the men at arms, who fought on horseback.] [Footnote 44: In the time of Polybius and Dionysius of Halicarnassus, (l.v.c.

45,) the steel point of the pilum seems to have been much longer.