The mounted knight was a great fighter and could overcome quite a number of unarmed and unarmored peasants. As long as fighting was done at close quarters no other fighter could equal him or expect to overcome him. But when the common people began to be armed with the bow and the pike an army could be raised that did not always have to fight at close quarters and so armor did not mean so much. War, too, was becoming a mercenary trade and a king could obtain an army by paying for mercenary cavalry and by arming his yeomen and peasants and forming them into pliant infantry. While the barons wasted their strength in fighting and robbing one another, the king swept down upon them with his army of infantry and mercenary cavalry and defeated them one by one, thus doing away with petty baronies and their private quarrels and uniting them under one strong power. When gunpowder came into general use, the knight and his armor vanished in smoke and the chivalry of the middle ages passed away and through the transforming influences of the printing press and steam power and the many other arts of modern times it was refined, and became the basis of the civilization of the present day. Chivalry is still extant, but it has a different meaning than that of feudal times, for where the feudal system had its _knight_ the present age has its _gentleman_. The age of chivalry most naturally aroused poetic and musical fancies and during that time arose the trouveurs of Northern France, with whom may be placed the minstrels of the British Isles, and the troubadours of Southern France and the minnesingers of Germany. These poets and singers were from all classes--nobility, artisans, clergy--and although most of them were of noble rank, yet there were some noted ones from the common people. They would go about the country reciting and singing their poems and they were welcome everywhere. They would sing of war and of love, many of the productions being based upon heroes of the past and again others being of imaginary characters. =The Peasantry.= During feudal times there arose a great distinction between noble and ignoble service. The noble service was that performed by the knight in armor on horseback, that of the unpaid warrior, while ignoble service was that of the field laborer. Since feudal life was mainly agricultural, the artisan, the dweller in the town, counted but little, but there came a time when he did count much for the overthrow of feudalism. The mass of the laboring people were serfs and they were treated sternly by their masters, the noblemen, and they were not much more than slaves.