[62] One of the most remarkable applications of this theory is with regard to the military art. Busbecq wrote a treatise on the _Art of Warfare against the Turks_. In it he constantly quotes as his authorities the great captains of Greece and Rome; some may smile on reading his work, and imagine that the tactics of Cæsar and Alexander are out of place in the days of gunpowder and cannon balls, but the following passage will show how one of his countrymen successfully followed out the principle, which he may possibly have taken in the first instance from Busbecq’s work. ‘Lewis William of Nassau had felt that the old military art was dying out, and that there was nothing to take its place. He had revived in the swamps of Friesland the old manœuvres, the quickness of wheeling, the strengthening, without breaking the ranks or columns, by which the ancient Romans had performed so much excellent work in their day, and which seemed to have passed entirely into oblivion. Old colonels and ritt-masters, who had never heard of Leo the Thracian or the Macedonian phalanx, smiled and shrugged their shoulders ... but there came a day when they did not laugh, neither friends nor enemies.’—Motley, _United Netherlands_, iii. 4; see also _United Netherlands_, iv. 34. [63] His contemporary, L. Guicciardini, says of him in his book, published 1567, ‘Il est homme sage et prudent: a cause dequoy il ha este envoyé plusieurs fois ambassadeur par les Princes en divers endroicts, pour tres-grans affaires et mesmes par l’Empereur Fernand, a Soliman Empereur des Turcs, ou il traicta, par l’espace de huict ans continuels les affaires de la Chrestienté, avec telle _fidelité et loyauté_ que outre le gré qu’il acquit empres de son Seigneur, fut surnommé par les Turcs mesmes, _Homme de bien_.’—_Description de tout le Païs bas_, p. 311. [64] On his way to Constantinople some of his escort complained of his servants not paying proper respect to paper—an unpardonable offence in the eyes of a Turk. Another might have argued the question, but Busbecq thoroughly appreciated the men he was dealing with. He tacitly admitted the heinousness of the offence; ‘but,’ added he, ‘what can you expect of fellows who eat pork?’ This argument was in their eyes unanswerable. [65] Roostem once sent a fine melon to Busbecq, telling him that there was plenty of such fruit at Belgrade; the melon was supposed to represent a cannon-ball, and the message was tantamount to a threat of war. Busbecq thanked him warmly for his present, and at the same time took the opportunity of observing that the Belgrade melons were very small compared to those produced at Vienna!