The chiefs, hearing from Archie that he had acted as one of Wallace’s lieutenants in battles where the English had been heavily defeated, willingly consented that he should endeavour to instil the tactics by which those battles had been won into their own followers; but when they found that he proposed that the men should remain stationary to withstand the English charges, they shook their heads.

“That will never do for our people,” they said.  “They must attack sword in hand.  They will rush fearlessly down against any odds, but you will never get them steadily to withstand a charge of men-at-arms.”

Archie, however, persuaded them to allow him to organize a band of two hundred men under his immediate orders.  These were armed with long pikes, and were to form a sort of reserve, in order that if the wild charge of the main body failed in its object these could cover a retreat, or serve as a nucleus around which they could rally.  The army swelled rapidly; every day fresh chiefs arrived with scores of wild tribesmen.  Presently the news came that an English force was advancing from the Pale against them.  A council was held at which Archie was present.  Very strongly he urged his views upon the chieftains, namely:  that they should altogether decline a pitched battle; but that, divided into numerous parties, they should enter the Pale, destroying weak garrisons and ravaging the country, trying to wear out the English by constant skirmishes and night attacks, but refusing always to allow themselves to be tempted into an engagement.

“The English cannot be everywhere at once,” he urged.  “Let them hold only the ground on which their feet stand.  As they advance or retire, close ever in on their rear, drive off their cattle and destroy their crops and granaries in the Pale; force them to live wholly in their walled towns, and as you gain in strength capture these one by one, as did we in Scotland.  So, and so only, can you hope for ultimate success.”

His advice was received with a silence which he at once saw betokened disapproval.  One after another of the Irish chieftains rose and declared that such a war could not be sustained.

“Our retainers,” they said, “are ready to fight, but after fighting they will want to return to their homes; besides, we are fifteen thousand strong, and the English men-at-arms marching against us are but eight hundred; it would be shameful and cowardly to avoid a battle, and were we willing to do so our followers would not obey us.  Let us first destroy this body of English, then we shall be joined by others, and can soon march straight upon Dublin.”

Archie saw that it was hopeless to persevere, and set out the following day with the wild rabble, for they could not be termed an army, to meet the English.  The leaders yielded so far to his advice as to take up a position where they would fight with the best chance of success.  The spot lay between a swamp extending a vast distance, and a river, and they were thus open only to an attack in front, and could, if defeated, take refuge in the bog, where horsemen could not follow them.