Page 83. line 431.

The wild-fire balls hiss'd thro' the midnight sky.

Drayton enumerates these among the English preparations for war:

"The engineer provided the petard

To break the strong portcullies, and the balls
Of wild-fire devised to throw from far

To burn to ground their palaces and halls."

And at the siege of Harfleur he says,

"Their brazen slings send in the wild-fire balls."

"Balls of consuming wild-fire

That lickt men up like lightning, have I laught at,
And tost 'em back again like childrens trifles."

B. and F. The Mad Lover.

"I do command that particular care be had, advising the gunners to have half butts with water and vinegar, as is accustomed, with bonnets and old sails, and wet mantels to defend fire, that as often is thrown.

"Every ship shall carry two boats lading of stones, to throw to profit in the time of fight on the deck, forecastle or tops, according to his burden.

"That the wild-fire be reparted to the people most expert, that we have for the use thereof, at due time; for that if it be not overseen, giving charge thereof to those that do understand it, and such as, we know, can tell how to use it; otherwise it may happen to great danger."

Orders set down by the duke of Medina to be observed in the voyage toward England. Harl. Misc. vol. i.

"Some were preparing to toss balls of wild-fire, as if the sea

had been their tennis-court."

Deliverance of certain Christians from the Turks.

Harl. Misc. vol. i.

gectoient par leur engins chevaulz mors et autres bestes mortes et puantes, pour les empuantir, dont ilz estoient la dedans en moult grant destresse. Car lair estoit fort et chault ainsi comme en plein este, et de ce furent plus constrains que de nulle autre chose. Si considerent finablement entre eulx que celle messaise ilz ne pourroient longuement endurer ne souffrir, tant leur estoit la punaisie abhominable." Froissart 1. 38.

This was an evil which sometimes annoyed the besieging army. At Dan" 'pour la puantise des bestes que lon tuoit en lost, et des chevaulx qui estoient mors, lair estoit tout corrumpu, dont moult de chevaliers et escuyers en estoient malades et melencolieux, et sey alloient les plusieurs, refreschir a Bruges et ailleurs pour eviter ce mauvais air.". Froissart 1. 175.

- Crowded in unwholesome vaults.

Page 84. line 440.

At Thin sur l' Escault, "La fist le duc charier grant foison d'engins de Cambray et de Douay, et en y eut six moult grans, le duc les fist lever devant la forteresse. Lesqlz engins gectoient nuyt et jour grosses pierres et mangonneuulx qui abatoient les combles et le hault des tours des chambres et des salles. Et en contraignoient les gens du Chastel par cest assault tresdurement. Et si nosient les compaignons qui le gardoient demourer en chambres nen sales quilz eussent, mais en caves et en celiers." Froissart 1. 38.

Page 84. line 459. Eager to mark the carrion crow for food.

Scudery has a most ingenious idea of the effects of famine: during the blockade of Rome by the Goths, he makes the inhabitants first eat one another, and then eat themselves.

La rage se meslant à leurs douleurs extrêmes,

Ils se mangent l'un l'autre, ils se mangent eux-mesmes.

Alaric.

Fuller expresses the want of food pithily. grew long, and victuals short.".

"The siege

Page 85. line 477. When in the Sun the Angel of the Lord.

And I saw an Angel standing in the sun; and he cried with a loud voice, saying to all the fowls that fly in the midst of heaven, Come and gather yourselves together unto the supper of the great God:

That ye may eat the flesh of kings, and the flesh of captains, and the flesh of mighty men, and the flesh of horses, and of them that sit on them. Revelation, xix. 17, 18.

A similar passage occurs in Ezekiel.

And thou, son of man, thus saith the Lord God, speak unto every feathered fowl, and to every beast of the field. Assemble yourselves, and come; gather yourselves on every side to my sacrifice that I do sacrifice for you, even a great sacrifice upon the mountains of Israel, that ye may eat flesh and drink blood.

Ye shall eat the flesh of the mighty, and drink the blood of the princes of the earth, of rams, of lambs, and of goats, of bullocks, all of them fatlings of Bashan.

And ye shall eat fat till ye be full, and drink blood till ye be drunken, of my sacrifice which I have sacrificed for you. Thus ye shall be filled at my table with horses and chariots, with mighty men, and with all men of war, saith the Lord God. Ezekiel xxxix. 17, &c.

Fuller calls this "resolving rather to lose their lives by wholesale on the point of the sword, than to retail them out by famine."

"It was the belief of the Mexicans, that at the conclusion of one of their centuries the sun and earth would be destroyed. On the last night of every century they extinguished all their

fires, covered the faces of the women and children, and expected the end of the world. The kindling of the sacred fire on the mountain of Huixachtla was believed an omen of their safety." Clavigero.

1

Reasons for burning a trumpeter

"The letter she sent to Suffolk was received with scorn, and the trumpeter that brought it commanded to be burnt, against the law of nations, saith a French* author, but erroneously, for his coming was not warranted by the authority of any lawfull prince, but from a private maid, how highly soever self-pretended, who had neither estate to keep, nor commission to send a trumpeter."- Fuller's Profane State.

Page 96. line 275.--In sight of Orleans and the Maiden's host.

"The trumpeter was ready to be burnt in the

De Serres says, sight of the besieged."

Let not him that girdeth on his harness boast himself, as he that putteth it off. 1 Kings, 20, 11.

“A ripâ fluminis Halys venimus ad Goukurthoy; inde Choron; post in The Ke Thioi. Hic multa didicimus a monachis Turcicis, quos Dervis vocant, qui eo loco insignem habent ædem, de heroe quodam Chederle summâ corporis atque animi fortitudine, quem eundem fuisse cum nostro D. Georgio fabulantur; eademque illi ascribunt quæ huic nostri; nimirum vasti et horrendi draconis cæde servasse expositam virginem. Ad hæc alia adjiciunt multa, et quæ libitum est, comminiscuntur, illum per longinquas oras peregrinari solitum, ad fluvium postremo pervenisse, cujus aquæ bibentibus præstarent immortalitatem Qui quidem fluvius, in quâ parte terrarum sit, non dicunt; nisi fortassis in Utopiâ collocari debet: tantum affirmant illum magnis tenebris, multâque caligine obductum latere ; neque cuiquam mortalium post Chederlem, uti illum videret, contigisse. Chederlem vero ipsum mortis legibus solutum, huc illuc in equo præstantissimo, qui similiter ejusdem aquæ haustu mortalitatem exuerit, divagari, gaudentem præliis, adesse in bello melioribus, aut iis qui ejus opem imploraverint, cujuscunque tandem sint religionis.” - Busbequius.

The Persians say, that Alexander coming to understand, that in the mountain of Kaf there was a great cave, very black and dark, wherein ran the water of immortality, would needs take a journey thither. But being afraid to lose his way in the cave, and considering with himself that he had committed a great oversight in leaving the more aged in cities and fortified places, and keeping about his person only young people, such as were not able to advise him, he ordered to be brought to him some old man, whose counsel he might follow in the adventure he was then upon. There were in the whole army but two brothers, named Chidder and Elias, who had brought their father along with them, and this good old man bad his sons go and tell Alexander, that to go through with the design he had undertaken, his only way were to take a mare that had a colt at her heels, and to ride upon her into the cave, and leave the colt at the entrance of it, and the mare would infal