button to main menu  Clarke's Survey of the Lakes, 1787

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Page 187:-
times other kinds were used for show; but Ascham condemns this custom entirely, saying, "That manye men which have taken them up for gaynesse, hath layde them down agayne for profit." The head of the arrow differed much from our modern ones: that used in shooting at marks seems to me to have been made somewhat larger than the end of the arrow, and then to have been closed down to it, as we see the jewellers close the cup in which a stone is set down to the stone; the head by this means would somewhat resemble a pine-apple, with a sharp, smooth top, but furrowed longitudinally towards the base; on this account, Ascham says, they were called "Hie-rigged, creased, or shouldered heades, or silver-spoone heades, for a certain likeness such heads have with the knob-ende of some silver spoones." He adds, "These heades be good both to keepe a lengthe withall, and also to perche a wind withall. To keepe a length withall, because a man may certainly pull it to the shouldering every shoote, and no farther; to perche a winde withall, because the point from the shoulder forward breaketh the weather, as all other sharpe things doo." For war, he recommends sharp heads without any barb, as were commonly used.
Having said thus much concerning the weapons of our forefathers, it remains to say something concerning their manner of handling them. The arrow was drawn, as we have seen, to the head, and always to the ear, and not to the breast, when they shot at pricks or short marks: when they shot at long marks, or rovers, it was (on account of the elevation then necessary) drawn to the breast. The Archers did not wink with one eye, as gunner usually do, but kept both open; nor did they look at their arrow, but at the mark only. Ascham, with great humour, ridicules the bad and awkward Archers of his time; but as his descriptions are rather long, I shall omit them: the reader may, if he pleases, consult the book, or take a view of a bowling-green, where he will see (mutatis mutandis) the self-same fund of ridicule.
To shew the great certainty of the bow, I shall quote passages from our author, Ascham, which shew this weapon to have been nearly as exact as our modern rifle-guns.
P.166. "Thus every Archer must know, not onlye what bowe and shafte is fittest for him to shoote withall, but also what time and season is best for him to shoote in."
P.168. "And as I toulde you before, in the hole year, Springe-time, Summer, Faule of the leafe, and Winter; and in one day, morninge, noontime, afternoone, and eventyde, altereth the course of the weather, the pyth of the bowe, the strength of the man. And in every one of these tymes the weather altereth; as sometime hot, sometime windy, sometime caulme, sometime cloudye, sometime cleare, somtime coulde the wynde, sometime moistye and thicke, sometime drye and smoothe. A little wynd in a moistye day stoppeth a shafte more than a good whysking wynd in a cleare daye. Yea, and I have seene when there hath bene no wynd at all, the ayre so mistye and thicke, that both marks have bene wonderfull great. And ones, when the plague was in Cambridge, the downe wynd twelve score marke for the space of three weekes, was thirteen score and a half; and into the wynd, being not very great, a great deale above fourteen score."
P.172. "The lengthes or shortnesse of the marke is always under the rule of the wether, yet somewhat there is in the marke worthie to be marked of an Archer. If the prickes stande on a streighte plaine ground, they be the best to shoote at. If the marke stand on a hill-syde, or the ground be unequal with pittes and turninge-wayes betwixt the markes, a man's eye shall thincke that to be streighte which is crooked."
P.170. "Besyde all these kindes of windes, you must take heed if you see any cloude appear, and gather by little and little against you, or else if a shower of raine be lyke
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