490 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



Foot using the first crude attempt at a musket. A favorite type of 

 canuon were then called " bombards," and he styled this diminutive 

 copy a "bombardelle." Nothing could have been ruder and more 

 primitive in design and construction. It was merely a tube — probably 

 about as large as a section of two-inch gas-pipe, but not so well made 

 — with one end closed, and near that a small hole for a vent. It was 

 securely fastened to a stout stick, the end of which rested on the 

 ground to receive the recoil. The Man on Foot, clad in light armor, 

 held the bombardelle up, while a comrade touched a live coal to the 

 vent. Powder was as yet very weak, and it was necessary to use a 

 ball weighing about a pound, in order to do any execution, even at 

 the range of a few score paces. Nothing illustrates so well the amaz- 

 ing slowness of the evolutions of the heavily armored men and horses 

 as that this clumsy weapon, which probably never had an eifcctive 

 range of one hundred yards, and could not have been fired oftener 

 than once in five minutes, could have rendered any service whatever. 

 With no facilities for aiming, it was by the merest accident that it 

 struck the cavalier, unhorsed him, and put him at the mercy of his 

 enemies on the ground, but even this chance was much gained. 



The power v/as now getting into the hands in which it belonged. 

 Invincible infantry means democracy sooner or later, just as inevitably 

 as the invincible Man on Horseback meant aristocracy, and artillery 

 autocracy. The foot-soldier, even though he be the myrmidon of a 

 king or the henchman of a lord, is, unconsciously perhaps, the enemy 

 of noble and sovereign. lie comes from the people and returns to the 

 people. Whatever he may do at behest of liege or lord is an object- 

 lesson to his fellow-commoners as to what they may do in opposition. 

 Every step taken by his masters to make him more formidable is 

 " Bloody instruction, which, being taught, returns 

 To plague th' inventor." 



The first cavalier that was rolled in the dust by a bombard elle-ball 

 reopened the era of the people which had closed when Rome's match- 

 less infantry disappeared from the fighting world. Thenceforward the 

 final overthrow of feudal and kingly despotism and the triumph of the 

 people became merely a question of improvements in the bombardelle. 

 In vain the Man on Horseback strengthened his armor and thickened 

 his castle-Avalls. The stronger his armor, the more he was weighted 

 down ; the slower he moved, the longer he was within striking dis- 

 tance of the man with the " hand-gonne." Nor could the thickening 

 of his walls keep pace with the improvement in cannon-making, the 

 substitution of iron balls for stones, and the strengthening of gun- 

 powder. 



In those days the Germans called cannon " boxes " (Biichse), from 

 the manner in which they were built up. They devised a fork or 

 hook (Ilaken) to support the bombardelle and afford better aim, ami 

 called the improved arm a " hook-box " (llaken-biichse), whence the 



