ARCHERY. 271 



with targets, and bows and arrows, prepared for this 

 pleasant and invigorating diversion. 



This exercise is peculiarly advantageous, and proper 

 for females, on account of the reason already given why 

 they ought to employ every means for invigorating the 

 chest in early life, and were these recreations generally 

 adopted, we have no doubt, but many a slender one, 

 who would otherwise occupy an untimely grave, might 

 long be preserved to herself and society. 



Nor is this exercise at all deficient, when properly car- 

 ried on, in that excitement which gives vigor to the 

 muscles, and buoyancy to the mind. But for this pur- 

 pose there must be preparations, and circumstances at- 

 tending it, which it is Accessary to describe. 



It is well known that the bow and arrow was an- 

 ciently the most efficient means of defence among civ- 

 ilized men, and that before, and even after the inven- 

 tion of gun-powder, it was the chief weapon employed 

 in the wars of Europe. 



In England, in the time of Henry VIII. every man in 

 the kingdom was obliged by law to have in his house a 

 good bow, and three arrows. Charles II. was an arch- 

 er himself, and once knighted a man for having beat Sir 

 Wm. Wood, a famous bow-man, in a game of shooting. 

 Such was the love of this sport in England, that particu- 

 lar spots of ground were appropriated to the archers, 

 by the law of the land, but these being gradually en- 

 croached upon, by tenements and gardens, the people 

 assembled, and without authority, cleared and levelled 

 the grounds without reference to trees, ditches, or oth- 

 er obstacles, until they opened the space of the archery- 

 fields agreeably to the ancient landmarks. Such impor- 

 tance did the people attach to this sport ; and at that 

 period, on account of their athletic exercises, men were 

 much stronger in all their limbs than we are at the pres- 

 ent day. 



This fine exercise afterwards gradually declined, and 

 for a long time was little practiced except by boys ; 

 but has recently been revived, particularly in England, 

 where every year meetings of archers, of both sexes, 

 frequently occur. These meetings are attended by ma- 

 ny of the female nobility, and are said often to compose 



