other European soldiers of to-day, it is scarcely possible to draw a faithful parallel. Each group belongs to its own age, and is surrounded and associated with its own distinct and characteristic accessories. We know, and we hope that we are able to appreciate, the true genuine pure chivalrous spirit that lives in the hearts of living soldiers, their birthright at once and their inheritance from their comrades who have gone before them. May we not also concede the spirit of chivalry, in its truth and purity, to those more remote men-at-arms, in whom the genius of their own times is reflected with such vivid fidelity? If science was in its early childhood when they wore their armour and laid their lances in rest, art then had attained to a vigorous and noble maturity. The men of the days of chivalry flourished amidst chivalrous surroundings; and, surely, it is scarcely consistent to assume, because of the excellence of their armour, that they were not chivalrous themselves.60

CHAPTER VIII.

ARMS AND ARMOUR OF THE MIDDLE AGES.-PART II.

In the reign of Philip VI., of Valois (A.D. 1328 to 1350), in France, and when in England Edward III. was king, the terrible and most unhappy hundred years' war between those countries had its commencement.61 Then there appeared on

the scene of the great historic drama the Grandes Compagnies -armies, that is, composed of mixed bands of mercenary soldiers who, having made a military life their profession, were always ready to enter into any service which would secure to them the highest pay, accompanied with the most attractive promise of plunder. These men, who included the natives of many countries in their ranks, knew no other interest than their personal advantages, and owed no allegiance except to themselves. In the war between England and France, they sometimes were French and sometimes English, their standard having been determined by their paymaster. During intervals of truce, these bands carried on war, and most atrocious and cruel was their system of warfare, on their own account with the peasantry, and with such citizens as might be exposed to their attacks. They included in their numbers cavalry and infantry, men-at-arms and archers, and miscellaneous bands. Men of noble birth and high rank rode amongst them side by side with peasants, or with serfs who had escaped from vassalage. Alike in their passions, their morals, their pursuits, and their military aspect, it may easily be supposed that but slight distinction amongst them grew

out of any differences there might be in their birth, their education, or their original rank.

To these men, brigands as they were, belongs the merit of having brought about that revolution in arms and armour, to which reference was made in the last chapter, and which the equipment of the more honourable troops of Louis IX. had rendered both necessary and inevitable.62

The civil costume had just undergone a thorough change. The long double robe, the coat and surcoat (cotte and surcot) which had been worn in France since the time of Philip Augustus, had given place to the pourpoint, a kind of paletot, fitting tight to the figure, buttoned from top to bottom in front, without any collar, provided with half-sleeves, padded and quilted, and swelling over the chest. As we see in the monuments of the period, under this pourpoint the coat, or cotte, was still worn; but now it had become a narrow and short blouse, in comparison with its earlier form and proportions, although still its sleeves might be longer than those of the pourpoint, and it might descend lower than that garment. Instead of the coat (cotte) in its new form, the men-at-arms adopted as their under-garment the quilted pourpoint, which they wore without sleeves; and over this, for defence, they placed a shirt or tunic of fine mail, a little longer than their pourpoint, and having sleeves; this they called the haubergeon, or diminished hauberk, and it was soon worn by all ranks, and the original long hauberk was altogether abandoned. In England, however, the shortened mail tunic generally retained the old name, and was called either hauberk or haubergeon. Whatever additional guards had been affixed to the mail of the hauberk in earlier times, to protect the shoulders, elbows, and knees, and also the more exposed surfaces of the limbs, were retained; and at this time the limb-guards were made to enclose the limbs within back and front pieces, hinged and buckled together; and the lower arm and the leg received

habitually the same defences of plate-armour, which before, while almost always given to the upper arm and the thigh, in their case were rather exceptional than general. These defences for the lower arm and the leg were severally named avantbras and grevières, lower arm-guards, and leg-pieces.

The garde-bras, or upper arm-guard, had its form somewhat modified at each extremity, both towards the shoulder and the bend of the arm, where it was finished in three or four circular overlapping plates, which gave more liberty to the limb. At the shoulders also, and at the openings in the arm-guards at the elbow-joint, and in like manner at the similar opening in the leg-pieces at the joints of the limb, where the mail would be visible, shields of very small dimensions were fixed, which more or less resembled convex discs. In England, at this time, the cuisses and chausses, or legcoverings of mail, were not worn beneath the plate, nor had the shortened hauberk sleeves, except quite early in the new period. The openings, however, in the plate, at all the joints of the limbs, and on the instep, were filled with small pieces of mail fixed within the plates. The feet were covered, not with mail, but with sollerets, formed of articulated plates, and the spurs were always of the rouelle form. The new armour for the foot, following the civil fashion (or leading it), eventually, in the 15th century, ended in extravagantly long points; and then the spurs were also scarcely less extravagant in their projection from beyond the heels. It will be observed that the plate sollerets were pointed, from the time of their first introduction, throughout the 14th century, and until some little time before the close of the 15th century.

The happiest innovation of all was the abolition of the heaume, or great helm, and the substitution in its stead of the basinet, a smaller and lighter head-piece, which was somewhat globular in form, but was raised a little above the head, and terminated above in a point. The basinet, while always

As

conforming to the general characteristics of its proper type, admitted many modifications in its form and contour. it decidedly differed from the heaume, in being only a true head-piece without descending over the head and resting on the shoulders, notwithstanding the circumstance that it was often made in such a prolonged shape at the back and sides as to cover the neck of the wearer, the basinet was considered to be incomplete without having appended to it, and depending from it, a mail defence for the neck and shoulders, called the camail. This is the lower part of a mail coif, a hood, or a tippet of mail, which was fixed to the basinet, and hung gracefully over the shoulders,

covering the upper part of the bodyarmour, but leaving the face bare. The defensive action of the basinet was completed by the further addition of an efficient protection for the face, which was accomplished by means of a piece that would completely close-in the open front of

the basinet itself. This piece, called Fig. 25.-FRENCH Basinet with the mesail, or mursail (from the kind

CLOSED VENTAILE.

of resemblance it necessarily bore to the muzzle of an animal), but more generally known in England as the ventaile, or visor, was pierced for both sight and breathing, and was adjusted in such a manner that it could be raised or lowered, or could be altogether removed, at the pleasure of the wearer; and, as a matter of course, this visor was not lowered and secured in front of the face except when the combat was imminent. In England the basinet was constantly worn with the camail, but without any ventaile; and in this case the great helm was retained, and in action was worn over the basinet, and, as of old, resting on the shoulders. A plate for additional defence sometimes was screwed upon a basinet.