The British Navy Book. Field Cyril

such occasions.

      Fifteenth-century Ship (From a painting by Carpaccio)

      Observe the capacious hull, the heavy mast, the way the sail is made fast in the middle as well as by the sheets at the corners, the crane for hoisting missiles to the top, and the darts ranged round it; also the way the main-yard is spliced in the middle.

      Nor must we overlook the ornamental nature of the sails in the times of which we are writing. It was no uncommon thing for the whole of the big square mainsail of a "cog" to be decorated with the arms of her owner. This is clearly shown in the well-known manuscript Life of the Earl of Warwick, by John Rous. Generally sails, often themselves of the richest colouring and material, were adorned with badges or devices, but sometimes merely with stripes of different colours. Colour ran riot in the war-vessels of our mediæval ancestors—how different from the sombre grey war-paint of our modern Leviathans!

      Ship of the latter half of the Fifteenth Century (From an illuminated MS. of 1480)

      Note the diminutive figure-head, the two shields amidships—probably placed there for decorative purposes, as the ship appears to be "dressed" with many pennons and streamers. The smallness of the tops is unusual, also the square port-hole and the double-gabled cabin.

      The end of the fifteenth century saw the development of the carrack into the caravel, such a ship as the Sancta Maria, in which Columbus sailed to the West Indies in 1492. As her original plans were found in the dockyard at Cadiz, and a replica of the famous original was built from them by Spanish workmen in the arsenal of Carracas in 1892 for the Chicago Exhibition, which took place in the following year, we know exactly what she was like. She was just over 60 feet long on her keel, and had a length over all of 93 feet, with a beam of nearly 6 feet. She had a displacement of 233 tons when fully laden and equipped. She had three masts, but only the mainmast had a top-sail. The mizzen carried a lateen sail. She was considerably smaller than many ships of her day, but in general appearance and rig she approximated to the smaller ships of the Elizabethan epoch, and she and her class may well be considered as forming a connecting-link between the old single-masted "round ships" and the square-rigged, many-gunned line-of-battleship, which from the time of Henry VIII to Queen Victoria formed the mainstay of our battle fleets. There were, of course, many developments and improvements during this long period, but the type persisted throughout, just as did that of the modified Viking ship in mediæval ages.

      So much for the ships of the Middle Ages. But before we go on to take stock of their crews it will be as well to attempt some description of the way they were fought. Nowadays the ship armed with the heaviest and longest-ranged guns—if her gunners know their work—seems to be able to "knock out" a slightly less powerfully gunned opponent before she can get in any effective reply. The present war has given us many illustrations of this fact. The Scharnhorst—a crack gunnery ship—with her heavier broadside, was able to sink the Good Hope with little or no damage to herself, and in her turn she was simply demolished by the heavy guns of the Inflexible and the Invincible off the Falkland Islands.

      But in the Middle Ages there was nothing like this. All decisive fighting was practically hand to hand and man to man, except for the use of the ram by galleys and the exchange of arrows and stones at comparatively close quarters. But victory was only achieved, as a general rule, when the enemy's ship was boarded and her crew defeated in a bloody tussle, at the end of which no one but the victors remained alive, unless, perhaps, some knight or noble who was worth preserving for the value of his ransom. The military portion of the crew, the archers, men-at-arms, and their knightly leaders, carried the usual arms of their day. The seamen, who were in the minority, probably used knives, short swords, and spears, and made themselves very useful in hurling big stones, heavy javelins called "viretons", unslaked lime, and other disagreeable missiles from the "top-castles" at the head of the mast or masts.

      We have already mentioned the fore and after fighting-stages, or, as they later on became, poops and forecastles, that were erected when a ship was going on the war-path. We may note, in passing, that in the earlier part of the period we are dealing with, these were so often and so generally required that "castle-building" afloat became a recognized trade, until, in the process of evolution, poops and forecastles became integral parts of the ship.

      We may add that, in addition to the fore and after fighting-platforms, special fighting-towers were not infrequently erected, certainly in the Mediterranean, and we may therefore assume that they were not altogether unknown in Northern waters. These towers were generally built up round the mast, and provided with loopholes and battlements, and sometimes protected by iron plates or raw hides.

      One account of mediæval war-galleys states that in some cases "a castle was erected of the width of the ship and some twenty feet in length; its platform being elevated sufficiently to allow of free passage under it and over the benches". King John introduced the famous Genoese cross-bowmen—who so signally failed to distinguish themselves at Crécy—into his navy. The reason most probably was that a cross-bow could be fired through a loophole by a man crouching under cover of the bulwarks or shield-row, whereas a long-bow could not be used in this way. Nevertheless the cross-bow did not succeed in ousting the long-bow in the British Navy, since, in 1456, in the course of a public disputation between the heralds of England and France as to the claim of the former country to the domination of the sea, the French herald claimed for his countrymen that they were more formidable afloat because they used the cross-bow. "Our arbalistiers", he asserted, "fire under cover or from the shelter of the fore and after castles; through little loopholes they strike their opponents without danger of being wounded themselves. Your English archers, on the other hand, cannot let fly their arrows except above-board and standing clear of cover; fear and the motion of the ship is likely to distract their aim." But there does not seem to have been much "fear" among the English archers, and as those that were in the habit of serving afloat doubtless had their "sea-legs", it must have taken a good deal to disconcert their aim, world-renowned for its deadliness.

      Still, as we shall see in a later chapter, the cross-bow was a most formidable weapon afloat, and the French herald's argument was a sound one. In the place of artillery the ships of the earlier Middle Ages were provided with mangonels, trebuchets, espringalds and other mechanical instruments for hurling heavy projectiles, which, according to some authorities, were made or imported as the result of the experiences of Richard I and his crusading companions in the Mediterranean. Personally, I should say that they had been known long before that time. A contemporary chronicle of the siege of Paris by the Northmen in 885-7 mentions that, to cover the Danish stormers, "thousands of leaden balls, scattered like a thick hail in the air, fall upon the city, and powerful catapults thunder upon the forts which defend the bridge". The knowledge of the heavy war-machines of the Ancients had never died out. The catapult was the old Roman onager, and consisted of a long arm or beam, of which one end was thrust through the middle of a tightly-twisted bundle of hair-ropes, fibres, or sinews stretched across a solid frame. At the other end was either a sling or a spoon-shaped receptacle for the projectile. This end was drawn back by means of levers and winches against the twist of the bundle of sinews and held by a catch. On the catch being released, by pulling on a lanyard attached to a trigger, the long end of the beam was forced violently forward till it struck against a strongly-supported transverse baulk of timber arranged for the purpose. When this occurred the huge stone or other projectile flew on through the air and struck its target with tremendous force.

      The trebuchet and the mangonel were very like the Roman ballista, and acted much in the same way as the catapult, except that the motive force was the fall of a heavy counterweight instead of tension. The springald, or espringald, was a large-sized steel cross-bow, mounted on a pivot, hurling heavy iron darts, with great force, which had considerable penetration. In the battle of Zierksee (1304) one of these heavy "garots", as they were called, struck the Orgueileuse of Bruges with such violence that it not only pierced the bulwarks of the forecastle, but took off the arm of one of the trumpeters who were sounding their silver trumpets, transfixed another, and finally embedded itself in the after castle.