So many bowyers,
So many fletchers,
And so few good archers
Saw I never.
While all these names, however, speak for specific workmanship, our ‘Flowers’ represent a more general term. We are told of Phœbus in the ‘Manciples Tale,’ that
His bowe he bent, and set therein a flo.
‘Flo,’ was a once familiar term for an arrow. ‘John le Floer,’ or ‘Nicholas le Flouer,’ therefore, would seem to be but synonymous with ‘Arrowsmith’ or ‘Fletcher.’ ‘Stringer’ and ‘Stringfellow’ are self-explanatory, and are common surnames still. What a list of sobriquets is here! What a change in English social life do they declare. Time was when to be a sure marksman was the object of every English boy’s ambition. The bow was his chosen companion. Evening saw him on the village green, beneath the shade of the old yew tree, and as he practised his accustomed sport, his breath would come thick and fast, as he bethought him of the coming wake, and his chance of bringing down the popinjay, and presenting the ribbon to his chosen queen of the May. Yes, times are altered. Teeming cities cover the once rustic sward, broadcloth has eclipsed the Lincoln green, the clothyard, the arrow; but still amid the crowd that rushes to and fro in our streets the name of an ‘Archer,’ or a ‘Bowman,’ or a ‘Butts,’ or a ‘Popgay’ spoken in our ears will hush the hubbub of the city, and, forgotten for a brief moment the greed for money, will carry us, like a pleasant dream recalled, into the fresher and purer atmosphere of England’s past.
In the poem from which I have but recently quoted we have the record of ‘gonnes,’ or ‘guns,’ as we should now term them. It would be quite possible for our nomenclature to be represented by memorials of the powder magazine, and I should be far from asserting that such is not the case.[[224]] In the household of Edward III. there are enumerated, among others, ‘Ingyners lvij; Artellers vj; Gonners vj.’ Here there is a clear distinction between the ‘gun’ and the ‘engine;’ between missiles hurled by powder and those by the catapult. Fifty years even earlier than this Chaucer had used the following sentence:—‘They dradde no assaut of gynne, gonne, nor skaffaut.’ In his ‘Romance,’ too, as I have just shown, he places in juxtaposition ‘grete engines’ and ‘gonnes.’ Of one, if not both of these, we have undoubted memorials in our nomenclature. The Hundred Rolls furnish us with a ‘William le Engynur’ and a ‘Walter le Ginnur;’ the Inquisitiones with a ‘Richard le Enginer,’ and the Writs with a ‘William le Genour.’ The descendants of such as these are, of course, our ‘Gunners,’ ‘Ginners,’ ‘Jenour,’ and ‘Jenners,’[[225]] the last of which are now represented by one who is as renowned for recovering as his ancestor in days gone by would be for destroying life. Our ‘Gunns’ and ‘Ginns’ also must be referred to the same source. In one of the records just alluded to a ‘Warin Engaine’ is to be met with. If we elide the first syllable, as in the previous instances, the modern form at once appears.
But if in the deadly tournament the baron and his retainers found an ample pastime, nevertheless the chase was of all diversions the most popular. In this the prince and the peasant alike found recreation, while with regard to the latter, as we shall see, it was also combined with service. The woody wastelands, so extended in these earlier days of a sparse population, afforded sport enough for the most ardent huntsman. According to the extent of privilege or the divisions into which they were separated, these tracts were styled by the various terms of ‘forest,’ ‘chase,’ ‘park,’ and ‘warren.’ To any one at all conversant with old English law these several words will be familiar enough. To keep the wilder beasts within their prescribed limits, to prevent them injuring the tilled lands, and in general to guard the common interests of lord and tenant, keepers were appointed. The names of these officers, the chief of whom are entitled by appellations whose root is of a local character, are well-nigh all found to this day in our directories. Indeed there is no class of names more firmly imbedded there. In the order of division I have just alluded to, we have ‘Forester,’ with its corrupted ‘Forster’ and ‘Foster,’ relics of such registered folk as ‘Ivo le Forester,’ ‘Henry le Forster,’ or ‘Walter le Foster;’ ‘Chaser,’ now obsolete, I believe, but lingering on for a considerable period as the offspring of ‘William’ or ‘Simon le Chasur;’ ‘Parker,’ or ‘Parkman,’ or ‘Park,’ descended from ‘Adam le Parkere,’ or ‘Hamo le Parkere,’ or ‘Roger atte Parke,’ or ‘John del Parc,’ and ‘Warener’ or ‘Warner,’ or ‘Warren,’ lineally sprung from men of the stamp of ‘Thomas le Warrener,’ ‘Jacke le Warner,’ or ‘Richard de Waren.’ The curtailed forms of these several terms seem to have been all but consequent with the rise of the officership itself. ‘Love’ in the ‘Romance’ says:—
Now am I knight, now chastelaine,