The two figures on the left of the same illustration represent two modes of carrying out the same principle, the one showing it as used in European warfare, and the other as a weapon of defence which has been employed from time immemorial, and is now in full use in many parts of the world.
Both these weapons are intended either to obstruct the approach of an enemy, or to cover the flight of a retreating force. The most simple and most ancient is the Ranjow, which is shown on the right hand of the illustration. The ranjow is nothing but a wooden stick varying in length from eighteen inches to nearly three feet, and sharply pointed at each end. In Borneo, China, &c., the ranjows are almost invariably made of bamboo, as that plant can be cut to a sharp point by a single stroke of a knife. (See page 59.)
When they are to be used, each soldier carries about a dozen or so of them, and sticks one end of them into the ground, taking care to make the upper end lean towards the enemy. Simple as are these weapons, they are extremely formidable, for it is necessary to pull up every ranjow before the troops can advance. Sometimes it has happened that a body of soldiers are driven over their own ranjows, and then the slaughter is terrible.
Some years ago a number of sketches were taken on the spot from scenes in the Chinese war. Among them was one that was absolutely terrible in its grotesqueness. It represented a piece of ground thickly planted with ranjows, over which the Chinese who had fixed them had been driven. They were simply hung with human bodies in all imaginable and unimaginable attitudes, some transfixed on a single ranjow, and others hanging on three or four, the body and limbs being alike pierced by them.
That ranjows were once used in Great Britain is evident from a discovery made by Col. Lane Fox. He had been excavating the soil around an old Irish fort, and deep beneath the bog he found a vast quantity of ranjows still set as the ancient warriors had left them. They were evidently used to defend a passage leading to the fort, and all of them were carefully set with their points outwards. Col. L. Fox was good enough to present me with several of these ancient weapons, which are now in my collection.
On the left is seen a piece of ground strewed with Caltrops, or Crow’s-feet, as they are sometimes called. These very unpleasant implements are made of iron, and have four sharp points, all radiating from one centre, so that no matter how they may be thrown, one point must be uppermost. They are used chiefly for the purpose of impeding cavalry, but I should think, judging from the specimens which I have seen, that infantry would find them very awkward impediments.
As for natural ranjows, they are so numerous that only a very few examples can be given.
The most perfect and most familiar example is, perhaps, the common Hedgehog, which, when rolled up, displays an array of sharp points so judiciously disposed, that it fears but very few foes. The same may be said of the Australian Echidna, or Porcupine Ant-eater, and the Porcupine itself. Whether the radiating bristles of the larva of the Tiger-moth, commonly called the Woolly Bear, come under the same category, I cannot say, but think it very likely.
Among vegetables the analogues are multitudinous. See, for example, the spikes of the Spanish and Horse Chestnuts, and especially the hair-like but formidable bristles which defend the common Prickly Pear. Indeed, all that tribe of plants is furnished so abundantly with natural ranjows, that a hedge of prickly pear forms the best defence which a house and garden can have.
Another example of natural ranjows is seen in the Tree-caddis, one of which is shown in the illustration on page [108], as it appears when suspended from a twig. It is the work of one of the House-builder Moths of the West Indies, and forms a sort of house in which the caterpillar can rest securely. It is built of bits of twigs and thorns, the latter being disposed so that their points are outwards, much after the fashion of a hedgehog’s spines.