Then Cloudesle cleft the apple in two,
As many a man myght se,
Over Gods forbode, [321] sayde the kynge,
That thou sholde shote at me.
XVII.—SUPERIORITY OF ANCIENT BOWMEN.
If we were to judge of the merits of the ancient bowmen from the practice of archery as it is exercised in the present day, these poetical eulogiums would appear to be entirely fictitious. There are no such distances now assigned for the marks as are mentioned before, nor such precision, even at short lengths, in the direction of the arrows. By an act established An. 33 Hen. VIII., no person who had reached the age of twenty-four years, might shoot at any mark at less than two hundred and twenty yards distance. [322] I believe few, if any, of the modern archers, in shooting at a mark, exceed the distance of eighty or a hundred yards, or, in long shooting, reach four hundred yards. I have seen the gentlemen who practise archery in the vicinity of London, repeatedly shoot from end to end, and not touch the target with an arrow; and for the space of several hours, without lodging one in the circle of gold, about six inches diameter in the centre of the target: this, indeed, is so seldom done, that one is led to think, when it happens, it is rather the effect of chance than of skill: which proves what Ascham has asserted, that an archer should be well taught early in life, and confirm the good teaching by continual practice afterwards. We may also recollect, that archery is now followed for amusement only, and is to be commended as a manly and gentleman-like exercise.
I remember about four or five years back, [323] at a meeting of the society of archers, in their ground near Bedford Square, the Turkish ambassador paid them a visit; and complained that the enclosure was by no means sufficiently extensive for a long shot: he therefore went into the adjacent fields to show his dexterity; where I saw him shoot several arrows more than double the length of the archery ground, and his longest shot fell upwards of four hundred and eighty yards from his standing. The bow he used was much shorter than those belonging to the English archers; and his arrows were of the bolt kind, with round heads made of wood. This distance rather exceeds the length our rhymist has given to the wands set up by Cloudesle and his companions, but then we are to recollect they shot with vast precision to that distance, [324] which the ambassador did not, he had no mark, and his arrows fell exceedingly wide of each other.
Carew, speaking of the Cornish archers two centuries back, says, "For long shooting, their shaft was a cloth yard in length, and their prickes twenty-four score paces, equal to four hundred and eighty yards; and for strength, they would pierce any ordinary armour;" he then adds, "and one Robert Arundell, whom I well knew, could shoot twelve score paces with his right hand, with his left, and from behind his head." [325] This puts me in mind of a curious anecdote related by Hall: "There came to his grace, king Henry the Eighth, a certayn man, with a bowe and arrowe, and he desyred his grace to take the muster of hym, and to see him shoote; for that tyme hys grace was contented; the man put hys one fote in his bosome, and so dyd shoote, and shote a very good shote, and well towardes hys marke; whereof, not onely his grace, but all others greatly merveyled; so the kynge gave him a rewarde," [326] and for this curious feat he afterwards obtained the by-name of "Fote in Bosome."