THE SCHOOLE OF SHOOTYNGE 53
39 lines✦
o call a forke-head: bothe these two kyndes of hearles,were used in Homers dayes, for Teucer used forked heades,sayinge thus to Agamemnon. Eighte good shaftes have I shot sithe I came, eche one wyth a forkeheade. Iliad. 8. Pandarus heades and Ulysses heades were broode arrowheades, as a man maye leame in Homer that would be curi-ouse in knowyng that matter. Hercules used forked heades,but yet they had thre pointes or forkes, when other menneshad but twoo. The Parthyans at that great battell wherethey slewe ritche Crassus and his sonne used brode Arroweheades, whyche stacke so sore that the Romaynes couldnot poule them out agayne. Commodus the Emperoureused forked heades, whose facion Herodiane doeth lyvelyand naturally describe, sayinge that they were lyke the shapof a new mone wherwyth he would smite of the heade of abirde and never misse, other facion of heades have not I redon. Our Englyshe heades be better in war than eytherforked heades, or brode arrowe heades. For firste the endebeynge lyghter they flee a great deele the faster, and by thesame reason gyveth a far sorer stripe. Yea and I supposeif ye same lytle barbes which they have, were clene putaway, they shuld be far better. For thys every man dothgraunt, that a shaft as long as it flyeth, turnes, and whan itleveth tumyug it leveth goyng any farther. And everythynge that enters by a tumynge and boring facion, themore flatter it is, the worse it enters, as a knife thoughe itbe sharpe yet because of the edges, wil not bore so wel as abodkin, for every rounde thynge enters beste and thereforenature, sayeth Aristotle, made the rayne droppes rounde forquicke percynge the ayer. Thus, eyther shaftes turne notin flyeng, or els our flatte arrowe heades stoppe the shaftein entrynge. Phi. But yet Toxophile to holde your communication alytle I suppose the flat heade is better, bothe bycause itmaketh a greter hoole, and also bycause it sticks faster in. Tox. These two reasons as they be bothe trewe, so theybe both nought. For fyrst the lesse hoole, yf it be depe, isthe worst to heale agayn : when a man shoteth at hys enemy.
✦