The leather guns of Gustavus Adolphus will be found mentioned in the following pages, but these were only covered with leather, presumably to protect them from wet, and were not made entirely of this material. We have no record of cuir-bouilli being employed to make artillery, and of course the chief reason against its use would be the weakness of the seam or join.
[Illustration: FIG. 50. Hat of Bradshaw the regicide, of leather and steel. Ashmolean Mus., Oxford.]
The only use of leather or cuir-bouilli for defensive armour found at the present day is found in the small bucklers of the hill tribes of India. These are often so skilfully treated that the leather is transparent and is almost impervious to a sword-cut, forming a very fair defence against the bullet from the primitive flintlocks in use among those tribes.
The leather hat reinforced with steel plates given at Fig. 50 was worn by the regicide Bradshaw at the trial of Charles I.[116]
REFERENCES TO LEATHER AND CUIR-BOUILLI FROM CONTEMPORARY DOCUMENTS
Moult fu riches qu’il li a chief mi Son poitrail lui laca qui fu de cuir bolis.
The “poitrail” in this extract is the breastplate of the knight and not of the horse.
1278. _Roll of Purchases for the Tournament at Windsor Park._
De Milon le Cuireur xxxviij quiret: p’c pec iij s.
Itm. ij Crest & j Blazon & una galea cor & j ensis de Balon de Rob’o Brunnler xxxviij galee de cor p’c galee xiv.
This tournament seems to have been more of a pageant than a serious contest like those of the fifteenth century. No armour of metal is mentioned among the purchases and the weapons are of whalebone, a material which was used also for gauntlets, as we know from Froissart’s[117] description of the equipment of the troops of Philip von Artevelde at the battle of Rosebecque in 1382. Whalebone was also employed for “privy coats” or brigandines, in which it was inserted between the lining and the cover. Buckram is also mentioned as being used for body-armour, which material will be found alluded to in the section devoted to the Linen Armourers.
1345. _Les Livres de Comptes des Freres Bonis_, I. 174, Forestie.
Item deu per un brasalot ... de cuer negre.
Ordenons que l’arbalestrier ... sera arme de plates ... et de harnois de bras de fer et de cuir.