they appear, therefore, to have carried other demands to too great a height, it can be ascribed only to the faithless and tyrannical character of the king himself, of which they had long had experience; and which, they foresaw, would, if they provided no further security, lead him soon to infringe their new liberties, and revoke his own concessions. This alone gave birth to those other articles, seemingly exorbitant, which were added as a rampart for the safeguard of the Great Charter.

The barons obliged the king to agree that London should remain in their hands, and the Tower be consigned to the custody of the primate, till the 15th of August ensuing, or till the execution of the several articles of the Great Charter. The better to ensure the same end, he allowed them to choose five-and-twenty members from their own body as conservators of the public liberties, and no bounds were set to the authority of these men either in extent or duration. If any complaint were made of the violation of the charter, whether attempted by the king, justiciaries, sheriffs, or foresters, any four of these barons might admonish the king to redress the grievance; if satisfaction were not obtained, they could assemble the whole council of twenty-five, who, in conjunction with the great council, were empowered to compel him to observe the charter; and in case of resistance might levy war against him, attack his castles, and employ every kind of violence, except against his royal person and that of his queen and children. All men throughout the kingdom were bound, under the penalty of confiscation, to swear obedience to the twenty-five barons; and the freeholders of each county were to choose twelve knights, who were to make report of such evil customs as required redress, conformably to the tenor of the Great Charter.

These men were, by this convention, really invested with the sovereignty of the kingdom; they were rendered co-ordinate with the king, or rather superior to him, in the exercise of the executive power: and as there was no circumstance of government which, either directly or indirectly, might not bear a relation to the security or obedience of the Great Charter, there could scarcely occur any incident in which they might not lawfully interpose their authority.

IRON AND CIVILISATION.

(From Industrial Biography,' by S. Smiles.)

con-sum'-mate, complete, finished
me-di-æ-val, relating to the middle ages,
i.e. from the eighth to the fifteenth
century

and'-i-rons, the irons fixed to the ends of
a fire-grate in which the spit turns
re-tain'-er, an adherent or dependent
ma-raud'-ing, plundering

feud, a quarrel

de-lin'-quen-cy, a fault

un-wield'-y, clumsy to handle

smelt'-ing, the operation of separating a metal from its ore

Cro'-sus, a king of Lydia, noted for his
riches, conquered by Cyrus B.C. 548
al'-chem-ist, a professor of the art of
transmuting metals

Hom'-il-don, in Northumberland. The
English, under Henry Hotspur, defeated
the Scots under Douglas in 1402

Crecy, in France. Edward III. and the Black Prince here defeated the French in 1346

Agincourt, in France. Henry V. defeated French, 1415

THE Smith's tools were of many sorts; but the chief were his hammer, pincers, chisel, tongs, and anvil. It is astonishing what a variety of articles he turned out of his smithy by the help of these rude implements. In the tooling, chasing, and consummate knowledge of the capabilities of iron, he greatly surpassed the modern workman; for the medieval blacksmith was an artist as well as a workman. The numerous exquisite specimens of his handicraft which exist in our old gateways, church-doors, altar-railings, and ornamented dogs and andirons, still serve as types for continual reproduction. He was, indeed, the most cunning workman' of his time. But, besides all this, he was an engineer. If a road had to be made, or a stream embanked, or a trench dug, he was invariably called upon to provide the tools, and often to direct the work. He was also the military engineer of his day, and as late as the reign of Edward III. we find the king repeatedly sending for smiths from the Forest of Dean to act as engineers for the royal army at the siege of Berwick.

The smith being thus the earliest and most important of mechanics, it will readily be understood how, at the time when surnames were adopted, his name should have been so common in all European countries.

Hence the multitudinous family of Smiths in England, in some cases vainly disguised under the Smythe' or 'De Smijthe;' in Germany the Schmidts; in Italy the Fabri, Fabricii, or Fabbroni; in France the Le Febres or Lefevres; in Scotland the Gows, Gowans, or Cowans. We have also among us the Brownsmiths, or makers of brown bills; the Nasmyths, or nailsmiths; the Arrowsmiths, or makers of arrowheads; the Spearsmiths, or spear-makers; the Shoosmiths, or horse-shoers; the Goldsmiths, or workers of gold; and many more. The smith proper was, however, the worker in iron-the maker of iron tools, implements,

and arms; and hence this name exceeds in number that of all the others combined.

In course of time the smiths of particular districts began to distinguish themselves for their excellence in particular branches of ironwork. From being merely the retainer of some lordly or religious establishment, the smith worked to supply the general demand, and gradually became a manufacturer. Thus the maker of swords, tools, bits, and nails congregated at Birmingham, and the makers of knives and arrowheads at Sheffield. Chaucer speaks of the Miller of Trompington as provided with Sheffield whittle:

A Shefeld thytel bare he in his hose.

The common English arrowheads manufactured at Sheffield were long celebrated for their excellent temper, as Sheffield iron and steel plates are now. The Battle of Homildon, fought in Scotland in 1402, was won mainly through their excellence. The historian records that they penetrated the armour of the Earl of Douglas, which had been three years in making, and they were 'so sharp and strong that no armour could repel them.' The same arrowheads were found equally efficient against French armour on the fields of Crecy and Agincourt.

Although Scotland is now one of the principal sources from which our supplies of iron are drawn, it was in ancient times greatly distressed for want of the metal. The people were as yet too little skilled to be able to turn their great mineral wealth to account. Even in the time of Wallace, they had scarcely emerged from the stone period, and were under the necessity of resisting their iron-armed English adversaries by means of rude weapons of that material. To supply themselves with swords and spearheads, they imported steel from Flanders, and the rest they obtained by marauding excursions into England. The district of Furness in Lancashire,— then, as now, an iron-producing district, was frequently ravaged with that object; and on such occasions the Scotch seized and carried off all the manufactured iron they could find, preferring it, though so heavy, to every other kind of plunder. About the same period, however, iron must have been regarded as almost a precious metal even in England itself; for we find that in Edward the Third's reign the pots, spits, and frying-pans of the royal kitchen were classed among his majesty's jewels.

The same famine of iron prevailed to a still greater extent in the Highlands, where it was even more valued, as the clans lived chiefly by hunting, and were in an almost constant state of feud. Hence the smith was a man of indispensable importance among the Highlanders, and the possession of a skilful

armourer was greatly valued by the chiefs. The story is told of some delinquency having been committed by a Highland smith, on whom justice must be done; but as the chief could not dispense with the smith, he generously offered to hang two weavers in his stead!

At length a great armourer arose in the Highlands, who was able to forge armour that would resist the best Sheffield arrowheads, and to make swords that would vie with the best weapons of Toledo and Milan. This was the famous Andrea de Ferrara, whose swords still maintain their ancient reputation. This workman is supposed to have learnt his art in the Italian city after which he was called, and returned to practise it in secresy among the Highland hills. Before him, no man in Great Britain is said to have known how to temper a sword in such a way as to bend so that the point should touch the hilt and spring back uninjured. The swords of Andrea de Ferrara did this, and were accordingly in great request; for it was of every importance to the warrior that his weapon should be strong and sharp without being unwieldy, and that it should not be liable to snap in the act of combat. This celebrated smith, whose personal identity has become merged in the Andrea de Ferrara swords of his manufacture, pursued his craft in the Highlands, where he employed a number of skilled workmen in forging weapons, devoting his own time principally to giving them their required temper. He is said to have worked in a dark cellar, the better to enable him to perceive the effects of the heat upon the metal, and to watch the nicety of the operation of tempering, as well as possibly to serve as a screen to his secret method of working.

England herself has on more than one occasion been supposed to be in serious peril because of the decay of her iron manufactures. Before the Spanish Armada, the production of iron had been greatly discouraged, because of the destruction of timber in the smelting of the ore-the art of reducing it with pit-coal not having yet been invented; and we were consequently mainly dependent upon foreign countries for our supplies of the material out of which arms were made. The best iron came from Spain itself, then the most powerful nation in Europe, and as celebrated for the excellence of its weapons as for the discipline and valour of its troops. The Spaniards prided themselves upon the superiority of their iron, and regarded its scarcity in England as an important element in their calculations of the conquest of the country by their famous Armada. 'I have heard,' says Harrison, that when one of the greatest peers of Spain espied our nakedness in this behalf, and did solemnly utter, in no obscure place, that it would be an easy matter in a short time to conquer England because it wanted armour, hiş

words were not so rashly uttered as politely noted.' The vigour of Queen Elizabeth promptly supplied a remedy by the large importations of iron which she caused to be made, principally from Sweden, as well as by the increased activity of the forges in Sussex and the Forest of Dean; 'whereby,' adds Harrison, ‘England obtained rest, that otherwise might have been sure of sharp and cruel wars. Thus a Spanish word, uttered by one man at one time, overthrew, or at the leastwise hindered, sundry privy practices of many at another.'

Nor has the subject which occupied the earnest attention of politicians in Queen Elizabeth's time ceased to be of interest; for, after the lapse of nearly three hundred years, we find the smith and the iron-manufacturer still uppermost in public discussions. It has of late years been felt that our much-prized 'hearts of oak' are no more able to stand against the prows of mail which were supposed to threaten them, than the sticks and stones of the ancient tribes were able to resist the men armed with weapons of bronze or steel. What Solon said to Croesus, when the latter was displaying his great treasures of gold, still holds true:-'If another comes that hath better iron than you, he will be master of all that gold.' So, when an alchemist waited upon the Duke of Brunswick during the Seven Years' War, and offered to communicate the secret of converting iron into gold, the Duke replied :-'By no means; I want all the iron I can find to resist my enemies; as for gold, I get it from England.' Thus the strength and wealth of nations depend upon coal and iron, not forgetting men, far more than upon gold.