: The ger-faulcon, and the tercel of the ger-faulcon, for a king. - Joseph Strutt

I may just add, that in addition to the hand-guns, I meet with other instruments of like kind mentioned in the reign of Elizabeth, namely, demy hags, or hag butts. They shot with these engines not only at butts and other dead marks, but also at birds and beasts, using sometimes bullets and sometimes half shots; but in the beginning of the seventeenth century the word artillery was used in a much more extensive sense, and comprehended long-bows, cross-bows, slur-bows, and stone-bows; also scorpions, rams, and catapults, which, the writer tells us, were formerly used; he then names the fire-arms as follows, cannons, basilisks, culverins, jakers, faulcons, minions, fowlers, chambers, harguebusses, calivers, petronils, pistols, and dags. "This," says he, "is the artillerie which is nowe in the most estimation, and they are divided into great ordinance, and into shot or guns," which proves that the use of fire-arms had then in great measure superseded the practice of archery.

The national passion for secular music admitted of little or no abatement by the disgrace and dispersion of the minstrels. Professional musicians, both vocal and instrumental, were afterwards retained at the court, and also in the mansions of the nobility. In the sixteenth century, a knowledge of music was considered as a genteel accomplishment for persons of high rank. Henry VIII not only sang well, but played upon several sorts of instruments; he also wrote songs, and composed the tunes for them; and his example was followed by several of the nobility, his favourites.

And here I cannot help mentioning a very ridiculous show of a learned pig, which of late days attracted much of the public notice, and at the polite end of the town. This pig, which indeed was a large unwieldy hog, being taught to pick up letters written upon pieces of cards, and to arrange them at command, gave great satisfaction to all who saw him, and filled his tormenter's pocket with money. One would not have thought that a hog had been an animal capable of learning: the fact, however, is another proof of what may be accomplished by assiduity; for the showman assured a friend of mine, that he had lost three very promising brutes in the course of training, and that the phenomenon then exhibited had often given him reason to despair of success.