Читать книгу The Book of the Sword онлайн

61 страница из 138

Use eke the cast of stone with slynge or honde;

It falleth ofte, yf other shot there none is,

Men harneysèd in steel may not withstonde

The multitude and mighty cast of stonys.[22]

II. The stroke or blow which led to the cut would be seen exemplified in the felidæ, by the terrible buffet of the lion, by the clawing of the tiger and the bear, and by the swing of the trunk of the ‘half-reasoner with the hand.’ Man also would observe that the zebra and the quagga (so called from its cry, wag-ga, wag-ga[23]), the horse and the ass, the camel, the giraffe, and even the cow, defend themselves with the kick or hoof-blow; while the ostrich, the swan, and the larger birds of prey assault with a flirt or stroke of the wing. The aries or sea-ram (Delphinus orca) charges with a butt. The common whale raises the head with such force that it has been held capable of sinking a whaler: moreover, this mammal uses the huge caudal fin or tail in battle with man and beast; for instance, when engaged with the fox-shark or thresher (Carcharias vulpes).[24] These, combined with the force of man’s doubled fist, would suggest the ‘noble art’ of boxing: it dates from remote antiquity; witness the cestus or knuckle-duster of the classics, Greeks, Romans, and Lusitanians. So far from being confined to Great or Greater Britain, as some suppose, it is still a favourite not only with the Russian peasants, but also with the Hausas, Moslem negroids who did such good service in the Ashanti war. A curious survival of the feline armature is the Hindu’s Wágh-nakh. Following Demmin, Colonel A. Lane Fox[25] was in error when he described this ‘tiger’s-claw’ as ‘an Indian weapon of treachery belonging to a secret society, and invented about a.d. 1659.’ Demmin[26] as erroneously attributes the Wágh-nakh to Sívají, the Prince of Maráthá-land in Western India, who traitorously used it upon Afzal Khan, the Moslem General of Aurangzeb, sent (a.d. 1659) to put down his rebellion.[27] A meeting of the chiefs was agreed upon, and the Moslem, quitting his army, advanced with a single servant; he wore a thin robe, and carried only a straight sword. Sívají, descending from the fort, assumed a timid and hesitating air, and to all appearance was unarmed. But he wore mail under his flimsy white cotton coat, and besides a concealed dagger, he carried his ‘tiger’s-claw.’ The Khan looked with contempt at the crouching and diminutive ‘mountain rat,’ whom the Moslems threatened to bring back in cages; but, at the moment of embracing, the Maráthá struck his Wágh-nakh into his adversary’s bowels and despatched him with his dagger. The Wágh-nakh in question is still kept as a relic, I am told, by the Bhonslá family.[28] Outside the hand you see nothing but two solid gold rings encircling the index and the minimus; these two are joined inside by a steel bar, which serves as a connecting base to three or four sharp claws, thin enough to fit between and to be hidden by the fingers of a half-closed hand. The attack is by ripping open the belly: and I have heard of a poisoned Wágh-nakh which may have been suggested by certain poison rings in ancient and mediæval Europe.[29] The date of invention is absolutely unknown, and a curious and instructive modification of it was made by those Indians-in-Europe, the Gypsies.