The first man who invented the plan of nailing up cannon, by driving an iron spike into the touch-hole, was Caspar Vimercalus, a soldier of Bremen, who thus destroyed the artillery of Sigismund Malatesta. There have been many contrivances suggested to force out nails that were thus inserted, but none have been found of general use. CHAPTER XXIV. MONTJOIE ST. DENIS! Next morning, before daybreak, preparations were made to capture the disarmed bastion, and to effect a lodgment under the walls and town gates. The rain and wind had passed away, and the keen, bright stars were looking out of the blue sky; but there was no moon, and half-an-hour before dawn, three hundred chosen men of the Scottish regiments of Hepburn, Ramsay, and Lesly--one hundred from each--mustered in front of their wet tents, to storm the Bastion de Louise. They were all volunteers, lightly accoutred, and supplied each with the _chardon de fer_, or crampiron, which was strapped over the shoe by means of a buckle. Previous to this invention, stormers used to take one shoe off, to prevent them from slipping on a rampart. The Vicomtes de Turenne and Arpajou, neither of whom had completed his twenty-third year, and Sir John Hepburn, led the assault. With them were twenty dismounted cuirassiers of the Scottish guard, of whom I was one, armed with partizans, and carrying daggers and pistols in our girdles. 'Forward, gentlemen, quickly and in silence,' said Sir John, as we marched to the front, and began the ascent of the mountain; 'to-night we shall sup in La Mothe, and drink to the fair maids of old Scotland in the best Burgundy of Duke Charles.' Followed by a strong covering column, under Colonel Ramsay, we left the trenches in our rear, and almost without a sound advanced over the wet and slippery ground I had so lately traversed twice, until we were within musket-shot of the walls, when the unfortunate explosion of an arquebuse, as a soldier stumbled and fell, gave an alarm, and in a moment after, we heard the drums beating in La Mothe; curving and sparkling, the rockets hissed aloft in fiery circles as the walls were manned and the Lorrainers stood by their guns in the Bastion de Louise, and opened, at random, a fire of small arms upon us. A brilliant flash, with a deep, hoarse, booming sound, from the town barrier, made me stoop instinctively, as a cannon shot passed over my head, and tore to pieces a poor pikeman in my rear. It struck him right in the breast; a portion of his body hit Lord Dundrennan with such force that he could scarcely breathe for some minutes after; but on we hurried with all speed, anxious to come to blows at a shorter distance. The coolness of the brilliant Marquis de Gordon, as we advanced, was somewhat amusing. Drawing off his gauntlet, he said to a captain of Ramsay's corps-- 'Forbes, I'll trouble you for a pinch of snuff.' The captain was about to comply, when a second flash broke from the town rampart, and a ball cut him in two.