As for the big guns, they were giants when compared with their smaller brothers. Old Froissart, whom I have already quoted more than once, tells of a very notable specimen employed by the "men of Ghent" to attack Oudenarde: "A marvellous great bombarde, which was fifty feet long, and threw great heavy stones of a wonderful bigness; when this bombarde was discharged, it might be heard five leagues by day, and ten at night, making so great a noise in going off, that it seemed as if all the devils in hell were abroad". All traces of this monster have disappeared, but an 18-feet gun of probably an exactly similar type is still to be seen at Ghent--unless the Germans have stolen it. This gun dates from about 1384, and has a bore something like 25 inches in diameter. As perhaps none of us are likely to be in Ghent for some time, we can see a rather smaller but almost duplicate weapon in Edinburgh--the celebrated "Mons Meg". Though she is supposed to have been built 100 years later, it is quite possible that both were turned out at the same manufactory. The Scots gun evidently came from Mons in Flanders, and the Flemish gun is also called "Meg", i.e. the _Dulle Griete_ or "Mad Margery" or "Meg". Another bigger and more handsomely finished gun of the same type, dating from 1464, is to be seen at the Royal Artillery Museum at Woolwich. This is a Turkish piece, and is said to have been "cast", while "Mons Meg" and her sisters are all built-up guns, as can be at once seen on inspection by the most amateur eyes. There are several others on the Continent, notably the two "Michelets" which were left at Mont St. Michael when the siege of that place was abandoned by the English in 1427. The siege began in 1423, so they may date from a good many years earlier. As the English batteries were erected on the Isle of Tombelaine, which is 3000 yards distant from the mount, some idea may be obtained of the distance to which these early cannon could hurl their granite projectiles. [Illustration: The Gun with which we won the Great War with France Observe the heavy breeching-rope attaching the gun to the ship's side; the tackle and block for running in and out; the wooden wheels, and the "quoins" or wedges for elevating the gun.]