“Greek fire” was used both in attack and defence. This was a Greek invention, as its name implies, and the secret of its composition was most jealously guarded. It was known in the east of Europe as early as 673, and was for a long time regarded as supernatural by the northern nations in the “dark ages,” but the secret was discovered by the Crusaders--in fact, Philip of France brought some of it from Acre, and used it for setting fire to the English ships at the siege of Dieppe. Jesuit Petavius states on the authority of Nicetas, Theophanes, and Cedrenus, that it was invented about the year 660.[43] Anna Comnena gives the ingredients as bitumen, sulphur, and naphtha; and states that the Emperor Alexius discharged it at the enemy from his galleys. Others add pitch and gum to these ingredients. It was used in many ways, but its most fatal and irresistible form of application was in setting fire to fortified towns, where the wooden houses of mediæval times afforded it free scope, when inadequately guarded against by a sufficient application of raw hides to the roofs, and other means of protection. A mixture of vinegar, sand, and urine was used to put out its flames. Barrels of “Greek fire” were fired into these towns from the ancient “trebuchet,” and also by a kind of mortar; it was also freely used by the besieged for the destruction of movable towers and engines of war. Froissart, in his account of the attack by the Black Prince on the castle of Romorantin on the Sandre, mentions an engine he calls an “aqueraux” to fire “le feu gregois.” PART XXII. THE SLING AND FUSTIBAL. These rude missile-casting weapons, with the longbow, were greatly used by the peasantry and yeomanry of the early “middle ages.” The first-named is too familiar to need much description, and its very ancient character is universally known. The Spaniards employed it with great effect at the battle of Navarete, where, Froissart says, “they broke many helmets and skullcaps, so that they wounded and unhorsed many of their opponents.” At the Rotunda, Woolwich, are twelve sling stones of two sizes, viz., 2.35 and 1.7 inches in diameter. These stones came from Rhodes--they are pebbles covered with lead. A single slinger appears on the margin of the Bayeux tapestry; the weapon is being used by a peasant aiming at a bird. The fustibal, or staff-sling, consists of a long pole, four feet in length, with a sling in the middle. An example is recorded in a MS., which is attributed to Matthew Paris, in Benet College Library, Cambridge, C. 5, xvi. It was wielded by both hands to cast large stones against an enemy, and was in use as late as the sixteenth century for hurling grenades. The ordinary sling was still to the fore in the fourteenth century--indeed, it was sometimes used in warfare even in the sixteenth; Grose gives an instance at the siege of Sancerre in 1572. The author saw it in Egypt, used by boys for frightening birds from the bean fields. PART XXIII.