In the Tower are some old hooped guns of the date of Henry VI. The first cast-iron cannon of English make were made at Buxtead in Sussex, in 1543, by Ralph Hogge, master founder, whose principal assistant was Pierre Baude, a Frenchman. About the same time, Hogge employed Peter Van Collet, a Flemish gunsmith, who, according to Stowe, "caused to be made certain mortar pieces, being at the mouth from eleven to nine inches wide, for the use whereof the said Peter caused to be made certain hollow shot of cast iron, stuffed with fyrwork, whereof the bigger sort has screws of iron to receive a match to carry fire, to break in small pieces the said _hollow shot_, whereof the smallest piece hitting a man would kill or spoil him." This is undoubtedly the parent of the explosive shell which has been brought to such terrible perfection in the present day. Many of Baude's brass and iron guns are still preserved in the Tower; and perhaps from his foundry came that very beautiful gun which bears the name of Henry VIII., 1541, and is preserved now at Southampton. Two old English guns are at present in the ducal castle of Blair, whither they had been brought by the Athole family when Lords of the Isle of Man. One is inscribed thus:-- "Henricus Octavus; Thomas Scymoure Knighte, Receyvour of the Peel, was Master of the King's Ordynans, when John and Robert Owyn made this pese. Anno dni., 1544." The other has the legend:-- "Henry, Earle of Derbye, Lord of this Isle of Man, being here in May, 1577; named _Dorothe_. Henry Halsall, Receyvour of the Peele, bought this pese, 1574." This was the fourth Earl of Derby, a K.G., and he had named the gun from his mother Dorothy, who was daughter of Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk. The old brass gun, popularly known as Queen Anne's Pocket Pistol, was once called Queen Elizabeth's, according to Colonel James. It was cast at Utrecht in 1544, and is a 12-pounder, twenty feet long, finely ornamented with figures in bas-relief. Scotland, which is rich in military and historical antiquities of all kinds, can also boast of several ancient cannon, extant or in her annals. In 1430, James I. had cast for him in Flanders a cannon of brass, called the Lion of Scotland, bearing this inscription:-- "Illustri Jacobo Scottorum principe digno, Regni magnified, dum fulmine castra reduco Factus sum sub eo, nuncupar ego Leo." "This," says Balfour in his _Annales_, "was the first canon or bombard of any strength or bignes, that ever was in Scotland." Among several ancient guns in the armory of the Grants of Grant in Strathspey, is one of singular beauty, covered with figures of men on horseback, and animals of the chase. It is four feet two inches long, and seems to have been a Moyenne or wall piece, and is inscribed:-- "Dominus . Johannes . Grant . Miles . Vicecomes de Invernes . Me fecit . in Germania, 1434."