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Chapter XLI
The Large Bolt Shooting Continental Target Crossbow
Fig. 143. - Large Continental Target Crossbow. Side
view.
This crossbow, which may be considered in some measure a revival of
the mediaeval weapon, was of admirable design and construction and had
as powerful a steel bow as it was possible to bend with a goat's-foot lever.1
Its bow was bent as shown in the crossbow, fig. 45, p. 89, and as is
also represented at the end of this Chapter. Its goat's-foot lever was,
of course, of a size proportionate to the strength of the bow and to the
distance the bowstring had to be drawn along the stock of the crossbow.
The lock had the two triggers commonly seen in all the best sporting
and target crossbows made in the latter half of the sixteenth century,
the back trigger being employed to cock the lock, and the front-, or hair-trigger
to discharge the crossbow.
The circular steel catch for the bow-string was the same in shape as
the ivory nut of mediaeval times. The catch and the lock of this crossbow
were identical with the catch and lock shown in fig. 113, p. 173.
The transverse metal pin for the goat's-foot lever had its ends fitted
with thin collars of steel. These revolving collars assisted the downward
slide of the arms of the lever when the latter was being used to pull back
the bow-string.
1 See Chapter XVII, for a description of the
goat's-foot lever. |
