111. _bracer_, a guard for the arm used by archers to prevent the friction
of the bow-string on the coat. It was made like a glove with a long
leathern top, covering the fore-arm (Fairholt). See it described in
Ascham's Toxophilus, ed. Arber, pp. 107, 108. Cf. E. _brace_.
112. For a description of 'sword and buckler play,' see Strutt's Sports and
Pastimes, bk. iii. c. 6. § 22; Brand, Pop. Antiquities, ed. Ellis, ii. 400.
114. _Harneised_, equipped. 'A certain girdle, _harnessed_ with silver' is
spoken of in Riley's Memorials of London, p. 399, with reference to the
year 1376; cf. Riley's tr. of Liber Albus, p. 521. 'De j daggar harnisiat'
xd.'; (1439) York Wills, iii. 96. 'De vj paribus cultellorum harnesiat' cum
auricalco. xvjd.'; ibid. 'A dagger harnest with sylver'; id. i. 419. And
see note to l. 104.
115. _Christofre._ 'A figure of St. Christopher, used as a brooch.... The
figure of St. Christopher was looked upon with particular reverence [13]
among the middle and lower classes; and was supposed to possess the power
of shielding the person who looked on it from hidden dangers'; note in
Wright's Chaucer. This belief is clearly shewn by a passage in Wright's
History of Caricature. It is of so early an origin that we already meet
with it in Anglo-Saxon in Cockayne's Shrine, p. 77, where we are told that
St. Christopher 'prayed God that every one who has any relic of him should
never be condemned in his sins, and that God's anger should never come upon
him'; and that his prayer was granted. There is a well-known early woodcut
exhibiting one of the earliest specimens of block-printing, engraved at p.
123 of Chambers' Book of Days, vol. ii, and frequently elsewhere. The
inscription beneath the figure of the saint runs as follows:--
'Christofori faciem die quacunque tueris
Illa nempe die morte mala non morieris.'
Hence the Yeoman wore his brooch for good luck. St. Christopher's day is
July 25. For his legend, see Mrs. Jameson's Sacred and Legendary Art, ii.
48; &c. _shene_; see n. to l. 160.
116. Riley, in his Memorials of London, p. 115, explains _baldric_ as 'a
belt passing mostly round one side of the neck, and under the opposite
arm.' In 1314, a baldric cost 12d. (same reference). See Spenser, F. Q. i.
7. 29.