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Rh for this slow introduction of them. To ward off the balls, the soldiers so cased themselves in iron armour that they were not only protected against the shot themselves, but disabled from injuring the enemy by the weight they carried. Still, as there was more genius brought to bear on the sword than the ploughshare, other improvements were made in different parts of Europe, and called after the towns in which they were invented. And some of these followed the decrescendo rule, which quite reversed the Irishman's idea, who said he had known a certain gun ever since it was a pocket-pistol. This miniature musket was first brought out in an Italian town called Pistoja, and was named the pistol after the place of its birth. The bayonet was first made in 1640 at Bayonne, and assumed the name of that town. It was first used as a simple dagger or poignard fixed in a wooden handle, which was fitted into the muzzle of the gun, so that no shooting could be carried on while it was used; and the gun became a simple pike for the time being. The French got the start in the improvement of the fixture; for when, in the reign of William III, they encountered an English force, they halted on the charge within a few paces of the regiment, and, with bayonets fixed by a socket over the muzzles of their guns, poured in a volley upon the enemy, who were as greatly astonished as if