Ambroise Paré (1510–90). Journeys in Diverse Places.
The Harvard Classics. 1909–14.
The Journey to Boulogne. 1545
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I was not far from this shot, so that I could just feel the moved air, without its doing me any harm save a fright, which made me duck my head low enough; but the ball was already far away. The soldiers laughed at me, to be afraid of a ball which had already passed. Mon petit maistre, I think if you had been there, I should not have been afraid all alone, and you would have had your share of it.
Monseigneur the Duc de Guise, François de Lorraine, was wounded before Boulogne with a thrust of a lance, which entered above the right eye, toward the nose, and passed out on the other side between the ear and the back of the neck, with so great violence that the head of the lance, with a piece of the wood, was broken and remained fast; so that it could not be drawn out save with extreme force, with smith’s pincers. Yet notwithstanding the great violence of the blow, which was not without fracture of bones, nerves, veins, and arteries, and other parts torn and broken, my lord, by the grace of God, was healed. He was used to go into battle always with his vizard raised: that is why the lance passed right out on the other side.