Beeton's Brave Tales, Bold Ballads, and Travels and Perils by Land and Sea. Illustrated ... Edited by S. O. Beeton

Front matter

BEETON'S BRAVE TALES, BOLD BALLADS, AND TMVELS AND PERILS V.Y LAND AND SEA. ILLUSTRATED BY SEPARATE PLATES, AND NUMEROUS WOODCUTS INSERTED IN THE TEXT. EDITED BY S. O. BEETON. LONDON: WARD, LOCK, AND TYLER, WARWICK HOUSE, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C. INDEX TAGE PAGE Historical Stories. By W. H. D. Hubert Ellis (continued). Adams. CHAP Story of the Nymphe and Cleop&tre, XIL W° *™ but ??r The 16 nends think it desirable Story of the First of June, The '. 149, 238 ™ *oul^ haTe Change Story of the Indefatigable and the ot Air- Barnes and 1 ac- Droits de L'Homme ... 481 company Archdale to Story of the Mutiny at the Nore and YTTT . „ 7,, ■ ■ f? Snithpad Q<1« XIII. The Abbot of Battle . . 260 P eact 94b XIV. The Abbot takes us to Fly his New Hawks— A Mes- Hubert Ellis : a Story or King sage from Winchelsea . 263 Bichard' s Days the Second.

By XV. " The Men of Rye fetch Francis Davenant. their Bells out of Nor- T , , , . mandy" . . . .268 Introductory 1 xvl We get a Lecturei hut do chap. not think the Abbot is I. How John Wyclif appeared really Angry . . . 353 before Bishop Courtney XVII. Oswald Barnes and I leave in St. Paul's ... 3 Battle Abbey and go back II. How the Duke of Lancaster to London — Gilbert went to Dine with John D'Arcy .... 355 of Ipres .... 7 XVIII. I give Alice what I took III. My Father — Brooklet — for her at Peter's Haven 358 Master Philpot's House XIX. John Philpot has " a few near the Garland . . 10 words with me," and I IV. A Supper Party at Master prepare to leave London Philpot's. ... 97 again — Oswald Barnes V. Oswald Barnes becomes my has leave to join us . 361 Good Friend . . . 102 XX. Our Ships drop down the VI.

The Games in Smithfield, Thames, and arrive at and how Sir Walter Hood the Nore .... 364 put an End to them . 105 XXI. How we discovered John VII. How Sir Walter Hood Es- Mercer the Scot, and caped the Fury of the what came of the disco- Londoners — Alice Philvery — A Fight at Sea . 449 pot Ill XXII. We come Back not Empty - VIII. Death of Edward III. — handed, and are well re- John Philpot visits Prince ceived by the People; Richard at Kennington, but Master Philpot is sent and makes an Address to for to the Council . . 455 him— John of Gaunt . 161 XXIII. The Council in the Tower IX. The Abbot of Battle sends — I am introduced to Sir William Archdale to say Hugh Calverley, who prohow the Town of Rye mises to take me next had been Burned by the time he goes to Sea . 458 French- Archdale . . 165 XXIV.

Chapter I. How John Wyclif Appeared Before Bishop Courtney In St

PAUL'S. " I smell a loller (Lollard) in the wind, quod he." Chaucer — Tlie Shipmaiis Tale. THE morning of the 19th of February, 1377, was beautifully bright. The birds were singiDg merrily, and the trees seemed to rejoice with them, as I pushed back the lattice of my bedroom window and looked forth from East Cheap upon the silver Thames. I was never a lie-a-bed, but this morning 1 was up and dressed by half-past four, in anticipation of the demand which I knew would be made for my services. My kind and good master, of whom much will be said later, had bidden me attend him as early as might be with the scores of the merchandise he was sending to Master Aldane, at Calais, and to receive his orders about other matters which required despatch, because it behoved him to repair betimes to St. Paul's Church, to give what countenance he might to his dear friend Master Wyclif, who was there to appear before the Bishop of London, and answer the charges which were to be made against him.

For a kind and good man too much can never be done ; aud though all his lifetime I strove to do my best to serve him, I have often regretted I had not done more. Now that he has gone whither I pray to follow him, and is beyond the reach or the need of service, I reproach myself with the omission of a hundred little things I might have done for him to make his way the smoother while he remained with us. On this day it was my good fortune to please him by the fulfilment of all that he required. We settled our business before six o'clock had chimed, and by half-past seven I was returning from on board our new carack The Leopard, which lay at anchor off Billingsgate, and had now got her final orders to make all haste to Calais, in time for the grand market to be held in ten days' time. By eight o'clock my master, Master Nicholas Twiford, of Maiden-lane, and Richard Lions, the lapidary, of Dowgate, were afoot and ready to start.

My master had declined to have his horses round, so off we went on foot through Fenchurch-street, crossed the Langbourne which runs adown it towards the river, and so out on to Cornhill. Here we were joined by one out of the many hundreds then streaming westwards, who will make a figure in this history, my master's tried and trusty friend Master William Walworth. " Well met and good morrow, Master Philpot," said Walworth, as coming up he shook my master's hand in an iron grasp, as if he meant to make him feel the heartiness he himself felt. " Are you going on yonder?" " As far as to Paul's," said Philpot, " to see what may be seen of our good friend Wyclif, who, Master Twiford tells me, will be hard pressed by charges which are none of the lightest." " Ay, and sure 'tis so," added Twiford.

" I was told but yesterday that he denies the miracle of the Holy Mass, and holds other doctrines no less displeasing to their reverences the clergy." " For all that he may teach against those drones of monks," said Walworth, " I hold him none the worse. Those fellows have become a clog upon us that must be shaken off somehow, and soon, too. I wonder, for my part, that the bishop should countenance them, for they are a sore hindrance to the parish priests, and set themselves up for their betters. They are scant observers of the authority of the bishops themselves, and were it not for the hold the bishops have at Rome, these Jack priests would have it all their own way with them. But what the mischief makes my Lord Duke of Lancaster so forward to aid our friend Wyclif? He was not wont to favour resistance to authority, of whatever sort it might be."

"Ay, that's the point," interposed Philpot ; " the duke may love Wyclif much, but .he hates Bishop Courtney more. The bishop is a man that will not yield to him as most men will — one that boasts as good blood as a Plantagenet, that knows his duty and stands to it, too, and who checks to the utmost the encroachments which the duke would make upon the king's power. I doubt the duke means so touch to help Wyclif as to rouse the people's sympathy on his behalf against the ■bishop ; but let him beware what he does. The Londoners won't see my lord bishop come to harm." " The Bishop of Winchester is to be one of the judges, men say — William Wykeham," said Twiford. " He's not to the duke's taste either," added Philpot somewhat mysteriously, " but I observe he is always careful not to quarrel with him."

" Has the bishop some secret power over him, think you?" said Walworth. "Nay, I cannot tell," answered Philpot; "but this I know, that Master Wykeham was confessor to the king's late queen, and shrove her on her death-bed, and I have heard from those who should know that— — " What it was that my master was told, which might so much concern the Duke of Lancaster, did not then appear, for having walked by this time to the bottom of West Cheap, we found ourselves in the crowd of people who were flocking to the church, and just as my master was speaking, the crowd had to make way for a person of consequence, whose servants began pushing and elbowing their way in a manner which called forth many a hard name for them from the citizens. "Room for my Lord of Lancaster — give way there!" shouted the stalwart Englishman who was in command of the advanced part of the cortege.

" Let him wait, master serving-man, till we let him pass !" sang out a London 'prentice. " Who is the duke, that his man should talk so big?" A blow, or an attempt at one, was the only reply made to this sally. I say an attempt at one, because the lad ducked before the man's staff could reach him, and rising again like a water-fowl a few yards off, hit his enemy full in the face with a lump of mud he had picked up from the street. The ludicrous condition of the servant, half blinded with the wet mud which streamed over his face and fine clothes, and striving in vain to keep up an appearance of dignity in spite of his dis comfiture, served to put the people into good-humour, which was perhaps as well. for as the Duke of Lancaster, accompanied by Lord Henry Percy, and attended by a small number of knights and gentlemen, rode by, looking sombre and unlovi'n"- to the commons, men scowled angrily at him, and muttered words about the maletots and the poll-tax, and the Spanish war, for which they held him responsible.

Very little would have provoked the people to violence, so much was the duke hated, but he seemed bent on giving no occasion for offence, and rode along on his beautiful roan palfrey without turning his head to right or left, except now and then to acknowledge the salute of some old soldier of his late brother the Black Prince, who had seen him in the battle-field, and knew him for a valiant man-at arms. • 5 The duke and his company turned to the west at Paul's Cross and made for the north door of the cathedral. We passed on in the same direction, and, reaching the entrance first, passed into the sacred building. Matins had just been sung in the chapel, and as we entered, the last notes of the service were dying away among the high vaults of the noble roof, faintly echoing and re-echoing their own amen.

The Bishops of London and. Winchester and many more of the clergy were already met in the chapel behind the high altar, and while they are waiting the arrival of Wyclif it may be as well that I should mention the cause of their assembling. For twenty years before this time Wyclif had written and spoken freely against what he considered to be the errors of the clergy and of the doctrines they taught. He had lifted his voice strongly against the corrupt living of the monks, the employment of clergymen in secular offices, the refusal of the Church authorities to sanction the translation of the Holy Scriptures, the doctrine that in the Eucharist the bread and wine are turned by consecration into the actual body and blood of the Saviour Christ, that the rite of confirmation can be conferred by bishops alone, that matter once created is indestructible, and last but most offensive, that as in the time of the Apostles there existed but the two orders of priests and deacons, so now there were not, nor need there be, any pope, patriarchs, or archbishops.

From time to time these doctrines and bold sayings had attracted much attention, and this year Convocation, or the representatives of all the clergy of England, had specially taken notice of them. It was ordered that inquiry should be made into the truth or error of these things, and that Wyclif should be called upon to answer charges founded upon them. To a committee of their body, with Courtney, Bishop of London, and Wykeham, Bishop of Winchester, at their head, was given the task of carrying out the order of the general assembly. That was how on this February morning the learned prelates and doctors came to meet in St. Paul's, which was now crowded in all its parts by the good men of London, anxious to find Wyclif, whom they loved and respected, free from heresy, and equally determined that their bishop should be free from scath and harm.

I was in the rear of our party, well placed inside the Lady Chapel, and from one of the arcades of the choir screen to which I had climbed could see thoroughly all that was going on. Not many minutes after the bishop had taken his seat, there was a slight stir in the aisle leading up to the chapel, and presently appeared, leaning on a tall white staff, a venerable-looking man, in height above the middle stature, with oval face fining off to the chin from a broad and massive brow. His grey hair and beard flowed in long curls over his simple dress of dark brown stuff, girded in at the waist and falling thence in ample folds to his feet. He walked with firm and dignified step, showing like a pattern of nobleness and of what is majestic in man. Behind him came a servant with books and paper rolls — copies of the aspersed writings and his own laboured manuscript of the English Bible.

On either side of him walked the two men who of all others the bishop least wished to see. I observed a flush come and go on my Lord Courtney's face as he recognised in these two the Duke of Lancaster and the earl marshal, Lord Henry Percy. A smile played for a moment round the Bishop of Winchester's firm mouth, and then his face gave no more indication of what was passing through his mind than the ocean gives of the secrets in its breast. He thought, perhaps, of what Queen Philippa had told him in her last confession. The press of people being now so great that Master Wyclif and his friends could not get through, Lord Percy, using or abusing the authority he had as earl marshal, began to drive the people back and to use force and loud gesture even in the chapel, as though it had been a common place, and as though the bishop had not been there.

My Lord Courtney was a proud man by his blood, being of the family of the great Earls of Devon, whose ancestors had sat on the throne of Constantine, and claimed to be descended from Charlemagne himself. Believe me, he could ill brook this behaviour of the marshal, and rising from his seat he called him to remember where he was and how he should conduct himself, adding these words : — " My lord, if I had known what masteries you would have kept in the church, I should have stopped you out from coming hither." Lord Percy took no heed to this speech, but the duke broke in with, " He shall exercise such authority, whether you will or will not," and to this the bishop made him no reply, but curbed his temper as much as he could. By this time a space had been cleared, and Master Wyclif stood before his judges.

Lord Percy then beckoned a servant to bring a chair, which the marshal gave to Wyclif and bade him sit down. "Not so," said the bishop with much calmness; " it is contrary to law and most unreasonable that one should sit down who is cited to appear before his ordinary ! He must and shall stand." " What Lord Percy says is most reasonable," answered the duke ; " Wyclif has much to answer, and needs a soft seat. And as for you, my lord bishop, who are so high and proud, I will bring down not only your pride, but the pride of all the bishops in England. Trust not in your parents, for I promise you they shall profit you little." " Sir," said the bishop, " my confidence is not in my parents nor in any man else, but only in God, in whom I trust, and by whose assistance I will be bold to speak the truth."

The duke was now thoroughly angered, the more so because he felt he had been doing a wrong and an ungenerous thing, and, like other men when ridden by passion, he gave himself to unbridled extremes of talk. " Rather than hear these words from him," said he to Lord Percy, " I'll drag him from the church by the hair of his head." And these words being heard by the bystanders, were passed from mouth to mouth until the people too began to show their anger. Loud and angry cries rang through the building. " Who is he that insults our bishop?" "Down with the nobles!" "Down with the enemies of the commons!" resounded from arch to arch, and a movement, with the evident design of doing some mischief, was made towards the place where the noblemen stood. The knights and gentlemen who attended the duke closed round him, and presented a ring which in that confined space could not be broken.

Swords flew out of their scabbards and flashed thirstily in the air ; the hubbub and uproar increased in the church, and it seemed impossible to prevent a serious collision, when the bishop rose up, beckoned to the people, and in a voice which was heard above the din and confusion, begged and ordered the multitude to depart peaceably. The duke had stood with folded arms an unmoved spectator of the scene, and, bidding his followers sheathe their weapons and refrain from answering the taunts of the people, prepared to quit the place. Wyclif had remained unheard, unquestioned, and unseated during all this unseemly riot. He stood there like some rock in the midst of a stormy sea which foamed and surged around it. It was not until the bishop had told him that the inquiry would not be had that day, and that he had leave to depart, that he complied with the request of his noble friends, and with them slowly retired from the church.

CHAPTER H. HOW THE DUKE OF LANCASTER WENT TO DINE WITH JOHN OF IPRES. " Of that wassail men told great tale." Kobeet de Bkunne. — About 1320. IN Knight Rider-street, in the ward of Vintry, John of Ipres lived in his own handsome house. He was by birth an Englishman. His parents were Flemings or of Flemish descent, and the family had been settled in London since the time of King Stephen. They had profited by the services they had many times rendered to the sovereign, and still more by their industry and thrift. Their house in Knight Rider-street was known all London over for the finest linen which the foreign trade had to show, and whoso needed good Flanders cloth knew that he could get it from John of Ipres. John was a rich man, and would have been given to hospitality had it not been that the Londoners resented his being a foreigner, and held themselves as much as possible aloof from all dealings with him except in the way of trade.

His social circle was not, therefore, large, and, with the exception of one or two citizens whose judgment got the better of their prejudices, his society consisted of some of his own countrymen and of the Genoese merchants who lived in Mincheon-lane. To many of the nobility he was as well known and as useful as his father had been. He made heavy loans to them when in difficulties, and his gold it was which fitted out many a handsome expedition which the soldier or ambassador could not pay for at the time. My Lord of Lancaster even, the king's son, thought no scorn to use the Flemish merchant's purse, and it so happened that the day following the events narrated in the last chapter, he and Lord Percy had both gone to John of Ipres' house to arrange some money difficulty which was incon veniently pressing.

John had known of their intention to visit him, and had prepared a reception worthy of such guests. Out of deference to the quality of his visitors, John had postponed his dinner to the hour now customary at court, and the meal was not served till half -past one o'clock. The dining-room was a fair chamber on the first floor, with oak panels and heavy beams of the same crossing each other at intervals of three feet along the ceiling, giving it the appearance of being vaulted. The length was full twenty feet, and the breadth could not have been less than twelve to thirteen. At the far end was a fine open grate, in which a blazing stack of wood was now burning cheerily, sending a ruddy glow of warmth and comfort through the room. Two of the three windows which looked on to Thames -street were filled with the painted glass in the manufacture of which the Flemings greatly excelled, and the paintings in them represented the Adoration of the Lamb and the Martyrdom of St. Bavon, the patron saint of Ghent.

It was only within the last few years that John had followed the now general custom of using a chimney, and the intrusion of the fireplace into the room, though a substantial comfort, seemed rather to block up the end of the apartment, which had been built before the birth of the innovation. Round the walls were hung many sets of arms and pieces of body armour which a prince might desire to wear, and where these did not serve to cover the nakedness of the walls some beautiful tapestry from French or Flemish hands, and representing the history of St. Ursula and the Eleven Thousand Virgins, was suspended. The floor had been lately scraped and strewn with fresh straw, and nothing had been left undone which might minister to the comfort of the noble visitors. In this room a sumptuous meal was served after John and the duke had settled their business matters in the warehouse, and there sat down my Lord of Lancaster, Lord Henry Percy, with two of their favourite knights, and John himself.

At the top of the board smoked a noble boar's head, flanked by huge pasties that would have sufficed to feed a score of schoolboys. Large pieces of roasted beef formed a succulent escort to a fine haunch of venison that once had graced in the form of a noble buck the forest glades of Windsor, whilst several dainty dishes of special virtue sent up a fragrant steam to the rafters above. Massive flagons and smaller tankards, all of purest silver, attested the wealth of the Flemish merchant, and the quality of the wines that were to make glad the heart of the duke and his companions was second to none that London could boast of. All was excellent and in abundance. The host and his guests sat down to as splendid a table-load as could be found anywhere away from the court. The diners were in good spirits and prepared to do full justice to the good cheer before them.

The duke had just commenced operations on a dish of oysters which were before him, and had made some sally apropos of their beards about pulling the "proud bishop" out of his church by his priest-cut beard, when a loud knocking at the outer gate of the mansion startled the host out of his dignity and made him run to the window to ascertain the cause. Two bloodhounds, who were leashed and lying on the rushes before the fire, growled angrily as the knocking was continued, and John of Ipres himself was scarcely less put out when he heard his own gate so continuously and impatiently battered. " By Our Lady 1" said the duke, who still applied himself to his oysters, " yon man must have got good St. Vitus's dance, and means to communicate the malady to your knocker." " Mischief seize him," cried John, " for a breaker of the peace 1 I've a mind to ply my cudgel on his head to the same tune that he is playing on my gate.

But forgive me, your grace, my rough speech ; the gentleman who claims admittance has your grace's badge on his arm. What a mischief does Haveland mean by not seeing to the gate? Run, there, some of you ; see that the gentleman be admitted and straightway, too." Away ran two of the serving-men in obedience to their master's orders, but before they reached the gate, old Haveland, the porter, had become convinced of the respectability of the applicant, whose haste brooked so httle delay, and with many mutterings and words to himself, had let the heavy gate turn upon its hinges to admit the stranger, and then let it swing back again into ita sockets. The courtyard once gained, the stranger ran across it, and reached the entrance door. Here the two men who had been sent to admit him met him in the passage, and he, thinking they meant to stop him, hurled one of them to the other end of the hall, and calling to the other not to hinder him as he loved the duke and his own life, rushed to the apartment above the warehouse, in which the duke was dining.

Pale and out of breath he entered the room and advanced to where the duke was. " What means this haste, Sir Walter Hood ?" inquired Lancaster, looking up into his servant's eyes, which were full of apprehension and terror. " Oh, my lord, fly, fly at once, stay not for anything ; a brutal rabble, set on by those who should know better, have been at the Savoy to seek you. They swear they will have your head, that you are a traitor to the people of England, and that they will not be satisfied till they take your life. They have found out you are not at the Savoy, and from some of the terrified slaves about the place they have an inkling of your being here. As I forced my way through them to get hither, I heard them say they would unearth the traitor wherever he might be hidden ; and when I left they had already turned their steps in this direction."

The duke turned pale at the word " traitor," but showed no sign of fear at the danger which threatened him. He conferred a moment with Lord Percy, and then turning with a smile to John of Ipres, who stood appalled at what he had heard from Sir Walter Hood, excused himself for so scurvily treating him by running away from such good cheer. The merchant began to stammer out some words of regret, but the duke, Lord Percy, and their attendants had quitted the room, and before John knew well that his guests were gone, they were down by the water side looking for the means of safety. The duke, who knew the house, threaded the passages which led to the water gate, and by the time the river was reached heard the roar and hubbub of the mob sounding hoarse and savage above the rush of the river. " Fools !" said Lancaster, " do they think to catch me like a fox in its hole?

Let them bray and blare to their heart's content. They cry crucify me to-day, and to-morrow they shall say ' All hail !' " A skiff which lay moored hard by where they stood was now unloosed. Sir Walter, the other two knights, and Lord Percy seized the oars, and the Duke of Lancaster, wrapped in his long furred robe, sat down in the stern-sheets, and took the tiller. "Push off!" cried Percy as soon as the party were seated, and in another minute a few vigorous strokes had shot the boat a good twenty yards into the stream. Not a minute had been lost in getting away, and not a minute too soon were they in starting, for just as the rowers were settling to their work in the boat, a yell from the shore announced that the people had discovered the fugitives. Whiz ! whiz ! came two arrows hurtling through the air, falling into the boat not a yard from the stroke oar.

"Pull steadily," said the duke, "but do not distress yourselves; we are safe from anything they can do, and we shall want our strength to meet the force of the stream higher up. They shall pay for this insult, by all that's horrible ! but for the present we can bide our time." No pursuit was attempted on the part of the mob, who, baffled in two quests .after their enemy, seemed not inclined to push the matter further. Bishop Courtney, too, as I heard afterwards, had hurried from his house as soon as the doings of th< rioters were made known to him, and coming among them, had forbidden them, under pain of the Church's displeasure, to follow out their evil intentions. Adam Staple, the mayor, too, had not been idle, and ere the mob at John Ipres' house could succeed in battering down the gate, he was upon them with a large number of the citizens, and drove them away to their homes.