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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/7715.txt b/7715.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..413ca44 --- /dev/null +++ b/7715.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4509 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook Last Of The Barons, by Lytton, Volume 1. +#142 in our series by Edward Bulwer-Lytton + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**EBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These EBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers***** + + +Title: The Last Of The Barons, Volume 1. + +Author: Edward Bulwer-Lytton + +Release Date: March 2005 [EBook #7715] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on May 6, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + + + + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LAST OF THE BARONS, V1 *** + + +This eBook was produced by Tapio Riikonen +and David Widger + + + + +THE LAST OF THE BARONS + +by Edward Bulwer Lytton + + + + +DEDICATORY EPISTLE. + +I dedicate to you, my indulgent Critic and long-tried Friend, the work +which owes its origin to your suggestion. Long since, you urged me to +attempt a fiction which might borrow its characters from our own +Records, and serve to illustrate some of those truths which History is +too often compelled to leave to the Tale-teller, the Dramatist, and +the Poet. Unquestionably, Fiction, when aspiring to something higher +than mere romance, does not pervert, but elucidate Facts. He who +employs it worthily must, like a biographer, study the time and the +characters he selects, with a minute and earnest diligence which the +general historian, whose range extends over centuries, can scarcely be +expected to bestow upon the things and the men of a single epoch. His +descriptions should fill up with colour and detail the cold outlines +of the rapid chronicler; and in spite of all that has been argued by +pseudo-critics, the very fancy which urged and animated his theme +should necessarily tend to increase the reader's practical and +familiar acquaintance with the habits, the motives, and the modes of +thought which constitute the true idiosyncrasy of an age. More than +all, to Fiction is permitted that liberal use of Analogical Hypothesis +which is denied to History, and which, if sobered by research, and +enlightened by that knowledge of mankind (without which Fiction can +neither harm nor profit, for it becomes unreadable), tends to clear up +much that were otherwise obscure, and to solve the disputes and +difficulties of contradictory evidence by the philosophy of the human +heart. + +My own impression of the greatness of the labour to which you invited +me made me the more diffident of success, inasmuch as the field of +English historical fiction had been so amply cultivated, not only by +the most brilliant of our many glorious Novelists, but by later +writers of high and merited reputation. But however the annals of our +History have been exhausted by the industry of romance, the subject +you finally pressed on my choice is unquestionably one which, whether +in the delineation of character, the expression of passion, or the +suggestion of historical truths, can hardly fail to direct the +Novelist to paths wholly untrodden by his predecessors in the Land of +Fiction. + +Encouraged by you, I commenced my task; encouraged by you, I venture, +on concluding it, to believe that, despite the partial adoption of +that established compromise between the modern and the elder diction, +which Sir Walter Scott so artistically improved from the more rugged +phraseology employed by Strutt, and which later writers have perhaps +somewhat overhackneyed, I may yet have avoided all material trespass +upon ground which others have already redeemed from the waste. +Whatever the produce of the soil I have selected, I claim, at least, +to have cleared it with my own labour, and ploughed it with my own +heifer. + +The reign of Edward IV. is in itself suggestive of new considerations +and unexhausted interest to those who accurately regard it. Then +commenced the policy consummated by Henry VII.; then were broken up +the great elements of the old feudal order; a new Nobility was called +into power, to aid the growing Middle Class in its struggles with the +ancient; and in the fate of the hero of the age, Richard Nevile, Earl +of Warwick, popularly called the King-maker, "the greatest as well as +the last of those mighty Barons who formerly overawed the Crown," +[Hume adds, "and rendered the people incapable of civil government,"-- +a sentence which, perhaps, judges too hastily the whole question at +issue in our earlier history, between the jealousy of the barons and +the authority of the king.] was involved the very principle of our +existing civilization. It adds to the wide scope of Fiction, which +ever loves to explore the twilight, that, as Hume has truly observed, +"No part of English history since the Conquest is so obscure, so +uncertain, so little authentic or consistent, as that of the Wars +between the two Roses." It adds also to the importance of that +conjectural research in which Fiction may be made so interesting and +so useful, that "this profound darkness falls upon us just on the eve +of the restoration of letters;" [Hume] while amidst the gloom, we +perceive the movement of those great and heroic passions in which +Fiction finds delineations everlastingly new, and are brought in +contact with characters sufficiently familiar for interest, +sufficiently remote for adaptation to romance, and above all, so +frequently obscured by contradictory evidence, that we lend ourselves +willingly to any one who seeks to help our judgment of the individual +by tests taken from the general knowledge of mankind. + +Round the great image of the "Last of the Barons" group Edward the +Fourth, at once frank and false; the brilliant but ominous boyhood of +Richard the Third; the accomplished Hastings, "a good knight and +gentle, but somewhat dissolute of living;" [Chronicle of Edward V., in +Stowe] the vehement and fiery Margaret of Anjou; the meek image of her +"holy Henry," and the pale shadow of their son. There may we see, +also, the gorgeous Prelate, refining in policy and wile, as the +enthusiasm and energy which had formerly upheld the Ancient Church +pass into the stern and persecuted votaries of the New; we behold, in +that social transition, the sober Trader--outgrowing the prejudices of +the rude retainer or rustic franklin, from whom he is sprung-- +recognizing sagaciously, and supporting sturdily, the sectarian +interests of his order, and preparing the way for the mighty Middle +Class, in which our Modern Civilization, with its faults and its +merits, has established its stronghold; while, in contrast to the +measured and thoughtful notions of liberty which prudent Commerce +entertains, we are reminded of the political fanaticism of the secret +Lollard,--of the jacquerie of the turbulent mob-leader; and perceive, +amidst the various tyrannies of the time, and often partially allied +with the warlike seignorie, [For it is noticeable that in nearly all +the popular risings--that of Cade, of Robin of Redesdale, and +afterwards of that which Perkin Warbeck made subservient to his +extraordinary enterprise--the proclamations of the rebels always +announced, among their popular grievances, the depression of the +ancient nobles and the elevation of new men.]--ever jealous against +all kingly despotism,--the restless and ignorant movement of a +democratic principle, ultimately suppressed, though not destroyed, +under the Tudors, by the strong union of a Middle Class, anxious for +security and order, with an Executive Authority determined upon +absolute sway. + +Nor should we obtain a complete and comprehensive view of that most +interesting Period of Transition, unless we saw something of the +influence which the sombre and sinister wisdom of Italian policy began +to exercise over the councils of the great,--a policy of refined +stratagem, of complicated intrigue, of systematic falsehood, of +ruthless, but secret violence; a policy which actuated the fell +statecraft of Louis XI.; which darkened, whenever he paused to think +and to scheme, the gaudy and jovial character of Edward IV.; which +appeared in its fullest combination of profound guile and resolute +will in Richard III.; and, softened down into more plausible and +specious purpose by the unimpassioned sagacity of Henry VII., finally +attained the object which justified all its villanies to the princes +of its native land,--namely, the tranquillity of a settled State, and +the establishment of a civilized but imperious despotism. + +Again, in that twilight time, upon which was dawning the great +invention that gave to Letters and to Science the precision and +durability of the printed page, it is interesting to conjecture what +would have been the fate of any scientific achievement for which the +world was less prepared. The reception of printing into England +chanced just at the happy period when Scholarship and Literature were +favoured by the great. The princes of York, with the exception of +Edward IV. himself, who had, however, the grace to lament his own want +of learning, and the taste to appreciate it in others, were highly +educated. The Lords Rivers and Hastings [The erudite Lord Worcester +had been one of Caxton's warmest patrons, but that nobleman was no +more at the time in which printing is said to have been actually +introduced into England.] were accomplished in all the "witte and +lere" of their age. Princes and peers vied with each other in their +patronage of Caxton, and Richard III., during his brief reign, spared +no pains to circulate to the utmost the invention destined to transmit +his own memory to the hatred and the horror of all succeeding time. +But when we look around us, we see, in contrast to the gracious and +fostering reception of the mere mechanism by which science is made +manifest, the utmost intolerance to science itself. The mathematics +in especial are deemed the very cabala of the black art. Accusations +of witchcraft were never more abundant; and yet, strange to say, those +who openly professed to practise the unhallowed science, [Nigromancy, +or Sorcery, even took its place amongst the regular callings. Thus, +"Thomas Vandyke, late of Cambridge," is styled (Rolls Parl. 6, p. 273) +Nigromancer as his profession.--Sharon Turner, "History of England," +vol iv. p. 6. Burke, "History of Richard III."] and contrived to make +their deceptions profitable to some unworthy political purpose, appear +to have enjoyed safety, and sometimes even honour, while those who, +occupied with some practical, useful, and noble pursuits +uncomprehended by prince or people, denied their sorcery were +despatched without mercy. The mathematician and astronomer +Bolingbroke (the greatest clerk of his age) is hanged and quartered as +a wizard, while not only impunity but reverence seems to have awaited +a certain Friar Bungey, for having raised mists and vapours, which +greatly befriended Edward IV. at the battle of Barnet. + +Our knowledge of the intellectual spirit of the age, therefore, only +becomes perfect when we contrast the success of the Impostor with the +fate of the true Genius. And as the prejudices of the populace ran +high against all mechanical contrivances for altering the settled +conditions of labour, [Even in the article of bonnets and hats, it +appears that certain wicked fulling mills were deemed worthy of a +special anathema in the reign of Edward IV. These engines are accused +of having sought, "by subtle imagination," the destruction of the +original makers of hats and bonnets" by man's strength,--that is, with +hands and feet; "and an act of parliament was passed (22d of Edward +IV.) to put down the fabrication of the said hats and bonnets by +mechanical contrivance.] so probably, in the very instinct and destiny +of Genius which ever drive it to a war with popular prejudice, it +would be towards such contrivances that a man of great ingenuity and +intellect, if studying the physical sciences, would direct his +ambition. + +Whether the author, in the invention he has assigned to his +philosopher (Adam Warner), has too boldly assumed the possibility of a +conception so much in advance of the time, they who have examined such +of the works of Roger Bacon as are yet given to the world can best +decide; but the assumption in itself belongs strictly to the most +acknowledged prerogatives of Fiction; and the true and important +question will obviously be, not whether Adam Warner could have +constructed his model, but whether, having so constructed it, the fate +that befell him was probable and natural. + +Such characters as I have here alluded to seemed, then, to me, in +meditating the treatment of the high and brilliant subject which your +eloquence animated me to attempt, the proper Representatives of the +multiform Truths which the time of Warwick the King-maker affords to +our interests and suggests for our instruction; and I can only wish +that the powers of the author were worthier of the theme. + +It is necessary that I now state briefly the foundation of the +Historical portions of this narrative. The charming and popular +"History of Hume," which, however, in its treatment of the reign of +Edward IV. is more than ordinarily incorrect, has probably left upon +the minds of many of my readers, who may not have directed their +attention to more recent and accurate researches into that obscure +period, an erroneous impression of the causes which led to the breach +between Edward IV. and his great kinsman and subject, the Earl of +Warwick. The general notion is probably still strong that it was the +marriage of the young king to Elizabeth Gray, during Warwick's +negotiations in France for the alliance of Bona of Savoy (sister-in- +law to Louis XI.), which exasperated the fiery earl, and induced his +union with the House of Lancaster. All our more recent historians +have justly rejected this groundless fable, which even Hume (his +extreme penetration supplying the defects of his superficial research) +admits with reserve. ["There may even some doubt arise with regard to +the proposal of marriage made to Bona of Savoy," etc.--HUME, note to +p. 222, vol. iii. edit. 1825.] A short summary of the reasons for +this rejection is given by Dr. Lingard, and annexed below. ["Many +writers tell us that the enmity of Warwick arose from his +disappointment caused by Edward's clandestine marriage with Elizabeth. +If we may believe them, the earl was at the very time in France +negotiating on the part of the king a marriage with Bona of Savoy, +sister to the Queen of France; and having succeeded in his mission, +brought back with him the Count of Dampmartin as ambassador from +Louis. To me the whole story appears a fiction. 1. It is not to be +found in the more ancient historians. 2. Warwick was not at the time +in France. On the 20th of April, ten days before the marriage, he was +employed in negotiating a truce with the French envoys in London (Rym. +xi. 521), and on the 26th of May, about three weeks after it, was +appointed to treat of another truce with the King of Scots (Rym. xi. +424). 3. Nor could he bring Dampmartin with him to England; for that +nobleman was committed a prisoner to the Bastile in September, 1463, +and remained there till May, 1465 (Monstrel. iii. 97, 109). Three +contemporary and well-informed writers, the two continuators of the +History of Croyland and Wyrcester, attribute his discontent to the +marriages and honours granted to the Wydeviles, and the marriage of +the princess Margaret with the Duke of Burgundy."--LINGARD, vol. iii. +c. 24, pp. 5, 19, 4to ed.] And, indeed, it is a matter of wonder that +so many of our chroniclers could have gravely admitted a legend +contradicted by all the subsequent conduct of Warwick himself; for we +find the earl specially doing honour to the publication of Edward's +marriage, standing godfather to his first-born (the Princess +Elizabeth), employed as ambassador or acting as minister, and fighting +for Edward, and against the Lancastrians, during the five years that +elapsed between the coronation of Elizabeth and Warwick's rebellion. + +The real causes of this memorable quarrel, in which Warwick acquired +his title of King-maker, appear to have been these. + +It is probable enough, as Sharon Turner suggests, [Sharon Turner: +History of England, vol. iii. p. 269.] that Warwick was disappointed +that, since Edward chose a subject for his wife, he neglected the more +suitable marriage he might have formed with the earl's eldest +daughter; and it is impossible but that the earl should have been +greatly chafed, in common with all his order, by the promotion of the +queen's relations, [W. Wyr. 506, 7. Croyl. 542.] new men and apostate +Lancastrians. But it is clear that these causes for discontent never +weakened his zeal for Edward till the year 1467, when we chance upon +the true origin of the romance concerning Bona of Savoy, and the first +open dissension between Edward and the earl. + +In that year Warwick went to France, to conclude an alliance with +Louis XI., and to secure the hand of one of the French princes [Which +of the princes this was does not appear, and can scarcely be +conjectured. The "Pictorial History of England" (Book v. 102) in a +tone of easy decision says "it was one of the sons of Louis XI." But +Louis had no living sons at all at the time. The Dauphin was not born +till three years afterwards. The most probable person was the Duke of +Guienne, Louis's brother.] for Margaret, sister to Edward IV.; during +this period, Edward received the bastard brother of Charles, Count of +Charolois, afterwards Duke of Burgundy, and arranged a marriage +between Margaret and the count. + +Warwick's embassy was thus dishonoured, and the dishonour was +aggravated by personal enmity to the bridegroom Edward had preferred. +[The Croyland Historian, who, as far as his brief and meagre record +extends, is the best authority for the time of Edward IV., very +decidedly states the Burgundian alliance to be the original cause of +Warwick's displeasure, rather than the king's marriage with Elizabeth: +"Upon which (the marriage of Margaret with Charolois) Richard Nevile, +Earl of Warwick, who had for so many years taken party with the French +against the Burgundians, conceived great indignation; and I hold this +to be the truer cause of his resentment than the king's marriage with +Elizabeth, for he had rather have procured a husband for the aforesaid +princess Margaret in the kingdom of France." The Croyland Historian +also speaks emphatically of the strong animosity existing between +Charolois and Warwick.--Cont. Croyl. 551.] The earl retired in +disgust to his castle. But Warwick's nature, which Hume has happily +described as one of "undesigning frankness and openness," [Hume, +"Henry VI.," vol. iii. p. 172, edit. 1825.] does not seem to have long +harboured this resentment. By the intercession of the Archbishop of +York and others, a reconciliation was effected, and the next year, +1468, we find Warwick again in favour, and even so far forgetting his +own former cause of complaint as to accompany the procession in honour +of Margaret's nuptials with his private foe. [Lingard.] In the +following year, however, arose the second dissension between the king +and his minister,--namely, in the king's refusal to sanction the +marriage of his brother Clarence with the earl's daughter Isabel,--a +refusal which was attended with a resolute opposition that must +greatly have galled the pride of the earl, since Edward even went so +far as to solicit the Pope to refuse his sanction, on the ground of +relationship. [Carte. Wm. Wyr.] The Pope, nevertheless, grants the +dispensation, and the marriage takes place at Calais. A popular +rebellion then breaks out in England. Some of Warwick's kinsmen-- +those, however, belonging to the branch of the Nevile family that had +always been Lancastrians, and at variance with the earl's party--are +found at its head. The king, who is in imminent danger, writes a +supplicating letter to Warwick to come to his aid. ["Paston Letters," +cxcviii. vol. ii., Knight's ed. See Lingard, c. 24, for the true date +of Edward's letters to Warwick, Clarence, and the Archbishop of York.] +The earl again forgets former causes for resentment, hastens from +Calais, rescues the king, and quells the rebellion by the influence of +his popular name. + +We next find Edward at Warwick's castle of Middleham, where, according +to some historians, he is forcibly detained,--an assertion treated by +others as a contemptible invention. This question will be examined in +the course of this work; [See Note II.] but whatever the true +construction of the story, we find that Warwick and the king are still +on such friendly terms, that the earl marches in person against a +rebellion on the borders, obtains a signal victory, and that the rebel +leader (the earl's own kinsman) is beheaded by Edward at York. We +find that, immediately after this supposed detention, Edward speaks of +Warwick and his brothers "as his best friends;" ["Paston Letters," +cciv. vol. ii., Knight's ed. The date of this letter, which puzzled +the worthy annotator, is clearly to be referred to Edward's return +from York, after his visit to Middleham in 1469. No mention is +therein made by the gossiping contemporary of any rumour that Edward +had suffered imprisonment. He enters the city in state, as having +returned safe and victorious from a formidable rebellion. The letter +goes on to say: "The king himself hath (that is, holds) good language +of the Lords Clarence, of Warwick, etc., saying 'they be his best +friends.'" Would he say this if just escaped from a prison? Sir John +Paston, the writer of the letter, adds, it is true, "But his household +men have (hold) other language." very probably, for the household men +were the court creatures always at variance with Warwick, and held, no +doubt, the same language they had been in the habit of holding +before.] that he betroths his eldest daughter to Warwick's nephew, the +male heir of the family. And then suddenly, only three months +afterwards (in February, 1470), and without any clear and apparent +cause, we find Warwick in open rebellion, animated by a deadly hatred +to the king, refusing, from first to last, all overtures of +conciliation; and so determined is his vengeance, that he bows a +pride, hitherto morbidly susceptible, to the vehement insolence of +Margaret of Anjou, and forms the closest alliance with the Lancastrian +party, in the destruction of which his whole life had previously been +employed. + +Here, then, where History leaves us in the dark, where our curiosity +is the most excited, Fiction gropes amidst the ancient chronicles, and +seeks to detect and to guess the truth. And then Fiction, accustomed +to deal with the human heart, seizes upon the paramount importance of +a Fact which the modern historian has been contented to place amongst +dubious and collateral causes of dissension. We find it broadly and +strongly stated by Hall and others, that Edward had coarsely attempted +the virtue of one of the earl's female relations. "And farther it +erreth not from the truth," says Hall, "that the king did attempt a +thing once in the earl's house, which was much against the earl's +honesty; but whether it was the daughter or the niece," adds the +chronicler, "was not, for both their honours, openly known; but surely +such a thing WAS attempted by King Edward," etc. + +Any one at all familiar with Hall (and, indeed, with all our principal +chroniclers, except Fabyan), will not expect any accurate precision as +to the date he assigns for the outrage. He awards to it, therefore, +the same date he erroneously gives to Warwick's other grudges (namely, +a period brought some years lower by all judicious historians) a date +at which Warwick was still Edward's fastest friend. + +Once grant the probability of this insult to the earl (the probability +is conceded at once by the more recent historians, and received +without scruple as a fact by Rapia, Habington, and Carte), and the +whole obscurity which involves this memorable quarrel vanishes at +once. Here was, indeed, a wrong never to be forgiven, and yet never +to be proclaimed. As Hall implies, the honour of the earl was +implicated in hushing the scandal, and the honour of Edward in +concealing the offence. That if ever the insult were attempted, it +must have been just previous to the earl's declared hostility is +clear. Offences of that kind hurry men to immediate action at the +first, or else, if they stoop to dissimulation the more effectually to +avenge afterwards, the outbreak bides its seasonable time. But the +time selected by the earl for his outbreak was the very worst he could +have chosen, and attests the influence of a sudden passion,--a new and +uncalculated cause of resentment. He had no forces collected; he had +not even sounded his own brother-in-law, Lord Stanley (since he was +uncertain of his intentions); while, but a few months before, had he +felt any desire to dethrone the king, he could either have suffered +him to be crushed by the popular rebellion the earl himself had +quelled, or have disposed of his person as he pleased when a guest at +his own castle of Middleham. His evident want of all preparation and +forethought--a want which drove into rapid and compulsory flight from +England the baron to whose banner, a few months afterwards, flocked +sixty thousand men--proves that the cause of his alienation was fresh +and recent. + +If, then, the cause we have referred to, as mentioned by Hall and +others, seems the most probable we can find (no other cause for such +abrupt hostility being discernible), the date for it must be placed +where it is in this work,--namely, just prior to the earl's revolt. +The next question is, who could have been the lady thus offended, +whether a niece or daughter. Scarcely a niece, for Warwick had one +married brother, Lord Montagu, and several sisters; but the sisters +were married to lords who remained friendly to Edward, [Except the +sisters married to Lord Fitzhugh and Lord Oxford. But though +Fitzhugh, or rather his son, broke into rebellion, it was for some +cause in which Warwick did not sympathize, for by Warwick himself was +that rebellion put down; nor could the aggrieved lady have been a +daughter of Lord Oxford, for he was a stanch, though not avowed, +Lancastrian, and seems to have carefully kept aloof from the court.] +and Montagu seems to have had no daughter out of childhood, [Montagu's +wife could have been little more than thirty at the time of his death. +She married again, and had a family by her second husband.] while that +nobleman himself did not share Warwick's rebellion at the first, but +continued to enjoy the confidence of Edward. We cannot reasonably, +then, conceive the uncle to have been so much more revengeful than the +parents,--the legitimate guardians of the honour of a daughter. It +is, therefore, more probable that the insulted maiden should have been +one of Lord Warwick's daughters; and this is the general belief. +Carte plainly declares it was Isabel. But Isabel it could hardly have +been. She was then married to Edward's brother, the Duke of Clarence, +and within a month of her confinement. The earl had only one other +daughter, Anne, then in the flower of her youth; and though Isabel +appears to have possessed a more striking character of beauty, Anne +must have had no inconsiderable charms to have won the love of the +Lancastrian Prince Edward, and to have inspired a tender and human +affection in Richard Duke of Gloucester. [Not only does Majerus, the +Flemish annalist, speak of Richard's early affection to Anne, but +Richard's pertinacity in marrying her, at a time when her family was +crushed and fallen, seems to sanction the assertion. True, that +Richard received with her a considerable portion of the estates of her +parents. But both Anne herself and her parents were attainted, and +the whole property at the disposal of the Crown. Richard at that time +had conferred the most important services on Edward. He had remained +faithful to him during the rebellion of Clarence; he had been the hero +of the day both at Barnet and Tewksbury. His reputation was then +exceedingly high, and if he had demanded, as a legitimate reward, the +lands of Middleham, without the bride, Edward could not well have +refused them. He certainly had a much better claim than the only +other competitor for the confiscated estates,--namely, the perjured +and despicable Clarence. For Anne's reluctance to marry Richard, and +the disguise she assumed, see Miss Strickland's "Life of Anne of +Warwick." For the honour of Anne, rather than of Richard, to whose +memory one crime more or less matters but little, it may here be +observed that so far from there being any ground to suppose that +Gloucester was an accomplice in the assassination of the young prince +Edward of Lancaster, there is some ground to believe that that prince +was not assassinated at all, but died (as we would fain hope the +grandson of Henry V. did die) fighting manfully in the field.-- +"Harleian Manuscripts;" Stowe, "Chronicle of Tewksbury;" Sharon +Turner, vol. iii. p. 335.] It is also noticeable, that when, not as +Shakspeare represents, but after long solicitation, and apparently by +positive coercion, Anne formed her second marriage, she seems to have +been kept carefully by Richard from his gay brother's court, and +rarely, if ever, to have appeared in London till Edward was no more. + +That considerable obscurity should always rest upon the facts +connected with Edward's meditated crime,--that they should never be +published amongst the grievances of the haughty rebel is natural from +the very dignity of the parties, and the character of the offence; +that in such obscurity sober History should not venture too far on the +hypothesis suggested by the chronicler, is right and laudable. But +probably it will be conceded by all, that here Fiction finds its +lawful province, and that it may reasonably help, by no improbable nor +groundless conjecture, to render connected and clear the most broken +and the darkest fragments of our annals. + +I have judged it better partially to forestall the interest of the +reader in my narrative, by stating thus openly what he may expect, +than to encounter the far less favourable impression (if he had been +hitherto a believer in the old romance of Bona of Savoy), [I say the +old romance of Bona of Savoy, so far as Edward's rejection of her hand +for that of Elizabeth Gray is stated to have made the cause of his +quarrel with Warwick. But I do not deny the possibility that such a +marriage had been contemplated and advised by Warwick, though he +neither sought to negotiate it, nor was wronged by Edward's preference +of his fair subject.] that the author was taking an unwarrantable +liberty with the real facts, when, in truth, it is upon the real +facts, as far as they can be ascertained, that the author has built +his tale, and his boldest inventions are but deductions from the +amplest evidence he could collect. Nay, he even ventures to believe, +that whoever hereafter shall write the history of Edward IV. will not +disdain to avail himself of some suggestions scattered throughout +these volumes, and tending to throw new light upon the events of that +intricate but important period. + +It is probable that this work will prove more popular in its nature +than my last fiction of "Zanoni," which could only be relished by +those interested in the examinations of the various problems in human +life which it attempts to solve. But both fictions, however different +and distinct their treatment, are constructed on those principles of +art to which, in all my later works, however imperfect my success, I +have sought at least steadily to adhere. + +To my mind, a writer should sit down to compose a fiction as a painter +prepares to compose a picture. His first care should be the +conception of a whole as lofty as his intellect can grasp, as +harmonious and complete as his art can accomplish; his second care, +the character of the interest which the details are intended to +sustain. + +It is when we compare works of imagination in writing with works of +imagination on the canvas, that we can best form a critical idea of +the different schools which exist in each; for common both to the +author and the painter are those styles which we call the Familiar, +the Picturesque, and the Intellectual. By recurring to this +comparison we can, without much difficulty, classify works of Fiction +in their proper order, and estimate the rank they should severally +hold. The Intellectual will probably never be the most widely popular +for the moment. He who prefers to study in this school must be +prepared for much depreciation, for its greatest excellences, even if +he achieve them, are not the most obvious to the many. In discussing, +for instance, a modern work, we hear it praised, perhaps, for some +striking passage, some prominent character; but when do we ever hear +any comment on its harmony of construction, on its fulness of design, +on its ideal character,--on its essentials, in short, as a work of +art? What we hear most valued in the picture, we often find the most +neglected in the book,--namely, the composition; and this, simply +because in England painting is recognized as an art, and estimated +according to definite theories; but in literature we judge from a +taste never formed, from a thousand prejudices and ignorant +predilections. We do not yet comprehend that the author is an artist, +and that the true rules of art by which he should be tested are +precise and immutable. Hence the singular and fantastic caprices of +the popular opinion,--its exaggerations of praise or censure, its +passion and reaction. At one while, its solemn contempt for +Wordsworth; at another, its absurd idolatry. At one while we are +stunned by the noisy celebrity of Byron, at another we are calmly told +that he can scarcely be called a poet. Each of these variations in +the public is implicitly followed by the vulgar criticism; and as a +few years back our journals vied with each other in ridiculing +Wordsworth for the faults which he did not possess, they vie now with +each other in eulogiums upon the merits which he has never displayed. + +These violent fluctuations betray both a public and a criticism +utterly unschooled in the elementary principles of literary art, and +entitle the humblest author to dispute the censure of the hour, while +they ought to render the greatest suspicious of its praise. + +It is, then, in conformity, not with any presumptuous conviction of +his own superiority, but with his common experience and common-sense, +that every author who addresses an English audience in serious earnest +is permitted to feel that his final sentence rests not with the jury +before which he is first heard. The literary history of the day +consists of a series of judgments set aside. + +But this uncertainty must more essentially betide every student, +however lowly, in the school I have called the Intellectual, which +must ever be more or less at variance with the popular canons. It is +its hard necessity to vex and disturb the lazy quietude of vulgar +taste; for unless it did so, it could neither elevate nor move. He +who resigns the Dutch art for the Italian must continue through the +dark to explore the principles upon which he founds his design, to +which he adapts his execution; in hope or in despondence still +faithful to the theory which cares less for the amount of interest +created than for the sources from which the interest is to be drawn; +seeking in action the movement of the grander passions or the subtler +springs of conduct, seeking in repose the colouring of intellectual +beauty. + +The Low and the High of Art are not very readily comprehended. They +depend not upon the worldly degree or the physical condition of the +characters delineated; they depend entirely upon the quality of the +emotion which the characters are intended to excite,--namely, whether +of sympathy for something low, or of admiration for something high. +There is nothing high in a boor's head by Teniers, there is nothing +low in a boor's head by Guido. What makes the difference between the +two? The absence or presence of the Ideal! But every one can judge +of the merit of the first, for it is of the Familiar school; it +requires a connoisseur to see the merit of the last, for it is of the +Intellectual. + +I have the less scrupled to leave these remarks to cavil or to +sarcasm, because this fiction is probably the last with which I shall +trespass upon the Public, and I am desirous that it shall contain, at +least, my avowal of the principles upon which it and its later +predecessors have been composed. You know well, however others may +dispute the fact, the earnestness with which those principles have +been meditated and pursued,--with high desire, if but with poor +results. + +It is a pleasure to feel that the aim, which I value more than the +success, is comprehended by one whose exquisite taste as a critic is +only impaired by that far rarer quality,--the disposition to over- +estimate the person you profess to esteem! Adieu, my sincere and +valued friend; and accept, as a mute token of gratitude and regard, +these flowers gathered in the Garden where we have so often roved +together. E. L. B. + + LONDON, January, 1843. + + +PREFACE TO THE LAST OF THE BARONS + +This was the first attempt of the author in Historical Romance upon +English ground. Nor would he have risked the disadvantage of +comparison with the genius of Sir Walter Scott, had he not believed +that that great writer and his numerous imitators had left altogether +unoccupied the peculiar field in Historical Romance which the Author +has here sought to bring into cultivation. In "The Last of the +Barons," as in "Harold," the aim has been to illustrate the actual +history of the period, and to bring into fuller display than general +History itself has done the characters of the principal personages of +the time, the motives by which they were probably actuated, the state +of parties, the condition of the people, and the great social +interests which were involved in what, regarded imperfectly, appear +but the feuds of rival factions. + +"The Last of the Barons" has been by many esteemed the best of the +Author's romances; and perhaps in the portraiture of actual character, +and the grouping of the various interests and agencies of the time, it +may have produced effects which render it more vigorous and lifelike +than any of the other attempts in romance by the same hand. + +It will be observed that the purely imaginary characters introduced +are very few; and, however prominent they may appear, still, in order +not to interfere with the genuine passions and events of history, they +are represented as the passive sufferers, not the active agents, of +the real events. Of these imaginary characters, the most successful +is Adam Warner, the philosopher in advance of his age; indeed, as an +ideal portrait, I look upon it as the most original in conception, and +the most finished in execution, of any to be found in my numerous +prose works, "Zanoni" alone excepted. + +For the rest, I venture to think that the general reader will obtain +from these pages a better notion of the important age, characterized +by the decline of the feudal system, and immediately preceding that +great change in society which we usually date from the accession of +Henry VII., than he could otherwise gather, without wading through a +vast mass of neglected chronicles and antiquarian dissertations. + + +TABLE OF CONTENTS + + BOOK I + + THE ADVENTURES OF MASTER MARMADUKE NEVILE + + CHAPTER + + I The Pastime-ground of old Cockaigne + II The Broken Gittern + III The Trader and the Gentle; or, the Changing Generation + IV Ill fares the Country Mouse in the Traps of Town + V Weal to the Idler, Woe to the Workman + VI Master Marmaduke Nevile fears for the Spiritual Weal of his + Host and Hostess + VII There is a Rod for the Back of every Fool who would be Wiser + than his Generation + + BOOK II + + THE KING'S COURT + + CHAPTER + + I Earl Warwick the King-maker + II King Edward the Fourth + III The Antechamber + + BOOK III + + IN WHICH THE HISTORY PASSES FROM THE KING'S COURT TO THE STUDENT'S + CELL, AND RELATES THE PERILS THAT BEFELL A PHILOSOPHER FOR + MEDDLING WITH THE AFFAIRS OF THE WORLD + + CHAPTER + + I The Solitary Sage and the Solitary Maid + II Master Adam Warner grows a Miser, and behaves Shamefully + III A Strange Visitor--All Ages of the World breed World- + Betters + IV Lord Hastings + V Master Adam Warner and King Henry the Sixth + VI How, on leaving King Log, Foolish Wisdom runs a-muck on + King Stork + VII My Lady Duchess's Opinion of the Utility of Master Warner's + Invention, and her esteem for its Explosion + VIII The Old Woman talks of Sorrows, the Young Woman dreams + of Love; the Courtier flies from Present Power to + Remembrances of Past Hopes, and the World-Bettered opens + Utopia, with a View of the Gibbet for the Silly Sage he + has seduced into his Schemes,--so, ever and evermore, + runs the World away + IX How the Destructive Organ of Prince Richard promises Goodly + Development + + BOOK IV + + INTRIGUES OF THE COURT OF EDWARD IV + + CHAPTER + + I Margaret of Anjou + II In which are laid Open to the Reader the Character of Edward + the Fourth and that of his Court, with the Machinations of + the Woodvilles against the Earl of Warwick + III Wherein Master Nicholas Alwyn visits the Court, and there + learns Matter of which the Acute Reader will judge for + himself + IV Exhibiting the Benefits which Royal Patronage confers on + Genius,--also the Early Loves of the Lord Hastings; with + other Matters Edifying and Delectable + V The Woodville Intrigue prospers--Montagu confers with + Hastings, visits the Archbishop of York, and is met on the + Road by a strange Personage + VI The Arrival of the Count de la Roche, and the various + Excitement produced on many Personages by that Event + VII The Renowned Combat between Sir Anthony Woodville and the + Bastard of Burgundy + VIII How the Bastard of Burgundy prospered more in his Policy than + With the Pole-axe--and how King Edward holds his Summer + Chase in the Fair Groves of Shene + IX The Great Actor returns to fill the Stage + X How the Great Lords come to the King-maker, and with what + Proffers + + BOOK V + + THE LAST OF THE BARONS IN HIS FATHERS HALLS + + CHAPTER + + I Rural England in the Middle Ages--Noble Visitors seek the + Castle + Of Middleham + II Councils and Musings + III The Sisters + IV The Destrier + + BOOK VI + + WHEREIN ARE OPENED SOME GLIMPSES OF THE FATE BELOW THAT ATTENDS THOSE + WHO ARE BETTER THAN OTHERS, AND THOSE WHO DESIRE TO MAKE OTHERS + BETTER. LOVE, DEMAGOGY, AND SCIENCE ALL EQUALLY OFF-SPRING OF THE + SAME PROLIFIC DELUSION,--NAMELY, THAT MEAN SOULS (THE EARTH'S + MAJORITY) ARE WORTH THE HOPE AND THE AGONY OF NOBLE SOULS, THE + EVERLASTING SUFFERING AND ASPIRING FEW. + + CHAPTER + I New Dissentions + II The Would-be Improvers of Jove's Football, Earth--The Sad + Father and the Sad Child--The Fair Rivals + III Wherein the Demagogue seeks the Courtier + IV Sibyll + V Katherine + VI Joy for Adam, and Hope for Sibyll--and Popular Friar Bungey! + VII A Love Scene + + BOOK VII + + THE POPULAR REBELLION + + CHAPTER + + I The White Lion of March shakes his Mane + II The Camp at Olney + III The Camp of the Rebels + IV The Norman Earl and the Saxon Demagogue confer + V What Faith Edward IV purposeth to keep with Earl and People + VI What befalls King Edward on his Escape from Olney + VII How King Edward arrives at the Castle of Middleham + VIII The Ancients rightly gave to the Goddess of Eloquence a Crown + IX Wedded Confidence and Love--the Earl and the Prelate--the + Prelate and the King--Schemes--Wiles--and the Birth of a + Dark Thought destined to eclipse a Sun + + BOOK VIII + + IN WHICH THE LAST LINK BETWEEN KING-MAKER AND KING SNAPS ASUNDER + + CHAPTER + + I The Lady Anne visits the Court + II The Sleeping Innocence--the Wakeful Crime + III New Dangers to the House of York--and the King's Heart + allies itself with Rebellion against the King's Throne + IV The Foster-brothers + V The Lover and the Gallant--Woman's Choice + VI Warwick returns-appeases a Discontented Prince-and confers + with a Revengeful Conspirator + VII The Fear and the Flight + VIII The Group round the Death-bed of the Lancastrian Widow + + BOOK IX. + + THE WANDERERS AND THE EXILES + + CHAPTER + + I How the Great Baron becomes as Great a Rebel + II Many Things briefly told + III The Plot of the Hostelry--the Maid and the Scholar in + their Home + IV The World's Justice, and the Wisdom of our Ancestors + V The Fugitives are captured--the Tymbesteres reappear-- + Moonlight on the Revel of the Living--Moonlight on the + Slumber of the Dead + + VI The Subtle Craft of Richard of Gloucester + VII Warwick and his Family in Exile + VIII How the Heir of Lancaster meets the King-maker + IX The Interview of Earl Warwick and Queen Margaret + X Love and Marriage--Doubts of Conscience--Domestic Jealousy-- + and Household Treason + + BOOK X. + + THE RETURN OF THE KING-MAKER + + CHAPTER + + I The Maid's Hope, the Courtier's Love, and the Sage's Comfort + II The Man awakes in the Sage, and the She-wolf again hath + tracked the Lamb + III Virtuous Resolves submitted to the Test of Vanity and the + World + IV The Strife which Sibyll had courted, between Katherine and + herself, commences in Serious Earnest + V The Meeting of Hastings and Katherine + VI Hastings learns what has befallen Sibyll, repairs to the + King, and encounters an old Rival + VII The Landing of Lord Warwick, and the Events that ensue + thereon + VIII What befell Adam Warner and Sibyll when made subject to the + Great Friar Bungey + IX The Deliberations of Mayor and Council, while Lord Warwick + marches upon London + X The Triumphal Entry of the Earl--the Royal Captive in the + Tower--the Meeting between King-maker and King + XI The Tower in Commotion + + BOOK XI + + THE NEW POSITION OF THE KING-MAKER + + CHAPTER + + I Wherein Master Adam Warner is notably commended and + advanced--and Greatness says to Wisdom, "Thy Destiny + be mine, Amen" + II The Prosperity of the Outer Show--the Cares of the Inner Man + III Further Views into the Heart of Man, and the Conditions + of Power + IV The Return of Edward of York + V The Progress of the Plantagenet + VI Lord Warwick, with the Foe in the field and the Traitor at + The Hearth + + BOOK XII + + THE BATTLE OF BARNET + + CHAPTER + + I A King in his City hopes to recover his Realm--A Woman in + her Chamber fears to forfeit her own + II Sharp is the Kiss of the Falcon's Bear + III A Pause + IV-VI The Battle + VII The last Pilgrims in the long Procession to the Common Bourne + + + + + +BOOK I. + +THE ADVENTURES OF MASTER MARMADUKE NEVILE. + + + + +CHAPTER I. + +THE PASTIME-GROUND OF OLD COCKAIGNE. + +Westward, beyond the still pleasant, but even then no longer solitary, +hamlet of Charing, a broad space, broken here and there by scattered +houses and venerable pollards, in the early spring of 1467, presented +the rural scene for the sports and pastimes of the inhabitants of +Westminster and London. Scarcely need we say that open spaces for the +popular games and diversions were then numerous in the suburbs of the +metropolis,--grateful to some the fresh pools of Islington; to others, +the grass-bare fields of Finsbury; to all, the hedgeless plains of +vast Mile-end. But the site to which we are now summoned was a new +and maiden holiday-ground, lately bestowed upon the townsfolk of +Westminster by the powerful Earl of Warwick. + +Raised by a verdant slope above the low, marsh-grown soil of +Westminster, the ground communicated to the left with the Brook- +fields, through which stole the peaceful Ty-bourne, and commanded +prospects, on all sides fair, and on each side varied. Behind, rose +the twin green hills of Hampstead and Highgate, with the upland park +and chase of Marybone,--its stately manor-house half hid in woods. In +front might be seen the Convent of the Lepers, dedicated to Saint +James, now a palace; then to the left, York House, [The residence of +the Archbishops of York] now Whitehall; farther on, the spires of +Westminster Abbey and the gloomy tower of the Sanctuary; next, the +Palace, with its bulwark and vawmure, soaring from the river; while +eastward, and nearer to the scene, stretched the long, bush-grown +passage of the Strand, picturesquely varied with bridges, and flanked +to the right by the embattled halls of feudal nobles, or the inns of +the no less powerful prelates; while sombre and huge amidst hall and +inn, loomed the gigantic ruins of the Savoy, demolished in the +insurrection of Wat Tyler. Farther on, and farther yet, the eye +wandered over tower and gate, and arch and spire, with frequent +glimpses of the broad sunlit river, and the opposite shore crowned by +the palace of Lambeth, and the Church of St. Mary Overies, till the +indistinct cluster of battlements around the Fortress-Palatine bounded +the curious gaze. As whatever is new is for a while popular, so to +this pastime-ground, on the day we treat of, flocked, not only the +idlers of Westminster, but the lordly dwellers of Ludgate and the +Flete, and the wealthy citizens of tumultuous Chepe. + +The ground was well suited to the purpose to which it was devoted. +About the outskirts, indeed, there were swamps and fish-pools; but a +considerable plot towards the centre presented a level sward, already +worn bare and brown by the feet of the multitude. From this, towards +the left, extended alleys, some recently planted, intended to afford, +in summer, cool and shady places for the favourite game of bowls; +while scattered clumps, chiefly of old pollards, to the right broke +the space agreeably enough into detached portions, each of which +afforded its separate pastime or diversion. Around were ranged many +carts, or wagons; horses of all sorts and value were led to and fro, +while their owners were at sport. Tents, awnings, hostelries, +temporary buildings, stages for showmen and jugglers, abounded, and +gave the scene the appearance of a fair; but what particularly now +demands our attention was a broad plot in the ground, dedicated to the +noble diversion of archery. The reigning House of York owed much of +its military success to the superiority of the bowmen under its +banners, and the Londoners themselves were jealous of their reputation +in this martial accomplishment. For the last fifty years, +notwithstanding the warlike nature of the times, the practice of the +bow, in the intervals of peace, had been more neglected than seemed +wise to the rulers. Both the king and his loyal city had of late +taken much pains to enforce the due exercise of "Goddes instrumente," +[So called emphatically by Bishop Latimer, in his celebrated Sixth +Sermon.] upon which an edict had declared that "the liberties and +honour of England principally rested!" + +And numerous now was the attendance, not only of the citizens, the +burghers, and the idle populace, but of the gallant nobles who +surrounded the court of Edward IV., then in the prime of his youth,-- +the handsomest, the gayest, and the bravest prince in Christendom. + +The royal tournaments (which were, however, waning from their ancient +lustre to kindle afresh, and to expire in the reigns of the succeeding +Tudors), restricted to the amusements of knight and noble, no doubt +presented more of pomp and splendour than the motley and mixed +assembly of all ranks that now grouped around the competitors for the +silver arrow, or listened to the itinerant jongleur, dissour, or +minstrel, or, seated under the stunted shade of the old trees, +indulged, with eager looks and hands often wandering to their dagger- +hilts, in the absorbing passion of the dice; but no later and earlier +scenes of revelry ever, perhaps, exhibited that heartiness of +enjoyment, that universal holiday, which attended this mixture of +every class, that established a rude equality for the hour between the +knight and the retainer, the burgess and the courtier. + +The revolution that placed Edward IV. upon the throne had, in fact, +been a popular one. Not only had the valour and moderation of his +father, Richard, Duke of York, bequeathed a heritage of affection to +his brave and accomplished son; not only were the most beloved of the +great barons the leaders of his party; but the king himself, partly +from inclination, partly from policy, spared no pains to win the good +graces of that slowly rising, but even then important part of the +population,--the Middle Class. He was the first king who descended, +without loss of dignity and respect, from the society of his peers and +princes, to join familiarly in the feasts and diversions of the +merchant and the trader. The lord mayor and council of London were +admitted, on more than one solemn occasion, into the deliberations of +the court; and Edward had not long since, on the coronation of his +queen, much to the discontent of certain of his barons, conferred the +Knighthood of the hath upon four of the citizens. On the other hand, +though Edward's gallantries--the only vice which tended to diminish +his popularity with the sober burgesses--were little worthy of his +station, his frank, joyous familiarity with his inferiors was not +debased by the buffooneries that had led to the reverses and the awful +fate of two of his royal predecessors. There must have been a popular +principle, indeed, as well as a popular fancy, involved in the steady +and ardent adherence which the population of London in particular, and +most of the great cities, exhibited to the person and the cause of +Edward IV. There was a feeling that his reign was an advance in +civilization upon the monastic virtues of Henry VI., and the stern +ferocity which accompanied the great qualities of "The Foreign Woman," +as the people styled and regarded Henry's consort, Margaret of Anjou. +While thus the gifts, the courtesy, and the policy of the young +sovereign made him popular with the middle classes, he owed the +allegiance of the more powerful barons and the favour of the rural +population to a man who stood colossal amidst the iron images of the +Age,--the greatest and the last of the old Norman chivalry, kinglier +in pride, in state, in possessions, and in renown than the king +himself, Richard Nevile, Earl of Salisbury and Warwick. + +This princely personage, in the full vigour of his age, possessed all +the attributes that endear the noble to the commons. His valour in +the field was accompanied with a generosity rare in the captains of +the time. He valued himself on sharing the perils and the hardships +of his meanest soldier. His haughtiness to the great was not +incompatible with frank affability to the lowly. His wealth was +enormous, but it was equalled by his magnificence, and rendered +popular by his lavish hospitality. No less than thirty thousand +persons are said to have feasted daily at the open tables with which +he allured to his countless castles the strong hands and grateful +hearts of a martial and unsettled population. More haughty than +ambitious, he was feared because he avenged all affront; and yet not +envied, because he seemed above all favour. + +The holiday on the archery-ground was more than usually gay, for the +rumour had spread from the court to the city that Edward was about to +increase his power abroad, and to repair what he had lost in the eyes +of Europe through his marriage with Elizabeth Gray, by allying his +sister Margaret with the brother of Louis XI., and that no less a +person than the Earl of Warwick had been the day before selected as +ambassador on the important occasion. + +Various opinions were entertained upon the preference given to France +in this alliance over the rival candidate for the hand of the +princess,--namely, the Count de Charolois, afterwards Charles the +Bold, Duke of Burgundy. + +"By 'r Lady," said a stout citizen about the age of fifty, "but I am +not over pleased with this French marriage-making! I would liefer the +stout earl were going to France with bows and bills than sarcenets and +satins. What will become of our trade with Flanders,--answer me that, +Master Stokton? The House of York is a good House, and the king is a +good king, but trade is trade. Every man must draw water to his own +mill." + +"Hush, Master Heyford!" said a small lean man in a light-gray surcoat. +"The king loves not talk about what the king does. 'T is ill jesting +with lions. Remember William Walker, hanged for saying his son should +be heir to the crown." + +"Troth," answered Master Heyford, nothing daunted, for he belonged to +one of the most powerful corporations of London,--it was but a scurvy +Pepperer [old name for Grocer] who made that joke; but a joke from a +worshipful goldsmith, who has moneys and influence, and a fair wife of +his own, whom the king himself has been pleased to commend, is another +guess sort of matter. But here is my grave-visaged headman, who +always contrives to pick up the last gossip astir, and has a deep eye +into millstones. Why, ho, there! Alwyn--I say, Nicholas Alwyn!--who +would have thought to see thee with that bow, a good half-ell taller +than thyself? Methought thou wert too sober and studious for such +man-at-arms sort of devilry." + +"An' it please you, Master Heyford," answered the person thus +addressed,--a young man, pale and lean, though sinewy and large-boned, +with a countenance of great intelligence, but a slow and somewhat +formal manner of speech, and a strong provincial accent,--"an' it +please you, King Edward's edict ordains every Englishman to have a bow +of his own height; and he who neglects the shaft on a holiday +forfeiteth one halfpenny and some honour. For the rest, methinks that +the citizens of London will become of more worth and potency every +year; and it shall not be my fault if I do not, though but a humble +headman to your worshipful mastership, help to make them so." + +"Why, that's well said, lad; but if the Londoners prosper, it is +because they have nobles in their gipsires, [a kind of pouch worn at +the girdle] not bows in their hands." + +"Thinkest thou then, Master Heyford, that any king at a pinch would +leave them the gipsire, if they could not protect it with the bow? +That Age may have gold, let not Youth despise iron." + +"Body o' me!" cried Master Heyford, "but thou hadst better curb in thy +tongue. Though I have my jest,--as a rich man and a corpulent,--a lad +who has his way to make good should be silent and--But he's gone." + +"Where hooked you up that young jack fish?" said Master Stokton, the +thin mercer, who had reminded the goldsmith of the fate of the grocer. + +"Why, he was meant for the cowl, but his mother, a widow, at his own +wish, let him make choice of the flat cap. He was the best 'prentice +ever I had. By the blood of Saint Thomas, he will push his way in +good time; he has a head, Master Stokton,--a head, and an ear; and a +great big pair of eyes always looking out for something to his proper +advantage." + +In the mean while, the goldsmith's headman had walked leisurely up to +the archery-ground; and even in his gait and walk, as he thus repaired +to a pastime, there was something steady, staid, and business-like. + +The youths of his class and calling were at that day very different +from their equals in this. Many of them the sons of provincial +retainers, some even of franklins and gentlemen, their childhood had +made them familiar with the splendour and the sports of knighthood; +they had learned to wrestle, to cudgel, to pitch the bar or the quoit, +to draw the bow, and to practise the sword and buckler, before +transplanted from the village green to the city stall. And even then, +the constant broils and wars of the time, the example of their +betters, the holiday spectacle of mimic strife, and, above all, the +powerful and corporate association they formed amongst themselves, +tended to make them as wild, as jovial, and as dissolute a set of +young fellows as their posterity are now sober, careful, and discreet. +And as Nicholas Alwyn, with a slight inclination of his head, passed +by, two or three loud, swaggering, bold-looking groups of apprentices +--their shaggy hair streaming over their shoulders, their caps on one +side, their short cloaks of blue torn or patched, though still +passably new, their bludgeons under their arms, and their whole +appearance and manner not very dissimilar from the German collegians +in the last century--notably contrasted Alwyn's prim dress, his +precise walk, and the feline care with which he stepped aside from any +patches of mire that might sully the soles of his square-toed shoes. + +The idle apprentices winked and whispered, and lolled out their +tongues at him as he passed. "Oh, but that must be as good as a May- +Fair day,--sober Nick Alwyn's maiden flight of the shaft! Hollo, +puissant archer, take care of the goslings yonder! Look this way when +thou pull'st, and then woe to the other side!" Venting these and many +similar specimens of the humour of Cockaigne, the apprentices, +however, followed their quondam colleague, and elbowed their way into +the crowd gathered around the competitors at the butt; and it was at +this spot, commanding a view of the whole space, that the spectator +might well have formed some notion of the vast following of the House +of Nevile. For everywhere along the front lines, everywhere in the +scattered groups, might be seen, glistening in the sunlight, the +armourial badges of that mighty family. The Pied Bull, which was the +proper cognizance [Pied Bull the cognizance, the Dun Bull's head the +crest] of the Neviles, was principally borne by the numerous kinsmen +of Earl Warwick, who rejoiced in the Nevile name. The Lord Montagu, +Warwick's brother, to whom the king had granted the forfeit title and +estates of the earls of Northumberland, distinguished his own +retainers, however, by the special request of the ancient Montagus.--a +Gryphon issuant from a ducal crown. But far more numerous than Bull +or Gryphon (numerous as either seemed) were the badges worn by those +who ranked themselves among the peculiar followers of the great Earl +of Warwick. The cognizance of the Bear and Ragged Staff, which he +assumed in right of the Beauchamps, whom he represented through his +wife, the heiress of the lords of Warwick, was worn in the hats of the +more gentle and well-born clansmen and followers, while the Ragged +Staff alone was worked front and back on the scarlet jackets of his +more humble and personal retainers. It was a matter of popular notice +and admiration that in those who wore these badges, as in the wearers +of the hat and staff of the ancient Spartans, might be traced a grave +loftiness of bearing, as if they belonged to another caste, another +race, than the herd of men. Near the place where the rivals for the +silver arrow were collected, a lordly party had reined in their +palfreys, and conversed with each other, as the judges of the field +were marshalling the competitors. + +"Who," said one of these gallants, "who is that comely young fellow +just below us, with the Nevile cognizance of the Bull on his hat? He +has the air of one I should know." + +"I never saw him before, my Lord of Northumberland," answered one of +the gentlemen thus addressed; "but, pardieu, he who knows all the +Neviles by eye must know half England." The Lord Montagu--for though +at that moment invested with the titles of the Percy, by that name +Earl Warwick's brother is known to history, and by that, his rightful +name, he shall therefore be designated in these pages--the Lord +Montagu smiled graciously at this remark, and a murmur through the +crowd announced that the competition for the silver arrow was about to +commence. The butts, formed of turf, with a small white mark fastened +to the centre by a very minute peg, were placed apart, one at each +end, at the distance of eleven score yards. At the extremity where +the shooting commenced, the crowd assembled, taking care to keep clear +from the opposite butt, as the warning word of "Fast" was thundered +forth; but eager was the general murmur, and many were the wagers +given and accepted, as some well-known archer tried his chance. Near +the butt that now formed the target, stood the marker with his white +wand; and the rapidity with which archer after archer discharged his +shaft, and then, if it missed, hurried across the ground to pick it up +(for arrows were dear enough not to be lightly lost), amidst the jeers +and laughter of the bystanders, was highly animated and diverting. As +yet, however, no marksman had hit the white, though many had gone +close to it, when Nicholas Alwyn stepped forward; and there was +something so unwarlike in his whole air, so prim in his gait, so +careful in his deliberate survey of the shaft and his precise +adjustment of the leathern gauntlet that protected the arm from the +painful twang of the string, that a general burst of laughter from the +bystanders attested their anticipation of a signal failure. + +"'Fore Heaven!" said Montagu, "he handles his bow an' it were a yard- +measure. One would think he were about to bargain for the bow-string, +he eyes it so closely." + +"And now," said Nicholas, slowly adjusting the arrow, "a shot for the +honour of old Westmoreland!" And as he spoke, the arrow sprang +gallantly forth, and quivered in the very heart of the white. There +was a general movement of surprise among the spectators, as the marker +thrice shook his wand over his head. But Alwyn, as indifferent to +their respect as he had been to their ridicule, turned round and said, +with a significant glance at the silent nobles, "We springals of +London can take care of our own, if need be." + +"These fellows wax insolent. Our good king spoils them," said +Montagu, with a curl of his lip. "I wish some young squire of gentle +blood would not disdain a shot for the Nevile against the craftsman. +How say you, fair sir?" And with a princely courtesy of mien and +smile, Lord Montagu turned to the young man he had noticed as wearing +the cognizance of the First House in England. The bow was not the +customary weapon of the well-born; but still, in youth, its exercise +formed one of the accomplishments of the future knight; and even +princes did not disdain, on a popular holiday, to match a shaft +against the yeoman's cloth-yard. [At a later period, Henry VIII. was +a match for the best bowman in his kingdom. His accomplishment was +hereditary, and distinguished alike his wise father and his pious +son.] The young man thus addressed, and whose honest, open, handsome, +hardy face augured a frank and fearless nature, bowed his head in +silence, and then slowly advancing to the umpires, craved permission +to essay his skill, and to borrow the loan of a shaft and bow. Leave +given and the weapons lent, as the young gentleman took his stand, his +comely person, his dress, of a better quality than that of the +competitors hitherto, and, above all, the Nevile badge worked in +silver on his hat, diverted the general attention from Nicholas Alwyn. +A mob is usually inclined to aristocratic predilections, and a murmur +of goodwill and expectation greeted him, when he put aside the +gauntlet offered to him, and said, "In my youth I was taught so to +brace the bow that the string should not touch the arm; and though +eleven score yards be but a boy's distance, a good archer will lay his +body into his bow ["My father taught me to lay my body in my bow," +etc., said Latimer, in his well-known sermon before Edward VI.,--1549. +The bishop also herein observes that "it is best to give the bow so +much bending that the string need never touch the arm. This," he +adds, "is practised by many good archers with whom I am acquainted."] +as much as if he were to hit the blanc four hundred yards away." + +"A tall fellow this!" said Montagu; "and one I wot from the North," as +the young gallant fitted the shaft to the bow. And graceful and +artistic was the attitude he assumed,--the head slightly inclined, the +feet firmly planted, the left a little in advance, and the stretched +sinews of the bow-hand alone evincing that into that grasp was pressed +the whole strength of the easy and careless frame. The public +expectation was not disappointed,--the youth performed the feat +considered of all the most dexterous; his arrow, disdaining the white +mark, struck the small peg which fastened it to the butts, and which +seemed literally invisible to the bystanders. + +"Holy Saint Dunstan! there's but one man who can beat me in that sort +that I know of," muttered Nicholas, "and I little expected to see him +take a bite out of his own hip." With that he approached his +successful rival. + +"Well, Master Marmaduke," said he, "it is many a year since you showed +me that trick at your father, Sir Guy's--God rest him! But I scarce +take it kind in you to beat your own countryman!" + +"Beshrew me!" cried the youth, and his cheerful features brightened +into hearty and cordial pleasure, "but if I see in thee, as it seems +to me, my old friend and foster-brother, Nick Alwyn, this is the +happiest hour I have known for many a day. But stand back and let me +look at thee, man. Thou! thou a tame London trader! Ha! ha! is it +possible?" + +"Hout, Master Marmaduke," answered Nicholas, "every crow thinks his +own baird bonniest, as they say in the North. We will talk of this +anon an' thou wilt honour me. I suspect the archery is over now. Few +will think to mend that shot." + +And here, indeed, the umpires advanced, and their chief--an old +mercer, who had once borne arms, and indeed been a volunteer at the +battle of Towton--declared that the contest was over,--"unless," he +added, in the spirit of a lingering fellow-feeling with the Londoner, +"this young fellow, whom I hope to see an alderman one of these days, +will demand another shot, for as yet there hath been but one prick +each at the butts." + +"Nay, master," returned Alwyn, "I have met with my betters,--and, +after all," he added indifferently, "the silver arrow, though a pretty +bauble enough, is over light in its weight." + +"Worshipful sir," said the young Nevile, with equal generosity, "I +cannot accept the prize for a mere trick of the craft,--the blanc was +already disposed of by Master Alwyn's arrow. Moreover; the contest +was intended for the Londoners, and I am but an interloper, beholden +to their courtesy for a practice of skill, and even the loan of a bow; +wherefore the silver arrow be given to Nicholas Alwyn." + +"That may not be, gentle sir," said the umpire, extending the prize. +"Sith Alwyn vails of himself, it is thine, by might and by right." + +The Lord Montagu had not been inattentive to this dialogue, and he now +said, in a loud tone that silenced the crowd, "Young Badgeman, thy +gallantry pleases me no less than thy skill. Take the arrow, for thou +hast won it; but as thou seemest a new comer, it is right thou +shouldst pay thy tax upon entry,--this be my task. Come hither, I +pray thee, good sir," and the nobleman graciously beckoned to the +mercer; "be these five nobles the prize of whatever Londoner shall +acquit himself best in the bold English combat of quarter-staff, and +the prize be given in this young archer's name. Thy name, youth?" + +"Marmaduke Nevile, good my lord." + +Montagu smiled, and the umpire withdrew to make the announcement to +the bystanders. The proclamation was received with a shout that +traversed from group to group and line to line, more hearty from the +love and honour attached to the name of Nevile than even from a sense +of the gracious generosity of Earl Warwick's brother. One man alone, +a sturdy, well-knit fellow, in a franklin's Lincoln broadcloth, and +with a hood half-drawn over his features, did not join the popular +applause. "These Yorkists," he muttered, "know well how to fool the +people." + +Meanwhile the young Nevile still stood by the gilded stirrup of the +great noble who had thus honoured him, and contemplated him with that +respect and interest which a youth's ambition ever feels for those who +have won a name. + +The Lord Montagu bore a very different character from his puissant +brother. Though so skilful a captain that he had never been known to +lose a battle, his fame as a warrior was, strange to say, below that +of the great earl, whose prodigious strength had accomplished those +personal feats that dazzled the populace, and revived the legendary +renown of the earlier Norman knighthood. The caution and wariness, +indeed, which Montagu displayed in battle probably caused his success +as a general, and the injustice done to him (at least by the vulgar) +as a soldier. Rarely had Lord Montagu, though his courage was +indisputable, been known to mix personally in the affray. Like the +captains of modern times, he contented himself with directing the +manoeuvres of his men, and hence preserved that inestimable advantage +of coolness and calculation, which was not always characteristic of +the eager hardihood of his brother. The character of Montagu differed +yet more from that of the earl in peace than in war. He was supposed +to excel in all those supple arts of the courtier which Warwick +neglected or despised; and if the last was on great occasions the +adviser, the other in ordinary life was the companion of his +sovereign. Warwick owed his popularity to his own large, open, +daring, and lavish nature. The subtler Montagu sought to win, by care +and pains, what the other obtained without an effort. He attended the +various holiday meetings of the citizens, where Warwick was rarely +seen. He was smooth-spoken and courteous to his equals, and generally +affable, though with constraint, to his inferiors. He was a close +observer, and not without that genius for intrigue, which in rude ages +passes for the talent of a statesman. And yet in that thorough +knowledge of the habits and tastes of the great mass, which gives +wisdom to a ruler, he was far inferior to the earl. In common with +his brother, he was gifted with the majesty of mien which imposes on +the eye; and his port and countenance were such as became the prodigal +expense of velvet, minever, gold, and jewels, by which the gorgeous +magnates of the day communicated to their appearance the arrogant +splendour of their power. + +"Young gentleman," said the earl, after eying with some attention the +comely archer, "I am pleased that you bear the name of Nevile. +Vouchsafe to inform me to what scion of our House we are this day +indebted for the credit with which you have upborne its cognizance?" + +"I fear," answered the youth, with a slight but not ungraceful +hesitation, "that my lord of Montagu and Northumberland will hardly +forgive the presumption with which I have intruded upon this assembly +a name borne by nobles so illustrious, especially if it belong to +those less fortunate branches of his family which have taken a +different side from himself in the late unhappy commotions. My father +was Sir Guy Nevile, of Arsdale, in Westmoreland." + +Lord Montagu's lip lost its gracious smile; he glanced quickly at the +courtiers round him, and said gravely, "I grieve to hear it. Had I +known this, certes my gipsire had still been five nobles the richer. +It becomes not one fresh from the favour of King Edward IV. to show +countenance to the son of a man, kinsman though he was, who bore arms +for the usurpers of Lancaster. I pray thee, sir, to doff, henceforth, +a badge dedicated only to the service of Royal York. No more, young +man; we may not listen to the son of Sir Guy Nevile.--Sirs, shall we +ride to see how the Londoners thrive at quarter-staff?" + +With that, Montagu, deigning no further regard at Nevile, wheeled his, +palfrey towards a distant part of the ground, to which the multitude +was already pressing its turbulent and noisy way. + +"Thou art hard on thy namesake, fair my lord," said a young noble, in +whose dark-auburn hair, aquiline, haughty features, spare but powerful +frame, and inexpressible air of authority and command, were found all +the attributes of the purest and eldest Norman race,--the Patricians +of the World. + +"Dear Raoul de Fulke," returned Montagu, coldly, "when thou hast +reached my age of thirty and four, thou wilt learn that no man's +fortune casts so broad a shadow as to shelter from the storm the +victims of a fallen cause." + +"Not so would say thy bold brother," answered Raoul de Fulke, with a +slight curl of his proud lip. "And I hold, with him, that no king is +so sacred that we should render to his resentments our own kith and +kin. God's wot, whosoever wears the badge and springs from the stem +of Raoul de Fulke shall never find me question over much whether his +father fought for York or Lancaster." + +"Hush, rash babbler!" said Montagu, laughing gently; "what would King +Edward say if this speech reached his ears? Our friend," added the +courtier, turning to the rest, "in vain would bar the tide of change; +and in this our New England, begirt with new men and new fashions, +affect the feudal baronage of the worn-out Norman. But thou art a +gallant knight, De Fulke, though a poor courtier." + +"The saints keep me so!" returned De Fulke. "From overgluttony, from +over wine-bibbing, from cringing to a king's leman, from quaking at a +king's frown, from unbonneting to a greasy mob, from marrying an old +crone for vile gold, may the saints ever keep Raoul de Fulke and his +sons! Amen!" This speech, in which every sentence struck its +stinging satire into one or other of the listeners, was succeeded by +an awkward silence, which Montagu was the first to break. + +"Pardieu!" he said, "when did Lord Hastings leave us, and what fair +face can have lured the truant?" + +"He left us suddenly on the archery-ground," answered the young +Lovell. "But as well might we track the breeze to the rose as Lord +William's sigh to maid or matron." + +While thus conversed the cavaliers, and their plumes waved, and their +mantles glittered along the broken ground, Marmaduke Nevile's eye +pursued the horsemen with all that bitter feeling of wounded pride and +impotent resentment with which Youth regards the first insult it +receives from Power. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + +THE BROKEN GITTERN. + +Rousing himself from his indignant revery, Marmaduke Nevile followed +one of the smaller streams into which the crowd divided itself on +dispersing from the archery-ground, and soon found himself in a part +of the holiday scene appropriated to diversions less manly, but no +less characteristic of the period than those of the staff and arrow. +Beneath an awning, under which an itinerant landlord dispensed cakes +and ale, the humorous Bourdour (the most vulgar degree of minstrel, or +rather tale-teller) collected his clownish audience; while seated by +themselves--apart, but within hearing--two harpers, in the king's +livery, consoled each other for the popularity of their ribald rival, +by wise reflections on the base nature of common folk. Farther on, +Marmaduke started to behold what seemed to him the heads of giants at +least six yards high; but on a nearer approach these formidable +apparitions resolved themselves to a company of dancers upon stilts. +There, one joculator exhibited the antics of his well-tutored ape; +there, another eclipsed the attractions of the baboon by a marvellous +horse that beat a tabor with his forefeet; there, the more sombre +Tregetour, before a table raised upon a lofty stage, promised to cut +off and refix the head of a sad-faced little boy, who in the mean time +was preparing his mortal frame for the operation by apparently larding +himself with sharp knives and bodkins. Each of these wonder-dealers +found his separate group of admirers, and great was the delight and +loud the laughter in the pastime-ground of old Cockaigne. + +While Marmaduke, bewildered by this various bustle, stared around him, +his eye was caught by a young maiden, in evident distress, struggling +in vain to extricate herself from a troop of timbrel-girls, or +tymbesteres (as they were popularly called), who surrounded her with +mocking gestures, striking their instruments to drown her +remonstrances, and dancing about her in a ring at every effort towards +escape. The girl was modestly attired as one of the humbler ranks, +and her wimple in much concealed her countenance; but there was, +despite her strange and undignified situation and evident alarm, a +sort of quiet, earnest self-possession,--an effort to hide her terror, +and to appeal to the better and more womanly feelings of her +persecutors. In the intervals of silence from the clamour, her voice, +though low, clear, well-tuned, and impressive, forcibly arrested the +attention of young Nevile; for at that day, even more than this +(sufficiently apparent as it now is), there was a marked distinction +in the intonation, the accent, the modulation of voice, between the +better bred and better educated and the inferior classes. But this +difference, so ill according with her dress and position, only served +to heighten more the bold insolence of the musical Bacchantes, who, +indeed, in the eyes of the sober, formed the most immoral nuisance +attendant on the sports of the time, and whose hardy license and +peculiar sisterhood might tempt the antiquary to search for their +origin amongst the relics of ancient Paganism. And now, to increase +the girl's distress, some half-score of dissolute apprentices and +journeymen suddenly broke into the ring of the Maenads, and were +accosting her with yet more alarming insults, when Marmaduke, pushing +them aside, strode to her assistance. "How now, ye lewd varlets! ye +make me blush for my countrymen in the face of day! Are these the +sports of merry England,--these your manly contests,--to strive which +can best affront a poor maid? Out on ye, cullions and bezonians! +Cling to me, gentle donzel, and fear not. Whither shall I lead thee?" +The apprentices were not, however, so easily daunted. Two of them +approached to the rescue, flourishing their bludgeons about their +heads with formidable gestures. "Ho, ho!" cried one, "what right hast +thou to step between the hunters and the doe? The young quean is too +much honoured by a kiss from a bold 'prentice of London." + +Marmaduke stepped back, and drew the small dagger which then formed +the only habitual weapon of a gentleman. [Swords were not worn, in +peace, at that period.] This movement, discomposing his mantle, +brought the silver arrow he had won (which was placed in his girdle) +in full view of the assailants. At the same time they caught sight of +the badge on his hat. These intimidated their ardour more than the +drawn poniard. + +"A Nevile!" said one, retreating. "And the jolly marksman who beat +Nick Alwyn," said the other, lowering his bludgeon, and doffing his +cap. "Gentle sir, forgive us, we knew not your quality. But as for +the girl--your gallantry misleads you." + +"The Wizard's daughter! ha, ha! the Imp of Darkness!" screeched the +timbrel-girls, tossing up their instruments, and catching them again +on the points of their fingers. "She has enchanted him with her +glamour. Foul is fair! Foul fair thee, young springal, if thou go to +the nets. Shadow and goblin to goblin and shadow! Flesh and blood to +blood and flesh!"--and dancing round him, with wanton looks and bare +arms, and gossamer robes that brushed him as they circled, they +chanted,-- + + "Come, kiss me, my darling, + Warm kisses I trade for; + Wine, music, and kisses + What else was life made for?" + +With some difficulty, and with a disgust which was not altogether +without a superstitious fear of the strange words and the outlandish +appearance of these loathsome Delilahs, Marmaduke broke from the ring +with his new charge; and in a few moments the Nevile and the maiden +found themselves, unmolested and unpursued, in a deserted quarter of +the ground; but still the scream of the timbrel-girls, as they +hurried, wheeling and dancing, into the distance, was borne ominously +to the young man's ear. "Ha, ha! the witch and her lover! Foul is +fair! foul is fair! Shadow to goblin, goblin to shadow,--and the +devil will have his own!" + +"And what mischance, my poor girl," asked the Nevile, soothingly, +"brought thee into such evil company?" + +"I know not, fair sir," said the girl, slowly recovering her self; +"but my father is poor, and I had heard that on these holiday +occasions one who had some slight skill on the gittern might win a few +groats from the courtesy of the bystanders. So I stole out with my +serving-woman, and had already got more than I dared hope, when those +wicked timbrel-players came round me, and accused me of taking the +money from them. And then they called an officer of the ground, who +asked me my name and holding; so when I answered, they called my +father a wizard, and the man broke my poor gittern,--see!"--and she +held it up, with innocent sorrow in her eyes, yet a half-smile on her +lips,--"and they soon drove poor old Madge from my side, and I knew no +more till you, worshipful sir, took pity on me." + +"But why," asked the Nevile, "did they give to your father so unholy a +name?" + +"Alas, sir! he is a great scholar, who has spent his means in studying +what he says will one day be of good to the people." + +"Humph!" said Marmaduke, who had all the superstitions of his time, +who looked upon a scholar, unless in the Church, with mingled awe and +abhorrence, and who, therefore, was but ill-satisfied with the girl's +artless answer, + +"Humph! your father--but--" checking what he was about, perhaps +harshly, to say, as he caught the bright eyes and arch, intelligent +face lifted to his own--"but it is hard to punish the child for the +father's errors." + +"Errors, sir!" repeated the damsel, proudly, and with a slight disdain +in her face and voice. "But yes, wisdom is ever, perhaps, the saddest +error!" + +This remark was of an order superior in intellect to those which had +preceded it: it contrasted with the sternness of experience the +simplicity of the child; and of such contrasts, indeed, was that +character made up. For with a sweet, an infantine change of tone and +countenance, she added, after a short pause, "They took the money! +The gittern--see, they left that, when they had made it useless." + +"I cannot mend the gittern, but I can refill the gipsire," said +Marmaduke. + +The girl coloured deeply. "Nay, sir, to earn is not to beg." +Marmaduke did not heed this answer; for as they were now passing by +the stunted trees, under which sat several revellers, who looked up at +him from their cups and tankards, some with sneering, some with grave +looks, he began, more seriously than in his kindly impulse he had +hitherto done, to consider the appearance it must have to be thus seen +walking in public with a girl of inferior degree, and perhaps doubtful +repute. Even in our own day such an exhibition would be, to say the +least, suspicious; and in that day, when ranks and classes were +divided with iron demarcations, a young gallant, whose dress bespoke +him of gentle quality, with one of opposite sex, and belonging to the +humbler orders, in broad day too, was far more open to censure. The +blood mounted to his brow, and halting abruptly, he said, in a dry and +altered voice: "My good damsel, you are now, I think, out of danger; +it would ill beseem you, so young and so comely, to go farther with +one not old enough to be your protector; so, in God's name, depart +quickly, and remember me when you buy your new gittern, poor child!" +So saying, he attempted to place a piece of money in her hand. She +put it back, and the coin fell on the ground. "Nay, this is foolish," +said he. + +"Alas, sir!" said the girl, gravely, "I see well that you are ashamed +of your goodness. But my father begs not. And once--but that matters +not." + +"Once what?" persisted Marmaduke, interested in her manner, in spite +of himself. + +"Once," said the girl, drawing herself up, and with an expression that +altered the whole character of her face--"the beggar ate at my +father's gate. He is a born gentleman and a knight's son." + +"And what reduced him thus?" + +"I have said," answered the girl, simply, yet with the same half-scorn +on her lip that it had before betrayed; "he is a scholar, and thought +more of others than himself." + +"I never saw any good come to a gentleman from those accursed books," +said the Nevile,--"fit only for monks and shavelings. But still, for +your father's sake, though I am ashamed of the poorness of the gift--" + +"No; God be with you, sir, and reward you." She stopped short, drew +her wimple round her face, and was gone. Nevile felt an uncomfortable +sensation of remorse and disapproval at having suffered her to quit +him while there was yet any chance of molestation or annoyance, and +his eye followed her till a group of trees veiled her from his view. + +The young maiden slackened her pace as she found herself alone under +the leafless boughs of the dreary pollards,--a desolate spot, made +melancholy by dull swamps, half overgrown with rank verdure, through +which forced its clogged way the shallow brook that now gives its name +(though its waves are seen no more) to one of the main streets in the +most polished quarters of the metropolis. Upon a mound formed by the +gnarled roots of the dwarfed and gnome-like oak, she sat down and +wept. In our earlier years, most of us may remember that there was +one day which made an epoch in life,--that day that separated +Childhood from Youth; for that day seems not to come gradually, but to +be a sudden crisis, an abrupt revelation. The buds of the heart open +to close no more. Such a day was this in that girl's fate. But the +day was not yet gone! That morning, when she dressed for her +enterprise of filial love, perhaps for the first time Sibyll Warner +felt that she was fair--who shall say whether some innocent, natural +vanity had not blended with the deep, devoted earnestness, which saw +no shame in the act by which the child could aid the father? Perhaps +she might have smiled to listen to old Madge's praises of her winsome +face, old Madge's predictions that the face and the gittern would not +lack admirers on the gay ground; perhaps some indistinct, vague +forethoughts of the Future to which the sex will deem itself to be +born might have caused the cheek--no, not to blush, but to take a +rosier hue, and the pulse to beat quicker, she knew not why. At all +events, to that ground went the young Sibyll, cheerful, and almost +happy, in her inexperience of actual life, and sure, at least, that +youth and innocence sufficed to protect from insult. And now she sat +down under the leafless tree to weep; and in those bitter tears, +childhood itself was laved from her soul forever. + +"What ailest thou, maiden?" asked a deep voice; and she felt a hand +laid lightly on her shoulder. She looked up in terror and confusion, +but it was no form or face to inspire alarm that met her eye. It was +a cavalier, holding by the rein a horse richly caparisoned; and though +his dress was plainer and less exaggerated than that usually worn by +men of rank, its materials were those which the sumptuary laws +(constantly broken, indeed, as such laws ever must be) confined to +nobles. Though his surcoat was but of cloth, and the colour dark and +sober, it was woven in foreign looms,--an unpatriotic luxury, above +the degree of knight,--and edged deep with the costliest sables. The +hilt of the dagger, suspended round his breast, was but of ivory, +curiously wrought, but the scabbard was sown with large pearls. For +the rest, the stranger was of ordinary stature, well knit and active +rather than powerful, and of that age (about thirty-five) which may be +called the second prime of man. His face was far less handsome than +Marmaduke Nevile's, but infinitely more expressive, both of +intelligence and command,--the features straight and sharp, the +complexion clear and pale, and under the bright gray eyes a dark shade +spoke either of dissipation or of thought. + +"What ailest thou, maiden,--weepest thou some faithless lover? Tush! +love renews itself in youth, as flower succeeds flower in spring." + +Sibyll made no reply; she rose and moved a few paces, then arrested +her steps, and looked around her. She had lost all clew to her way +homeward, and she saw with horror, in the distance, the hateful +timbrel-girls, followed by the rabble, and weaving their strange +dances towards the spot. + +"Dost thou fear me, child? There is no cause," said the stranger, +following her. "Again I say, What ailest thou?" This time his voice +was that of command, and the poor girl involuntarily obeyed it. She +related her misfortunes, her persecution by the tymbesteres, her +escape,--thanks to the Nevile's courtesy,--her separation from her +attendant, and her uncertainty as to the way she should pursue. + +The nobleman listened with interest: he was a man sated and wearied by +pleasure and the world, and the evident innocence of Sibyll was a +novelty to his experience, while the contrast between her language and +her dress moved his curiosity. "And," said he, "thy protector left +thee, his work half done; fie on his chivalry! But I, donzel, wear +the spurs of knighthood, and to succour the distressed is a duty my +oath will not let me swerve from. I will guide thee home, for I know +well all the purlieus of this evil den of London. Thou hast but to +name the suburb in which thy father dwells." + +Sibyll involuntarily raised her wimple, lifted her beautiful eyes to +the stranger, in bewildered gratitude and surprise. Her childhood had +passed in a court, her eye, accustomed to rank, at once perceived the +high degree of the speaker. The contrast between this unexpected and +delicate gallantry and the condescending tone and abrupt desertion of +Marmaduke affected her again to tears. + +"Ah, worshipful sir!" she said falteringly, "what can reward thee for +this unlooked-for goodness?" + +"One innocent smile, sweet virgin!--for such I'll be sworn thou art." + +He did not offer her his hand, but hanging the gold-enamelled rein +over his arm, walked by her side; and a few words sufficing for his +guidance, led her across the ground, through the very midst of the +throng. He felt none of the young shame, the ingenious scruples of +Marmaduke, at the gaze he encountered, thus companioned. But Sibyll +noted that ever and anon bonnet and cap were raised as they passed +along, and the respectful murmur of the vulgar, who had so lately +jeered her anguish, taught her the immeasurable distance in men's +esteem between poverty shielded by virtue, and poverty protected by +power. + +But suddenly a gaudy tinsel group broke through the crowd, and +wheeling round their path, the foremost of them daringly approached +the nobleman, and looking full into his disdainful face, exclaimed, +"Tradest thou, too, for kisses? Ha, ha! life is short,--the witch is +outwitched by thee! But witchcraft and death go together, as +peradventure thou mayest learn at the last, sleek wooer." Then +darting off, and heading her painted, tawdry throng, the timbrel-girl +sprang into the crowd and vanished. + +This incident produced no effect upon the strong and cynical intellect +of the stranger. Without allusion to it, he continued to converse +with his young companion, and artfully to draw out her own singular +but energetic and gifted mind. He grew more than interested,--he was +both touched and surprised. His manner became yet more respectful, +his voice more subdued and soft. + +On what hazards turns our fate! On that day, a little, and Sibyll's +pure but sensitive heart had, perhaps, been given to the young Nevile. +He had defended and saved her; he was fairer than the stranger, he was +more of her own years and nearer to her in station; but in showing +himself ashamed to be seen with her, he had galled her heart, and +moved the bitter tears of her pride. What had the stranger done? +Nothing but reconciled the wounded delicacy to itself; and suddenly he +became to her one ever to be remembered, wondered at,--perhaps more. +They reached an obscure suburb, and parted at the threshold of a +large, gloomy, ruinous house, which Sibyll indicated as her father's +home. + +The girl lingered before the porch; and the stranger gazed, with the +passionless admiration which some fair object of art produces on one +who has refined his taste, but who has survived enthusiasm, upon the +downcast cheek that blushed beneath his gaze. "Farewell!" he said; +and the girl looked up wistfully. He might, without vanity, have +supposed that look to imply what the lip did not dare to say,--"And +shall we meet no more?" + +But he turned away, with formal though courteous salutation; and as he +remounted his steed, and rode slowly towards the interior of the city, +he muttered to himself, with a melancholy smile upon his lips, "Now +might the grown infant make to himself a new toy; but an innocent +heart is a brittle thing, and one false vow can break it. Pretty +maiden! I like thee well eno' not to love thee. So, as my young +Scotch minstrel sings and plays,-- + + 'Christ keep these birdis bright in bowers, + Sic peril lies in paramours!'" + +[A Scotch poet, in Lord Hailes's Collection, has the following lines +in the very pretty poem called "Peril in Paramours:"-- + + "Wherefore I pray, in termys short, + Christ keep these birdis bright in bowers, + Fra false lovers and their disport, + Sic peril lies in paramours."] + +We must now return to Marmaduke. On leaving Sibyll, and retracing his +steps towards the more crowded quarter of the space, he was agreeably +surprised by encountering Nicholas Alwyn, escorted in triumph by a +legion of roaring apprentices from the victory he had just obtained +over six competitors at the quarter-staff. + +When the cortege came up to Marmaduke, Nicholas halted, and fronting +his attendants, said, with the same cold and formal stiffness that had +characterized him from the beginning, "I thank you, lads, for your +kindness. It is your own triumph. All I cared for was to show that +you London boys are able to keep up your credit in these days, when +there's little luck in a yard-measure, if the same hand cannot bend a +bow, or handle cold steel. But the less we think of the strife when +we are in the stall, the better for our pouches. And so I hope we +shall hear no more about it, until I get a ware of my own, when the +more of ye that like to talk of such matters the better ye will be +welcome,--always provided ye be civil customers, who pay on the nail, +for as the saw saith, 'Ell and tell makes the crypt swell.' For the +rest, thanks are due to this brave gentleman, Marmaduke Nevile, who, +though the son of a knight-banneret who never furnished less to the +battle-field than fifty men-at-arms, has condescended to take part and +parcel in the sports of us peaceful London traders; and if ever you +can do him a kind turn--for turn and turn is fair play--why, you will, +I answer for it. And so one cheer for old London, and another for +Marmaduke Nevile. Here goes! Hurrah, my lads!" And with this pithy +address Nicholas Alwyn took off his cap and gave the signal for the +shouts, which, being duly performed, he bowed stiffly to his +companions, who departed with a hearty laugh, and coming to the side +of Nevile, the two walked on to a neighbouring booth, where, under a +rude awning, and over a flagon of clary, they were soon immersed in +the confidential communications each had to give and receive. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + +THE TRADER AND THE GENTLE; OR, THE CHANGING GENERATION. + +"No, my dear foster-brother," said the Nevile, "I do not yet +comprehend the choice you have made. You were reared and brought up +with such careful book-lere, not only to read and to write--the which, +save the mark! I hold to be labour eno'--but chop Latin and logic and +theology with Saint Aristotle (is not that his hard name?) into the +bargain, and all because you had an uncle of high note in Holy Church. +I cannot say I would be a shaveling myself; but surely a monk with the +hope of preferment is a nobler calling to a lad of spirit and ambition +than to stand out at a door and cry, 'Buy, buy,' 'What d'ye lack?' to +spend youth as a Flat-cap, and drone out manhood in measuring cloth, +hammering metals, or weighing out spices?" + +"Fair and softly, Master Marmaduke," said Alwyn, "you will understand +me better anon. My uncle, the sub-prior, died,--some say of +austerities, others of ale,--that matters not; he was a learned man +and a cunning. 'Nephew Nicholas,' said he on his death-bed, 'think +twice before you tie yourself up to the cloister; it's ill leaping +nowadays in a sackcloth bag. If a pious man be moved to the cowl by +holy devotion, there is nothing to be said on the subject; but if he +take to the Church as a calling, and wish to march ahead like his +fellows, these times show him a prettier path to distinction. The +nobles begin to get the best things for themselves; and a learned +monk, if he is the son of a yeoman, cannot hope, without a specialty +of grace, to become abbot or bishop. The king, whoever he be, must be +so drained by his wars, that he has little land or gold to bestow on +his favourites; but his gentry turn an eye to the temporalities of the +Church, and the Church and the king wish to strengthen themselves by +the gentry. This is not all; there are free opinions afloat. The +House of Lancaster has lost ground, by its persecutions and burnings. +Men dare not openly resist, but they treasure up recollections of a +fried grandfather, or a roasted cousin,--recollections which have done +much damage to the Henries, and will shake Holy Church itself one of +these days. The Lollards lie hid, but Lollardism will never die. +There is a new class rising amain, where a little learning goes a +great way, if mixed with spirit and sense. Thou likest broad pieces +and a creditable name,--go to London and be a trader. London begins +to decide who shall wear the crown, and the traders to decide what +king London shall befriend. Wherefore, cut thy trace from the +cloister, and take thy road to the shop.' The next day my uncle gave +up the ghost.--They had better clary than this at the convent, I must +own; but every stone has its flaw." + +"Yet," said Marmaduke, "if you took distaste to the cowl, from reasons +that I pretend not to judge of, but which seem to my poor head very +bad ones, seeing that the Church is as mighty as ever, and King Edward +is no friend to the Lollards, and that your uncle himself was at least +a sub-prior--" + +"Had he been son to a baron, he had been a cardinal," interrupted +Nicholas, "for his head was the longest that ever came out of the +north country. But go on; you would say my father was a sturdy +yeoman, and I might have followed his calling?" + +"You hit the mark, Master Nicholas." + +"Hout, man. I crave pardon of your rank, Master Nevile. But a yeoman +is born a yeoman, and he dies a yeoman--I think it better to die Lord +Mayor of London; and so I craved my mother's blessing and leave, and a +part of the old hyde has been sold to pay for the first step to the +red gown, which I need not say must be that of the Flat-cap. I have +already taken my degrees, and no longer wear blue. I am headman to my +master, and my master will be sheriff of London." + +"It is a pity," said the Nevile, shaking his head; "you were ever a +tall, brave lad, and would have made a very pretty soldier." + +"Thank you, Master Marmaduke, but I leave cut and thrust to the +gentles. I have seen eno' of the life of a retainer. He goes out on +foot with his shield and his sword, or his bow and his quiver, while +Sir Knight sits on horseback, armed from the crown to the toe, and the +arrow slants off from rider and horse, as a stone from a tree. If the +retainer is not sliced and carved into mincemeat, he comes home to a +heap of ashes, and a handful of acres, harried and rivelled into a +common; Sir Knight thanks him for his valour, but he does not build up +his house; Sir Knight gets a grant from the king, or an heiress for +his son, and Hob Yeoman turns gisarme and bill into ploughshares. +Tut, tut, there's no liberty, no safety, no getting on, for a man who +has no right to the gold spurs, but in the guild of his fellows; and +London is the place for a born Saxon like Nicholas Alwyn." + +As the young aspirant thus uttered the sentiments, which though others +might not so plainly avow and shrewdly enforce them, tended towards +that slow revolution, which, under all the stormy events that the +superficial record we call HISTORY alone deigns to enumerate, was +working that great change in the thoughts and habits of the people, +--that impulsion of the provincial citywards, that gradual formation +of a class between knight and vassal,--which became first +constitutionally visible and distinct in the reign of Henry VII., +Marmaduke Nevile, inly half-regretting and half-despising the +reasonings of his foster-brother, was playing with his dagger, and +glancing at his silver arrow. + +"Yet you could still have eno' of the tall yeoman and the stout +retainer about you to try for this bauble, and to break half a dozen +thick heads with your quarter-staff!" + +"True," said Nicholas; "you must recollect we are only, as yet, +between the skin and the selle,--half-trader, half-retainer. The old +leaven will out,--'Eith to learn the cat to the kirn,' as they say in +the North. But that's not all; a man, to get on, must win respect +from those who are to jostle him hereafter, and it's good policy to +show those roystering youngsters that Nick Alwyn, stiff and steady +though he be, has the old English metal in him, if it comes to a +pinch; it's a lesson to yon lords too, save your quality, if they ever +wish to ride roughshod over our guilds and companies. But eno' of +me.--Drawer, another stoup of the clary--Now, gentle sir, may I make +bold to ask news of yourself? I saw, though I spake not before of it, +that my Lord Montagu showed a cold face to his kinsman. I know +something of these great men, though I be but a small one,--a dog is +no bad guide in the city he trots through." + +"My dear foster-brother," said the Nevile, "you had ever more brains +than myself, as is meet that you should have, since you lay by the +steel casque,--which, I take it, is meant as a substitute for us +gentlemen and soldiers who have not so many brains to spare; and I +will willingly profit by your counsels. You must know," he said, +drawing nearer to the table, and his frank, hardy face assuming a more +earnest expression, "that though my father, Sir Guy, at the +instigation of his chief, the Earl of Westmoreland, and of the Lord +Nevile, bore arms at the first for King Henry--" + +"Hush! hush! for Henry of Windsor!" + +"Henry of Windsor!--so be it! yet being connected, like the nobles I +have spoken of, with the blood of Warwick and Salisbury, it was ever +with doubt and misgiving, and rather in the hope of ultimate +compromise between both parties (which the Duke of York's moderation +rendered probable) than of the extermination of either. But when, at +the battle of York, Margaret of Anjou and her generals stained their +victory by cruelties which could not fail to close the door on all +conciliation; when the infant son of the duke himself was murdered, +though a prisoner, in cold blood; when my father's kinsman, the Earl +of Salisbury, was beheaded without trial; when the head of the brave +and good duke, who had fallen in the field, was, against all knightly +and king-like generosity, mockingly exposed, like a dishonoured +robber, on the gates of York, my father, shocked and revolted, +withdrew at once from the army, and slacked not bit or spur till he +found himself in his hall at Arsdale. His death, caused partly by his +travail and vexation of spirit, together with his timely withdrawal +from the enemy, preserved his name from the attainder passed on the +Lords Westmoreland and Nevile; and my eldest brother, Sir John, +accepted the king's proffer of pardon, took the oaths of allegiance to +Edward, and lives safe, if obscure, in his father's halls. Thou +knowest, my friend, that a younger brother has but small honour at +home. Peradventure, in calmer times, I might have bowed my pride to +my calling, hunted my brother's dogs, flown his hawks, rented his +keeper's lodge, and gone to my grave contented. But to a young man, +who from his childhood had heard the stirring talk of knights and +captains, who had seen valour and fortune make the way to distinction, +and whose ears of late had been filled by the tales of wandering +minstrels and dissours, with all the gay wonders of Edward's court, +such a life soon grew distasteful. My father, on his death-bed (like +thy uncle, the sub-prior), encouraged me little to follow his own +footsteps. 'I see,' said he, 'that King Henry is too soft to rule his +barons, and Margaret too fierce to conciliate the commons; the only +hope of peace is in the settlement of the House of York. Wherefore, +let not thy father's errors stand in the way of thy advancement;' and +therewith he made his confessor--for he was no penman himself, the +worthy old knight!--indite a letter to his great kinsman, the Earl of +Warwick, commending me to his protection. He signed his mark, and set +his seal to this missive, which I now have at mine hostelrie, and died +the same day. My brother judged me too young then to quit his roof; +and condemned me to bear his humours till, at the age of twenty-three, +I could bear no more! So having sold him my scant share in the +heritage, and turned, like thee, bad land into good nobles, I joined a +party of horse in their journey to London, and arrived yesterday at +Master Sackbut's hostelrie in Eastchepe. I went this morning to my +Lord of Warwick; but he was gone to the king's, and hearing of the +merry-makings here, I came hither for kill-time. A chance word of my +Lord of Montagu--whom Saint Dunstan confound!--made me conceit that a +feat of skill with the cloth-yard might not ill preface my letter to +the great earl. But, pardie! it seems I reckoned without my host, and +in seeking to make my fortunes too rashly, I have helped to mar them." +Wherewith he related the particulars of his interview with Montagu. + +Nicholas Alwyn listened to him with friendly and thoughtful interest, +and, when he had done, spoke thus,-- + +"The Earl of Warwick is a generous man, and though hot, bears little +malice, except against those whom he deems misthink or insult him; he +is proud of being looked up to as a protector, especially by those of +his own kith and name. Your father's letter will touch the right +string, and you cannot do better than deliver it with a plain story. +A young partisan like thee is not to be despised. Thou must trust to +Lord Warwick to set matters right with his brother; and now, before I +say further, let me ask thee, plainly, and without offence, Dost thou +so love the House of York that no chance could ever make thee turn +sword against it? Answer as I ask,--under thy breath; those drawers +are parlous spies!" + +And here, in justice to Marmaduke Nevile and to his betters, it is +necessary to preface his reply by some brief remarks, to which we must +crave the earnest attention of the reader. What we call PATRIOTISM, +in the high and catholic acceptation of the word, was little if at all +understood in days when passion, pride, and interest were motives +little softened by reflection and education, and softened still less +by the fusion of classes that characterized the small States of old, +and marks the civilization of a modern age. Though the right by +descent of the House of York, if genealogy alone were consulted, was +indisputably prior to that of Lancaster, yet the long exercise of +power in the latter House, the genius of the Fourth Henry, and the +victories of the Fifth, would no doubt have completely superseded the +obsolete claims of the Yorkists, had Henry VI. possessed any of the +qualities necessary for the time. As it was, men had got puzzled by +genealogies and cavils; the sanctity attached to the king's name was +weakened by his doubtful right to his throne, and the Wars of the +rival Roses were at last (with two exceptions, presently to be noted) +the mere contests of exasperated factions, in which public +considerations were scarcely even made the blind to individual +interest, prejudice, or passion. + +Thus, instances of desertion, from the one to the other party, even by +the highest nobles, and on the very eve of battle, had grown so common +that little if any disgrace was attached to them; and any knight or +captain held an affront to himself an amply sufficient cause for the +transfer of his allegiance. It would be obviously absurd to expect in +any of the actors of that age the more elevated doctrines of party +faith and public honour, which clearer notions of national morality, +and the salutary exercise of a large general opinion, free from the +passions of single individuals, have brought into practice in our more +enlightened days. The individual feelings of the individual MAN, +strong in himself, became his guide, and he was free in much from the +regular and thoughtful virtues, as well as from the mean and plausible +vices, of those who act only in bodies and corporations. The two +exceptions to this idiosyncrasy of motive and conduct were, first, in +the general disposition of the rising middle class, especially in +London, to connect great political interests with the more popular +House of York. The commons in parliament had acted in opposition to +Henry the Sixth, as the laws they wrung from him tended to show, and +it was a popular and trading party that came, as it were, into power +under King Edward. It is true that Edward was sufficiently arbitrary +in himself; but a popular party will stretch as much as its +antagonists in favour of despotism,--exercised, on its enemies. And +Edward did his best to consult the interests of commerce, though the +prejudices of the merchants interpreted those interests in a way +opposite to that in which political economy now understands them. The +second exception to the mere hostilities of individual chiefs and +feudal factions has, not less than the former, been too much +overlooked by historians. But this was a still more powerful element +in the success of the House of York. The hostility against the Roman +Church and the tenets of the Lollards were shared by an immense part +of the population. In the previous century an ancient writer computes +that one half the population were Lollards; and though the sect were +diminished and silenced by fear, they still ceased not to exist, and +their doctrines not only shook the Church under Henry VIII., but +destroyed the throne by the strong arm of their children, the +Puritans, under Charles I. It was impossible that these men should +not have felt the deepest resentment at the fierce and steadfast +persecution they endured under the House of Lancaster; and without +pausing to consider how far they would benefit under the dynasty of +York, they had all those motives of revenge which are mistaken so +often for the counsels of policy, to rally round any standard raised +against their oppressors. These two great exceptions to merely +selfish policy, which it remains for the historian clearly and at +length to enforce, these: and these alone will always, to a sagacious +observer, elevate the Wars of the Roses above those bloody contests +for badges which we are at first sight tempted to regard them. But +these deeper motives animated very little the nobles and the knightly +gentry; [Amongst many instances of the self-seeking of the time, not +the least striking is the subservience of John Mowbray, the great Duke +of Norfolk, to his old political enemy, the Earl of Oxford, the moment +the last comes into power, during the brief restoration of Henry VI. +John Paston, whose family had been sufficiently harassed by this great +duke, says, with some glee, "The Duke and Duchess (of Norfolk) sue to +him (Lord Oxford) as humbly as ever I did to them."--Paston Letters, +cccii.] and with them the governing principles were, as we have just +said, interest, ambition, and the zeal for the honour and advancement +of Houses and chiefs. + +"Truly," said Marmaduke, after a short and rather embarrassed pause, +"I am little beholden as yet to the House of York. There where I see +a noble benefactor, or a brave and wise leader, shall I think my sword +and heart may best proffer allegiance." + +"Wisely said," returned Alwyn, with a slight but half sarcastic smile; +"I asked thee the question because--draw closer--there are wise men in +our city who think the ties between Warwick and the king less strong +than a ship's cable; and if thou attachest thyself to Warwick, he will +be better pleased, it may be, with talk of devotion to himself than +professions of exclusive loyalty to King Edward. He who has little +silver in his pouch must have the more silk on his tongue. A word to +a Westmoreland or a Yorkshire man is as good as a sermon to men not +born so far north. One word more, and I have done. Thou art kind and +affable and gentle, my dear foster-brother, but it will not do for +thee to be seen again with the goldsmith's headman. If thou wantest +me, send for me at nightfall; I shall be found at Master Heyford's, in +the Chepe. And if," added Nicholas, with a prudent reminiscence, +"thou succeedest at court, and canst recommend my master,--there is no +better goldsmith,--it may serve me when I set up for myself, which I +look to do shortly." + +"But to send for thee, my own foster-brother, at nightfall, as if I +were ashamed!" + +"Hout, Master Marmaduke, if thou wert not ashamed of me, I should be +ashamed to be seen with a gay springal like thee. Why, they would say +in the Chepe that Nick Alwyn was going to ruin. No, no. Birds of a +feather must keep shy of those that moult other colours; and so, my +dear young master, this is my last shake of the hand. But hold: dost +thou know thy way back?" + +"Oh, yes,--never fear!" answered Marmaduke; "though I see not why so +far, at least, we may not be companions." + +"No, better as it is; after this day's work they will gossip about +both of us, and we shall meet many who know my long visage on the way +back. God keep thee; avise me how thou prosperest." + +So saying, Nicholas Alwyn walked off, too delicate to propose to pay +his share of the reckoning with a superior; but when he had gone a few +paces he turned back, and accosting the Nevile, as the latter was +rebuckling his mantle, said,-- + +"I have been thinking, Master Nevile, that these gold nobles, which it +has been my luck to bear off, would be more useful in thy gipsire than +mine. I have sure gains and small expenses; but a gentleman gains +nothing, and his hand must be ever in his pouch, so--" + +"Foster-brother," said Marmaduke, haughtily, "a gentleman never +borrows,--except of the Jews, and with due interest. Moreover, I too +have my calling; and as thy stall to thee, so to me my good sword. +Saints keep thee! Be sure I will serve thee when I can." + +"The devil's in these young strips of the herald's tree," muttered +Alwyn, as he strode off; "as if it were dishonest to borrow a broad +piece without cutting a throat for it! Howbeit, money is a prolific +mother: and here is eno' to buy me a gold chain against I am alderman +of London. Hout, thus goes the world,--the knight's baubles become +the alderman's badges--so much the better!" + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + +ILL FARES THE COUNTRY MOUSE IN THE TRAPS OF TOWN. + +We trust we shall not be deemed discourteous, either, on the one hand, +to those who value themselves on their powers of reflection, or, on +the other, to those who lay claim to what, in modern phrenological +jargon, is called the Organ of Locality, when we venture to surmise +that the two are rarely found in combination; nay, that it seems to us +a very evident truism, that in proportion to the general activity of +the intellect upon subjects of pith and weight, the mind will be +indifferent to those minute external objects by which a less +contemplative understanding will note, and map out, and impress upon +the memory, the chart of the road its owner has once taken. Master +Marmaduke Nevile, a hardy and acute forester from childhood, possessed +to perfection the useful faculty of looking well and closely before +him as he walked the earth; and ordinarily, therefore, the path he had +once taken, however intricate and obscure, he was tolerably sure to +retrace with accuracy, even at no inconsiderable distance of time,-- +the outward senses of men are usually thus alert and attentive in the +savage or the semi-civilized state. He had not, therefore, over- +valued his general acuteness in the note and memory of localities, +when he boasted of his power to refind his way to his hostelrie +without the guidance of Alwyn. But it so happened that the events of +this day, so memorable to him, withdrew his attention from external +objects, to concentrate it within. And in marvelling and musing over +the new course upon which his destiny had entered, he forgot to take +heed of that which his feet should pursue; so that, after wandering +unconsciously onward for some time, he suddenly halted in perplexity +and amaze to find himself entangled in a labyrinth of scattered +suburbs, presenting features wholly different from the road that had +conducted him to the archery-ground in the forenoon. The darkness of +the night had set in; but it was relieved by a somewhat faint and +mist-clad moon, and some few and scattered stars, over which rolled, +fleetly, thick clouds, portending rain. No lamps at that time cheered +the steps of the belated wanderer; the houses were shut up, and their +inmates, for the most part, already retired to rest, and the suburbs +did not rejoice, as the city, in the round of the watchman with his +drowsy call to the inhabitants, "Hang out your lights!" The +passengers, who at first, in various small groups and parties, had +enlivened the stranger's way, seemed to him, unconscious as he was of +the lapse of time, to have suddenly vanished from the thoroughfares; +and he found himself alone in places thoroughly unknown to him, waking +to the displeasing recollection that the approaches to the city were +said to be beset by brawlers and ruffians of desperate characters, +whom the cessation of the civil wars had flung loose upon the skirts +of society, to maintain themselves by deeds of rapine and plunder. As +might naturally be expected, most of these had belonged to the +defeated party, who had no claim to the good offices or charity of +those in power. And although some of the Neviles had sided with the +Lancastrians, yet the badge worn by Marmaduke was considered a pledge +of devotion to the reigning House, and added a new danger to those +which beset his path. Conscious of this--for he now called to mind +the admonitions of his host in parting from the hostelrie--he deemed +it but discreet to draw the hood of his mantle over the silver +ornament; and while thus occupied, he heard not a step emerging from a +lane at his rear, when suddenly a heavy hand was placed on his +shoulder. He started, turned, and before him stood a man, whose +aspect and dress betokened little to lessen the alarm of the +uncourteous salutation. Marmaduke's dagger was bare on the instant. + +"And what wouldst thou with me?" he asked. + +"Thy purse and thy dagger!" answered the stranger. + +"Come and take them," said the Nevile, unconscious that he uttered a +reply famous in classic history, as he sprang backward a step or so, +and threw himself into an attitude of defence. The stranger slowly +raised a rude kind of mace, or rather club, with a ball of iron at the +end, garnished with long spikes, as he replied, "Art thou mad eno' to +fight for such trifles?" + +"Art thou in the habit of meeting one Englishman who yields his goods +without a blow to another?" retorted Marmaduke. "Go to! thy club does +not daunt me." The stranger warily drew back a step, and applied a +whistle to his mouth. The Nevile sprang at him, but the stranger +warded off the thrust of the poniard with a light flourish of his +heavy weapon; and had not the youth drawn back on the instant, it had +been good-night and a long day to Marmaduke Nevile. Even as it was, +his heart beat quick, as the whirl of the huge weapon sent the air +like a strong wind against his face. Ere he had time to renew his +attack, he was suddenly seized from behind, and found himself +struggling in the arms of two men. From these he broke, and his +dagger glanced harmless against the tough jerkin of his first +assailant. The next moment his right arm fell to his side, useless +and deeply gashed. A heavy blow on the head--the moon, the stars +reeled in his eyes--and then darkness,--he knew no more. His +assailants very deliberately proceeded to rifle the inanimate body, +when one of them, perceiving the silver badge, exclaimed, with an +oath, "One of the rampant Neviles! This cock at least shall crow no +more." And laying the young man's head across his lap, while he +stretched back the throat with one hand, with the other he drew forth +a long sharp knife, like those used by huntsmen in despatching the +hart. Suddenly, and in the very moment when the blade was about to +inflict the fatal gash, his hand was forcibly arrested, and a man, who +had silently and unnoticed joined the ruffians, said in a stern +whisper, "Rise and depart from thy brotherhood forever. We admit no +murderer." + +The ruffian looked up in bewilderment. "Robin--captain--thou here!" +he said falteringly. + +"I must needs be everywhere, I see, if I would keep such fellows as +thou and these from the gallows. What is this?--a silver arrow--the +young archer--Um." + +"A Nevile!" growled the would-be murderer. + +"And for that very reason his life should be safe. Knowest thou not +that Richard of Warwick, the great Nevile, ever spares the commons? +Begone! I say." The captain's low voice grew terrible as he uttered +the last words. The savage rose, and without a word stalked away. + +"Look you, my masters," said Robin, turning to the rest, "soldiers +must plunder a hostile country. While York is on the throne, England +is a hostile country to us Lancastrians. Rob, then, rifle, if ye +will; but he who takes life shall lose it. Ye know me!" The robbers +looked down, silent and abashed. Robin bent a moment over the youth. +"He will live," he muttered. "So! he already begins to awaken. One +of these houses will give him shelter. Off, fellows, and take care of +your necks!" + +When Marmaduke, a few minutes after this colloquy, began to revive, it +was with a sensation of dizziness, pain, and extreme cold. He strove +to lift himself from the ground, and at length succeeded. He was +alone; the place where he had lain was damp and red with stiffening +blood. He tottered on for several paces, and perceived from a +lattice, at a little distance, a light still burning. Now reeling, +now falling, he still dragged on his limbs as the instinct attracted +him to that sign of refuge. He gained the doorway of a detached and +gloomy house, and sank on the stone before it to cry aloud; but his +voice soon sank into deep groans, and once more, as his efforts +increased the rapid gush of the blood, became insensible. The man +styled Robin, who had so opportunely saved his life, now approached +from the shadow of a wall, beneath which he had watched Marmaduke's +movements. He neared the door of the house, and cried, in a sharp, +clear voice, "Open, for the love of Christ!" + +A head was now thrust from the lattice, the light vanished; a minute +more, the door opened; and Robin, as if satisfied, drew hastily back, +and vanished, saying to himself, as he strode along, "A young man's +life must needs be dear to him; yet had the lad been a lord, methinks +I should have cared little to have saved for the people one tyrant +more." + +After a long interval, Marmaduke again recovered, and his eyes turned +with pain from the glare of a light held to his face. + +"He wakes, Father,--he will live!" cried a sweet voice. "Ay, he will +live, child!" answered a deeper tone; and the young man muttered to +himself, half audibly, as in a dream, "Holy Mother be blessed! it is +sweet to live." The room in which the sufferer lay rather exhibited +the remains of better fortunes than testified to the solid means of +the present possessor. The ceiling was high and groined, and some +tints of faded but once gaudy painting blazoned its compartments and +hanging pendants. The walls had been rudely painted (for arras [Mr. +Hallam ("History of the Middle Ages," chap. ix. part 2) implies a +doubt whether great houses were furnished with hangings so soon as the +reign of Edward IV.; but there is abundant evidence to satisfy our +learned historian upon that head. The Narrative of the "Lord of +Grauthuse," edited by Sir F. Madden, specifies the hangings of cloth +of gold in the apartments in which that lord was received by Edward +IV.; also the hangings of white silk and linen in the chamber +appropriated to himself at Windsor. But long before this period (to +say nothing of the Bayeux Tapestry),--namely, in the reign of Edward +III. (in 1344),--a writ was issued to inquire into the mystery of +working tapestry; and in 1398 Mr. Britton observes that the celebrated +arras hangings at Warwick Castle are mentioned. (See Britton's +"Dictionary of Architecture and Archaelogy," art. "Tapestry.")] then +was rare, even among the wealthiest); but the colours were half +obliterated by time and damp. The bedstead on which the wounded man +reclined was curiously carved, with a figure of the Virgin at the +head, and adorned with draperies, in which were wrought huge figures +from scriptural subjects, but in the dress of the date of Richard +II.,--Solomon in pointed upturned shoes, and Goliath, in the armour of +a crusader, frowning grimly upon the sufferer. By the bedside stood a +personage, who, in reality, was but little past the middle age, but +whose pale visage, intersected with deep furrows, whose long beard and +hair, partially gray, gave him the appearance of advanced age: +nevertheless there was something peculiarly striking in the aspect of +the man. His forehead was singularly high and massive; but the back +of the head was disproportionately small, as if the intellect too much +preponderated over all the animal qualities for strength in character +and success in life. The eyes were soft, dark, and brilliant, but +dreamlike and vague; the features in youth must have been regular and +beautiful, but their contour was now sharpened by the hollowness of +the cheeks and temples. The form, in the upper part, was nobly +shaped, sufficiently muscular, if not powerful, and with the long +throat and falling shoulders which always gives something of grace and +dignity to the carriage; but it was prematurely bent, and the lower +limbs were thin and weak, as is common with men who have sparely used +them; they seemed disproportioned to that broad chest, and still more +to that magnificent and spacious brow. The dress of this personage +corresponded with the aspect of his abode. The materials were those +worn by the gentry, but they were old, threadbare, and discoloured +with innumerable spots and stains. His hands were small and delicate, +with large blue veins, that spoke of relaxed fibres; but their natural +whiteness was smudged with smoke-stains, and his beard--a masculine +ornament utterly out of fashion among the younger race in King +Edward's reign, but when worn by the elder gentry carefully trimmed +and perfumed--was dishevelled into all the spiral and tangled curls +displayed in the sculptured head of some old Grecian sage or poet. + +On the other side of the bed knelt a young girl of about sixteen, with +a face exquisitely lovely in its delicacy and expression. She seemed +about the middle stature, and her arms and neck, as displayed by the +close-fitting vest, had already the smooth and rounded contour of +dawning womanhood, while the face had still the softness, innocence, +and inexpressible bloom of a child. There was a strong likeness +between her and her father (for such the relationship, despite the +difference of sex and years),--the same beautiful form of lip and +brow, the same rare colour of the eyes, dark-blue, with black fringing +lashes; and perhaps the common expression, at that moment, of gentle +pity and benevolent anxiety contributed to render the resemblance +stronger. + +"Father, he sinks again!" said the girl. + +"Sibyll," answered the man, putting his finger upon a line in a +manuscript book that he held, "the authority saith, that a patient so +contused should lose blood, and then the arm must be tightly bandaged. +Verily we lack the wherewithal." + +"Not so, Father!" said the girl, and blushing, she turned aside, and +took off the partelet of lawn, upon which holiday finery her young +eyes perhaps that morning had turned with pleasure, and white as snow +was the neck which was thus displayed; "this will suffice to bind his +arm." + +"But the book," said the father, in great perplexity--"the book +telleth us not how the lancet should be applied. It is easy to say, +'Do this and do that;' but to do it once, it should have been done +before. This is not among my experiments." + +Luckily, perhaps, for Marmaduke, at this moment there entered an old +woman, the solitary servant of the house, whose life, in those warlike +times, had made her pretty well acquainted with the simpler modes of +dealing with a wounded arm and a broken head. She treated with great +disdain the learned authority referred to by her master; she bound the +arm, plastered the head, and taking upon herself the responsibility to +promise a rapid cure, insisted upon the retirement of father and +child, and took her solitary watch beside the bed. + +"If it had been any other mechanism than that of the vile human body!" +muttered the philosopher, as if apologizing to himself; and with that +he recovered his self-complacency and looked round him proudly. + + + + +CHAPTER V. + +WEAL TO THE IDLER, WOE TO THE WORKMAN. + +As Providence tempers the wind to the shorn lamb, so it possibly might +conform the heads of that day to a thickness suitable for the blows +and knocks to which they were variously subjected; yet it was not +without considerable effort and much struggling that Marmaduke's +senses recovered the shock received, less by his flesh-wound and the +loss of blood, than a blow on the seat of reason that might have +despatched a passable ox of these degenerate days. Nature, to say +nothing of Madge's leechcraft, ultimately triumphed, and Marmaduke +woke one morning in full possession of such understanding as Nature +had endowed him with. He was then alone, and it was with much simple +surprise that he turned his large hazel eyes from corner to corner of +the unfamiliar room. He began to retrace and weave together sundry +disordered and vague reminiscences: he commenced with the +commencement, and clearly satisfied himself that he had been +grievously wounded and sorely bruised; he then recalled the solitary +light at the high lattice, and his memory found itself at the porch of +the large, lonely, ruinous old house; then all became a bewildered and +feverish dream. He caught at the vision of an old man with a long +beard, whom he associated, displeasingly, with recollections of pain; +he glanced off to a fair face, with eyes that looked tender pity +whenever he writhed or groaned under the tortures that, no doubt, that +old accursed carle had inflicted upon him. But even this face did not +dwell with pleasure in his memory,--it woke up confused and labouring +associations of something weird and witchlike, of sorceresses and +tymbesteres, of wild warnings screeched in his ear, of incantations +and devilries and doom. Impatient of these musings, he sought to leap +from his bed, and was amazed that the leap subsided into a tottering +crawl. He found an ewer and basin, and his ablutions refreshed and +invigorated him. He searched for his raiment, and discovered it all +except the mantle, dagger, hat, and girdle; and while looking for +these, his eye fell on an old tarnished steel mirror. He started as +if he had seen his ghost; was it possible that his hardy face could +have waned into that pale and almost femininely delicate visage? With +the pride (call it not coxcombry) that then made the care of person +the distinction of gentle birth, he strove to reduce into order the +tangled locks of the long hair, of which a considerable portion above +a part that seemed peculiarly sensitive to the touch had been +mercilessly clipped; and as he had just completed this task, with +little satisfaction and much inward chafing at the lack of all +befitting essences and perfumes, the door gently opened, and the fair +face he had dreamed of appeared at the aperture. + +The girl uttered a cry of astonishment and alarm at seeing the patient +thus arrayed and convalescent, and would suddenly have retreated; but +the Nevile advanced, and courteously taking her hand-- + +"Fair maiden," said he, "if, as I trow, I owe to thy cares my tending +and cure--nay, it may be a life hitherto of little worth, save to +myself--do not fly from my thanks. May Our Lady of Walsingham bless +and reward thee!" + +"Sir," answered Sibyll, gently withdrawing her hands from his clasp, +"our poor cares have been a slight return for thy generous protection +to myself." + +"To thee! ah, forgive me--how could I be so dull? I remember thy face +now; and, perchance, I deserve the disaster I met with in leaving thee +so discourteously. My heart smote me for it as my light footfall +passed from thy side." + +A slight blush, succeeded by a thoughtful smile--the smile of one who +recalls and caresses some not displeasing remembrance--passed over +Sibyll's charming countenance, as the sufferer said this with +something of the grace of a well-born man, whose boyhood had been +taught to serve God and the Ladies. + +There was a short pause before she answered, looking down, "Nay, sir, +I was sufficiently beholden to you; and for the rest, all molestation +was over. But I will now call your nurse--for it is to our servant, +not us, that your thanks are due--to see to your state, and administer +the proper medicaments." + +"Truly, fair damsel, it is not precisely medicaments that I hunger and +thirst for; and if your hospitality could spare me from the larder a +manchet, or a corner of a pasty, and from the cellar a stoup of wine +or a cup of ale, methinks it would tend more to restore me than those +potions which are so strange to my taste that they rather offend than +tempt it; and, pardie, it seemeth to my poor senses as if I had not +broken bread for a week!" + +"I am glad to hear you of such good cheer," answered Sibyll; "wait but +a moment or so, till I consult your physician." + +And, so saying, she closed the door, slowly descended the steps, and +pursued her way into what seemed more like a vault than a habitable +room, where she found the single servant of the household. Time, +which makes changes so fantastic in the dress of the better classes, +has a greater respect for the costume of the humbler; and though the +garments were of a very coarse sort of serge, there was not so great a +difference, in point of comfort and sufficiency, as might be supposed, +between the dress of old Madge and that of some primitive servant in +the North during the last century. The old woman's face was thin and +pinched; but its sharp expression brightened into a smile as she +caught sight, through the damps and darkness, of the gracious form of +her young mistress. "Ah, Madge," said Sibyll, with a sigh, "it is a +sad thing to be poor!" + +"For such as thou, Mistress Sibyll, it is indeed. It does not matter +for the like of us. But it goes to my old heart when I see you shut +up here, or worse, going out in that old courtpie and wimple,--you, a +knight's grandchild; you, who have played round a queen's knees, and +who might have been so well-to-do, an' my master had thought a little +more of the gear of this world. But patience is a good palfrey, and +will carry us a long day. And when the master has done what he looks +for, why, the king--sith we must so call the new man on the throne-- +will be sure to reward him; but, sweetheart, tarry not here; it's an +ill air for your young lips to drink in. What brings you to old +Madge?" + +"The stranger is recovered, and--" + +"Ay, I warrant me, I have cured worse than he. He must have a +spoonful of broth,--I have not forgot it. You see I wanted no dinner +myself--what is dinner to old folks!--so I e'en put it all in the pot +for him. The broth will be brave and strong." + +"My poor Madge, God requite you for what you suffer for us! But he +has asked"--here was another sigh, and a downcast look that did not +dare to face the consternation of Madge, as she repeated, with a half- +smile--"he has asked--for meat, and a stoup of wine, Madge!" + +"Eh, sirs! And where is he to get them? Not that it will be bad for +the lad, either. Wine! There's Master Sancroft of the Oak will not +trust us a penny, the seely hilding, and--" + +"Oh, Madge, I forgot!--we can still sell the gittern for something. +Get on your wimple, Madge--quick,--while I go for it." + +"Why, Mistress Sibyll, that's your only pleasure when you sit all +alone, the long summer days." + +"It will be more pleasure to remember that it supplied the wants of my +father's guest," said Sibyll; and retracing the way up the stairs, she +returned with the broken instrument, and despatched Madge with it, +laden with instructions that the wine should be of the best. She then +once more mounted the rugged steps, and halting a moment at +Marmaduke's door, as she heard his feeble step walking impatiently to +and fro, she ascended higher, where the flight, winding up a square, +dilapidated turret, became rougher, narrower, and darker, and opened +the door of her father's retreat. + +It was a room so bare of ornament and furniture that it seemed merely +wrought out of the mingled rubble and rough stones which composed the +walls of the mansion, and was lighted towards the street by a narrow +slit, glazed, it is true,--which all the windows of the house were +not,--but the sun scarcely pierced the dull panes and the deep walls +in which they were sunk. The room contained a strong furnace and a +rude laboratory. There were several strange-looking mechanical +contrivances scattered about, several manuscripts upon some oaken +shelves, and a large pannier of wood and charcoal in the corner. In +that poverty-stricken house, the money spent on fuel alone, in the +height of summer, would have comfortably maintained the inmates; but +neither Sibyll nor Madge ever thought to murmur at this waste, +dedicated to what had become the vital want of a man who drew air in a +world of his own. This was the first thing to be provided for; and +Science was of more imperative necessity than even Hunger. + +Adam Warner was indeed a creature of remarkable genius,--and genius, +in an age where it is not appreciated, is the greatest curse the iron +Fates can inflict on man. If not wholly without the fond fancies +which led the wisdom of the darker ages to the philosopher's stone and +the elixir, he had been deterred from the chase of a chimera by want +of means to pursue it! for it required the resources or the patronage +of a prince or noble to obtain the costly ingredients consumed in the +alchemist's crucible. In early life, therefore, and while yet in +possession of a competence derived from a line of distinguished and +knightly ancestors, Adam Warner had devoted himself to the surer and +less costly study of the mathematics, which then had begun to attract +the attention of the learned, but which was still looked upon by the +vulgar as a branch of the black art. This pursuit had opened to him +the insight into discoveries equally useful and sublime. They +necessitated a still more various knowledge; and in an age when there +was no division of labour and rare and precarious communication among +students, it became necessary for each discoverer to acquire +sufficient science for his own collateral experiments. + +In applying mathematics to the practical purposes of life, in +recognizing its mighty utilities to commerce and civilization, Adam +Warner was driven to conjoin with it, not only an extensive knowledge +of languages, but many of the rudest tasks of the mechanist's art; and +chemistry was, in some of his researches, summoned to his aid. By +degrees, the tyranny that a man's genius exercises over his life, +abstracted him from all external objects. He had loved his wife +tenderly, but his rapid waste of his fortune in the purchase of +instruments and books, then enormously dear, and the neglect of all +things not centred in the hope to be the benefactor of the world, had +ruined her health and broken her heart. Happily Warner perceived not +her decay till just before her death; happily he never conceived its +cause, for her soul was wrapped in his. She revered, and loved, and +never upbraided him. Her heart was the martyr to his mind. Had she +foreseen the future destinies of her daughter, it might have been +otherwise. She could have remonstrated with the father, though not +with the husband. But, fortunately, as it seemed to her, she (a +Frenchwoman by birth) had passed her youth in the service of Margaret +of Anjou, and that haughty queen, who was equally warm to friends and +inexorable to enemies, had, on her attendant's marriage, promised to +ensure the fortunes of her offspring. Sibyll at the age of nine-- +between seven and eight years before the date the story enters on, and +two years prior to the fatal field of Towton, which gave to Edward the +throne of England--had been admitted among the young girls whom the +custom of the day ranked amidst the attendants of the queen; and in +the interval that elapsed before Margaret was obliged to dismiss her +to her home, her mother died. She died without foreseeing the +reverses that were to ensue, in the hope that her child, at least, was +nobly provided for, and not without the belief (for there is so much +faith in love!) that her husband's researches, which in his youth had +won favour of the Protector Duke of Gloucester, the most enlightened +prince of his time, would be crowned at last with the rewards and +favours of his king. That precise period was, indeed, the fairest +that had yet dawned upon the philosopher. Henry VI., slowly +recovering from one of those attacks which passed for imbecility, had +condescended to amuse himself with various conversations with Warner, +urged to it first by representations of the unholy nature of the +student's pursuits; and, having satisfied his mind of his learned +subject's orthodoxy, the poor monarch had taken a sort of interest, +not so much, perhaps, in the objects of Warner's occupations, as in +that complete absorption from actual life which characterized the +subject, and gave him in this a melancholy resemblance to the king. +While the House of Lancaster was on the throne, the wife felt that her +husband's pursuits would be respected, and his harmless life safe from +the fierce prejudices of the people; and the good queen would not +suffer him to starve, when the last mark was expended in devices how +to benefit his country:--and in these hopes the woman died! + +A year afterwards, all at court was in disorder,--armed men supplied +the service of young girls, and Sibyll, with a purse of broad pieces, +soon converted into manuscripts, was sent back to her father's +desolate home. There had she grown a flower amidst ruins, with no +companion of her own age, and left to bear, as her sweet and +affectionate nature well did, the contrast between the luxuries of a +court and the penury of a hearth which, year after year, hunger and +want came more and more sensibly to invade. + +Sibyll had been taught, even as a child, some accomplishments little +vouchsafed then to either sex,--she could read and write; and Margaret +had not so wholly lost, in the sterner North, all reminiscence of the +accomplishments that graced her father's court as to neglect the +education of those brought up in her household. Much attention was +given to music, for it soothed the dark hours of King Henry; the +blazoning of missals or the lives of saints, with the labours of the +loom, were also among the resources of Sibyll's girlhood, and by these +last she had, from time to time, served to assist the maintenance of +the little family of which, child though she was, she became the +actual head. But latterly--that is, for the last few weeks--even +these sources failed her; for as more peaceful times allowed her +neighbours to interest themselves in the affairs of others, the dark +reports against Warner had revived. His name became a by-word of +horror; the lonely light at the lattice burning till midnight, against +all the early usages and habits of the day; the dark smoke of the +furnace, constant in summer as in winter, scandalized the religion of +the place far and near. And finding, to their great dissatisfaction, +that the king's government and the Church interfered not for their +protection, and unable themselves to volunteer any charges against the +recluse (for the cows in the neighbourhood remained provokingly +healthy), they came suddenly, and, as it were by one of those common +sympathies which in all times the huge persecutor we call the PUBLIC +manifests when a victim is to be crushed, to the pious resolution of +starving where they could not burn. Why buy the quaint devilries of +the wizard's daughter?--no luck could come of it. A missal blazoned +by such hands, an embroidery worked at such a loom, was like the +Lord's Prayer read backwards. And one morning, when poor Sibyll stole +out as usual to vend a month's labour, she was driven from door to +door with oaths and curses. + +Though Sibyll's heart was gentle, she was not without a certain +strength of mind. She had much of the patient devotion of her mother, +much of the quiet fortitude of her father's nature. If not +comprehending to the full the loftiness of Warner's pursuits, she +still anticipated from them an ultimate success which reconciled her +to all temporary sacrifices. The violent prejudices, the ignorant +cruelty, thus brought to bear against existence itself, filled her +with sadness, it is true, but not unmixed with that contempt for her +persecutors, which, even in the meekest tempers, takes the sting from +despair. But hunger pressed. Her father was nearing the goal of his +discoveries, and in a moment of that pride which in its very contempt +for appearances braves them all, Sibyll had stolen out to the pastime- +ground,--with what result has been seen already. Having thus +accounted for the penury of the mansion, we return to its owner. + +Warner was contemplating with evident complacency and delight the +model of a machine which had occupied him for many years, and which he +imagined he was now rapidly bringing to perfection. His hands and +face were grimed with the smoke of his forge, and his hair and beard, +neglected as usual, looked parched and dried up, as if with the +constant fever that burned within. + +"Yes, yes!" he muttered, "how they will bless me for this! What Roger +Bacon only suggested I shall accomplish! How it will change the face +of the globe! What wealth it will bestow on ages yet unborn!" + +"My father," said the gentle voice of Sibyll, "my poor father, thou +hast not tasted bread to-day." + +Warner turned, and his face relaxed into a tender expression as he saw +his daughter. + +"My child," he said, pointing to his model, "the time comes when it +will live! Patience! patience!" + +"And who would not have patience with thee, and for thee, Father?" +said Sibyll, with enthusiasm speaking on every feature. "What is the +valour of knight and soldier--dull statues of steel--to thine? Thou, +with thy naked breast, confronting all dangers,--sharper than the +lance and glaive, and all--" + +"All to make England great!" + +"Alas! what hath England merited from men like thee? The people, more +savage than their rulers, clamour for the stake, the gibbet, and the +dungeon, for all who strive to make them wiser. Remember the death of +Bolingbroke, [A mathematician accused as an accomplice, in sorcery, of +Eleanor Cobham, wife of Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, and hanged upon +that charge. His contemporary (William Wyrcestre) highly extols his +learning.]--a wizard, because, O Father!--because his pursuits were +thine!" + +Adam, startled by this burst, looked at his daughter with more +attention than he usually evinced to any living thing. "Child," he +said at length, shaking his head in grave reproof, "let me not say to +thee, 'O thou of little faith!' There were no heroes were there no +martyrs!" + +"Do not frown on me, Father," said Sibyll, sadly; "let the world +frown,--not thou! Yes, thou art right. Thou must triumph at last." +And suddenly, her whole countenance changing into a soft and caressing +endearment, she added, "But now come, Father. Thou hast laboured well +for this morning. We shall have a little feast for thee in a few +minutes. And the stranger is recovered, thanks to our leechcraft. He +is impatient to see and thank thee." + +"Well, well, I come, Sibyll," said the student, with a regretful, +lingering look at his model, and a sigh to be disturbed from its +contemplation; and he slowly quitted the room with Sibyll. + +"But not, dear sir and father, not thus--not quite thus--vill you go +to the stranger, well-born like yourself? Oh, no! your Sibyll is +proud, you know,--proud of her father." So saying, she clung to him +fondly, and drew him mechanically, for he had sunk into a revery, and +heeded her not, into an adjoining chamber, in which he slept. The +comforts even of the gentry, of men with the acres that Adam had sold, +were then few and scanty. The nobles and the wealthy merchants, +indeed, boasted many luxuries that excelled in gaud and pomp those of +their equals now. But the class of the gentry who had very little +money at command were contented with hardships from which a menial of +this day would revolt. What they could spend in luxury was usually +consumed in dress and the table they were obliged to keep. These were +the essentials of dignity. Of furniture there was a woful stint. In +many houses, even of knights, an edifice large enough to occupy a +quadrangle was composed more of offices than chambers inhabited by the +owners; rarely boasting more than three beds, which were bequeathed in +wills as articles of great value. The reader must, therefore, not be +surprised that Warner's abode contained but one bed, properly so +called, and that was now devoted to Nevile. The couch which served +the philosopher for bed was a wretched pallet, stretched on the floor, +stuffed with straw,--with rough say, or serge, and an old cloak for +the coverings. His daughter's, in a room below, was little better. +The walls were bare; the whole house boasted but one chair, which was +in Marmaduke's chamber; stools or settles of rude oak elsewhere +supplied their place. There was no chimney except in Nevile's room, +and in that appropriated to the forge. + +To this chamber, then, resembling a dungeon in appearance, Sibyll drew +the student, and here, from an old worm-eaten chest, she carefully +extracted a gown of brown velvet, which his father, Sir Armine, had +bequeathed to him by will,--faded, it is true, but still such as the +low-born wore not, [By the sumptuary laws only a knight was entitled +to wear velvet.] trimmed with fur, and clasped with a brooch of gold. +And then she held the ewer and basin to him, while, with the docility +of a child, he washed the smoke-soil from his hands and face. It was +touching to see in this, as in all else, the reverse of their natural +position,--the child tending and heeding and protecting, as it were, +the father; and that not from his deficiency, but his greatness; not +because he was below the vulgar intelligences of life, but above them. +And certainly, when, his patriarchal hair and beard smoothed into +order, and his velvet gown flowing in majestic folds around a figure +tall and commanding, Sibyll followed her father into Marmaduke's +chamber, she might well have been proud of his appearance; and she +felt the innocent vanity of her sex and age in noticing the half-start +of surprise with which Marmaduke regarded his host, and the tone of +respect in which he proffered him his salutations and thanks. Even +his manner altered to Sibyll; it grew less frank and affable, more +courtly and reserved: and when Madge came to announce that the +refection was served, it was with a blush of shame, perhaps, at his +treatment of the poor gittern-player on the pastime-ground, that the +Nevile extended his left hand, for his right was still not at his +command, to lead the damsel to the hall. + +This room, which was divided from the entrance by a screen, and, +except a small closet that adjoined it, was the only sitting-room in a +day when, as now on the Continent, no shame was attached to receiving +visitors in sleeping apartments, was long and low; an old and very +narrow table, that might have feasted thirty persons, stretched across +a dais raised upon a stone floor; there was no rere-dosse, or +fireplace, which does not seem at that day to have been an absolute +necessity in the houses of the metropolis and its suburbs, its place +being supplied by a movable brazier. Three oak stools were placed in +state at the board, and to one of these Marmaduke, in a silence +unusual to him, conducted the fair Sibyll. + +"You will forgive our lack of provisions," said Warner, relapsing into +the courteous fashions of his elder days, which the unwonted spectacle +of a cold capon, a pasty, and a flask of wine brought to his mind by a +train of ideas that actively glided by the intervening circumstances, +which ought to have filled him with astonishment at the sight, "for my +Sibyll is but a young housewife, and I am a simple scholar, of few +wants." + +"Verily," answered Marmaduke, finding his tongue as he attacked the +pasty, "I see nothing that the most dainty need complain of; fair +Mistress Sibyll, your dainty lips will not, I trow, refuse me the +waisall. [I.e. waissail or wassal; the spelling of the time is +adopted in the text.] To you also, worshipful sir! Gramercy! it +seems that there is nothing which better stirs a man's appetite than a +sick bed. And, speaking thereof, deign to inform me, kind sir, how +long I have been indebted to your hospitality. Of a surety, this +pasty hath an excellent flavour, and if not venison, is something +better. But to return, it mazes me much to think what time hath +passed since my encounter with the robbers." + +"They were robbers, then, who so cruelly assailed thee?" observed +Sibyll. + +"Have I not said so--surely, who else? And, as I was remarking to +your worshipful father, whether this mischance happened hours, days, +months, or years ago, beshrew me if I can venture the smallest guess." + +Master Warner smiled, and observing that some reply was expected from +him, said, "Why, indeed, young sir, I fear I am almost as oblivious as +yourself. It was not yesterday that you arrived, nor the day before, +nor--Sibyll, my child, how long is it since this gentleman hath been +our guest?" + +"This is the fifth day," answered Sibyll. + +"So long! and I like a senseless log by the wayside, when others are +pushing on, bit and spur, to the great road. I pray you, sir, tell me +the news of the morning. The Lord Warwick is still in London, the +court still at the Tower?" + +Poor Adam, whose heart was with his model, and who had now satisfied +his temperate wants, looked somewhat bewildered and perplexed by this +question. "The king, save his honoured head," said he, inclining his +own, "is, I fear me, always at the Tower, since his unhappy detention, +but he minds it not, sir,--he heeds it not; his soul is not on this +side Paradise." + +Sibyll uttered a faint exclamation of fear at this dangerous +indiscretion of her father's absence of mind; and drawing closer to +Nevile, she put her hand with touching confidence on his arm, and +whispered, "You will not repeat this, Sir! my father lives only in his +studies, and he has never known but one king!" + +Marmaduke turned his bold face to the maid, and pointed to the salt- +cellar, as he answered in the same tone, "Does the brave man betray +his host?" + +There was a moment's silence. Marmaduke rose. "I fear," said he, +"that I must now leave you; and while it is yet broad noon, I must +indeed be blind if I again miss my way." + +This speech suddenly recalled Adam from his meditations; for whenever +his kindly and simple benevolence was touched, even his mathematics +and his model were forgotten. "No, young sir," said he, "you must not +quit us yet; your danger is not over. Exercise may bring fever. +Celsus recommends quiet. You must consent to tarry with us a day or +two more." + +"Can you tell me," said the Nevile, hesitatingly, "what distance it is +to the Temple-gate, or the nearest wharf on the river?" + +"Two miles, at the least," answered Sibyll. + +"Two miles!--and now I mind me, I have not the accoutrements that +beseem me. Those hildings have stolen my mantle (which, I perceive, +by the way, is but a rustic garment, now laid aside for the super- +tunic), and my hat and dague, nor have they left even a half groat to +supply their place. Verily, therefore, since ye permit me to burden +your hospitality longer, I will not say ye nay, provided you, +worshipful sir, will suffer one of your people to step to the house of +one Master Heyford, goldsmith, in the Chepe, and crave one Nicholas +Alwyn, his freedman, to visit me. I can commission him touching my +goods left at mine hostelrie, and learn some other things which it +behooves me to know." + +"Assuredly. Sibyll, tell Simon or Jonas to put himself under our +guest's order." + +Simon or Jonas! The poor Adam absolutely forgot that Simon and Jonas +had quitted the house these six years! How could he look on the +capon, the wine, and the velvet gown trimmed with fur, and not fancy +himself back in the heyday of his wealth? + +Sibyll half smiled and half sighed, as she withdrew to consult with +her sole counsellor, Madge, how the guest's orders were to be obeyed, +and how, alas! the board was to be replenished for the evening meal. +But in both these troubles she was more fortunate than she +anticipated. Madge had sold the broken gittern, for musical +instruments were then, comparatively speaking, dear (and this had been +a queen's gift), for sufficient to provide decently for some days; +and, elated herself with the prospect of so much good cheer, she +readily consented to be the messenger to Nicholas Alwyn. When with a +light step and a lighter heart Sibyll tripped back to the hall, she +was scarcely surprised to find the guest alone. Her father, after her +departure, had begun to evince much restless perturbation. He +answered Marmaduke's queries but by abstracted and desultory +monosyllables; and seeing his guest at length engaged in contemplating +some old pieces of armour hung upon the walls, he stole stealthily and +furtively away, and halted not till once more before his beloved +model. + +Unaware of his departure, Marmaduke, whose back was turned to him, +was, as he fondly imagined, enlightening his host with much soldier- +like learning as to the old helmets and weapons that graced the hall. +"Certes, my host," said he, musingly, "that sort of casque, which has +not, I opine, been worn this century, had its merits; the vizor is +less open to the arrows. But as for these chain suits, they suited +only--I venture, with due deference, to declare--the Wars of the +Crusades, where the enemy fought chiefly with dart and scymetar. They +would be but a sorry defence against the mace and battle-axe; +nevertheless, they were light for man and horse, and in some service, +especially against foot, might be revived with advantage. Think you +not so?" + +He turned, and saw the arch face of Sibyll. + +"I crave pardon for my blindness, gentle damsel," said he, in some +confusion, "but your father was here anon." + +"His mornings are so devoted to labour," answered Sibyll, "that he +entreats you to pardon his discourtesy. Meanwhile if you would wish +to breathe the air, we have a small garden in the rear;" and so +saying, she led the way into the small withdrawing-room, or rather +closet, which was her own favourite chamber, and which communicated, +by another door, with a broad, neglected grassplot, surrounded by high +walls, having a raised terrace in front, divided by a low stone Gothic +palisade from the green sward. + +On the palisade sat droopingly, and half asleep, a solitary peacock; +but when Sibyll and the stranger appeared at the door, he woke up +suddenly, descended from his height, and with a vanity not wholly +unlike his young mistress's wish to make the best possible display in +the eyes of a guest, spread his plumes broadly in the sun. Sibyll +threw him some bread, which she had taken from the table for that +purpose; but the proud bird, however hungry, disdained to eat, till he +had thoroughly satisfied himself that his glories had been +sufficiently observed. + +"Poor proud one," said Sibyll, half to herself, "thy plumage lasts +with thee through all changes." + +"Like the name of a brave knight," said Marmaduke, who overheard her. + +"Thou thinkest of the career of arms." + +"Surely,--I am a Nevile!" + +"Is there no fame to be won but that of a warrior?" + +"Not that I weet of, or heed for, Mistress Sibyll." + +"Thinkest thou it were nothing to be a minstrel, who gave delight; a +scholar, who dispelled darkness?" + +"For the scholar? Certes, I respect holy Mother Church, which they +tell me alone produces that kind of wonder with full safety to the +soul, and that only in the higher prelates and dignitaries. For the +minstrel, I love him, I would fight for him, I would give him at need +the last penny in my gipsire; but it is better to do deeds than to +sing them." + +Sibyll smiled, and the smile perplexed and half displeased the young +adventurer. But the fire of the young man had its charm. + +By degrees, as they walked to and fro the neglected terrace, their +talk flowed free and familiar; for Marmaduke, like most young men full +of himself, was joyous with the happy egotism of a frank and careless +nature. He told his young confidante of a day his birth, his history, +his hopes, and fears; and in return he learned, in answer to the +questions he addressed to her, so much, at least, of her past and +present life, as the reverses of her father, occasioned by costly +studies, her own brief sojourn at the court of Margaret, and the +solitude, if not the struggles, in which her youth was consumed. It +would have been a sweet and grateful sight to some kindly bystander to +hear these pleasant communications between two young persons so +unfriended, and to imagine that hearts thus opened to each other might +unite in one. But Sibyll, though she listened to him with interest, +and found a certain sympathy in his aspirations, was ever and anon +secretly comparing him to one, the charm of whose voice still lingered +in her ears; and her intellect, cultivated and acute, detected in +Marmaduke deficient education, and that limited experience which is +the folly and the happiness of the young. + +On the other hand, whatever admiration Nevile might conceive was +strangely mixed with surprise, and, it might almost be said, with +fear. This girl, with her wise converse and her child's face, was a +character so thoroughly new to him. Her language was superior to what +he had ever heard, the words more choice, the current more flowing: +was that to be attributed to her court-training or her learned +parentage? + +"Your father, fair mistress," said he, rousing himself in one of the +pauses of their conversation--"your father, then, is a mighty scholar, +and I suppose knows Latin like English?" + +"Why, a hedge-priest pretends to know Latin," said Sibyll, smiling; +"my father is one of the six men living who have learned the Greek and +the Hebrew." + +"Gramercy!" cried Marmaduke, crossing himself. "That is awsome +indeed! He has taught you his lere in the tongues?" + +"Nay, I know but my own and the French; my mother was a native of +France." + +"The Holy Mother be praised!" said Marmaduke, breathing more freely; +"for French I have heard my father and uncle say is a language fit for +gentles and knights, specially those who come, like the Neviles, from +Norman stock. This Margaret of Anjou--didst thou love her well, +Mistress Sibyll?" + +"Nay," answered Sibyll, "Margaret commanded awe, but she scarcely +permitted love from an inferior: and though gracious and well-governed +when she so pleased, it was but to those whom she wished to win. She +cared not for the heart, if the hand or the brain could not assist +her. But, poor queen, who could blame her for this?--her nature was +turned from its milk; and, when, more lately, I have heard how many +she trusted most have turned against her, I rebuked myself that--" + +"Thou wert not by her side?" added the Nevile, observing her pause, +and with the generous thought of a gentleman and a soldier. + +"Nay, I meant not that so expressly, Master Nevile, but rather that I +had ever murmured at her haste and shrewdness of mood. By her side, +said you?--alas! I have a nearer duty at home; my father is all in +this world to me! Thou knowest not, Master Nevile, how it flatters +the weak to think there is some one they can protect. But eno' of +myself. Thou wilt go to the stout earl, thou wilt pass to the court, +thou wilt win the gold spurs, and thou wilt fight with the strong +hand, and leave others to cozen with the keen head." + +"She is telling my fortune!" muttered Marmaduke, crossing himself +again. "The gold spurs--I thank thee, Mistress Sibyll!--will it be on +the battle-field that I shall be knighted, and by whose hand?" + +Sibyll glanced her bright eye at the questioner, and seeing his +wistful face, laughed outright. + +"What, thinkest thou, Master Nevile, I can read thee all riddles +without my sieve and my shears?" + +"They are essentials, then, Mistress Sibyll?" said the Nevile, with +blunt simplicity. "I thought ye more learned damozels might tell by +the palm, or the--why dost thou laugh at me?" + +"Nay," answered Sibyll, composing herself. "It is my right to be +angered. Sith thou wouldst take me to be a witch, all that I can tell +thee of thy future" (she added touchingly) "is from that which I have +seen of thy past. Thou hast a brave heart, and a gentle; thou hast a +frank tongue, and a courteous; and these qualities make men honoured +and loved,--except they have the gifts which turn all into gall, and +bring oppression for honour, and hate for love." + +"And those gifts, gentle Sibyll?" + +"Are my father's," answered the girl, with another and a sadder change +in her expressive countenance. And the conversation flagged till +Marmaduke, feeling more weakened by his loss of blood than he had +conceived it possible, retired to his chamber to repose himself. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + +MASTER MARMADUKE NEVILE FEARS FOR THE SPIRITUAL WEAL OF HIS HOST AND +HOSTESS. + +Before the hour of supper, which was served at six o'clock, Nicholas +Alwyn arrived at the house indicated to him by Madge. Marmaduke, +after a sound sleep, which was little flattering to Sibyll's +attractions, had descended to the hall in search of the maiden and his +host, and finding no one, had sauntered in extreme weariness and +impatience into the little withdrawing-closet, where as it was now +dusk, burned a single candle in a melancholy and rustic sconce; +standing by the door that opened on the garden, he amused himself with +watching the peacock, when his friend, following Madge into the +chamber, tapped him on the shoulder. + +"Well, Master Nevile. Ha! by Saint Thomas, what has chanced to thee? +Thine arm swathed up, thy locks shorn, thy face blanched! My honoured +foster-brother, thy Westmoreland blood seems over-hot for Cockaigne!" + +"If so, there are plenty in this city of cut-throats to let out the +surplusage," returned Marmaduke; and he briefly related his adventure +to Nicholas. + +When he had done, the kind trader reproached himself for having +suffered Marmaduke to find his way alone. "The suburbs abound with +these miscreants," said he; "and there is more danger in a night walk +near London than in the loneliest glens of green Sherwood--more shame +to the city! An' I be Lord Mayor one of these days, I will look to it +better. But our civil wars make men hold human life very cheap, and +there's parlous little care from the great of the blood and limbs of +the wayfarers. But war makes thieves--and peace hangs them! Only +wait till I manage affairs!" + +"Many thanks to thee, Nicholas," returned the Nevile; "but foul befall +me if ever I seek protection from sheriff or mayor! A man who cannot +keep his own life with his own right hand merits well to hap-lose it; +and I, for one, shall think ill of the day when an Englishman looks +more to the laws than his good arm for his safety; but, letting this +pass, I beseech thee to avise me if my Lord Warwick be still in the +city?" + +"Yes, marry, I know that by the hostelries, which swarm with his +badges, and the oxen, that go in scores to the shambles! It is a +shame to the Estate to see one subject so great, and it bodes no good +to our peace. The earl is preparing the most magnificent embassage +that ever crossed the salt seas--I would it were not to the French, +for our interests lie contrary; but thou hast some days yet to rest +here and grow stout, for I would not have thee present thyself with a +visage of chalk to a man who values his kind mainly by their thews and +their sinews. Moreover, thou shouldst send for the tailor, and get +thee trimmed to the mark. It would be a long step in thy path to +promotion, an' the earl would take thee in his train; and the gaudier +thy plumes, why, the better chance for thy flight. Wherefore, since +thou sayest they are thus friendly to thee under this roof, bide yet a +while peacefully; I will send thee the mercer, and the clothier, and +the tailor, to divert thy impatience. And as these fellows are +greedy, my gentle and dear Master Nevile, may I ask, without offence, +how thou art provided?" + +"Nay, nay, I have moneys at the hostelrie, an' thou wilt send me my +mails. For the rest, I like thy advice, and will take it." + +"Good!" answered Nicholas. "Hem! thou seemest to have got into a poor +house,--a decayed gentleman, I wot, by the slovenly ruin!" + +"I would that were the worst," replied Marmaduke, solemnly, and under +his breath; and therewith he repeated to Nicholas the adventure on the +pastime-ground, the warnings of the timbrel-girls, and the "awsome" +learning and strange pursuits of his host. As for Sibyll, he was +evidently inclined to attribute to glamour the reluctant admiration +with which she had inspired him. "For," said he, "though I deny not +that the maid is passing fair, there be many with rosier cheeks, and +taller by this hand!" + +Nicholas listened, at first, with the peculiar expression of shrewd +sarcasm which mainly characterized his intelligent face, but his +attention grew more earnest before Marmaduke had concluded. + +"In regard to the maiden," said he, smiling and shaking his head, "it +is not always the handsomest that win us the most,--while fair Meg +went a maying, black Meg got to church; and I give thee more +reasonable warning than thy timbrel-girls, when, in spite of thy cold +language, I bid thee take care of thyself against her attractions; +for, verily, my dear foster-brother, thou must mend and not mar thy +fortune, by thy love matters; and keep thy heart whole for some fair +one with marks in her gipsire, whom the earl may find out for thee. +Love and raw pease are two ill things in the porridge-pot. But the +father!--I mind me now that I have heard of his name, through my +friend Master Caxton, the mercer, as one of prodigious skill in the +mathematics. I should like much to see him, and, with thy leave (an' +he ask me), will tarry to supper. But what are these?"--and Nicholas +took up one of the illuminated manuscripts which Sibyll had prepared +for sale. "By the blood! this is couthly and marvellously blazoned." + +The book was still in his hands when Sibyll entered. Nicholas stared +at her, as he bowed with a stiff and ungraceful embarrassment, which +often at first did injustice to his bold, clear intellect, and his +perfect self-possession in matters of trade or importance. + +"The first woman face," muttered Nicholas to himself, "I ever saw that +had the sense of a man's. And, by the rood, what a smile!" + +"Is this thy friend, Master Nevile?" said Sibyll, with a glance at the +goldsmith. "He is welcome. But is it fair and courteous, Master +Nelwyn--" + +"Alwyn, an' it please you, fair mistress. A humble name, but good +Saxon,--which, I take it, Nelwyn is not," interrupted Nicholas. + +"Master Alwyn, forgive me; but can I forgive thee so readily for thy +espial of my handiwork, without license or leave?" + +"Yours, comely mistress!" exclaimed Nicholas, opening his eyes, and +unheeding the gay rebuke--"why, this is a master-hand. My Lord +Scales--nay, the Earl of Worcester himself--hath scarce a finer in all +his amassment." + +"Well, I forgive thy fault for thy flattery; and I pray thee, in my +father's name, to stay and sup with thy friend." Nicholas bowed low, +and still riveted his eyes on the book with such open admiration, that +Marmaduke thought it right to excuse his abstraction; but there was +something in that admiration which raised the spirits of Sibyll, which +gave her hope when hope was well-nigh gone; and she became so +vivacious, so debonair, so charming, in the flow of a gayety natural +to her, and very uncommon with English maidens, but which she took +partly, perhaps, from her French blood, and partly from the example of +girls and maidens of French extraction in Margaret's court, that +Nicholas Alwyn thought he had never seen any one so irresistible. +Madge had now served the evening meal, put in her head to announce it, +and Sibyll withdrew to summon her father. + +"I trust he will not tarry too long, for I am sharp set!" muttered +Marmaduke. "What thinkest thou of the damozel?" "Marry," answered +Alwyn, thoughtfully, "I pity and marvel at her. There is eno' in her +to furnish forth twenty court beauties. But what good can so much wit +and cunning do to an honest maiden?" + +"That is exactly my own thought," said Marmaduke; and both the young +men sunk into silence, till Sibyll re-entered with her father. + +To the surprise of Marmaduke, Nicholas Alwyn, whose less gallant +manner he was inclined to ridicule, soon contrived to rouse their host +from his lethargy, and to absorb all the notice of Sibyll; and the +surprise was increased, when he saw that his friend appeared not +unfamiliar with those abstruse and mystical sciences in which Adam was +engaged. + +"What!" said Adam, "you know, then, my deft and worthy friend Master +Caxton! He hath seen notable things abroad--" + +"Which, he more than hints," said Nicholas, "will lower the value of +those manuscripts this fair damozel has so couthly enriched; and that +he hopes, ere long, to show the Englishers how to make fifty, a +hundred,--nay even five hundred exemplars of the choicest book, in a +much shorter time than a scribe would take in writing out two or three +score pages in a single copy." + +"Verily," said Marmaduke, with a smile of compassion, "the poor man +must be somewhat demented; for I opine that the value of such +curiosities must be in their rarity; and who would care for a book, if +five hundred others had precisely the same?--allowing always, good +Nicholas, for thy friend's vaunting and over-crowing. Five hundred! +By'r Lady, there would be scarcely five hundred fools in merry England +to waste good nobles on spoilt rags, specially while bows and mail are +so dear." + +"Young gentleman," said Adam, rebukingly, "meseemeth that thou +wrongest our age and country, to the which, if we have but peace and +freedom, I trust the birth of great discoveries is ordained. Certes, +Master Alwyn," he added, turning to the goldsmith, "this achievement +maybe readily performed, and hath existed, I heard an ingenious +Fleming say years ago, for many ages amongst a strange people [Query, +the Chinese?] known to the Venetians! But dost thou think there is +much appetite among those who govern the State to lend encouragement +to such matters?" + +"My master serves my Lord Hastings, the king's chamberlain, and my +lord has often been pleased to converse with me, so that I venture to +say, from my knowledge of his affection to all excellent craft and +lere, that whatever will tend to make men wiser will have his +countenance and favour with the king." + +"That is it, that is it!" exclaimed Adam, rubbing his hands. "My +invention shall not die!" + +"And that invention--" + +"Is one that will multiply exemplars of books without hands; works of +craft without 'prentice or journeyman; will move wagons and litters +without horses; will direct ships without sails; will--But, alack! it +is not yet complete, and, for want of means, it never may be." + +Sibyll still kept her animated countenance fixed on Alwyn, whose +intelligence she had already detected, and was charmed with the +profound attention with which he listened. But her eye glancing from +his sharp features to the handsome, honest face of the Nevile, the +contrast was so forcible, that she could not restrain her laughter, +though, the moment after, a keen pang shot through her heart. The +worthy Marmaduke had been in the act of conveying his cup to his lips; +the cup stood arrested midway, his jaws dropped, his eyes opened to +their widest extent, an expression of the most evident consternation +and dismay spoke in every feature; and when he heard the merry laugh +of Sibyll, he pushed his stool from her as far as he well could, and +surveyed her with a look of mingled fear and pity. + +"Alas! thou art sure my poor father is a wizard now?" + +"Pardie!" answered the Nevile. "Hath he not said so? Hath he not +spoken of wagons without horses, ships without sails? And is not all +this what every dissour and jongleur tells us of in his stories of +Merlin? Gentle maiden," he added earnestly, drawing nearer to her, +and whispering in a voice of much simple pathos, "thou art young, and +I owe thee much. Take care of thyself. Such wonders and derring-do +are too solemn for laughter." + +"Ah," answered Sibyll, rising, "I fear they are. How can I expect the +people to be wiser than thou, or their hard natures kinder in their +judgment than thy kind heart?" Her low and melancholy voice went to +the heart thus appealed to. Marmaduke also rose, and followed her +into the parlour, or withdrawing-closet, while Adam and the goldsmith +continued to converse (though Alwyn's eye followed the young hostess), +the former appearing perfectly unconscious of the secession of his +other listeners. But Alwyn's attention occasionally wandered, and he +soon contrived to draw his host into the parlour. + +When Nicholas rose, at last, to depart, he beckoned Sibyll aside. +"Fair mistress," said he, with some awkward hesitation, "forgive a +plain, blunt tongue; but ye of the better birth are not always above +aid, even from such as I am. If you would sell these blazoned +manuscripts, I can not only obtain you a noble purchaser in my Lord +Scales, or in my Lord Hastings, an equally ripe scholar, but it may be +the means of my procuring a suitable patron for your father; and, in +these times, the scholar must creep under the knight's manteline." + +"Master Alwyn," said Sibyll, suppressing her tears, "it was for my +father's sake that these labours were wrought. We are poor and +friendless. Take the manuscripts, and sell them as thou wilt, and God +and Saint Mary requite thee!" + +"Your father is a great man," said Alwyn, after a pause. + +"But were he to walk the streets, they would stone him," replied +Sibyll, with a quiet bitterness. + +Here the Nevile, carefully shunning the magician, who, in the nervous +excitement produced by the conversation of a mind less uncongenial +than he had encountered for many years, seemed about to address him-- +here, I say, the Nevile chimed in, "Hast thou no weapon but thy +bludgeon? Dear foster-brother, I fear for thy safety." + +"Nay, robbers rarely attack us mechanical folk; and I know my way +better than thou. I shall find a boat near York House; so pleasant +night and quick cure to thee, honoured foster-brother. I will send +the tailor and other craftsmen to-morrow." + +"And at the same time," whispered Marmaduke, accompanying his friend +to the door, "send me a breviary, just to patter an ave or so. This +gray-haired carle puts my heart in a tremble. Moreover, buy me a +gittern--a brave one--for the damozel. She is too proud to take +money, and, 'fore Heaven, I have small doubts the old wizard could +turn my hose into nobles an' he had a mind for such gear. Wagons +without horses, ships without sails, quotha!" + +As soon as Alwyn had departed, Madge appeared with the final +refreshment, called "the Wines," consisting of spiced hippocras and +confections, of the former of which the Nevile partook in solemn +silence. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + +THERE IS A ROD FOR THE BACK OF EVERY FOOL WHO WOULD BE WISER THAN HIS +GENERATION. + +The next morning, when Marmaduke descended to the hall, Madge, +accosting him on the threshold, informed him that Mistress Sibyll was +unwell, and kept her chamber, and that Master Warner was never visible +much before noon. He was, therefore, prayed to take his meal alone. +"Alone" was a word peculiarly unwelcome to Marmaduke Nevile, who was +an animal thoroughly social and gregarious. He managed, therefore, to +detain the old servant, who, besides the liking a skilful leech +naturally takes to a thriving patient, had enough of her sex about her +to be pleased with a comely face and a frank, good-humoured voice. +Moreover, Marmaduke, wishing to satisfy his curiosity, turned the +conversation upon Warner and Sibyll, a theme upon which the old woman +was well disposed to be garrulous. He soon learned the poverty of the +mansion and the sacrifice of the gittern; and his generosity and +compassion were busily engaged in devising some means to requite the +hospitality he had received, without wounding the pride of his host, +when the arrival of his mails, together with the visits of the tailor +and mercer, sent to him by Alwyn, diverted his thoughts into a new +channel. + +Between the comparative merits of gowns and surcoats, broad-toed shoes +and pointed, some time was disposed of with much cheerfulness and +edification; but when his visitors had retired, the benevolent mind of +the young guest again recurred to the penury of his host. Placing his +marks before him on the table in the little withdrawing parlour, he +began counting them over, and putting aside the sum he meditated +devoting to Warner's relief. "But how," he muttered, "how to get him +to take the gold. I know, by myself, what a gentleman and a knight's +son must feel at the proffer of alms--pardie! I would as lief Alwyn +had struck me as offered me his gipsire,--the ill-mannered, +affectionate fellow! I must think--I must think--" + +And while still thinking, the door softly opened, and Warner himself, +in a high state of abstraction and revery, stalked noiselessly into +the room, on his way to the garden, in which, when musing over some +new spring for his invention, he was wont to peripatize. The sight of +the gold on the table struck full on the philosopher's eyes, and waked +him at once from his revery. That gold--oh, what precious +instruments, what learned manuscripts it could purchase! That gold, +it was the breath of life to his model! He walked deliberately up to +the table, and laid his hand upon one of the little heaps. Marmaduke +drew back his stool, and stared at him with open mouth. + +"Young man, what wantest thou with all this gold?" said Adam, in a +petulant, reproachful tone. "Put it up! put it up! Never let the +poor see gold; it tempts them, sir,--it tempts them." And so saying, +the student abruptly turned away his eyes, and moved towards the +garden. Marmaduke rose and put himself in Adam's way. "Honoured +sir," said the young man, "you say justly what want I with all this +gold? The only gold a young man should covet is eno' to suffice for +the knight's spurs to his heels. If, without offence, you would--that +is--ahem!--I mean,--Gramercy! I shall never say it, but I believe my +father owed your father four marks, and he bade me repay them. Here, +sir!" He held out the glittering coins; the philosopher's hand closed +on them as the fish's maw closes on the bait. Adam burst into a +laugh, that sounded strangely weird and unearthly upon Marmaduke's +startled ear. + +"All this for me!" he exclaimed. "For me! No, no, no! for me, for +IT--I take it--I take it, sir! I will pay it back with large usury. +Come to me this day year, when this world will be a new world, and +Adam Warner will be--ha! ha! Kind Heaven, I thank thee!" Suddenly +turning away, the philosopher strode through the hall, opened the +front door, and escaped into the street. + +"By'r Lady," said Marmaduke, slowly recovering his surprise, "I need +not have been so much at a loss; the old gentleman takes to my gold as +kindly as if it were mother's milk. 'Fore Heaven, mine host's laugh +is a ghastly thing!" So soliloquizing, he prudently put up the rest +of his money, and locked his mails. + +As time went on, the young man became exceedingly weary of his own +company. Sibyll still withheld her appearance; the gloom of the old +hall, the uncultivated sadness of the lonely garden, preyed upon his +spirits. At length, impatient to get a view of the world without, he +mounted a high stool in the hall, and so contrived to enjoy the +prospect which the unglazed wicker lattice, deep set in the wall, +afforded. But the scene without was little more animated than that +within,--all was so deserted in the neighbourhood,--the shops mean and +scattered, the thoroughfare almost desolate. At last he heard a +shout, or rather hoot, at a distance; and, turning his attention +whence it proceeded, he beheld a figure emerge from an alley opposite +the casement, with a sack under one arm, and several books heaped +under the other. At his heels followed a train of ragged boys, +shouting and hallooing, "The wizard! the wizard!--Ah! Bah! The old +devil's kin!" At this cry the dull neighbourhood seemed suddenly to +burst forth into life. From the casements and thresholds of every +house curious faces emerged, and many voices of men and women joined, +in deeper bass, with the shrill tenor of the choral urchins, "The +wizard! the wizard! out at daylight!" The person thus stigmatized, as +he approached the house, turned his face with an expression of wistful +perplexity from side to side. His lips moved convulsively, and his +face was very pale, but he spoke not. And now, the children, seeing +him near his refuge, became more outrageous. They placed themselves +menacingly before him, they pulled his robe, they even struck at him; +and one, bolder than the rest, jumped up, and plucked his beard. At +this last insult, Adam Warner, for it was he, broke silence; but such +was the sweetness of his disposition, that it was rather with pity +than reproof in his voice, that he said,-- + +"Fie, little one! I fear me thine own age will have small honour if +thou thus mockest mature years in me." + +This gentleness only served to increase the audacity of his +persecutors, who now, momently augmenting, presented a formidable +obstacle to further progress. Perceiving that he could not advance +without offensive measures on his own part, the poor scholar halted; +and looking at the crowd with mild dignity, he asked, "What means +this, my children? How have I injured you?" + +"The wizard! the wizard!" was the only answer he received. Adam +shrugged his shoulders, and strode on with so sudden a step, that one +of the smaller children, a curly-headed laughing rogue, of about eight +years old, was thrown down at his feet, and the rest gave way. But +the poor man, seeing one of his foes thus fallen, instead of pursuing +his victory, again paused, and forgetful of the precious burdens he +carried, let drop the sack and books, and took up the child in his +arms. On seeing their companion in the embrace of the wizard, a +simultaneous cry of horror broke from the assemblage, "He is going to +curse poor Tim!" + +"My child! my boy!" shrieked a woman, from one of the casements; "let +go my child!" + +On his part, the boy kicked and shrieked lustily, as Adam, bending his +noble face tenderly over him, said, "Thou art not hurt, child. Poor +boy! thinkest thou I would harm thee?" While he spoke a storm of +missiles--mud, dirt, sticks, bricks, stones--from the enemy, that +had now fallen back in the rear, burst upon him. A stone struck him +on the shoulder. Then his face changed; an angry gleam shot from his +deep, calm eyes; he put down the child, and, turning steadily to the +grown people at the windows, said, "Ye train your children ill;" +picked up his sack and books, sighed, as he saw the latter stained by +the mire, which he wiped with his long sleeve, and too proud to show +fear, slowly made for his door. Fortunately Sibyll had heard the +clamour, and was ready to admit her father, and close the door upon +the rush which instantaneously followed his escape. The baffled rout +set up a yell of wrath, and the boys were now joined by several foes +more formidable from the adjacent houses; assured in their own minds +that some terrible execration had been pronounced upon the limbs and +body of Master Tim, who still continued bellowing and howling, +probably from the excitement of finding himself raised to the dignity +of a martyr, the pious neighbours poured forth, with oaths and curses, +and such weapons as they could seize in haste, to storm the wizard's +fortress. + +From his casement Marmaduke Nevile had espied all that had hitherto +passed, and though indignant at the brutality of the persecutors, he +had thought it by no means unnatural. "If men, gentlemen born, will +read uncanny books, and resolve to be wizards, why, they must reap +what they sow," was the logical reflection that passed through the +mind of that ingenuous youth; but when he now perceived the arrival of +more important allies, when stones began to fly through the wicker +lattice, when threats of setting fire to the house and burning the +sorcerer who muttered spells over innocent little boys were heard, +seriously increasing in depth and loudness, Marmaduke felt his +chivalry called forth, and with some difficulty opening the rusty +wicket in the casement, he exclaimed: "Shame on you, my countrymen, +for thus disturbing in broad day a peaceful habitation! Ye call mine +host a wizard. Thus much say I on his behalf: I was robbed and +wounded a few nights since in your neighbourhood, and in this house +alone I found shelter and healing." + +The unexpected sight of the fair young face of Marmaduke Nevile, and +the healthful sound of his clear ringing voice, produced a momentary +effect on the besiegers, when one of them, a sturdy baker, cried out, +"Heed him not,--he is a goblin. Those devil-mongers can bake ye a +dozen such every moment, as deftly as I can draw loaves from the +oven!" + +This speech turned the tide, and at that instant a savage-looking man, +the father of the aggrieved boy, followed by his wife, gesticulating +and weeping, ran from his house, waving a torch in his right hand, his +arm bare to the shoulder; and the cry of "Fire the door!" was +universal. + +In fact, the danger now grew imminent: several of the party were +already piling straw and fagots against the threshold, and Marmaduke +began to think the only chance of life to his host and Sibyll was in +flight by some back way, when he beheld a man, clad somewhat in the +fashion of a country yeoman, a formidable knotted club in his hand, +pushing his way, with Herculean shoulders, through the crowd; and +stationing himself before the threshold and brandishing aloft his +formidable weapon, he exclaimed, "What! In the devil's name, do you +mean to get yourselves all hanged for riot? Do you think that King +Edward is as soft a man as King Henry was, and that he will suffer any +one but himself to set fire to people's houses in this way? I dare +say you are all right enough in the main, but by the blood of Saint +Thomas, I will brain the first man who advances a step,--by way of +preserving the necks of the rest!" + +"A Robin! a Robin!" cried several of the mob. "It is our good friend +Robin. Harken to Robin. He is always right." + +"Ay, that I am!" quoth the defender; "you know that well enough. If I +had my way, the world should be turned upside down, but what the poor +folk should get nearer to the sun! But what I say is this, never go +against law, while the law is too strong. And it were a sad thing to +see fifty fine fellows trussed up for burning an old wizard. So, be +off with you, and let us, at least all that can afford it, make for +Master Sancroft's hostelrie and talk soberly over our ale. For +little, I trow, will ye work now your blood's up." + +This address was received with a shout of approbation. The father of +the injured child set his broad foot on his torch, the baker chucked +up his white cap, the ragged boys yelled out, "A Robin! a Robin!" and +in less than two minutes the place was as empty as it had been before +the appearance of the scholar. Marmaduke, who, though so ignorant of +books, was acute and penetrating in all matters of action, could not +help admiring the address and dexterity of the club-bearer; and the +danger being now over, withdrew from the casement, in search of the +inmates of the house. Ascending the stairs, he found on the landing- +place, near his room, and by the embrasure of a huge casement which +jutted from the wall, Adam and his daughter. Adam was leaning against +the wall, with his arms folded, and Sibyll, hanging upon him, was +uttering the softest and most soothing words of comfort her tenderness +could suggest. + +"My child," said the old man, shaking his head sadly, "I shall never +again have heart for these studies,--never! A king's anger I could +brave, a priest's malice I could pity; but to find the very children, +the young race for whose sake I have made thee and myself paupers, to +find them thus--thus--" He stopped, for his voice failed him, and the +tears rolled down his cheeks. + +"Come and speak comfort to my father, Master Nevile," exclaimed +Sibyll; "come and tell him that whoever is above the herd, whether +knight or scholar, must learn to despise the hootings that follow +Merit. Father, Father, they threw mud and stones at thy king as he +passed through the streets of London. Thou art not the only one whom +this base world misjudges." + +"Worthy mine host!" said Marmaduke, thus appealed to, "Algates, it +were not speaking truth to tell thee that I think a gentleman of birth +and quality should walk the thoroughfares with a bundle of books under +his arm; yet as for the raptril vulgar, the hildings and cullions who +hiss one day what they applaud the next, I hold it the duty of every +Christian and well-born man to regard them as the dirt on the +crossings. Brave soldiers term it no disgrace to receive a blow from +a base hind. An' it had been knights and gentles who had insulted +thee, thou mightest have cause for shame. But a mob of lewd +rascallions and squalling infants--bah! verily, it is mere matter for +scorn and laughter." + +These philosophical propositions and distinctions did not seem to have +their due effect upon Adam. He smiled, however, gently upon his +guest, and with a blush over his pale face, said, "I am rightly +chastised, good young man; mean was I, methinks, and sordid to take +from thee thy good gold. But thou knowest not what fever burns in the +brain of a man who feels that, had he wealth, his knowledge could do +great things,--such things!--I thought to repay thee well. Now the +frenzy is gone, and I, who an hour ago esteemed myself a puissant +sage, sink in mine own conceit to a miserable blinded fool. Child, I +am very weak; I will lay me down and rest." + +So saying, the poor philosopher went his way to his chamber, leaning +on his daughter's arm. + +In a few minutes Sibyll rejoined Marmaduke, who had returned to the +hall, and informed him that her father had lain down a while to +compose himself. + +"It is a hard fate, sir," said the girl, with a faint smile,--"a hard +fate, to be banned and accursed by the world, only because one has +sought to be wiser than the world is." + +"Douce maiden," returned the Nevile, "it is happy for thee that thy +sex forbids thee to follow thy father's footsteps, or I should say his +hard fate were thy fair warning." + +Sibyll smiled faintly, and after a pause, said, with a deep blush,-- + +"You have been generous to my father; do not misjudge him. He would +give his last groat to a starving beggar. But when his passion of +scholar and inventor masters him, thou mightest think him worse than +miser. It is an overnoble yearning that ofttimes makes him mean." + +"Nay," answered Marmaduke, touched by the heavy sigh and swimming eyes +with which the last words were spoken; "I have heard Nick Alwyn's +uncle, who was a learned monk, declare that he could not constrain +himself to pray to be delivered from temptation, seeing that he might +thereby lose an occasion for filching some notable book! For the +rest," he added, "you forget how much I owe to Master Warner's +hospitality." + +He took her hand with a frank and brotherly gallantry as he spoke; but +the touch of that small, soft hand, freely and innocently resigned to +him, sent a thrill to his heart--and again the face of Sibyll seemed +to him wondrous fair. + +There was a long silence, which Sibyll was the first to break. She +turned the conversation once more upon Marmaduke's views in life. It +had been easy for a deeper observer than he was to see that, under all +that young girl's simplicity and sweetness, there lurked something of +dangerous ambition. She loved to recall the court-life her childhood +had known, though her youth had resigned it with apparent +cheerfulness. Like many who are poor and fallen, Sibyll built herself +a sad consolation out of her pride; she never forgot that she was +well-born. But Marmaduke, in what was ambition, saw but interest in +himself, and his heart beat more quickly as he bent his eyes upon that +downcast, thoughtful, earnest countenance. + +After an hour thus passed, Sibyll left the guest, and remounted to her +father's chamber. She found Adam pacing the narrow floor, and +muttering to himself. He turned abruptly as she entered, and said, +"Come hither, child; I took four marks from that young man, for I +wanted books and instruments, and there are two left; see, take them +back to him." + +"My father, he will not receive them. Fear not, thou shalt repay him +some day." + +"Take them, I say, and if the young man says thee nay, why, buy +thyself gauds and gear, or let us eat, and drink, and laugh. What +else is life made for? Ha, ha! Laugh, child, laugh!" + +There was something strangely pathetic in this outburst, this terrible +mirth, born of profound dejection. Alas for this guileless, simple +creature, who had clutched at gold with a huckster's eagerness! who, +forgetting the wants of his own child, had employed it upon the +service of an Abstract Thought, and whom the scorn of his kind now +pierced through all the folds of his close-webbed philosophy and self +forgetful genius. Awful is the duel between MAN and THE AGE in which +he lives! For the gain of posterity, Adam Warner had martyrized +existence,--and the children pelted him as he passed the streets! +Sibyll burst into tears. + +"No, my father, no," she sobbed, pushing back the money into his +hands. "Let us both starve rather than you should despond. God and +man will bring you justice yet." + +"Ah," said the baffled enthusiast, "my whole mind is one sore now! I +feel as if I could love man no more. Go, and leave me. Go, I say!" +and the poor student, usually so mild and gall-less, stamped his foot +in impotent rage. Sibyll, weeping as if her heart would break, left +him. + +Then Adam Warner again paced to and fro restlessly, and again muttered +to himself for several minutes. At last he approached his Model,--the +model of a mighty and stupendous invention, the fruit of no chimerical +and visionary science; a great Promethean THING, that, once matured, +would divide the Old World from the New, enter into all operations of +Labour, animate all the future affairs, colour all the practical +doctrines of active men. He paused before it, and addressed it as if +it heard and understood him: "My hair was dark, and my tread was firm, +when, one night, a THOUGHT passed into my soul,--a thought to make +Matter the gigantic slave of Mind. Out of this thought, thou, not yet +born after five-and-twenty years of travail, wert conceived. My +coffers were then full, and my name was honoured; and the rich +respected and the poor loved me. Art thou a devil, that has tempted +me to ruin, or a god, that has lifted me above the earth? I am old +before my time, my hair is blanched, my frame is bowed, my wealth is +gone, my name is sullied. And all, dumb idol of Iron and the Element, +all for thee! I had a wife whom I adored; she died,--I forgot her +loss in the hope of thy life. I have a child still--God and our Lady +forgive me! she is less dear to me than thou hast been. And now"--the +old man ceased abruptly, and folding his arms, looked at the deaf iron +sternly, as on a human foe. By his side was a huge hammer, employed +in the toils of his forge; suddenly he seized and swung it aloft. One +blow, and the labour of years was shattered into pieces! One blow!-- +But the heart failed him, and the hammer fell heavily to the ground. + +"Ay!" he muttered, "true, true! if thou, who hast destroyed all else, +wert destroyed too, what were left me? Is it a crime to murder Alan? +--a greater crime to murder Thought, which is the life of all men! +Come, I forgive thee!" + +And all that day and all that night the Enthusiast laboured in his +chamber, and the next day the remembrance of the hooting, the pelting, +the mob, was gone,--clean gone from his breast. The Model began to +move, life hovered over its wheels; and the Martyr of Science had +forgotten the very world for which he, groaning and rejoicing, toiled! + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + +MASTER MARMADUKE NEVILE MAKES LOVE, AND IS FRIGHTENED. + +For two or three days Marmaduke and Sibyll were necessarily brought +much together. Such familiarity of intercourse was peculiarly rare in +that time, when, except perhaps in the dissolute court of Edward IV., +the virgins of gentle birth mixed sparingly, and with great reserve, +amongst those of opposite sex. Marmaduke, rapidly recovering from the +effect of his wounds, and without other resource than Sibyll's society +in the solitude of his confinement, was not proof against the +temptation which one so young and so sweetly winning brought to his +fancy or his senses. The poor Sibyll--she was no faultless paragon,-- +she was a rare and singular mixture of many opposite qualities in +heart and in intellect! She was one moment infantine in simplicity +and gay playfulness; the next a shade passed over her bright face, and +she uttered some sentence of that bitter and chilling wisdom, which +the sense of persecution, the cruelty of the world, had already taught +her. She was, indeed, at that age when the Child and the Woman are +struggling against each other. Her character was not yet formed,--a +little happiness would have ripened it at once into the richest bloom +of goodness. But sorrow, that ever sharpens the intellect, might only +serve to sour the heart. Her mind was so innately chaste and pure, +that she knew not the nature of the admiration she excited; but the +admiration pleased her as it pleases some young child; she was vain +then, but it was an infant's vanity, not a woman's. And thus, from +innocence itself, there was a fearlessness, a freedom, a something +endearing and familiar in her manner, which might have turned a wiser +head than Marmaduke Nevile's. And this the more, because, while +liking her young guest, confiding in him, raised in her own esteem by +his gallantry, enjoying that intercourse of youth with youth so +unfamiliar to her, and surrendering herself the more to its charm from +the joy that animated her spirits, in seeing that her father had +forgotten his humiliation, and returned to his wonted labours,--she +yet knew not for the handsome Nevile one sentiment that approached to +love. Her mind was so superior to his own, that she felt almost as if +older in years, and in their talk her rosy lips preached to him in +grave advice. + +On the landing, by Marmaduke's chamber, there was a large oriel +casement jutting from the wall. It was only glazed at the upper part, +and that most imperfectly, the lower part being closed at night or in +inclement weather with rude shutters. The recess formed by this +comfortless casement answered, therefore, the purpose of a balcony; it +commanded a full view of the vicinity without, and gave to those who +might be passing by the power also of indulging their own curiosity by +a view of the interior. + +Whenever he lost sight of Sibyll, and had grown weary of the peacock, +this spot was Marmaduke's favourite haunt. It diverted him, poor +youth, to look out of the window upon the livelier world beyond. The +place, it is true, was ordinarily deserted, but still the spires and +turrets of London were always discernible,--and they were something. + +Accordingly, in this embrasure stood Marmaduke, when one morning, +Sibyll, coming from her father's room, joined him. + +"And what, Master Nevile," said Sibyll, with a malicious yet charming +smile, "what claimed thy meditations? Some misgiving as to the +trimming of thy tunic, or the length of thy shoon?" + +"Nay," returned Marmaduke, gravely, "such thoughts, though not without +their importance in the mind of a gentleman, who would not that his +ignorance of court delicacies should commit him to the japes of his +equals, were not at that moment uppermost. I was thinking--" + +"Of those mastiffs, quarrelling for a bone. Avow it." + +"By our Lady, I saw them not, but now I look, they are brave dogs. +Ha! seest thou how gallantly each fronts the other, the hair +bristling, the eyes fixed, the tail on end, the fangs glistening? Now +the lesser one moves slowly round and round the bigger, who, mind you, +Mistress Sibyll, is no dullard, but moves, too, quick as thought, not +to be taken unawares. Ha! that is a brave spring! Heigh, dogs, +Neigh! a good sight!--it makes the blood warm! The little one hath +him by the throat!" + +"Alack," said Sibyll, turning away her eyes, "can you find pleasure in +seeing two poor brutes mangle each other for a bone?" + +"By Saint Dunstan! doth it matter what may be the cause of quarrel, so +long as dog or man bears himself bravely, with a due sense of honour +and derring-do? See! the big one is up again. Ah, foul fall the +butcher, who drives them away! Those seely mechanics know not the +joyaunce of fair fighting to gentle and to hound. For a hound, mark +you, hath nothing mechanical in his nature. He is a gentleman all +over,--brave against equal and stranger, forbearing to the small and +defenceless, true in poverty and need where he loveth, stern and +ruthless where he hateth, and despising thieves, hildings, and the +vulgar as much as e'er a gold spur in King Edward's court! Oh, +certes, your best gentleman is the best hound!" + +"You moralize to-day; and I know not how to gainsay you," returned +Sibyll, as the dogs, reluctantly beaten off, retired each from each, +snarling and reluctant, while a small black cur, that had hitherto sat +unobserved at the door of a small hostelrie, now coolly approached and +dragged off the bone of contention. "But what sayst thou now? See! +see! the patient mongrel carries off the bone from the gentleman- +hounds. Is that the way of the world?" + +"Pardie! it is a naught world, if so, and much changed from the time +of our fathers, the Normans. But these Saxons are getting uppermost +again, and the yard measure, I fear me, is more potent in these +holiday times than the mace or the battle-axe." The Nevile paused, +sighed, and changed the subject: "This house of thine must have been a +stately pile in its day. I see but one side of the quadrangle is +left, though it be easy to trace where the other three have stood." + +"And you may see their stones and their fittings in the butcher's and +baker's stalls over the way," replied Sibyll. + +"Ay!" said the Nevile, "the parings of the gentry begin to be the +wealth of the varlets." + +"Little ought we to pine at that," returned Sibyll, "if the varlets +were but gentle with our poverty; but they loathe the humbled fortunes +on which they rise, and while slaves to the rich, are tyrants to the +poor." + +This was said so sadly, that the Nevile felt his eyes overflow; and +the humble dress of the girl, the melancholy ridges which evinced the +site of a noble house, now shrunk into a dismal ruin, the remembrance +of the pastime-ground, the insults of the crowd, and the broken +gittern, all conspired to move his compassion, and to give force to +yet more tender emotions. + +"Ah," he said suddenly, and with a quick faint blush over his handsome +and manly countenance,--"ah, fair maid--fair Sibyll--God grant that I +may win something of gold and fortune amidst yonder towers, on which +the sun shines so cheerly. God grant it, not for my sake,--not for +mine; but that I may have something besides a true heart and a +stainless name to lay at thy feet. Oh, Sibyll! By this hand, by my +father's soul, I love thee, Sibyll! Have I not said it before? Well, +hear me now,--I love thee!" + +As he spoke, he clasped her hand in his own, and she suffered it for +one instant to rest in his. Then withdrawing it, and meeting his +enamoured eyes with a strange sadness in her own darker, deeper, and +more intelligent orbs, she said,-- + +"I thank thee,--thank thee for the honour of such kind thoughts; and +frankly I answer, as thou hast frankly spoken. It was sweet to me, +who have known little in life not hard and bitter,--sweet to wish I +had a brother like thee, and, as a brother, I can love and pray for +thee. But ask not more, Marmaduke. I have aims in life which forbid +all other love." + +"Art thou too aspiring for one who has his spurs to win?" + +"Not so; but listen. My mother's lessons and my own heart have made +my poor father the first end and object of all things on earth to me. +I live to protect him, work for him, honour him; and for the rest, I +have thoughts thou canst not know, an ambition thou canst not feel. +Nay," she added, with that delightful smile which chased away the +graver thought which had before saddened her aspect, "what would thy +sober friend Master Alwyn say to thee, if he heard thou hadst courted +the wizard's daughter?" + +"By my faith," exclaimed Marmaduke, "thou art a very April,--smiles +and clouds in a breath! If what thou despisest in me be my want of +bookcraft, and such like, by my halidame I will turn scholar for thy +sake; and--" + +Here, as he had again taken Sibyll's hand, with the passionate ardour +of his bold nature, not to be lightly daunted by a maiden's first +"No," a sudden shrill, wild burst of laughter, accompanied with a +gusty fit of unmelodious music from the street below, made both maiden +and youth start, and turn their eyes; there, weaving their immodest +dance, tawdry in their tinsel attire, their naked arms glancing above +their heads, as they waved on high their instruments, went the +timbrel-girls. + +"Ha, ha!" cried their leader, "see the gallant and the witch-leman! +The glamour has done its work! Foul is fair! foul is fair! and the +devil will have his own!" + +But these creatures, whose bold license the ancient chronicler +records, were rarely seen alone. They haunted parties of pomp and +pleasure; they linked together the extremes of life,--the grotesque +Chorus that introduced the terrible truth of foul vice and abandoned +wretchedness in the midst of the world's holiday and pageant. So now, +as they wheeled into the silent, squalid street, they heralded a +goodly company of dames and cavaliers on horseback, who were passing +through the neighbouring plains into the park of Marybone to enjoy the +sport of falconry. The splendid dresses of this procession, and the +grave and measured dignity with which it swept along, contrasted +forcibly with the wild movements and disorderly mirth of the timbrel- +players. These last darted round and round the riders, holding out +their instruments for largess, and retorting, with laugh and gibe, the +disdainful look or sharp rebuke with which their salutations were +mostly received. + +Suddenly, as the company, two by two, paced up the street, Sibyll +uttered a faint exclamation, and strove to snatch her hand from the +Nevile's grasp. Her eye rested upon one of the horsemen, who rode +last, and who seemed in earnest conversation with a dame, who, though +scarcely in her first youth, excelled all her fair companions in +beauty of face and grace of horsemanship, as well as in the costly +equipments of the white barb that caracoled beneath her easy hand. At +the same moment the horseman looked up and gazed steadily at Sibyll, +whose countenance grew pale, and flushed, in a breath. His eye then +glanced rapidly at Marmaduke; a half-smile passed his pale, firm lips; +he slightly raised the plumed cap from his brow, inclined gravely to +Sibyll, and, turning once more to his companion, appeared to answer +some question she addressed to him as to the object of his salutation, +for her look, which was proud, keen, and lofty, was raised to Sibyll, +and then dropped somewhat disdainfully, as she listened to the words +addressed her by the cavalier. + +The lynx eyes of the tymbesteres had seen the recognition; and their +leader, laying her bold hand on the embossed bridle of the horseman, +exclaimed, in a voice shrill and loud enough to be heard in the +balcony above, "Largess! noble lord, largess! for the sake of the lady +thou lovest best!" + +The fair equestrian turned away her head at these words; the nobleman +watched her a moment, and dropped some coins into the timbrel. + +"Ha, ha!" cried the tymbestere, pointing her long arm to Sibyll, and +springing towards the balcony,-- + + "The cushat would mate + Above her state, + And she flutters her wings round the falcon's beak; + But death to the dove + Is the falcon's love! + Oh, sharp is the kiss of the falcon's beak!" + +Before this rude song was ended, Sibyll had vanished from the place; +the cavalcade had disappeared. The timbrel-players, without deigning +to notice Marmaduke, darted elsewhere to ply their discordant trade, +and the Nevile, crossing himself devoutly, muttered, "Jesu defend us! +Those she Will-o'-the-wisps are eno' to scare all the blood out of +one's body. What--a murrain on them!--do they portend, flitting round +and round, and skirting off, as if the devil's broomstick was behind +them! By the Mass! they have frighted away the damozel, and I am not +sorry for it. They have left me small heart for the part of Sir +Launval." + +His meditations were broken off by the sudden sight of Nicholas Alwyn, +mounted on a small palfrey, and followed by a sturdy groom on +horseback, leading a steed handsomely caparisoned. In another moment, +Marmaduke had descended, opened the door, and drawn Alwyn into the +hall. + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + +MASTER MARMADUKE NEVILE LEAVES THE WIZARD'S HOUSE FOR THE GREAT WORLD. + +"Right glad am I," said Nicholas, "to see you so stout and hearty, for +I am the bearer of good news. Though I have been away, I have not +forgotten you; and it so chanced that I went yesterday to attend my +Lord of Warwick with some nowches [buckles and other ornaments] and +knackeries, that he takes out as gifts and exemplars of English work. +They were indifferently well wrought, specially a chevesail, of which +the--" + +"Spare me the fashion of thy mechanicals, and come to the point," +interrupted Marmaduke, impatiently. + +"Pardon me, Master Nevile. I interrupt thee not when thou talkest of +bassinets and hauberks,--every cobbler to his last. But, as thou +sayest, to the point: the stout earl, while scanning my workmanship, +for in much the chevesail was mine, was pleased to speak graciously of +my skill with the bow, of which he had heard; and he then turned to +thyself, of whom my Lord Montagu had already made disparaging mention. +When I told the earl somewhat more about thy qualities and disposings, +and when I spoke of thy desire to serve him, and the letter of which +thou art the bearer, his black brows smoothed mighty graciously, and +he bade me tell thee to come to him this afternoon, and he would judge +of thee with his own eyes and ears. Wherefore I have ordered the +craftsman to have all thy gauds and gear ready at thine hostelrie, and +I have engaged thee henchmen and horses for thy fitting appearance. +Be quick: time and the great wait for no man. So take whatever thou +needest for present want from thy mails, and I will send a porter for +the rest ere sunset." + +"But the gittern for the damozel?" + +"I have provided that for thee, as is meet." And Nicholas, stepping +back, eased the groom of a case which contained a gittern, whose +workmanship and ornaments delighted the Nevile. + +"It is of my lord the young Duke of Gloucester's own musical-vendor; +and the duke, though a lad yet, is a notable judge of all appertaining +to the gentle craft. [For Richard III.'s love of music, and patronage +of musicians and minstrels, see the discriminating character of that +prince in Sharon Turner's "History of England," vol. IV. p. 66.] So +despatch, and away!" + +Marmaduke retired to his chamber, and Nicholas, after a moment spent +in silent thought, searched the room for the hand-bell, which then +made the mode of communication between the master and domestics. Not +finding this necessary luxury, he contrived at last to make Madge hear +his voice from her subterranean retreat; and on her arrival, sent her +in quest of Sibyll. + +The answer he received was, that Mistress Sibyll was ill, and unable +to see him. Alwyn looked disconcerted at this intelligence, but, +drawing from his girdle a small gipsire, richly broidered, he prayed +Madge to deliver it to her young mistress, and inform her that it was +the fruit of the commission with which she had honoured him. + +"It is passing strange," said he, pacing the hall alone,--"passing +strange, that the poor child should have taken such hold on me. After +all, she would be a bad wife for a plain man like me. Tush! that is +the trader's thought all over. Have I brought no fresher feeling out +of my fair village-green? Would it not be sweet to work for her, and +rise in life, with her by my side? And these girls of the city, so +prim and so brainless!--as well marry a painted puppet. Sibyll! Am I +dement? Stark wode? What have I to do with girls and marriage? +Humph! I marvel what Marmaduke still thinks of her,--and she of him." + +While Alwyn thus soliloquized, the Nevile having hastily arranged his +dress, and laden himself with the moneys his mails contained, summoned +old Madge to receive his largess, and to conduct him to Warner's +chamber, in order to proffer his farewell. + +With somewhat of a timid step he followed the old woman (who kept +muttering thanks and benedicites as she eyed the coin in her palm) up +the ragged stairs, and for the first time knocked at the door of the +student's sanctuary. No answer came. "Eh, sir! you must enter," said +Madge; "an' you fired a bombard under his ear he would not heed you." +So, suiting the action to the word, she threw open the door, and +closed it behind him, as Marmaduke entered. + +The room was filled with smoke, through which mirky atmosphere the +clear red light of the burning charcoal peered out steadily like a +Cyclop's eye. A small, but heaving, regular, labouring, continuous +sound, as of a fairy hammer, smote the young man's ear. But as his +gaze, accustoming itself to the atmosphere, searched around, he could +not perceive what was its cause. Adam Warner was standing in the +middle of the room, his arms folded, and contemplating something at a +little distance, which Marmaduke could not accurately distinguish. +The youth took courage, and approached. "Honoured mine host," said +he, "I thank thee for hospitality and kindness, I crave pardon for +disturbing thee in thy incanta--ehem!--thy--thy studies, and I come to +bid thee farewell." + +Adam turned round with a puzzled, absent air, as if scarcely +recognizing his guest; at length, as his recollection slowly came back +to him, he smiled graciously, and said: "Good youth, thou art richly +welcome to what little it was in my power to do for thee. +Peradventure a time may come when they who seek the roof of Adam +Warner may find less homely cheer, a less rugged habitation,--for look +you!" he exclaimed suddenly, with a burst of irrepressible enthusiasm +--and laying his hand on Nevile's arm, as, through all the smoke and +grime that obscured his face, flashed the ardent soul of the +triumphant Inventor,--"look you! since you have been in this house, +one of my great objects is well-nigh matured,--achieved. Come +hither," and he dragged the wondering Marmaduke to his model, or +Eureka, as Adam had fondly named his contrivance. The Nevile then +perceived that it was from the interior of this machine that the sound +which had startled him arose; to his eye the THING was uncouth and +hideous; from the jaws of an iron serpent, that, wreathing round it, +rose on high with erect crest, gushed a rapid volume of black smoke, +and a damp spray fell around. A column of iron in the centre kept in +perpetual and regular motion, rising and sinking successively, as the +whole mechanism within seemed alive with noise and action. + +"The Syracusan asked an inch of earth, beyond the earth, to move the +earth," said Adam; "I stand in the world, and lo! with this engine the +world shall one day be moved." + +"Holy Mother!" faltered Marmaduke; "I pray thee, dread sir, to ponder +well ere thou attemptest any such sports with the habitation in which +every woman's son is so concerned. Bethink thee, that if in moving +the world thou shouldst make any mistake, it would--" + +"Now stand there and attend," interrupted Adam, who had not heard one +word of this judicious exhortation. + +"Pardon me, terrible sir!" exclaimed Marmaduke, in great trepidation, +and retreating rapidly to the door; "but I have heard that the fiends +are mighty malignant to all lookers-on not initiated." + +While he spoke, fast gushed the smoke, heavily heaved the fairy +hammers, up and down, down and up, sank or rose the column, with its +sullen sound. The young man's heart sank to the soles of his feet. + +"Indeed and in truth," he stammered out, "I am but a dolt in these +matters; I wish thee all success compatible with the weal of a +Christian, and bid thee, in sad humility, good day:" and he added, in +a whisper--"the Lord's forgiveness! Amen!" + +Marmaduke then fairly rushed through the open door, and hurried out of +the chamber as fast as possible. + +He breathed more freely as he descended the stairs. "Before I would +call that gray carle my father, or his child my wife, may I feel all +the hammers of the elves and sprites he keeps tortured within that +ugly little prison-house playing a death's march on my body! Holy +Saint Dunstan, the timbrel-girls came in time! They say these wizards +always have fair daughters, and their love can be no blessing!" + +As he thus muttered, the door of Sibyll's chamber opened, and she +stood before him at the threshold. Her countenance was very pale, and +bore evidence of weeping. There was a silence on both sides, which +the girl was the first to break. + +"So, Madge tells me thou art about to leave us?" + +"Yes, gentle maiden! I--I--that is, my Lord of Warwick has summoned +me. I wish and pray for all blessings on thee! and--and--if ever it +be mine to serve or aid thee, it will be--that is--verily, my tongue +falters, but my heart--that is--fare thee well, maiden! Would thou +hadst a less wise father; and so may the saints (Saint Anthony +especially, whom the Evil One was parlous afraid of) guard and keep +thee!" + +With this strange and incoherent address, Marmaduke left the maiden +standing by the threshold of her miserable chamber. Hurrying into the +hall, he summoned Alwyn from his meditations, and, giving the gittern +to Madge, with an injunction to render it to her mistress, with his +greeting and service, he vaulted lightly on his steed; the steady and +more sober Alwyn mounted his palfrey with slow care and due caution. +As the air of spring waved the fair locks of the young cavalier, as +the good horse caracoled under his lithesome weight, his natural +temper of mind, hardy, healthful, joyous, and world-awake, returned to +him. The image of Sibyll and her strange father fled from his +thoughts like sickly dreams. + + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LAST OF THE BARONS, V1 *** + +***** This file should be named 7715.txt or 7715.zip ****** + +This eBook was produced by Tapio Riikonen +and David Widger + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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