ARRIVAL AT TAUNTON
Ah! Richard, with the eyes of heavy mind,
I see thy glory, like a shooting star,
Fall to the base earth from the firmament.
SHAKSPEARE.
Richard proceeded towards Taunton. Although this was in appearance an
advance, his ill success before Exeter, and report of the large force
already brought against them by Sir John Cheney, King Henry's
chamberlain, had so far discouraged his followers as to occasion the
desertion of many, so that of the seven thousand he had with him in
Devonshire, he retained but three on his arrival near Taunton. These
consisted of the original body of insurgents, Cornishmen, who had
proceeded too far to go back, and who, partly in affection for their
leader, partly from natural stubbornness, swore to die in the cause.
Poor fellows! rusty rapiers, and misshapen lances were their chief arms;
a few had bows; others slings; a still greater number their ponderous
tools, implements of labour and of peace, to be used now in slaughter.
Their very dress displayed at once their unmartial and poverty-stricken
state. In all these might be gathered a troop of three hundred foot, not
wholly destitute of arms and discipline. The horse were not less at
fault; yet among them there were about one hundred tolerably mounted,
the riders, indeed, but too frequently disgracing their steeds.
It required all Richard's energy of purpose to hold him back from
despair. The bitter sense of degradation visited him in spite of every
effort. Had he ever made one of the chivalry of France and Burgundy? Had
he run a tilt with James of Scotland, or grasped in knightly brotherhood
the mailed hand of Sir Patrick Hamilton? And were these his comrades?
unwashed artificers; ragged and rude peasants; vulgar-tongued traders?
He felt "in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes;" and now to obtain
pardon for them, to send them back scathless to their own homes, was his
chief desire, even to the buying of their safety with his own downfall.
After a two days' march he arrived near Taunton. On reconnoitring the
town, its position and weakness gave him hope that he might carry it,
even with his sorry soldiery. To check these thoughts, tidings came,
that Sir John Cheney was in close neighbourhood, and Henry himself
advancing with a chosen body of men. On the evening of their arrival
before the town, a detachment of the enemy entered it, cutting off the
last hope of Richard.
The next morning it became evident that the crisis of his fortunes was
at hand. The whole country teemed with soldiery. As the troops poured
towards a common centre, the array and order of a battle-field became
apparent in their operations. A battle, between a very myriad of
golden-spurred knights, armed at all points, and the naked inhabitants
of Richard's camp! call it rather a harvest; there were the
reapers, here the bending corn. When in the north Richard wept
over the devastation of the land, he felt that a word of his could
counteract the harm--but now, his challenge had proved an airy
dagger--substance-less--his resolve to encounter his foe, bringing the
unarmed against these iron-suited warriors, grew in his eyes into
premeditated murder: his heart heaved in his overcharged breast. To add
bitterness to his thoughts there were his companions--O'Water brave in
despair; Astley pale with fear for his lord; Heron foolish in his
unmeaning boasting; Skelton trembling in every joint, and talking
incessantly, apparently to deafen himself to "the small still voice"
that whispered terror to his heart.
Richard spent the day among his men. They were prepared to fight; if
needs must, to fall: protestations of sturdy devotion, the overflowing
of the rude, manly heart, always affecting, met him at every turn. He
was beloved, for he was generous and kind. Often he had exposed his
life, when before Exeter, to save some one among them: when dismayed, he
had cheered, when defeated, he had comforted them; nor did he leave the
body of the meanest camp-follower uninterred; for one of Richard's
characteristics was a quick sympathy with his species, and a reverence
for all that bore the shape of man. But, while these qualities rendered
him dear to all, they inspired him with a severe sense of his duties
towards others, and a quick insight into their feelings; thus increasing
to anguish the disquietude that agitated him.
Towards evening he was alone in his tent. At first he was confused by
the various aspects, all terrible, that his fortunes assumed. By the
caprice of destiny, he, who was descended from a line of kings, who had
so long been the inhabitant of courts, a cavalier, honourable in his
degree, renowned for his prowess, had not one noble-born partizan near
him: not one of his ancient counsellors, to whom he had been used to
defer, remained; he was absolutely alone; the sense of right and justice
in his own heart was all he possessed, to be a beacon-light in this
awful hour, when thousands depended upon his word--yet had he the power
to save?
An idea, dim at first as a star on the horizon's verge, struggling
through vapours, but growing each second brighter and clearer, dawned
upon his mind. All then was over! his prophetic soul had proved false in
its presumed foreknowledge; defeat, dishonour, disgrace tracked his
steps. To lead his troops forth, and then to redeem them at Henry's
hand, by the conditionless surrender of himself, was the thought, child
of despair and self-devotion, that, still struggling with the affections
and weaknesses of his nature, presented itself, not yet full fledged,
but about to become so.
He had been several times interrupted during his meditations by the
arrival of scouts, with various reports of the situation and proceedings
of the enemy: Richard, better than these untaught recruits, knew the
meaning of the various operations. As if on a map, he saw the stationing
of a large and powerful army in expectation of battle; and was aware how
incapable he was to cope with their numbers and force. At last Astley
announced the arrival of two men: one was a Fleming, known to Richard as
one of Lalayne's men, but the fellow was stupidly drunk; the other was
an English peasant. "Please your worship," he said, "I am this man's
guide, and must act as his interpreter besides; nothing would serve the
spungy fellow but he must swallow ale at every tavern on the way."
"Speak, then," said Richard; "what is the purport of his journey?"
"Please you, sir, last night three hundred of them came right pop upon
us afore we were aware: sore afraid they made us with their tall
iron-shafted poles, steel caps, and short swords, calling each one for
bread and beer."
"Do you mean," cried the prince, his eye brightening as he spoke, "that
three hundred men, soldiers, armed like yonder fellow, are landed in
England?"
So the countryman averred; and that even now they were but at the
distance of twenty miles from Richard's encampment. They were still
advancing, when the report was spread that the prince's forces were
dispersed, himself taken prisoner. The rustic drew from the Fleming's
pocket a letter, in French, signed by Schwartz, a son of him who fell at
Stoke, a man in high favour with the Lady Margaret of Burgundy. It said
how he had been despatched by her grace to his succour; how intelligence
of the large army of Henry, and his defeat, had so terrified his men,
that they refused to proceed, nay, by the next morning would take their
way back to Poole, where they had landed, unless Richard himself came to
reassure them, and to lead them on. Every word of the letter lighted up
to forgotten joy young Richard's elastic spirit. With these men to aid
him, giving weight and respectability to his powers, he might hope to
enforce the conditions of his challenge. All must be decided on the
morrow; that very hour he would set forth, to return before morning
with these welcome succours.
It was near midnight; his camp was still: the men, in expectation of the
morrow's struggle, had retired to repose; their leaders had orders to
visit their commander in his tent at the hour which now the empty
hour-glass told was come. Hastily, eagerly, Richard announced the
arrival of these German mercenaries; he directed them to accompany him,
that with some show of attendance he might present himself to Schwartz.
The camp was not to be disturbed; two or three men alone among them were
awakened, and ordered to keep guard--in five hours assuredly he must
return. In a brief space of time, the troop who were to accompany him,
Heron, Skelton, O'Water, and Astley, with some forty more, led their
horses to his tent in silence:--there were few lights through all the
camp; their honest hearts which beat within slept, while he was awake to
succour and save them. This was Richard's last thought, as, mounted on
his good steed, he led the way across the dim heath towards Yeovil.
It was such a night as is frequent at the end of September; a warm but
furious west-wind tore along the sky, shaking the dark tresses of the
tress, and chasing the broad shadows of the clouds across the plains.
The moon, at the beginning of her third quarter, sped through the sky
with rapid silvery wings; now cutting the dark, sea-like ether; now
plunging deep amidst the clouds; now buried in utter darkness; anon
spreading a broad halo among the thinner woof of vapours. The guide was
at the prince's side; Heron, upon his short, sturdy pony, was just
behind; Skelton tried to get his tall mare to an even pace with
Richard's horse, but she fell back continually: the rushing, howling
wind and rustling trees drowned the clatter of the hoofs. They reached
the extreme edge of the common; Richard turned his head--the lights of
his little camp burnt dim in the moonshine, its poor apparel of tents
was lost in the distance: they entered a dark lane, and lost sight of
every trace of it; still they rode fleetly on. Night, and the obscure
shapes of night around--holy, blinding, all-seeing night! when we feel
the power of the Omnipotent as if immediately in contact with us; when
religion fills the soul, and our very fears are unearthly; when familiar
images assume an unknown power to thrill our hearts; and the winds and
trees and shapeless clouds have a voice not their own, to speak of all
that we dream or imagine beyond our actual life. Through embowered
lanes, whose darkness seemed thick and palpable--over open, moonshiny
fields, where the airy chase of clouds careered in dimmer shapes upon
the earth--Richard rode forward, fostering newly-awakened hope; glad in
the belief that while he saved all who depended on him, he would not
prove a mere victim led in tame submission, an unrighteous sacrifice to
the Evil Spirit of the World.