Produced by Al Haines.
JOHN INGLESANT
A Romance
by
John Henry Shorthouse
[Greek: Agapetoi, nun tekna Theou esmen, kai
oupo ephanerothe ti esometha.]
VOL. I.
London
MACMILLAN AND CO.
1881
_Printed by_ R & R. CLARK, _Edinburgh_.
_TO_
_RAWDON LEVETT, ESQ._
_MY DEAR LEVETT,_
_I dedicate these volumes to you, that I may have an
opportunity of calling myself your friend._
_J. HENRY SHORTHOUSE._
_LANSDOWNE, EDGBASTON,_
_May 1, 1881._
Memoirs of the Life
OF
MR. JOHN INGLESANT
SOMETIME SERVANT TO KING CHARLES I.
WITH
AN ACCOUNT OF HIS BIRTH, EDUCATION, AND TRAINING BY
THE JESUITS
AND
A PARTICULAR RELATION OF THE SECRET SERVICES
IN WHICH HE WAS ENGAGED
ESPECIALLY IN CONNECTION WITH THE LATE
IRISH REBELLION
WITH
SEVERAL OTHER REMARKABLE PASSAGES AND OCCURRENCES.
ALSO
A HISTORY OF HIS RELIGIOUS DOUBTS AND EXPERIENCES
AND OF THE MOLINISTS OR QUIETISTS IN ITALY
IN WHICH COUNTRY HE RESIDED FOR MANY YEARS
WITH AN ACCOUNT OF
THE ELECTION OF THE LATE POPE
AND
MANY OTHER EVENTS AND AFFAIRS.
*JOHN INGLESANT.*
*INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER.*
During my second year at Oxford I became acquainted with a Roman
Catholic gentleman, the eldest son of a family long resident on the
borders of Shropshire towards Wales. My friend, whose name was Fisher,
invited me to his home, and early in my last long vacation I accepted
his invitation. The picturesque country was seen to great advantage in
the lovely summer weather. That part of Shropshire partakes somewhat of
the mountain characteristics of Wales, combined with the more cultivated
beauties of English rural scenery. The ranges of hills, some of which
are lofty and precipitous, which intersect the country, form wide and
fertile valleys which are watered by pleasant streams. The wide
pastures are bordered by extensive plantations covering the more gradual
ascents, and forming long lines along the level summits. We had some
miles to drive even from the small station on the diminutive branch line
of railway which had slowly conveyed us the last dozen miles or so of
our journey. At last, just at the foot of one of the long straight
hills, called Edges in that country, we came upon my friend's house,
seen over a flat champaign of pasture land, surrounded by rows of lofty
trees, and backed by fir and other wood, reaching to the summit of the
hill behind it. It was an old and very picturesque house, jumbled
together with the additions of many centuries, from the round tower-like
staircase with an extinguisher turret, to a handsome addition of two or
three years ago. Close by was the mutilated tower of a ruined priory,
the chancel of which is used as the parish church. A handsome stone
wing of one story, built in the early Gothic style, and not long
completed, formed the entrance hall and dining-room, with a wide
staircase at the back. The hall was profusely hung with old landscapes
and family portraits. After a short introduction to my friend's family,
we were soon assembled in the newly finished dining-room, with its stone
walls and magnificent overhanging Gothic fireplace. The dinner party
consisted of my friend's father and mother, his two sisters, and a Roman
Catholic clergyman, the family chaplain and priest of a neighbouring
chapel which Mr. Fisher had erected and endowed. The room was hung
entirely with portraits, several of them being ecclesiastics in
different religious costumes, contrasting, to my eyes, strangely with
the gay cavaliers and the beautiful ladies of the Stuarts' Court, and
the not less elaborately dressed portraits of the last century, and with
those of my host and hostess in the costume of the Regency. I was
struck with the portrait which happened to be opposite me, of a young
man with a tonsured head, in what appeared to me to be a very simple
monk's dress, and I asked the Priest, a beautiful and mild-looking old
man, whom it was intended to represent.
"A singular story is attached to that portrait," he said, "which, it may
surprise you to learn, is not that of a--a member of our communion. It
is the portrait of a young Englishman named Inglesant, a servant of King
Charles the First, who was very closely connected with the Roman
Catholics of that day, especially abroad, and was employed in some
secret negotiations between the King and the Catholic gentry; but the
chief interest connected with his story consists in some very remarkable
incidents which took place abroad, connected with the murderer of his
only brother--incidents which exhibit this young man's character in a
noble and attractive light. He is connected with Mr. Fisher's family
solely through the relations of his brother's wife, but, singularly, he
is buried not far from here, across the meadows. In the latter years of
his life he purchased an estate in this neighbourhood, though it was not
his native country, and founded an almshouse or rather hospital, for
lunatics, in the chapel in which his tomb is still standing. That
portrait, in which he appears in the dress of a novice," he continued,
turning to the one before me, "was taken in Rome, when he was residing
at the English college, where he certainly was received, as he appears
to have been generally when abroad, into full communion with us. As a
contrast to it, I will show you another in the drawing-room, by Vandyke,
which, though it really was intended for his brother, yet may equally
well represent himself, as, at that period, the two brothers are said to
have been so exactly alike that they could not be known apart. On his
tomb at Monk's Lydiard, as you may see if you incline to take the
trouble to walk so far--and it is a pleasing walk--he is represented in
his gown of bachelor of civil law, a degree which he received at Oxford
during the civil war, and he is there also represented with tonsured
head. I have often thought," continued the Priest, musingly, "of
arranging a considerable collection of papers referring to this
gentleman's story, which is at present in the library; or at least of
writing out a plain statement of the facts; but it would be better done,
perhaps, by a layman. I have the authority of these young ladies," he
continued, with a smile, turning to the Miss Fishers, "that the story is
a more entertaining and even exciting one than the sensational novels of
the day, of which, I need not say, I am not a judge."
The young ladies confirmed this as far as their knowledge went; but they
had heard only fragments of the story, and were urgent with the
clergyman to set about the task. He, however, replied to their
entreaties only by a shake of the head; and the ladies soon after left
the room.
When we went into the drawing-room, I was eager to see the Vandyke, and
was shown a magnificent picture at one end of the room, representing a
singularly handsome young man, in a gorgeous satin court dress of the
reign of Charles the First, whose long hair and profusion of lace and
ornament would probably, in the work of another artist, have produced an
unpleasing impression, but, softened by the peculiar genius of Vandyke,
the picture possessed that combination of splendour and pathos which we
are in the habit of associating only with his paintings. His satin
shoes and silk stockings contrasted curiously with the grass on which
the cavalier stood, and the sylvan scene around him; and still more so
with his dogs and two horses, which were held at some little distance by
a page. His face was high and noble, but on closely comparing it--as I
did several times--with that of the Monk in the dining-room, I arrived
at the conclusion that either the likeness between the brothers was
exaggerated, or the expression of the survivor must have altered greatly
in after years; for no difference in dress, great as was the contrast
between the coarse serge of the novice and the satin of the cavalier,
and between the close-cropped tonsured head and the flowing love locks,
would account for the greater strength and resolve of the portrait in
the dining-room, combined, strangely, as this expression was, with a
slightly wild and abstracted look, indicating either religious
enthusiasm, or perhaps unsettlement of the reason within; this latter
expression being totally wanting in the face of the cavalier.
The next day was Sunday, and I opened my window on a lovely prospect of
lawn and water, with the fir woods sweeping up the hill-sides beyond.
Walking out in the avenue when I was dressed, I met the family returning
from low mass at the chapel. I attended high mass with them at eleven
o'clock. The Chapel was picturesquely built higher up in the wood than
the house. It had a light and graceful interior, and the coverings of
the altar were delicate and white. The exquisite plaintive music, the
pale glimmer of the tapers in the morning sunlight, the soothing perfume
of the incense, the sense of pathetic pleading and of mysterious awe, as
if of the possibility of a Divine Presence, produced its effect on me,
as it does, I imagine, on most educated Churchmen; but this effect
failed in convincing me (then, as at other times) that there was more
under that gorgeous ceremonial than may be found under the simpler
Anglican ritual of the Blessed Sacrament. After church, my friend, who
had some engagement with the Priest, accepted my assurance that I was
fond of solitary walks; and I set off alone on my quest of the tomb of
John Inglesant.
I followed a footpath which led direct from the ruined Church near the
house, across the small park-like enclosure, into the flat meadows
beyond. The shadows of the great trees lay on the grass, the wild roses
and honeysuckle covered the hedges, a thousand butterflies fluttered
over the fields. That Sunday stillness which is, possibly, but the echo
of our own hearts, but which we fancy marks the day, especially in the
country, soothed the sense. The service in the morning had not supplied
the sacrament to me, but it had been far from being without the sense of
worship; and the quiet country in the lovely summer weather, in
connection with it, seemed to me then, as often, the nearest foretaste
we can gain of what the blissful life will be. As I went on the distant
murmur of Church bells came across the meadows, and following a footpath
for a couple of miles, I came to the Hospital or Almshouse, standing
amid rows of elms, and having a small village attached to it, built
probably since its erection. The bells which I had heard, and which
ceased a little before I reached the place, were in a curious turret or
cupola attached to the Chapel, which formed one side of the court. The
buildings were of red brick, faced with stone, in the latest style of
the Stuart architecture. The door of the Chapel was wide open, and I
entered and dropped into a seat just as the Psalms began. The room was
fitted in a style exactly corresponding to the outside; a circular
recess at the upper end took the place of chancel, lighted with three
windows, which were filled with innumerable small panes of glass. The
altar was richly draped; and on it, besides vases of flowers, were two
massive candlesticks of an antique pattern, and an old painting,
apparently of the Virgin and Child. The lower walls of the chancel and
of the whole Chapel were panelled, and the whole had a flat ceiling of
panelled oak, painted in the centre with a sun with rays. Partly in the
chancel, and partly in the Chapel, the surpliced choir was accommodated
in stalls or pews, and the organ and pulpit, in elaborate carved
mahogany, completed the interior. There was a good congregation; and
from this, and from many tablets on the walls, I gathered that the
Chapel was used by the neighbourhood as probably being nearer than the
Parish Churches. The soft afternoon light filled the place, gilding the
old brass-work, and lighting up the dark carving and the sombre narrow
pews. The music was of a very high class, deliciously sung, and I found
afterwards that there was an endowment especially for the choir, and
that the chaplains were required to be musical. The service bore
comparison favourably with the morning's mass, and a short sermon
followed. When all was over, and the people were gone out into the
sunshine, I began to look for the tomb I had come to see, and the
chaplain, having come out of the vestry, and seeming to expect it, I
went up and spoke to him. I told him I had walked from Lydiard--my
friend's house--to see the tomb of the founder, to which I had been
directed by the Roman Catholic gentleman who resided there. He was well
acquainted with Father Arnold, he told me, and took me at once to the
tomb, which was in a recess by the altar, screened from view by the
choir seats. There he lay, sure enough, just as the Priest had told me,
carved from head to foot in alabaster, in his gown of bachelor of civil
law, and his tonsured head. The sculptor had understood his work; the
face was life-like, and the likeness to the portrait was quite
perceptible. The inscription was curious--"sub marmore isto Johannes
Inglesant, Peccator, usque ad judicium latet, expectans revelationem
filiorum Dei."
I told the chaplain what Father Arnold had told me of this man's story,
and of the materials that existed for writing it. He had heard of them
too, and even examined them.
"The Priest will never write it," he said.
"Why do not you?" I asked.
He laughed. "I am a musician," he said, "not an author. You seem more
interested in it than most people; you had better do it."
As I came back across the fields I pondered over this advice; and after
dinner I asked the Priest the story. He told me the outline, and the
next morning took me into the library, and showed me the papers.
The library at Lydiard is a very curious room below the level of the
ground, and in the oldest part of the house. It adjoins the tower with
the extinguisher turret, by which there is communication with the bed
chambers, and with the leads and garrets at the top of the house. The
room was large, and had several closets besides a smaller room beyond,
which had no visible communication except into the library; but the
Priest showed me a secret doorway and staircase, which, he said,
descended into the cellars. Both these rooms and the closets were
crammed with books, the accumulation of four hundred years--most of them
first editions, and clean as when they came from the binder, but browned
and mellowed with age. Early works of the German press, a Caxton, the
scarce literature of the sixteenth century--all the books which had once
been fashionable--Cornelius Agrippa, and Cardan, two or three editions
of the Euphues, folios of Shakespeare and the dramatists, and choice
editions of the literature of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries,
down to our own day. Besides this general literature, there was a large
collection of Roman Catholic works and pamphlets, many privately printed
at home or published abroad; biographies of Seminary Priests who had
suffered death in England, reports of trials, private instructions, and
even volumes of private letters, for Lydiard had always been a secure
hiding-place for the hunted priests, and more than one had died there,
leaving all his papers in the library. No fitter place could exist in
which to attempt the task I had already determined to undertake, and I
obtained leave of the Priest, promising to make nothing public without
his approval. I had the whole vacation before me; too idle and
desultory to read for honours, I had always been fond of literature and
the classics, and was safe for my degree, and I gave myself up
unreservedly to my task. I have endeavoured, as Father Arnold said, to
tell a plain story. I have no pretensions to dramatic talent, and I
deprecate the reader's criticism. If I have caught anything of the
religious and social tone of the seventeenth century, I am more than
content.
GEOFFREY MONK, M.A.
*CHAPTER I.*
When Cromwell, Earl of Essex, was in the zenith of his power, and was
engaged in completing the suppression of the smaller monasteries before
commencing on the greater,--he had in his service a young gentleman
named Richard Inglesant, the son of a knight, and descended from a
knightly family, originally of Flanders, who had come into England with
the Princess of Hainault. This young man was of an attractive person, a
scholar, active and useful in many ways, and therefore a favourite with
his master. One evening in the end of June 1537, he was sent for by
Cromwell into the great gallery of his magnificent house in Throgmorton
Street, where he found his master walking up and down in thought.
"You must be ready to depart at once, Richard," he said, "into
Wiltshire. I have in this commission appointed you Visitor of the
Priory of Westacre, six miles south of Malmsbury, on the way into
Somerset, which they call the Priory in the Wood. The King's Grace is
resolved on the suppression of this house, as a priory; but note very
carefully what I tell you;--it will be for your guidance. Great
interest has been made to his Grace's Highness on behalf of this house,
both by many of the gentry dwelling thereabout, and also by the common
people by the mouth of the Mayor of Malmsbury. They say the house is
without any slander or evil fame; that it stands in a waste ground, very
solitary, keeping such hospitality, that except with singular good
management it could not be maintained though it had half as much land
again as it has, such a number of the poor inhabitants nigh thereunto
are daily relieved. The Prior is a right honest man, and well beloved
of all the inhabitants therewith adjoining, having with him, in the
house, eight religious persons, being priests of right good
conversation, and living religiously. They spend their time in writing
books with a very fair hand, in making garments for the poor people, in
printing or graving. Now the prayer of these people is that the King's
Highness shall translate this priory into a college, and so continue as
many of the priests as the lands will maintain for the benefit of the
neighbours; and the King is much inclined to do this. Now, on the other
hand, this house has a proper lodging, where the Prior lay, with a fair
garden and an orchard, very mete to be bestowed on some friend of mine,
and some faithful servant of the King's Grace. There is no small number
of acres ready sown with wheat, the tilthes ordered for barley; the
house and grounds are well furnished with plate, stuff, corn, cattle;
the woods well saved, and the hedgerows full of timber, as though the
Prior had looked for no alteration of his house. I had set mine hand on
this house for a friend of mine, but the King's Grace is determined upon
this:--if the Prior will surrender the house in a discreet and frank
manner, and will moreover, on Sunday next, which is the Feast of the
most Precious Blood, after mass, to which all the neighbouring people
shall have been called, in his sermon, make mention of the King's title
of Supreme Head, and submit himself wholly, in all matters spiritual, to
the King's Grace, under Christ, the house shall be continued as a
college, and no man therein disturbed, and not so much as an ounce of
plate taken, that they may pray God Almighty to preserve the King's
Grace with his blessed pleasure. Now I send you on this mission
because, if things go as I think they may, I mean this house for you;
and there is so much clamour about this business that I will have no
more hands in it than I can help. Take two or three of the men with you
whom you can trust; but see you fail not in one jot in the course you
take with the Prior, for should it come to the King's ears that you had
deceived the Prior--and it surely would so come to his Grace--your head
would not be your own for an hour, and I should doubt, even, of my own
favour with the King."
Richard Inglesant was on horseback before daylight the next morning; and
riding by easy stages, arrived at Malmsbury at last, and slept a night
there, making inquiries about the way to Westacre. At Malmsbury, and at
all the villages where he stopped, he heard nothing but what agreed with
what Cromwell had told him; and what he heard seemed to make him loiter
still more, for he slept at Malmsbury a second night, and then did not
go forward to Westacre till noonday. In the middle of the summer
afternoon he crossed the brow of the hilly common, and saw the roofs of
the Priory beneath him surrounded by its woods. The country all about
lay peaceful in the soft, mellow sunlight; wide slopes of wood,
intermixed with shining water, and the quiet russet downs stretching
beyond. Richard had sent on a man the day before to warn the Prior, who
had been expecting his coming all day. The house stood with a little
walled court in front of it, and a gate-house; and consisted of three
buildings--a chapel, a large hall, and another building containing the
Prior's parlour and other rooms on the ground floor, and a long gallery
or dormitory above, out of which opened other chambers; the kitchens and
stables were near the latter building, on the right side of the court.
The Prior received Inglesant with deference, and took him over the house
and gardens, pointing out the well-stocked fish-ponds and other
conveniences, with no apparent wish of concealing anything. Richard was
astonished at the number of books, not only in the book-room, but also
in the Prior's own chamber; these latter the Prior seemed anxious he
should not examine. As far as Richard could see, they were, many of
them, chemical and magical books. He supped with the Prior in Hall,
with the rest of the household, and retired with him to the parlour
afterwards, where cakes and spiced wine were served to them, and they
remained long together. Inglesant delivered his commission fairly to
his host, dwelling, again and again, on every particular, while the
Prior sat silent or made but short and inconclusive replies. At last
Inglesant betook himself to rest in the guest-chamber, a room hung with
arras, opening from the gallery where the monks slept, towards the west;
one of his servants slept also in the dormitory near his door. The
Prior's care had ordered a fire of wood on the great hearth that lighted
up the carved bed and the hunting scene upon the walls. He lay long and
could not sleep. All night long, at intervals, came the sound of
chanting along the great hall and up the stairs into the dormitory, as
the monks sung the service of matins, lauds, and prime. His mind was
ill at ease. A scholar, and brought up from boyhood at the Court, he
had little sympathy with the new doctrines, and held the simple and
illiterate people who mostly followed them in small esteem. He was
strongly influenced by that mysterious awe which the Romish system
inspires in the most careless, even when it is not strong enough to
influence their lives. The mission he had undertaken, and the probable
destruction of this religious house, and the expulsion of its inmates
for his benefit, frightened him, and threatened him with unknown
penalties and terrors hereafter which he dared not face. He lay
listlessly on his bed listening to the summer wind, and when at last he
fell asleep, it was but a light fitful slumber, out of which he woke
ever and anon to hear the distant chanting of the monks, and see by the
flickering fire-light the great hounds coursing each other over the
walls of his room.
In the morning he heard mass in the chapel, after which the Prior sent a
message to explain his absence, informing him that he was gone to
Malmsbury to consult with his friends there how he might best serve the
King's Grace. All that morning Richard Inglesant sat in the hall
receiving the evidence of all who came before him (of whom there was no
lack)--of the neighbours, gentry, and country people. He evidently
examined them with great care and acuteness, noting down every answer,
in a fair clerkly hand, exactly as he received it, neither extenuating
anything nor adding the least word. He also in the same report kept an
exact account of how he passed his time while at Westacre. There
appears--as Cromwell had said--not to have been the least breath of
scandal against the Prior or any of the priests in the house. The only
report at all injurious to the character of the Prior seems to have been
an opinion--oftentimes hinted at by the witnesses--that he was addicted
to the study of chemistry and magic; that, besides his occult books, he
had in his closet in his chamber a complete chemical apparatus with
which he practised alchemy, and was even said to be in possession of the
Elixir of Life. These reports Inglesant does not appear to have paid
much attention to, probably regarding them as not necessarily coming
within the limits of his commission; and, indeed, there is evidence of
his having acted with the most exact fairness throughout the
investigation, more than once putting questions to the witness,
evidently for the purpose of correcting misapprehensions which told
against the Prior. After dinner he rode out to the downs to a gentleman
who had courteously sent him word that he was coursing with greyhounds:
he, however, was not absent from the Priory long, declining the
gentleman's invitation to supper. After he had supped he spent the rest
of the evening in his own chamber, reading what he calls "Ovidii Nasonis
metamorphoseos libri moralizati," an edition of which, printed at
Leipsic in 1510, he had found in the Prior's room.
The next forenoon he spent in the same manner as the last, the people
flocking in voluntarily to give their evidence in favour of the house.
A little after noon the Prior came back, travelling on foot and alone.
As he came along he was thinking of the words of the gospel which
promise great things to him who gives up houses and land for the Lord's
sake.
When he reached the brow of the hill from which he could see the three
red-tiled roofs of the Priory peeping out from among the trees, with the
gardens and the green meadows, and the cattle seen here and there, he
stood long to gaze. The air was soft and yet fresh, and the woods
stretching up the rising-grounds about the Priory were wavering and
shimmering all over with their myriad rustling leaves, instinct with
life and beauty both to the ear and eye; a perpetual change from light
to shadow, from the flight of the fleecy clouds, would have made the
landscape dazzling but for the green on which the eye dwelt with a sense
of rest to the wearied and excited brain. A gentle sound and murmur, as
of happy and contented beings, made itself softly felt rather than
heard, through the noontide air. "Omnes qui relinquunt patrem, domes,
uxorem," said the Prior; but his eyes were so dim that he stumbled as he
went on down the hill.
Richard Inglesant and he were some time alone together that evening.
Whether the Prior prepared him at all for the course he had determined
to pursue, does not appear, but certainly he did not, to any great
extent.
The next day was Sunday, being the "Feast of the most Precious Blood"--a
Sunday long remembered in that country side. The people, for a score of
miles round, thronged to hear the Prior's sermon. The Mayor of
Malmsbury was there; but the clergy of the Abbey, it was noticed, were
not present. The little Chapel would not hold a tithe of the
people--indeed, few more than the gentry and their ladies, who came in
great numbers, were allowed admission. Richard Inglesant and the
Sheriff had Fald-stools in front of the altar, where they remained
kneeling the whole of mass. The doors and windows of the Chapel were
opened, that the people outside might assist at the celebration. They
stood as thick as they could be packed in the little courtyard, and up
the sloping fields around the Priory, listening in silence to the music
of the mass; and at the sound of the bell the whole multitude fell on
their knees as one man, remaining so for several minutes. Mass being
over, the Prior came in procession from the Chapel to where a small
wooden pulpit had been set up just outside the gate-house, in front of
which seats were placed for the Sheriff and Inglesant, and the chief
gentry. The silence was greater than ever, when the Prior, who had
changed the gorgeous vestments in which he had celebrated mass, and
appeared only as a simple monk, ascended the pulpit and began to preach.
The Prior was a great preacher; a small and quiet man enough to look at,
when he entered the pulpit he was transfigured. His form grew
dignified, his face lighted up with enthusiasm, and his voice, even in
the open air, was full and clear, and possessed that magical property of
reaching the hearts of all who heard him, now melted into tenderness,
and now raised to firm resolve. He began with the text that had haunted
his memory the day before, and the first part of his sermon was simply
an earnest and eloquent exhortation to follow Christ in preference to
anything beside on earth. Then, warming in his subject, he answered the
question (speaking that magnificent English tongue that even now rings
in the pages of Foxe), Where was Christ? and urging the people to follow
Him as He manifested Himself in the Church, and especially in the
sacrament of the altar. Then suddenly throwing aside all reserve, and
with a rapidity of utterance and a torrent of eloquence that carried his
hearers with him, he rushed into the question of the day, brought face
to face the opposing powers of the State and Christ, hurled defiance at
the former, and while not absolutely naming the King or his council,
denounced his policy in the plainest words. Then, amid the swaying of
the excited crowd, and a half stifled cry and murmur, he suddenly
dropped his voice, pronounced the formal benediction, and shrank back,
to all appearance, into the quiet, timid monk.
It is needless to describe the excitement and astonishment of the crowd.
The Prior and his procession with difficulty returned to the chapel
through the press. The Sheriff and Richard Inglesant, who with the
other leading gentry had affected perfect unconsciousness that anything
unusual was taking place, entered the hall of the Priory, and the Prior
had a message sent into the sacristy that the King's commissioner
desired to see him immediately in the parlour.
When the Prior entered, Inglesant was standing upon the hearth; he was
pale, and his manner was excited and even fierce.
"You are a bold man, master Prior," he said almost before the other was
in the room; "do you know that you have this day banished yourself and
all your fellowship into the world without shelter and without help?
Nay, I know not but the King's Grace may have you up to answer for this
day with your life! Do you know this?"
The Prior looked him steadily in the face, but he was deadly pale, and
his manner was humble and cowed.
"Yes, I know it," he said.
"Well," continued the other still more excitedly, "I call you to
witness, master Prior, as I shall before the throne of God Almighty,
that I have neither hand nor part in this day's work; that you have
brought this evil upon yourself by your own deed and choice, by no want
of warning and no suddenness on my part, but by your own madness alone."
"It is very true," said the Prior.
"I must to horse," said Inglesant, scarcely heeding him, "and ride post
to my lord. It is as much as my head is worth should any rumour of this
day's business reach the King's Grace by any other tongue than mine.
You will stay here under the Sheriff's guard; but I fear you will too
soon hear what a tragedy this day's play has been for you! God have you
in his keeping, Prior! for you have put yourself out of all hope of
mercy from the King's Grace."
He might have said more, but an alarming noise made him hasten into the
hall. The most lawless and poorest of the people--of whom numbers had
mingled in the crowd in the hope of spoil, taking for granted that the
house was dissolved--had made an attack upon the Chapel and the Prior's
lodging, and it was some time before the Sheriff, assisted by Inglesant
and the other gentlemen and their servants, all of whom were armed,
could restore order. When this was done, and the peaceable people and
women reassured, Inglesant's horses were brought out, and he mounted and
rode off through the dispersing but still excited and lawless crowds,
leaving the Priory to a strong guard of the Sheriff's men. As he rode
up the hill--the people shrinking back to let him pass--he muttered,
bitterly:
"A fine piece of work we have set our hands to, with all the rascal
people of the country to aid. And why should not the Poverty get some
of the droppings, when the Gentry cuts the purse?"
Travelling at a very different pace from that at which he had ridden
from London, he reached the city the next night, and went at once to the
Lord Cromwell, who, the next morning, took him to the King, to whom he
gave a full account of what had occurred. Henry--who appears to have
been induced to form his previous intention by the influence of a
gentleman at Court who probably had his private expectations with regard
to the future possession of the Priory--seems to have really cared
little about the matter. He was, however, highly incensed at the
Prior's sermon, and made no difficulty of immediately granting the
Priory to Richard Inglesant. A pursuivant was sent down to bring the
Prior up to London to be examined before the Council, but it does not
appear that he ever was examined. Probably Inglesant exerted his
influence with Cromwell in his behalf, for Cromwell examined him
himself, and appears to have informed the King that he was harmless and
mad. At any rate, he was set at liberty; and his troubles appear to
have actually affected his reason, for he is said to have returned to
the neighbourhood of Malmsbury, and to have wandered about the Priory at
nights. The other inmates of the Priory had been dispersed, and the
house taken possession of by Inglesant's servants; but he himself seems
to have taken but little pleasure in his new possession, for it was more
than a year before he visited it; and when he did so, events occurred
which increased his dislike to the place.
It was late in October when his visit took place, and the weather was
wild and stormy. He slept in the Prior's guest-chamber, which was in
the same state as when he had occupied it before. The wind moaned in
the trees, and swept over the roofs and among the chimneys of the old
house. In the early part of the night he had a terrible dream, or what
was rather partly a dream and partly a feverish sense of the objects
around him. He thought he was lying in the bed in the room where he
really was, and could not sleep; a fierce contention of the elements and
of some powers more fearful than the elements seemed going on outside.
The room became hateful to him, with its dark, hearse-like bed, and the
strange figures on the tapestry, which seemed to his bewildered fancy to
course each other over the walls with a rapidity and a fantastic motion
which made his senses reel. He thought that, unable to remain where he
was, he rose and went out into the old dormitory, now silent and
deserted, from one end of which he could look into the courtyard, while
from the other he could see a dark mass of woodland, and a lurid distant
sky. On this side all was quiet; but the courtyard seemed astir. The
moon shone with the brightness of day on the mouldering, ivy-grown
walls, and on the round pebble stones between which the long grass was
growing all over the court. The wind swept fiercely across it, and
splashes of rain, every now and then, made streaks in the moonlight like
fire; strange voices cried to him in an unknown language, and
undistinguished forms seemed passing to and fro. The Chapel was all
alight, and low and mournful music proceeded from it, as for the dead.
Fascinated with terror, he left the gallery and descended into the
court. An irresistible impulse led him to the Chapel, which was open,
and he went in. As he did so, voices and strange forms seemed to rush
forward to enter with him, and an overwhelming horror took possession of
him. Inside, the Chapel was hung with black; cowled forms filled the
stalls, and chanted, with hollow, shadowy voices, a dirge for the
departed. A hooded and black form stood before the altar, celebrating
the mass. The altar was alight with tapers, and torches were borne by
sable attendants on either side of the choir. The ghostly forms that
entered with him now thronged about him in the form and habit of living
men. Voices called from without, and were answered from within the
Chapel; rushing sounds filled the air as though the trees were being
torn up, and the Chapel and house rocked. There was no coffin nor pall,
nor any sign of mourning; and it seemed to Inglesant that he was present
at the celebration of some obyte, or anniversary of the death of one
long departed, over whom a wild and ghostly lamentation was made by
beings no longer of the earth. An inexpressible dread and sorrow lay
upon him--an overwhelming dread, as if the final Reckoning were near at
hand, and all hope taken away--sorrow, as though all whom he had ever
loved and known lay before him in death, with the solemn dirge and
placebo said over them by the ghostly choir. The strain was too intense
and painful to be borne, and with a cry, he awoke.
Utterly incapable of remaining where he was, he dressed, and went out
into the gallery, and down into the courtyard. The court was lighted by
the moonlight as brightly as in his dream for one moment, and then was
totally dark from the passing clouds flitting over the moon. All was
calm and still. A small door in the corner of the court near the Chapel
was open, and, surprised at this, Inglesant crossed over and passed
through it. It led into the graveyard of the Priory outside the Chapel,
where the monks and some of the country people had been used to bury
their dead. It was walled round, but the wall at the farther side was
old and ruinous, and had partly fallen down. As Inglesant reached the
postern door, the moon shone out brightly, and he saw, between himself
and the ruined wall, a wasted and cowled figure slowly traversing the
rows of graves. For a moment he felt a terror equal to that of his
dream, but the next the thought of the Prior flashed upon his mind, and
he crossed the graveyard and followed silently in the track of the
figure. The ghostly form reached the opposite wall, and commenced, with
some substance that shone like fire, to draw magic figures upon the
stones of one of its most perfect parts. Placing himself in a position
evidently indicated by these geometrical figures, he carefully observed
the precise spot where his shadow was projected on the wall before him
by the moonlight, and going to this spot, he carefully loosened and
removed a stone. By this time Inglesant was close upon him, and saw him
take from within the wall an antique glass or vial of a singular and
occult shape. As he raised it, some slight motion the other made caused
him to turn round, and at the sight of Inglesant he dropped the magic
glass upon the stone he had removed, and shattered it to pieces. When
he saw what had happened, the strange and weird creature threw his arms
above his head, and with a piercing cry that rang again and again
through the chill night air, fell backwards senseless, and lay in the
pale moonlight white and still among the graves. Inglesant removed him
into the house, and he was restored to sense, but scarcely to reason.
He lived for more than five years, never leaving the Priory, where
Inglesant directed that all his wants should be attended to, wandering
about the gardens, and sometimes poring over his old books, which still
remained upon his shelves. Inglesant never saw him again; but when he
died the old man sent him his blessing, and was buried before the altar
in the Chapel, where all the Priors of the house had lain before him; he
on whom the evil days, which they perhaps had merited but had escaped,
had fallen, and had crushed.
*CHAPTER II.*
Richard Inglesant never, till the last few years of his life, lived at
Westacre, and visited it very seldom. He was a successful courtier; and
at Cromwell's fall became a servant of the King. He married, and lived
entirely at the Court. He was all his life a Catholic at heart, but
conformed outwardly to the religion of the hour. He had one son, named
after him, who was educated at Oxford, and intended for the bar, but his
father left him so considerable a fortune that he was independent of any
profession. That Richard Inglesant left no more than he did, shows that
he adhered through life to the line of conduct we have seen him pursue
at Westacre--conduct which probably satisfied his conscience as being
rigidly exact and honest. On Henry's death he still retained one of his
places about the Court; but on King Edward's death, being a partisan of
Queen Mary's and a hearty conformer, he became a great favourite, and
held a lucrative post. He visited Westacre more frequently, and built a
stately range of buildings on one side of the court, where formerly the
old stables and kitchen were, no doubt for his son's sake, enlarging the
garden on that side to form a terrace in front of the new rooms. At
Queen Mary's accession service was recommenced in the Prior's Chapel,
which was repaired and fitted up afresh, and a regular priest appointed
to serve it. Inglesant's name does not appear in the trials of the
Protestants, a circumstance which makes it appear probable that he was
true to the temporising policy of his youth, and kept his zeal under
good control. When Elizabeth came to the throne, the service in the
Chapel underwent some modification, King Edward's Service Book being
used. The service then had been found so useful to the neighbours that
the parish petitioned for its continuance, and it was legally settled as
a chapelry. The priest conformed to the new order of things, and
Richard Inglesant--who at that time resided constantly at
Westacre--attended the service regularly. He remained a Catholic, but
during the first seven years of Queen Elizabeth's reign, which were all
he lived to see, the Catholics generally came to their parish churches
until forbidden by the Pope's Bull. It remained, therefore, for his
son, who was eighteen years of age at his father's death, to declare
himself; and he conformed to the usage of the English Church. He
resided entirely at Westacre, with an occasional visit to Court, keeping
open-handed hospitality, and slightly embarrassing the estate, though,
like his father, he had only one child. He was a favourer of the
Papists, and once or twice was in trouble on that account; but being
perfectly loyal, and a very popular man, he was rather a favourite with
the Queen, who always noticed him when he came to Court, and was wont to
say that "the dry crust Dick Inglesant gave a Papist should never choke
him while she lived." He lived beyond the term of years usual in his
family, and died in 1629, at the age of eighty-two, having been for the
last twenty years of his life, since the death of the Queen, entirely
under the guidance of his son, very much to his own advantage, as during
those black years for the Papists, he would most probably have committed
imprudences which might have been his ruin. His son, whose name was
Eustace, was a shrewd lawyer and courtier. He was--much more than his
father--a Papist at heart, but he conformed strictly to the English
Church, and possessed considerable indirect influence at Court. He was
thought much of by the Catholics, who regarded him as one of their most
powerful friends. He married young, in 1593, but he had no children by
his first wife, who died in 1610; and in 1620 he married again, a
Catholic lady who was his ward. With this lady he came to reside at
Westacre; but two years after, his wife died in giving birth to two
boys; and, disgusted with the country, he left the two infants to their
grandfather's care and returned to London, visiting Westacre, however,
regularly at intervals; where, with a small number of servants, the old
gentleman, totally forgetful of his old hospitality, and of his friends
the Papists, spent his last days with the greatest delight, in anxiously
watching over his little grandchildren. They were beautiful boys, so
exactly alike that it was impossible to tell them apart, and from their
earliest infancy so united in love to each other that they became a
proverb in the neighbourhood. The eldest was named Eustace, after his
father; but the youngest, at the entreaty of his young mother--uttered
in her faint and dying voice, as the children lay before her during the
few moments that were given her in mercy to look at them before her eyes
were closed on these dearly purchased treasures and all other earthly
things--was named John, after her brother, a Seminary priest of Douay,
executed in England for saying mass, and refusing the oath of supremacy.