Deduct for his age at the time of the
battle of Flodden Field 12
--- 157
Peter Garden, the man who heard Jenkins
give his evidence, died at 127
Deduct for his age when he saw Jenkins 11
--- 116
The person whose father knew Peter
Garden was born shortly before 1786,
or 70 years since 70
----
A.D. 1856
In this year, 1856, Mr. Sidney Gibson, F.S.A. showed, as above, that a
person living in 1786, conversed with a man that fought at Flodden
Field.
We now proceed to narrate a few instances in which the details of early
battles have been most successfully investigated and identified.
There is not much myth about the BATTLE OF HASTINGS. On that undulating
upland, and in that steep morass, raged on Saturday, October 14th, A.D.
1060, from nine till three, when its tide first turned, as fierce a
battle, as real a stand-up fight between the army of England and the
great Norman host, as any which has ever decided the destinies of
countries. There is no important battle, the details of which have been
so carefully handed down to us. How the Conqueror's left foot slipped on
landing--the ill omen--and how his right foot "stacked in the sand"--the
good omen of "seisin;"--how the ships were pierced, so that his host
might fight its way to glory without retreat; and how he merrily
extracted an omen for good even while putting on his hauberk the wrong
side foremost; how brother Gurth with the tender conscience counselled
brother Harold with the seared conscience to stay away from the fray,
lest his broken oath to William should overtake him; and how, as they
reconnoitred the vast Norman host, the elder brother's heart had failed
him, had not the younger one called him scoundrel for his meditated
flight; the prayerful eve in the one camp and the carousing eve in the
other, "with wassails and drinkhails;" the exploits of valiant knight
Taillifer between the lines; how the Normans shot high in air to blind
the enemy; and the dreadful _mêlée_ in the "blind ditch Malfosse
shadowed with reed and sedge;" and the Conqueror's hearty after-battle
meal, when he was chaired among the dying and the dead; and that
exquisitely pathetic touch of story which tells how Edith, the
swan-necked,--for the love she bore to Harold,--when all others failed
to recognise him, was brought to discover his mutilated corse among the
slain; and the Conqueror's vow, so literally redeemed, to fix the high
altar of the "Abbey of the Battaile" where the Saxon _gonfanon_
fell--all these, and a thousand other minute circumstances of the
memorable day, stand out in as clear relief at this distance of time as
the last charge of Waterloo, or the closing scene at Trafalgar.
Sussex has little occasion to feel humbled by having been the scene of
this well-contested field. Whatever the inhabitants of the British isles
have since been able to effect for their own greatness and for the
happiness of the human race, is attributable in no small degree to the
issue of that fight. Thenceforth the Saxon was guided and elevated by
the high spirit and far-reaching enterprise of the Norman, and the
elements of the national character were complete.[69]
Among the memorials of the conquered must not be forgotten the roll of
the companions of the Conqueror, which was installed with great
festivity in August, 1862, at Dives, a small town on the seacoast, in
the department of Calvados, in Normandy. It was near this town, at the
mouth of the Dives, that William and his companions in arms met previous
to their embarkation for the subjugation of England. The very spot was
already marked by a column erected in 1861, by M. de Caumont, the
eminent Norman savant and archæologist; and the fête in August, 1862,
was held under the auspices of the same learned gentleman. The
commemoration was intended to be international, and a public invitation
was given to the English residents in the locality; but, from some
unexplained cause or other, no English person attended. Sir Bernard
Burke attributes this absence to the announcement being imperfectly
made; "for what," he asks, "could more come home to the better and more
educated classes of English people than the inauguration of a roll which
contains the greatest names amongst us; a roll to which the proudest
feel prouder still to belong, and which may be said to form the very
household words of our glory--the roll, in fact, of what has since been
the best and bravest aristocracy in the universe?"
The fête commenced by a meeting in the Market-hall of Dives, which was
characteristically decorated; one of the objects being a large picture
of the construction and embarkation of William's fleet, painted from the
Bayeux Tapestry. The Dives Roll is deposited within the church, over the
principal entrance. It differs from the Battle Abbey Roll in this
respect, that the latter is the roll of those who actually fought at
Hastings, and the former is the roll of those who assembled for the
expedition, and were otherwise engaged in furthering the conquest of
England. The roll is printed in the _Bulletin de la Societé des
Antiquaires de Normandie_, and in the _Vicissitudes of Families_, third
series.
Next are three battles of the fifteenth century: Towton, Tewkesbury, and
Bosworth. TOWTON FIELD, supposed to be the most fierce and bloody battle
that ever happened in any domestic war, was fought between the Houses of
York and Lancaster in 1461. On the 29th of March, the armies met at
Towton: the Lancastrians were totally routed, and Edward left
unquestionably king. The carnage of this terrible field is appalling.
Proclamations forbidding quarter were issued before the engagement. Like
Leipsic, it reached over the night; but, unlike Leipsic, even the hours
of darkness brought no rest. They fought from four o'clock in the
afternoon, throughout the whole night, on to noon the next day. Like
Waterloo, it was fought on a Sunday. And the accounts of contemporary
writers state, in words very like the letters from Mont St. Jean, that,
for weeks afterwards the blood stood in puddles, and stagnated in
gutters, and that the water of the wells was red. No inaccuracy is more
frequent in ancient authors than that of numbers, and generally on the
side of exaggeration. But on this occasion we can form a more correct
estimate of the carnage by the concurrence of unusually reputable
testimonies; and, perhaps, in these times it will give the best idea of
it, to say that the number of Englishmen slain exceeded the _sum_ of
those who fell at Vimiera, Talavera, Albuera, Salamanca, Vittoria, and
Waterloo.[70]
TEWKESBURY FIELD has been minutely explored. Mr. Richard Brooke, F.S.A.,
after narrating, from Holinshed, the circumstances which preceded this
memorable battle--from the arrival of Queen Margaret at Weymouth, to the
termination of the conflict, and the murder of Prince Edward--points out
the field of battle as close to the first mile-stone on the high road
leading from Tewkesbury through Tredington to Cheltenham and Gloucester.
On the western side of the town of Tewkesbury is the Home-ground, or
Home-hill, where once a castle stood; a part of this elevated ground is
a field, called "the Gastons," which extends to the first mile-stone,
just opposite which, on the eastern side of the road, is a field which
has been immemorially called "Margaret's Camp." The battle was,
according to tradition, fought on that place, and in the adjacent fields
on the southward, as also in those a little eastward of it. In
"Margaret's Camp," in the centre is a small circular inclosure,
surrounded by a ditch, without hedge or bank, but having some large elm
trees growing round its inner edge. This is too insignificant to have
been a military entrenchment; but it may have been the place of
interment of some of the slain; or is thought to have been formed in
comparatively modern times to commemorate the spot where the
Lancastrian army was posted. In the field, called "Gup's Hill," Mr.
Brooke was told by elderly persons, bones had formerly been discovered.
The old annalists and chroniclers, Mr. Brooke says, have left us much in
the dark as to the exact spot near the camp of the Lancastrians where
Edward's forces passed the night prior to the battle; but on the morning
of the battle, and immediately before it commenced, his army, according
both to tradition and probability, took up a position upon some elevated
ground adjoining the turnpike-road, and to the southward of and opposite
the Lancastrian army. From that position a tract of ground (now fields
and closes) slopes downwards, so as to form a depression between it and
the spot occupied by the Lancastrians. This tract of ground was formerly
called the "Red Piece," and it is now intersected by the turnpike-road,
and forms two fields, one on each side of the road, one of which is
called the Near Red Close, and the other the Further Red Close. This
tract of ground extends to the field called "Margaret's Camp," and it
appears almost certain that it was on the southward side of the latter
that Edward's forces made their attack.
A meadow in the rear of the Lancastrian position, and lying on the
westward side of the turnpike-road, half a mile from Tewkesbury, and
within a few hundred yards of the Tewkesbury Union Workhouse, is called
the "Bloody Meadow:" an idea is generally entertained that it derives
its name from the slaughter of many of the fugitives, who fled from the
battle towards the meadow, in hope of getting over the Severn, as there
is a ferry not far from it. Fourteen or fifteen years ago, was found in
the Bloody Meadow a long piece of iron, which appeared to have been
part of a sword-blade.
BOSWORTH FIELD is a still more memorable site. On August 22, 1485, was
fought the famous battle of Bosworth, the precise spot being pointed out
by the following passage contained in a proclamation sent by Henry VII.,
almost immediately after his victory, to the municipality of York:
"Moreover, the King ascertaineth you that Richard, Duke of Gloucester,
lately called King Richard, was slain at a place called Sandeford, in
the county of Leicester, and brought dead off the field," &c.
The field of battle lies about three miles south of Market Bosworth; and
it is clear from direct historical testimony, which is in this instance
fully corroborated by local traditions, that the principal encounter
between the forces of Richard and Richmond took place on "Ambien Hill,"
on the southern slope of which rises the spring, "Richard's Well," from
which the King is traditionally reported to have drank during the
engagement. The plain of Redmoor was also partly comprehended in the
movements of the two armies, and across which there cannot be a doubt
the flight of the vanquished royalists was afterwards directed towards
Dadlington, Stoke Golding, and Crown Hill, besides the strong position
of Ambien Hill, on the south and west. It is, therefore, evident that
the place where the King fell must be looked for in the immediate
vicinity of these two well-ascertained sites of conflict. Now
_Sandeford_, or _Sandford_, named in the proclamation of Henry VII., is
not known to have existed as a hamlet or village in the county of
Leicester, from the date of Domesday-book; hence Sandford is taken to
imply an ancient road or passage over some fordable stream or
water-course. It has been found that the old road from Leicester to
Atherstone, through the villages of Peckleton and Kirkby Mallory, and
along which road Richard advanced, when on his march from Leicester upon
Sunday, August 21, to meet his antagonist, used formerly, after skirting
and partially traversing the field of battle, to cross a _ford_,
remembered by the present generation, and situated at but a short
distance from the south-western slope of Ambien Hill. And part of the
comparatively modern highway which now passes over the site of the same
ford, is called the _Sandroad_ at the present time. The stream which
once flooded the highway, is now carried through a vaulted tunnel
beneath it. The ford has consequently disappeared; but any visitor to
Bosworth Field, who inquires for the _Water Gate_, may yet stand on the
ground pointed out as the scene of the death of Richard III. by the
words of his rival Henry VII. It should be added that Mr. J. F.
Hollings, of Leicester, who has communicated the above details to _Notes
and Queries_, 2nd S., No. 150, has shown also that the Ordnance Map is
not altogether to be relied upon as a guide to the various localities
connected with the battle of Bosworth.
Mr. Syer Cuming, F.S.A., in a paper read to the British Archæological
Association, in 1862, has grouped these interesting Memorials of Richard
III. On this occasion, the archæologists proceeded from Leicester to the
battle-field; and a considerable accession to the number being received
at Bosworth, the procession extended upwards of half-a-mile in length.
On arriving at the field, large numbers of people had preceded the
procession and congregated round the platform, and altogether there
could not have been fewer than a thousand persons present. The platform
was decorated with banners. A facsimile of the crown of Richard III.
was shown on a cushion in front of Major Wollaston, who presided on the
occasion. A flag marked the place where King Richard died, near a small
pond, and a white flag pointed out the position of Richmond's army.
Richard Plantagenet was born about the year 1450, of Lady Cecilia, wife
of Richard, Duke of York, in the ancient castle of Fotheringhay,
Northamptonshire; but his natal abode was swept away by order of our
first James, and we have perhaps no earlier relic of the Prince than his
official seal as Admiral of England the date of which is fixed by Mr.
Pettigrew between the years 1471 and 1475. It bears on it a large
vessel, the mainsail blazoned with the arms of France and England,
crossed by a label of three points; similar charges appearing on a flag
held by a greyhound at the aft-castle. The verge represents a collar of
roses, and within it is a legend setting forth that it is the seal of
Richard, Duke of Gloucester, Admiral of England, for the counties of
Dorset and Somerset--_S' Rici: Dvc' Glovc': Admiralli: Angl: I: Com:
Dors' et Soms_.
[When Dr. Dibdin was on his "Northern Tour," published in 1838, at
Whiburn, in the neighbourhood of Tynemouth, he had the good fortune to
be introduced to Sir Hedworth Williamson's old trunk of family seals, in
red and white wax, among which he found a warrant of Richard III., then
Duke of Gloucester, dated 20th of February, in the thirteenth year of
Edward IV., with the Autograph of the Duke, and part of the Seal
appended; both of which are of most rare occurrence.]
If tradition is to be believed, King John and Queen Elizabeth must have
had as many palaces as there are counties in England; and though the
name of Richard III. is less frequently connected with old mansions,
there are still plenty of antiquated houses which are said to have been
his abiding-places for more or less lengthy periods. Among others may be
mentioned the Black Boy Inn, Chelmsford, where were formerly to be seen
two carved bosses on the ceiling of its great room: one being painted
with a blue boar on a deep red field, surrounded by a collar of seven
stars or mullets; the other, with a full-blown rose, once entirely
white, but subsequently white and red, indicative of the union of the
Houses of York and Lancaster. Both these bosses were communicated to the
_Gentleman's Magazine_ (May, 1840), by John Adey Repton; but the editor
of that serial contended that the boar is the insignia of Vere, Earl of
Oxford, and that the tradition regarding Richard must therefore be
rejected, forgetful of the fact that after the attainder of the Earl for
high treason, his vast possessions in Essex and other counties were
given to the Duke of Gloucester, so that the Black Boy Inn may, after
all, have served as a hunting-lodge of the Plantagenet. Of Richard's two
London residences one has altogether vanished, and the other has lost
much of its antique aspect, but Shakspeare has given a world-wide and
lasting fame to both. Baynard's Castle stood on the northern bank of the
Thames, and was destroyed in the Great Fire of 1666. It was in the court
of this fortress that Stafford, Duke of Buckingham, offered the crown to
the Duke of Gloucester, and where the dramatist makes the latter say:--
"Since you will buckle fortune on my back,
To bear her burden, whe'r I will or no,
I must have patience to endure the load."
_Richard III._ ii. 7.
The other dwelling alluded to is Crosby Place, Bishopsgate, built by Sir
John Crosby about the year 1467; and, in spite of alterations and
renovations, this is still one of the finest examples of Early Domestic
architecture in England. Hither Shakspeare makes Gloucester invite the
Lady Anne; and bid the murderers repair after the assassination of
Clarence and the young princes in the Tower.
The old building in Leicester, which was properly called "King Richard's
House," was known to be part of the Old Blue Boar: at the commencement
of the last century, it was used as an inn, and known by that sign,
though originally it bore the name of the "White Boar," the cognizance
of King Richard III.; but, after his defeat, this sign was torn down by
the infuriated populace, and the owner or landlord compelled to change
the title. Popular tradition has always identified the building with the
ill-fated monarch, and the inquiries of our local antiquaries confirm
the tradition. It was taken down in the month of March, 1836; but,
fortunately, before its destruction, a drawing was made of the front;
and that has been frequently engraved. In this house Richard took up his
quarters, and slept on a bedstead, the remains of which are believed to
be in existence. It had a false bottom, in which a large sum of money
could be concealed, and did duty as a military chest. Engravings of the
house and bedstead are given in Hutton's _Battle of Bosworth Field_, 2d
edition, by J. Nichols, F.S.A.
Richard is reported to have been peculiarly subject to the influence of
omens. "During his abode at Exeter," says Holinshed, "he went about the
citie, and viewed the seat of the same, and at length he came to the
castle; and when he understood that it was called Rugemont, suddenlie he
fell into a dumpe, and (as one astonied) said, 'Well, I see my dayes be
not long.' He spake this of a prophecy told him, that when he once came
to Richmond, he should not long live after." He had more rational cause
for alarm when Jockey of Norfolk produced the doggrel warning found in
his tent, for it clearly indicated the desertion and treachery that were
about to prove fatal to him.
On the night before the battle, going the rounds, Richard found a
sentinel asleep, and stabbed him, with the remark, "I found him asleep,
and have left him as I found him."
The vanguard of Richard's army was commanded by the Duke of Norfolk; the
centre and main body by the King himself, who rode at their head,
mounted on his celebrated milk-white steed, White Surrey, and arrayed in
the splendid suit of armour which he had worn at Tewkesbury. Like Henry
V. at Agincourt, Richard wore a golden crown, not as a man would wear a
hat or cap, but by way of crest over his helmet. Richmond, too, bore
himself gallantly, and rode through the ranks, marshalling and
encouraging his men, arrayed in complete armour, but unhelmeted. His
vanguard, commanded by the Earl of Oxford, began the battle by crossing
the low ground towards the elevated position where Richard prudently
waited the attack. "The trumpets blew, and the soldiers shouted, and the
King's archers courageously let fly their arrows. The Earl's bowmen
stood not still, but paid them home again; and the terrible shot once
passed, the armies joined, and came to hand-strokes."[71]
The leaders of those days deemed it a point of honour to fight hand to
hand, if possible, and Oxford and Norfolk managed to engage in a
personal encounter. After shivering their spears on each other's shields
or breastplates, they fell to with their swords. Oxford, wounded in the
arm by a blow which glanced from his crest, returned it by one which
hewed off the vizor of Norfolk's helmet, leaving the face bare; and
then, disdaining to follow up the advantage, drew back, when an arrow
from an unknown hand pierced the Duke's brain. Surrey, hurrying up to
assist or avenge his father, was surrounded and overpowered by Sir
Gilbert Talbot and Sir John Savage, who commanded on the right and left
for Richmond:--
"Young Howard single with an army fights;
When, moved with pity, two renownèd knights,
Strong Clarendon and valiant Conyers, try
To rescue him, in which attempt they die.
Now Surrey, fainting, scarce his sword can hold,
Which made a common soldier grow so bold,
To lay rude hands upon that noble flower,
Which he disdaining--anger gives him power,--
Erects his weapon with a nimble round,
And sends the peasant's arm to kiss the ground."--
_Bosworth Field_, by Sir John Beaumont, Bart.
If we may credit tradition or the chroniclers, all this was literally
true. When completely exhausted, Surrey presented the hilt of his sword
to Talbot, whom he requested to take his life, and save him from dying
by an ignoble hand. He lived to be the Surrey of Flodden Field, and the
worthy transmitter of "all the blood of all the Howards."
When Richard was about to make that renowned charge, which historians
describe as the last effort of despair, he was bringing up his main
body, and intelligence reached him that Richmond was posted behind the
hill with a slender attendance. His plan was formed on the instant; nor,
although fiery courage or burning hate might have suggested it, was it
ill-judged or reckless. Three-fourths of the combatants, if we include
the Stanleys, were ready to side with the strongest. Richmond's army,
without Richmond, was a rope of sand. His fall would be the signal for a
general scattering, or a feigned renewal of hollow allegiance to the
conqueror. Neither did the execution of the proposed _coup de main_
betoken a sudden impulse inconsiderately acted upon. Richard rode out at
the right flank of his army, and ascended a rising ground to get a view
of his enemy, with whose person he was not acquainted. He summoned to
his side a chosen body of knights, all of whom, with the exception of
Lord Lovell, perished with him; and he paused to drink at a spring,
which still goes by his name. That Richard's horse was slain is very
doubtful; and, for aught we _know_, it was White Surrey that bore him,
like a thunderbolt, against the bosom of his foe; and it was spear in
rest that he dashed against Richmond's surprised and fluttered
bodyguard.
The personal prowess of the pair who were contending for a kingdom, is
thus estimated by Hutton: "Richard was better versed in arms, Henry was
better served. Richard was brave, Henry was a coward. Richard was about
five feet four, rather runted, but only made crooked by his enemies;
and wanted six weeks of thirty-three. Henry was twenty-seven, slender,
and near five feet nine, with a saturnine countenance, yellow hair, and
grey eyes." According to Grafton, Richard, so soon as he descried
Richmond, "put spurs to his horse, and, like a hungry lion, ran with
spear in rest towards him." He unhorsed Sir John Cheney, a strong and
brave knight,[72] and rushing on Sir William Brandon, Henry's
standard-bearer, cleft his skull, tore the standard from his grasp, and
flung it on the ground. "He was now," says Hume, "within reach of
Richmond himself, who declined not the combat." Others say that Richmond
drew back, as a braver man might have done in his place--
"No craven he, and yet he shuns the blow,
So much confusion magnifies the foe."
Fortunately for him, Sir William Stanley came up at the very nick of
time, "with three thousand tall men," and overpowered Richard, who died,
fighting furiously, and murmuring with his last breath, _Treason!
Treason! Treason!_ So nicely timed was Stanley's aid, that Henry
afterwards justified the ungrateful return he made for it, by saying:
"He came time enough to save my life, but he stayed long enough to
endanger it." Richard received wounds enough to let out a hundred
lives; his crown had been struck off at the beginning of the onset; and
his armour was so broken, and his features were so defaced, that he was
hardly to be recognised when dragged from beneath a heap of slain.
And can that stripped and mutilated corpse be the crowned monarch who at
morning's rise led a gallant army to an assured victory, who had
recently been described by Philip de Commines as holding the proudest
position held by any King of England for a hundred years? Nothing places
in a stronger light the depth of moral degradation and insensibility,
fast verging towards barbarism, to which men's minds had been sunk by
the multiplied butcheries of these terrible conflicts, than the
indignities heaped upon the dead King, with the sanction, if not by the
express orders, of his successor. The body, perfectly naked, with a rope
round the neck, was flung across a horse, like the carcase of a calf,
behind a pursuivant-at-arms, and was thus carried in triumph to
Leicester. It was exposed two days in the Town-hall, and then buried
without ceremony in the Gray Friars' Church. At the destruction of the
religious houses, the remains were thrown out, and the coffin, which was
of stone, was converted into a watering-trough at the White Horse Inn.
The best intelligence that Mr. Hutton, who made a journey on purpose in
1758, could collect concerning it, was that it was broken up about the
latter end of the reign of George I., and that some of the pieces had
been placed as steps in the cellar of the inn. "To what base uses may we
return!" The sign of the White Boar at Leicester, at which Richard
slept, was forthwith converted into the Blue Boar; and the name of the
street called after it has been corrupted into Blubber-lane.
Leicester and Richard III. are associated in traditional history, which
the Corporation have handed down, with a newly-built bridge, in two
inscriptions:--1. "This bridge was erected by the Corporation of
Leicester, in the mayoralty of S. Viccars, Esq., A.D. 1862, on the site
of the ancient Bow Bridge, over which King Richard III. passed, at the
head of his army, to the battle of Bosworth Field, August, 1485. Joseph
Whetstone, Chairman of Highway Committee; S. Stone, Town Clerk; E. S.
Stephens, Borough Surveyor." The plate on the opposite side bears the
legend in verse, according to Speed's _History of Great Britain_:--
"Upon this bridge [as tradition hath
Delivered] stood a stone of some height,
Against which King Richard, as he passed
Towards Bosworth, by chance struck his spur,
And against the same stone, as he was brought
Back, hanging by the horse's side, his head
Was dashed and broken, as a wise woman
[Forsooth] had _foretold_, who, before Richard's
Going to battle, being asked as to his success,
Said that where his spur struck, his head
Should be broken."
This is legendary evidence of Richard's belief in omens, in addition to
that recorded at page 305.
Richard had a habit of gnawing his under lip, and a trick of playing
with his dagger, which, although misconstrued into signs of an evil
disposition, were, probably, mere outward manifestations of
restlessness. Polydore Virgil speaks of his "horrible vigilance and
celerity." It was the old story of the sword wearing out the scabbard;
and the chances are, that he would not long have survived Bosworth Field
had he come off unscathed and the conqueror.
"In the dreadful wars of York and Lancaster," writes Mr. Brooke,[73] "it
is said that more than 10,000 Englishmen lost their lives; but that is
merely the number believed to have been slain in battle; and, however
repulsive it may be to our feelings, it must be admitted that it cannot
include the numbers who must have perished during that disastrous
period, in unimportant skirmishes, in marauding parties, in private
warfare, by assassination, by the axe or by the halter, in pursuance of
or under the colour of judicial sentences, or by open and undisguised
murder. Besides this horrible sacrifice of human life, during this
distracted period it is shocking to think what sufferings unprotected
and helpless persons must have been exposed to, from the lawless
partisans of the rival parties, when they passed through or were located
near any district, which they chose to consider as favouring their
antagonists. Pillage, cruelty, violence to women, incendiarism, and
contempt of the laws and of religion, were the natural attendants upon a
civil war, carried on with feelings of bitter hatred by each party; and
it is certain that the examples of cruelty and wickedness which were
openly set by the nobles and leaders of both factions would readily be
copied by their followers. One of our ancient historical writers
correctly states, that 'this conflict was in maner unnaturall, for in it
the sonne fought against the father, the brother against the brother,
the nephew against the uncle, the tenant against his lord.'"
It is well known that the Wars of the Roses had weakened to the last
degree the great nobles--destroying many of the houses, and
impoverishing all to such an extent that when Henry assumed the Crown he
found himself in possession of nearly absolute power. Under his
Plantagenet predecessors the great nobles had so much authority that at
times they could defy the Crown, and an influential earl might be
regarded as almost the rival of the Sovereign. The English barons were
now reduced to comparative insignificance, and the descendants of men
who in the bygone time might have aspired to the throne, and actually
ruled as independent princes in their ample domains, were content to
appear at Court and to swell the train of their Sovereign liege. The
Wars of the Roses had in reality precipitated in England a change which
was gradually approaching--the destruction of the feudal, and the rise
of the municipal system. But the decay of the feudal system and the rise
of the municipal produced consequences which are very important for
their social and political bearings.[74]
Sad are the memories of these devastating wars, which are intertwined
with many a legendary tale and fitful romance. Not the least curious of
these records is the story that in a beautiful district of England,
whilst the wars raged, there was discovered in the garden of Longleat
Priory, in Wiltshire, a French rose-tree, covered on one side with
_white_ roses, and on the opposite with _red_; which, being known,
attracted crowds of persons, who believed it to portend the speedy
return of peace to their country, by the union of the rival powers.
According to the same tradition, a short time afterwards, the tree bore
roses of mixed petals, and there immediately followed the marriage of
Henry VII. and Elizabeth, thus fulfilling the floral prediction by the
friendship and union of the contending parties. The rose is thought to
have been an early specimen of our "York and Lancaster;" a
red-white--the colours of the two houses--hence its name; and although
the account is probably but a fable, it has, like many others, found its
way into history.
The tendency to embalm falsehoods is a part of the question of the worth
of traditions, which is really worthy of a philosophical inquiry. The
rib of the Dun cow and Guy's porridge-pot are still shown at Warwick
Castle, though the one is the bone of a fossil elephant, and the other a
military cooking vessel of the time of Charles I. Sir Samuel Meyrick
scientifically classified and arranged the collection of armour in the
Tower, but the Beefeaters stick to the old stories still. Richard the
Third's bed in the neighbourhood of Bosworth, turns out to be
Elizabethan;[75] Queen Mary's, at Holyrood, to be of the last century.
Only the other day they sold off at Berkeley the bed of the murdered
Edward as an undoubted anachronism and admitted imposture. Old chairs
are as little to be trusted. Some persons have even doubted the famous
Glastonbury specimen, but these are unduly cautious and sceptical. St.
Crispin's chair in Linlithgow Cathedral is of excellent mahogany,--a
wood which he could only have obtained by miracle previous to the
discovery of America. Princes of Wales are not more fortunate in their
traditions than the Popes themselves, for the Tower of Carnarvon, in
which it is said that the first of them was born, was almost certainly
built after he came into existence. The printing press will dispose of
these false traditions in time, as it has already extinguished so many
others, whether false or true.[76]