unorthodox views, an accusation most difficult to refute, especially for an ignorant person, who was very apt to get confused when interrogated on matters of faith and doctrine by a subtle theologian bent on his destruction. The Lollards' Tower at Lambeth was very likely used, in later days, as a prison for heretics under the immediate jurisdiction of the Archbishop of Canterbury, but it was certainly not the Lollards' Tower so famous in the history of Protestantism in this country.

A curious but little known after-effect of John Wycliff's memorable appearance in St. Paul's occurred at Candlemas in the same year, when 132 citizens rode out to pay their respects to Prince Richard and his mother, the Princess of Wales, then residing at Kennington Palace. The said citizens came from Newgate, and passed through Southwark. They were in masquerade apparel, and accompanied by musical instruments and torches. Some of these masqueraders, we are informed, were dressed as squires, and wore beautiful gold and silver vizards or masks; others impersonated knights; one wore "a very pompous Imperial habit"; and yet another was dressed as a Pope, and accompanied by a train of cardinals and by some mysterious persons dressed in black, described as "Legates from an Infernal Pontiff." Soon after their arrival at the royal palace, "these merry maskers" played dice with the Prince and Princess of Wales and the Duke of Lancaster. The dice, it seems, were loaded by the citizens in such a manner that the Princess and the nobility present stood no chance of losing, but "all won valuable gold rings." Then the "Pope and the Cardinals," and the dusky-robed representatives of the lower regions, performed "an antic," after which the whole company joined in a merry dance. At its conclusion they all sat down together to a jovial supper, and "it was long after midnight when the citizens joyfully returned to the city." The presence of a guest dressed as a Pope shows which way the wind blew, even at that early period. England was intensely Catholic in those days, and she is as equally intensely Protestant in these; but who amongst us would dare to go to a fancy-dress ball at Buckingham Palace or Marlborough House, or anywhere else, dressed as a comic Pope, accompanied by a Sacred College of droll cardinals and ambassadors from an "Infernal Pontiff"? Toleration and

good taste have certainly gained ground among us, and the Briton of the twentieth century knows how to appreciate the apostolic virtues of a Roman Pontiff, even though he does not accept his spiritual supremacy.

Among Edward the Third's many enactments for the better control of the city, several exceedingly curious provisions show that, in some respects, matters have changed but little since his day. In Normano-Plantagenet times, wine was as common a drink as beer, and was consequently largely imported into the country. Adulteration was unfortunately frequent. Sometimes the wine was plentifully mixed with water, sometimes spirit was added to make it more potent. An ordinance, dated 1334, severely condemned all attempts to adulterate wine, and the merchant or innkeeper caught in the act was not only to spend a considerable time in the stocks, but his licence was withdrawn for an indefinite number of years.

At one period of this long reign, a form of "hooliganism" raged in London. In 1328, shortly after the King's marriage with Philippa of Hainault, a dangerous insurrection of brewers, vintners, bakers, cooks, millers, fishmongers, poulterers, butchers, corn-chandlers, and others, broke out in the city. The rioters were joined by a "villainous crew, justly denominated malefactors, or evil-doers, whose chief pleasure was in doing mischief." These medieval "corner boys" wandered about armed with swords and bucklers, "killing some, beating others," and generally misbehaving. In connection with this disturbance, the King addressed a curious letter to the Mayor, from which we gather an idea of what an unpoliced London must have been. Edward begins by asserting that "disturbers of the peace" have "made divers knots, Confederacies, and unlawful Conventicles" in London, "and do wander about and run here and there, beating, wounding the people, and spoiling others of their goods and possessions." He further bears eloquent testimony to the state of law and order of the period, declaring these brigands to be in the habit of "kidnapping and imprisoning worthy merchants and business people" till "they give Fines and Redemptions, and not desisting daily to commit them to the terror of our people." The object of this epistle was, in short, to impress the Sheriffs with the necessity of discovering the names of the "disturbers,"

and so chastising them that "the Lewdnesses and Damages aforesaid might not happen any more, whereby we might take heavily of you." This latter threat evidently produced a salutary effect, for we learn that numbers of these "evil-doers" were caught, tried, and punished by the Mayor. Five years later (in 1333) Edward had to issue another Proclamation to the effect that anyone wearing armour ("coat of plate") or carrying arms in the streets of London, Westminster, or in any of the suburbs, should forfeit all his possessions. The "hooligan," though unaided by "butchers, millers, cooks, etc.," is still with us, and though he no longer imprisons and blackmails business men, his proclivities are as objectionable and dangerous, though perhaps somewhat better checked than in Chaucer's day.

The Fœdera contains numerous other ordinances tend

ing to prevent abuses of many sorts. Chandlers were wont, it appears, to sell candles of indifferent quality for those "of fine white wax" imported from Paris and called "French lights." Spice merchants mixed their peppers and ground cinnamon with sand; and armourers sold their breastplates and helmets, their back-pieces and their gauntlets, at extortionate prices. They even seem to have polished up old pieces, picked up on battlefields, and sold them as new. The world changes less than we are apt to think! Would it be believed that even Dickens' Fagan had his prototype in Chaucer's time? In those days a notorious scoundrel was arrested and soundly "thrashed for the keeping of a college of thieves" in which the old villain taught the youngsters how to pick pockets with dexterity by practising their skill either on his own person or a dummy suspended by a cord from the roof. The "game" consisted in plundering this effigy without disturbing its equilibrium in the least degree. The boy who stripped it of a kerchief or purse without shaking it was rewarded by his teacher as an encouragement to his companions who were regularly taken to Cheapside, and other crowded places, to pick pockets and carry off purses and parcels from the unwary!

CHAPTER XIII

IN THE DAYS OF RICHARD THE UNLUCKY

ΟΝ

They were met in the mother, and his uncle

N the death of Edward III., in 1377, his frivolous, ill-fated grandson, Richard II., son of the Black Prince, forthwith ascended the throne in his eleventh year. Young Dickon was at Sheen at the time, and thither a deputation of leading citizens went to announce his accession to him. Great Hall by the juvenile monarch, his of Lancaster, and so hearty was the greeting between the new King and these liege subjects, that he kissed every single one of them on both cheeks. On the following day, July 3, the youthful monarch, riding a magnificent white charger, and clad in white garments, made his state entry into the metropolis, attended by a numerous suite similarly attired in virgin white. He was attended by the Duke of Lancaster, Lord High Steward of the Kingdom, Lord Percy, the Earl Marshal, and a throng of gorgeously apparelled nobles. The King's horse was led by Nicholas Baud, and the Sword of State was borne by Sir Simon Baily, and these two men walked all the way to London on either side of him. At Temple Bar the Lord Mayor, Aldermen, and Sheriffs waited to conduct the King to Cheapside, where there was a magnificent "pageant" representing a tower, with a fountain in front of it, which ran red and white wine all day and night, for twenty-four hours,-the people being freely allowed to fill their jugs and bottles. Twelve fair damsels offered a cup of each kind of wine to King Richard. They were dressed in cloth-of-silver, and wore wreaths of fresh roses binding their tresses. A bevy of other young ladies, also in white, presented wine and cakes to the nobility in the King's escort. It seems that the lesser personages, during this halt, went round to a

neighbouring tavern to refresh themselves, being no doubt tired, hot, and thirsty after their long ride. As the King departed for the Tower, other white-robed damsels appeared and scattered flowers and gold leaves before him. Meanwhile, Lancaster ordered a quantity of small coin to be thrown for the crowd to scramble for, whereupon "there was much confusion and merriment." And thus began, by what was long remembered as the "White Pageant," this poor King's reign, which promised so well but was fated to end so tragically, and this mainly through the self-same defects of character that had ruined the career of his great-grandfather, Edward II.,-a strange case of atavism!

The time of Richard's accession was a critical moment. England, like the rest of Western Europe, was in the throes of a popular movement, the precursor of the Reformation and of the great social revolutions of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. For some fifty years, a subtle influence of intellectual, and even physical, unrest had swayed the upper classes of society, and, filtering down at length to the lower strata, was beginning to work even there. That this democratic movement had been influenced by Wycliff's preaching and writings there can be no doubt. Itinerant lecturers had been going up and down the country, fomenting bitterness against intolerable oppression. Thus the populace had nibbled at the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge, and discovered itself to be naked-naked of justice and of creature comforts; much as is the case, nowadays, in modern Russia. The peasantry of Flanders had risen in revolt, and Philip van Artevalde, son of the Brewer of Ghent, was soon the idol of every Flemish working-man, for he had championed his cause against the oppression of a callously haughty aristocracy. Paris, too, was aflame, stirred by the eloquent words of Pierre Dubois, a prototype of the relentless Danton. The peasantry of England, realising these facts by those subtle inferences which ever attend upon revolutions, took up arms, clamouring for redress of wrongs, for lighter taxes, higher wages, and shorter labouring hours. Three men suddenly sprang into prominenceWat Tyler, John Ball, and Jack Straw.

Old-fashioned historians have dealt very harshly with these representatives of a'down-trodden class, but, their brutal violence and shortcomings notwithstanding, we can only feel sympathy for