Mistress Margery Part 4

Friar Andrew was despatched to York fair to purchase twenty yards of scarlet cloth, fourteen yards of tawny satin, eight of purple satin, and the same number of blue cloth of silver, with jewels and rich furs. All was cutting-out and fitting-on, with discussions about tr.i.m.m.i.n.gs, quintises, and head-dresses. Richard Pynson was sent hither and thither on errands. Sir Geoffrey himself superintended the purchase of a new pillion, and ordered it to be covered with green velvet. Lord Marnell, who did not often come to Lovell Tower himself, sent over a trusty messenger every day to inquire if Mistress Margery had rested well and was merry. From the latter condition she was very far. At length the preparations were completed; and on a splendid summer day, when the birds were singing their most joyous melodies, Margery Lovell was married, in Bostock Church, to Sir Ralph Marnell, Baron Marnell of Lymington, Knight of the Garter. The bride was attired in blue cloth of silver, trimmed with miniver; and her hair, as was then the custom at weddings, was not confined by any head-dress, but flowed down her back, long and straight. The bridegroom was dressed in cramoisie--crimson velvet--richly trimmed with bullion, and wore three long waving plumes in his cap, as well as a streamer of gold lace. If any one who may read these pages should inquire why Margery chose blue for her wedding-dress, I may answer that Margery would have been greatly astonished if any one had recommended white. White at this period was not only a mourning colour, but mourning of the very deepest character.

No pains were spared to make this a merry wedding, and yet it certainly could not be called a joyous one. All the inhabitants of Lovell Tower knew well that the bride was very far from happy; Sir Geoffrey and Dame Lovell were naturally sorry to lose their only child; Friar Andrew mourned over his favourite and his kettle of furmety; while Richard Pynson had his own private sorrow, to which I need not allude further in this place.

The bridal feast was held at Lovell Tower, and all the neighbours were invited to it. The festivities were prolonged to a late hour; and at five o'clock next morning everybody was busy helping the bride to pack up. Everybody thought of everything so well, that there was very little left for her to think of; but she did think of one thing. When Margery set out for her new home in London, the book went too.

The journey to London from the North was in those days a long and wearisome one. There were no vehicles but litters and waggons. Margery travelled part of the way in a litter, and part on a pillion behind her bridegroom, who rode on horseback the whole way. He had with him a regular army of retainers, besides sundry maidens for the Lady Marnell, at the head of whom was Alice Jordan, the unlucky girl who, at our first visit to Lovell Tower, was reprimanded for leaving out the onions in the blanch-porre. Margery had persuaded her mother to resign to her for a personal attendant this often clumsy and forgetful but really well-meaning girl. It was a Friday evening when they arrived in London; and Margery was much too tired to think of doing anything but rest her wearied head in sleep.

As early as four o'clock the next morning, she was roused by London cries from a happy dream of Lovell Tower. "Quinces! sweet quinces! ripe quinces!"

"Any kitchen-stuff, have you, maids?"

"Cakes and ale! cakes and ale!"

"Cherry ripe! cherry ripe!"

"Come buy, pretty maids, come buy! come buy!" with an undercurrent of the long rhymed cry of the hawker of haberdashery, of which Shakespeare has given us a specimen as regards the English version--

"Lawn, as white as driven snow; Cyprus, black as e'er was crow,"

etcetera.

Margery lay still, and listened in silence to all these new sounds. At length she rose and dressed herself, with the a.s.sistance of Alice, who was seriously dissatisfied with the narrow streets and queer smells of the town, and spared no comment on these points while a.s.sisting her young mistress at her toilette. Having dressed, Margery pa.s.sed into an antechamber, close to her bedroom, where breakfast was served. This repast consisted of a pitcher of new milk, another pitcher of wine, a dish of poached eggs, a tremendous bunch of water-cress, a large loaf of bread, and marchpanes--a sweet cake, not unlike the modern macaroon.

Breakfast over, Margery put on her hood, and taking Alice with her, she sallied forth on an expedition to examine the neighbourhood of her new home. One of Lord Marnell's men-servants followed at a short distance, wearing a rapier, to defend his mistress in case of any a.s.sault being made upon her.

Lord Marnell's house was very near the country, and in a quiet and secluded position, being pleasantly situated in Fleet Street. Green fields lay between the two cities of London and Westminster. There was only one bridge across the river, that silver Thames, which ran, so clear and limpid, through the undulating meadows; and the bridge was entirely built over, a covered way pa.s.sing under the houses for wheeled vehicles. Far to the right rose the magnificent Palace of Westminster, a relic of the Saxon kings; and behind it the grand old Abbey, and the strong, frowning Sanctuary; while to the left glittered the walls and turrets of the White Tower, the town residence of royalty. Margery, however, could not see the whole of this as she stepped out of her house. What first met her eyes were the more detailed and less pleasant features of the scene. There were no causeways; the streets, as a rule, would just allow of the progress of one vehicle, though a few of the princ.i.p.al ones would permit the pa.s.sage of two; and the pavements consisted of huge stones, not remarkable either for evenness or smoothness. A channel ran down the middle of the street, into which every housewife emptied her slops from the window, and along which dirty water, sewerage, straw, drowned rats, and mud, floated in profuse and odoriferous mezee. Margery found it desirable to make considerable use of her pomander, a ball of various mixed drugs inclosed in a gold network, and emitting a pleasant fragrance when carried in the warm hand. As she proceeded along the streets which were lined with shops, the incessant cry of the shopkeepers standing at their doors, "What do you lack? what do you lack?" greeted her on every side. The vehicles were of two cla.s.ses, as I have before observed--waggons and litters, the litters being the carriages of the fourteenth century; but the waggons were by far the most numerous. Occasionally a lady of rank would ride past in her litter, drawn by horses whose trappings swept the ground; or a knight, followed by a crowd of retainers, would prance by on his high-mettled charger. Margery spent the happiest day which she had pa.s.sed since her marriage, in wandering about London, and satisfying her girlish curiosity concerning every place of which she had ever heard.

Lord Marnell frowned when Margery confessed, on her return, that she had been out to see London. It was not fit, he said, that she should go out on foot: ladies of rank were not expected to walk: she ought to have ordered out her litter, with a due attendance of retainers.

"But, my lord," said Margery, very naturally, "an't please you, I could not see so well in a litter."

Lord Marnell's displeased lips relaxed into a laugh, for he was amused at her simplicity; but he repeated that he begged she would remember, now that she _had_ seen, that she was no longer plain Mistress Margery Lovell, but Baroness Marnell of Lymington, and would behave herself accordingly. Margery sighed at this curtailment of her liberty, and withdrew to see where Alice was putting her dresses.

As it was approaching evening, Lord Marnell's voice called her downstairs.

"If thou wilt see a sight, Madge," he said, good-naturedly, as she entered, "come quickly, and one will gladden thine eyes which never sawest thou before. The King rideth presently from the Savoy to the Tower."

Margery ran to the window, and saw a number of horses, decked, as well as their riders, in all the colours of the rainbow, coming up the street from the stately Savoy Palace, which stood, surrounded by green fields, in what is now the Strand.

"Which is the King's Grace, I pray you?" asked she, eagerly.

"He weareth a plain black hood and a red gown," answered her husband.

"He rideth a white horse, and hath a scarlet footcloth, all powdered over with ostrich feathers in gold."

"What!" said Margery, in surprise, "that little, fair, goodly man, with the golden frontlet to his horse?"

"The very same," said Lord Marnell. "The tall, comely man who rideth behind him, on yon brown horse, and who hath eyes like to an eagle, is the Duke of Lancaster. 'John of Gaunt,' the folk call him, by reason that he was born at Ghent, in Flanders."

"And who be the rest, if I weary you not with asking?" said Margery, rather timidly.

"In no wise," answered he. "Mostly lords and n.o.ble gentlemen, of whom thou mayest perchance have heard. The Earl of Surrey is he in the green coat, with a red plume. The Earl of Northumberland hath a blue coat, broidered with gold, and a footcloth of the same. Yon dark, proud-looking man in scarlet, on the roan horse, is the Duke of Exeter [Sir John Holland], brother to the King's Grace by my Lady Princess his mother, who was wed afore she wedded the Prince, whose soul G.o.d rest!

Ah! and here cometh my Lord of Hereford, Harry of Bolingbroke [afterwards Henry IV], the Duke of Lancaster's only son and heir--and a son and heir who were worse than none, if report tell truth," added Lord Marnell, in a lower tone. "Seest thou, Madge, yon pa.s.sing tall man, with black hair, arrayed in pink cloth of silver?" [See note 1].

"I see him well, I thank your good Lordship," was Margery's answer; but she suddenly shivered as she spoke.

"Art thou cold, Madge, by the cas.e.m.e.nt? Shall I close the lattice?"

"I am not cold, good my Lord, I thank you," said Margery, in a different tone; "but I like not to look upon that man."

"Why so?" asked Lord Marnell, looking down from his alt.i.tude upon the slight frail figure at his side. "Is he not a n.o.ble man and a goodly?"

"I know not," answered Margery, still in a troubled voice. "There is a thing in his face for which I find not words, but it troubleth me."

"Look not on him, then," said he, drawing her away. She thanked him for his kindness in showing and explaining the glittering scene to her, and returned to her supervision of Alice.

A few days after this, the Prioress of Kennington, Lord Marnell's sister, came in her litter to see her young sister-in-law. Margery was surprised to find in her a lady so little resembling her country-formed idea of a nun. She wore, indeed, the costume of her order; but her dress, instead of being common serge or camlet, was black velvet; her frontlet and barb [see Note 2] were elaborately embroidered; her long gloves [see Note 3] were of white Spanish leather, delicately perfumed, and adorned with needlework in coloured silks; she wore nearly as many rings as would have stocked a small jeweller's shop, and from her girdle, set with the finest gems, were suspended a pomander richly worked in gold and enamel, a large silver seal, and a rosary, made of amethyst beads, holding a crucifix, the materials of which were alabaster and gold.

In those palmy days of Romanism in England, nuns were by no means so strictly secluded as now. They were present at all manner of festivities; the higher cla.s.s travelled about the country very much as they chose, and all of them, while retaining the peculiar shape and colour of the prescribed monastic costume, contrived to spend a fortune on the accessories and details of their dress. The Prioress of Kennington, as I have just described her, is a specimen of nearly all the prioresses and other conventual authorities of her day.

This handsomely-dressed lady was stiff and stately in her manner, and uttered, with the proudest mien, words expressive only of the most abject humility. "If her fair sister would come and see her at her poor house at Kennington, she would be right glad of so great honour."

Margery replied courteously, but she had no desire to see much of the Prioress.

Lord Marnell took his wife to Court, and presented her to the King--the Queen was dead--and the d.u.c.h.ess of Gloucester [Eleanor Bohu], his aunt.

The King spoke to Margery very kindly, and won her good opinion by so doing. The d.u.c.h.ess honoured her with a haughty stare, and then "supposed she came from the North?" in a tone which indicated that she considered her a variety of savage. The ladies in waiting examined and questioned her with more curiosity than civility; and Margery's visit to Court left upon her mind, with the single exception of King Richard's kindness, a most unpleasant impression.

In the winter of 1396, King Richard brought home a new queen, the Princess Isabelle of France, who had attained the mature age of eight years. Margery watched the little Queen make her entrance into London.

She was decked out with jewels, of which she brought a great quant.i.ty over with her, and fresh ones were presented to her at every place where she halted. Alice, with round eyes, declared that "the Queen's Grace's jewels must be worth a King's ransom--and would not your good Ladyship wish to have the like?"

Margery shook her head.

"The only jewels that be worth having, good Alice," said she, "be gems of the heart, such like as meekness, obedience, and charity. And in truth, if I were the chooser, there be many things that I would have afore jewels. But much good do they the Queen's Grace, poor child! and I pray G.o.d she rest not content with gauds of this earth."

Before that winter was over, one thing, worth more than the Queen's jewels in her eyes, was bestowed upon Margery. Something to take care of--something to love and live for. A little golden-haired baby, which became, so far as anything in this world could become so, the light and joy of her heart and soul.

Margery soon learned to value at its true worth the show and tinsel of London life. She never appeared again at Court but once, to pay her respects to the new Queen, who received her very cordially, seated on a throne by her husband. The small Queen of eight "hoped she was quite well, and thought that England was a very fine country." The king spoke to her as kindly as before, offered her ipocras [see Note 4] and spices, and on the close of the interview, took up his little Queen in his arms, and carried her out of the room. Margery had, indeed, no opportunity to visit the Court again; for the young Queen was educated at Windsor, and very rarely visited London. And Lady Marnell, tired of the hollow glitter of high life, and finding few or none in her own sphere with whom she could complacently a.s.sociate, went back with fresh zest to her baby and the book.

Note 1. These descriptions are taken from the invaluable illuminations in Creton's _Histoire du Roy Richart Deux_, Harl. Ms. 1319. Creton was a contemporary and personal friend of King Richard.

Note 2. The frontlet and barb were pieces of white linen, the former worn over the forehead, the latter over the chin.

Note 3. Gloves were just becoming fashionable in the fourteenth century for common wear. Before that, they were rarely used except when the wearer carried a falcon on the wrist.

Note 4. A sweet wine or liqueur, generally served at the "void."

CHAPTER FIVE.

THE BEGINNING OF THE END.