Under the Mendips Part 6

The old baronial Palace of Wells, surrounded by its moat and reached by a drawbridge--not raised now as in olden times,--is in perfect harmony with the city in which it stands. In it, but not of it; for when once the gateway is pa.s.sed, the near neighbourhood of the market-place is forgotten, such traffic as this little city knows is left behind; and the gardens of the Palace might well be supposed to be far from all human habitations, so complete is the repose which broods over it.

Encircled by battlemented walls, and standing in a wide demesne, a stranger is at once struck with the unusual beauty of its surroundings.

Mr. Arundel's admiration rather disconcerted his friend.

"Come on, Arundel. Don't stare about like that; some of the family may be at the windows."

But Mr. Arundel did not heed his friend's entreaty.

"Come on; it is so like a country clodhopper to stand looking at a big house, as if you had never seen one before."

"I never have seen one before, in the least like this big house," was the reply; "and what are those ruins? It is odd, Falconer, that you never prepared me for the beautiful things I was to find in Somersetshire."

"It's a mighty damp place," Melville said. "Rheumatism and low fever haunt the servants' quarters, which are on a level with the moat; but, my dear fellow, do come on."

"Can't we cross over to that old wall? It is like a glimpse of Paradise through there."

"No, no, we must go up to the front like well-mannered folk. Come, don't be so obstinate, Arundel."

Whether Melville would have succeeded in his attempts to draw his friend towards the entrance-porch, which stood in the centre of a long line of windows of the lower story of this side of the Palace, I do not know, had not a clerical figure in knee-breeches and shovel hat, been seen advancing over the emerald turf, and approaching the two young men.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Gateway of the Bishop's Palace, Wells.]

Melville began to show signs of nervousness, and the grand air which he maintained to his inferiors gave place to a rather servile and cringing manner, as he carefully removed his high narrow hat from his curled head and, bowing low, said:

"My lord, my friend Mr. Arundel is anxious to pay his respects to you."

The bishop looked with keen grey eyes at Melville, and said stiffly:

"Mr. Falconer's son, I think?"

"Yes, my lord; your lordship's humble servant," again bowing till the tails of his short-waisted coat stood up like those of a robin-redbreast.

"Arundel, Arundel," the bishop repeated; "Arundel: the name is familiar to me."

"My mother, my lord, had the honour of your lordship's acquaintance some years ago. She was Annabella Thorndeane."

The bishop's somewhat stiff manner changed at once. He extended his hand, and said:

"To have known your mother is to bear her always in affectionate remembrance. Where is she living?"

"Since my father's death, my lord, my mother has had no settled home.

She has lived within reach of me, first at Winchester, and then at Oxford. Now she will settle where I do."

"And what profession are you taking, may I inquire?"

"The law I believe; things are not yet decided, my lord; but there is some notion of a partnership in Bristol, when I have pa.s.sed the needful examinations."

"Well, well, we must have lawyers, and can no more do without them than doctors, eh?" All this time Melville had fidgeted, and felt annoyed at the bishop's coldness to him. "I am alone just now in the Palace; health, or rather the search for health, has taken the ladies to the east coast, a very distant spot--Cromer in Norfolk. But bracing was recommended, and our Western sea cannot come under that head. But will you walk round; I shall be pleased to show you over the grounds, and the gallery, where the portraits of my predecessors hang. One has the mark of a bullet in his cheek, caught in the battle of Sedgemoor. All our surroundings speak of warlike times, and there are moments now when I feel as if I would gladly pull up my drawbridge and have done with the world without. There is strife in the streets, and storms even in our little tea-cup, I can a.s.sure you."

The bishop now led the way round to the gardens at which Arundel had looked with longing eyes through the ruins. Suddenly the bishop turned sharply on Melville, looking him down from head to foot with anything but an approving glance.

"And what profession, sir, do you mean to take up?--law, like your friend--or what?"

"I am going to travel for a year, my lord."

"Travel! humph! Your good father has several sons, I think?"

"Four younger sons, my lord; so much the worse for me."

"I hope you set them a good example," said the bishop, drily. "I should venture to suggest that your father might want help with his estate."

"He has a steward, my lord, an old servant."

"Stewards mean money, don't they? and a gentleman with a small landed property cannot be overburdened with that article nowadays, more especially if he has five sons."

Melville's brow clouded, and he would fain, if he had dared, given vent to some rather uncomplimentary adjectives, of which "old meddler" was one.

"Here," said the bishop, "are the ruins of the old Hall, where, report says, the last abbot of Glas...o...b..ry was hanged. He was tried here by the king's orders, for suppression of some of the church lands which the king had seized. That," pointing to the end of the Palace, "is the part of the building which was blown down, or, rather, the roof blown in, upon one of my predecessors during the last century. Both Bishop Kidder and his wife were buried in their bed in the ruins. But not to dwell on these memories, I have pleasanter ones to recount. On that terrace walk, where we will now mount and take a view of the surrounding country, the pious Ken--that G.o.d-fearing and steadfast man--composed the hymns, which, morning and night, bring him to our minds."

Melville Falconer had forgotten, if he had ever heard, those hymns; but Mr. Arundel said:

"My mother will be interested, indeed, my lord, to hear I have been on the spot where those hymns had birth."

"Ay," said the bishop; "and we must have her here one day and show her this fair place. One can imagine, as he gazed out on this prospect, that the saintly Ken was eager to call on every one to 'shake off dull sloth,' and rise early with the birds to offer the sacrifice of the morning."

It was indeed a fair prospect towards which the bishop waved his hand.

Fields of b.u.t.tercups lay like burnished gold in the summer sunshine.

Beyond these fields, known as the Bishop's Fields, was a belt of copse, and further still the gra.s.sy slopes of a hill, really of no very exalted height, but from its strongly defined outline and the sudden elevation of its steep sides from the valley below it, it a.s.sumes almost mountainous proportions, and is a striking feature in the landscape as seen from Wells and its neighbourhood. A wooded height, known as Tor Hill, rises nearer to the Palace, and then the line sweeps round to the Mendip range, which shuts in Wells on the north-east, and across which a long, straight road lies in the direction of Bristol.

The bishop continued to chat pleasantly as he led his visitors along the broad terrace walk on the top of the battlemented wall. Then he pa.s.sed down into the garden, and ascended a spiral stone staircase which led to a small ante-chamber, and then into the long gallery.

This room is one of the princ.i.p.al features of the Palace at Wells, with its long line of small, deep bay windows, and its beautiful groined roof, the walls covered with portraits of many bishops who have held the see.

Archbishop Laud looks down with a somewhat grim face, like a man who had set himself to endure hardness, and never flinch from the line he had marked out for himself. Saintly Ken, too, is there, and keen, thin-lipped Wolsey, who had not learned when he sat for that picture the bitter lesson which his old age brought him, not to put his trust in princes, or in any child of man.

The war-like bishop, too, with the hole in his cheek, had, a very unwarlike expression.

"A jolly old fellow!" Mr. Arundel remarked; "not like a man who cared to handle a musket or bayonet."

"No; appearances are deceitful at times," the bishop said. "The stairs up which we came, open into my study, from that little ante-chamber; and I confess I should take flight by them and get into the chapel if by chance the Palace is besieged."

"Not much fear of that," Melville said, "in these days."

"These days are not as quiet as they may look, young sir. It strikes me, before you are grey-headed, there will be a desperate struggle between law and anarchy--between the king and the people. The horizon is dark enough. There are graver matters pressing than gewgaws and finery and personal indulgence. We are too much given in Wells to look upon it as the world, and refuse to believe in the near approach of the storm of which there are signs already, and not far from us. But, young gentlemen, I have an appointment, and must not delay if I wish to be punctual. I shall hope to see you again, Mr. Arundel. How long will you be in our neighbourhood?"

"For a few days, my lord."

"Well, well. I shall come out to Fair Acres with my son, and pay my respects to your excellent parents, Mr. Falconer, of whom I have heard much during my short residence in Wells."