A Legend of Reading Abbey

by Charles MacFarlane

  IX.

  By times in the morning, the treasure, which filled six coffers of thelargest, was put into boats to be floated down Thamesis unto our abbey;and some of us going by water and some by land, we all proceededthitherward, amidst the rejoicings and blessings of all the people.Right glad were they all for the destruction of Sir Ingelric'sstronghold! Had it been the fitting season they would have carriedpalm-branches before us, as was used at that blessed entrance intoJerusalem; but it was dead winter, and the morning, though bright andclear, was nipping cold. The first time it was I did see our hardy lordabbat muffle his chin, in a skin or fur brought from foreign parts. Aglorious reception, I ween, was that which awaited us! Our brotherhood,to the number of one hundred and fifty, formed in goodly order ofprocession with the banners of our church displayed, and with the priorat their head bearing our richest rood, met us at the edge of theFalbury, all singing--"Beati qui veniant,"--"Blessed are those that comein the name of the Lord; blessed are those that come from the doing ofgood." And our good vassals of the township, and the franklins ofReading and the vicinage, were all there in their holiday clothes, andour near-dwelling serfs in their cleanest sheep-skin jackets, shoutingand throwing up their caps; our abbey bells ringing out lustily andmerrily the while. Needs not to say that we sang our best in the choirat that Te Deum, or that the feast which was ready by the hour of noonwas sumptuous and mirthful. Nor was the joy less that evening in thecastle at Caversham, whither I and some few others went with Sir Alainand the abbat; for the lord of Caversham being ever of a pleasant humourand ofttimes jocose, did say that forasmuch as I, Felix the novice, andPhilip the merry lay-brother, did first carry Alice by night in thelittle basket unto the castle, to the scandal of some and to theamazement of all, so ought we now to carry back and present to the ladieAlfgiva the restored damsel; and hereat the young Lord Arthur hadclapped his hands, and said so it ought to be.

  And from this happy evening the bountiful ladie of Caversham grew welland strong, and the children grew up together in all love andloveliness. Somewhat squalid were they both when they were first broughthome, but in a brief space of time they were plump and ruddy withhealth. The little maiden was then in her sixth year; the little lord,as hath been said, only in his tenth. Truly it is wondrous to think howsoon they grew up into womanhood and manhood! And I the while waspassing from blooming manhood to sober age; yet did I not grieve withHoratius--_Eheu! Fugaces._

  When at our leisure we did examine the great treasure brought from theevil castellum at Speen, we found much money that bore the impress ofthe mint of our house, and divers pieces of plate which had been stolenby the countess's people out of our church. These things, as of right,we did keep; but the rest of the plate we restored to the lawful ownersthereof when we could discover them, which, sooth to say, did not happenon every occasion. Of the money which was not thought to be our own wedid make two portions, and gave one to the poor and sent the other toKing Stephen, who ever needed more money than he could get. But let mendo ever so right and be ever so just and holy, they will still beexposed to evil constructions, and the sharp malice of evil tongues; andtherefore no marvel was it that many did say we made a great profit untoourselves out of the sacking of Sir Ingelric's castle.

  And now, touching Sir Ingelric's dark wife; she was shut up for a shortseason in Reading Castle, and was then carried away to the easternparts, and was there confined in a solitary and very strong house ofreligion that stood on the sea-shore. Of the other prisoners, some,being foreigners, were shipped and sent beyond sea, and the rest ofthem, being native, were sent unto King Stephen's army.

  By the time we had returned unto our abbey, from Oxenford, it was hardupon the feast of the Epiphany, of the year of grace eleven hundred andforty-three. At the first coming of spring the king, who had been toLondon and the eastern parts to collect a great force, marched throughReading and tarried a few hours at our house, without doing any notabledamage thereunto, excepting always that he did _borrow_ from us all thecoined money in our mint, which he did intend to repay so soon as thecountry should be settled. But it grieved us much to learn that he, too,had hired and brought into England great tumultuary companies ofFlemings and Bourguignons and other half-baptized, unholy, ungodly men,who had no bowels of compassion for the people of England, no respectfor our holy places, but an insatiate appetite for plunder. And theseblack bands, on marching away to the westward, brake open diversnunneries and burned sundry towns and churches, maugre all that thelegate bishop of Winchester, who was with his brother the king, couldsay or do to prevent them. This sacrilege brought down vengeance anddiscomfiture upon the king's cause, and did drive away from his bannerfor that time our good Lord of Caversham. Matilda and her princely boyHenry remained in Bristowe Castle, or about that fair western country bythe shores of the broad Severn, or on the banks of the Avon; but some ofher partisans had made themselves formidable at Sarum; and to check theincursions of these the king turned the nunnery at Wilton into a castle,driving out the chaste sisterhood and girding their once quiet abodewith bulwarks and battlements. But while he was upon this ill-judgedwork the great Robert, Earl of Gloucester, on the first of the kalendsof July, fell suddenly upon his encamped army, and by surprise andsuperiority of force did gain a great victory over King Stephen. Theking with his brother the bishop fled with shame, and the earl's mentook the king's people and his plate and money-chest, and other things.Among the men of name that were taken at Wilton was William Martell, thegreat favourite and sewer to the king, who was sent to WallingfordCastle, that terrible stronghold of Brian Fitzcount, which few men couldmention without turning pale. Thus sundry more years passed withvariable successes, and every year heaped on each side freshcalamities, to the great ruin of the whole land. And still both partiesbrought over their hungry bands of adventurers, and still many of ourgreat men, caring neither for one party nor for the other, continuedtheir castle-building and their plundering for their own account, andstill the poor and despairing people of England said that Christ and hissaints were asleep. Villages and hamlets were fast disappearing, andthat our towns were not _all_ sacked and burned in these nineteen yearsof war, and that the substance of every man was not taken from him, wasowing to the prayers of the church, and to the leagues andconfederations which the franklins and free burghers did make amongthemselves, binding themselves by a solemn covenant each to assist theothers. At first those who were men of war did laugh at these leagues,but after they had sustained many a check and defeat they were taught torespect the valour of our free men. I have known the weaver quit hisshuttle and go forth to battle with sword and spear, and bring backcaptive from the field a knight and great lord; and when numerous deedsof the like sort had been done by the honest folk who took up arms onlyfor the defence of their own houses and properties and lives, the greatlords and powerful men did either avoid these townships, or treat themwith more gentleness and justice.

  It was in this year, at the fall of the leaf, that John-a-Blount died atMaple-Durham, and was buried there. After that our indulgent abbat hadconfessed him and shrieved him (upon penances duly performed by the saidJohn), and had quitted and fully released him from the cucullus, thepoor youth again put on the steel cap, and went to Caversham to serveas one of the garnison of that good house. Good were the lord and thehappy little lordling unto John, and I ween the Ladie Alfgiva had agreat care taken of him when she saw how sad he was, and how fastwasting. But neither cook nor leach, neither generous wine norcomfortable words, could restore strength, or infuse hope, or induce acomposure and tranquillity of mind, or keep poor John any long seasonamong us. His heart seemed broken within him; and there was a flush onhis wasted cheek, and then a terrible coughing. So at last my whilomecompanion being able to do nothing, quitted Caversham and went toMaple-Durham, that he might die there among some of his kindred, and beburied under the sward by the wattled hillock which marked the grave ofhis father. That young Angevin Herodias was as much John's murtheress asshe could have been if she had put poison
in his meat, or a dagger intohis heart. May his soul find peace, and her great sin forgiveness! Wedid most of us weep as well as pray for poor John-a-Blount.

  In the year next after the battle at Wilton, King Stephen gained a greatvictory in the meadows which lie near to the abbey of Saint Albans, andour Lord Abbat Reginald did plant a goodly vineyard on the slopes by theside of our house at Reading, and did make an orchard a little beyondKennet. Many other battles were there in this same year of woe; and thatgreat partisan of the countess, Robert Marmion, was slain in a fiercefight at Coventry; and Geoffrey Mandeville, Earl of Essex, was slain atBurwell; and Ernulphus, Earl Mandeville's son, was taken after hisfather's death and banished the land. There seemed no end to theseslayings and banishings and imprisonings in foul prisons. Verily thosewho made the mischief did not escape from its effects! The cup of woethey mixed for the nation was put to their own lips; turn and turn aboutthey nearly all perished or suffered the extremities of evil fortune!None gained, all lost in the end, by this intestine and unnatural war.

  In the year of grace eleven hundred and forty-five King Stephen againpassed by Reading, and went and laid close siege to Wallingford Castle;but he could not prevail against that mighty robber and spoiler BrianFitzcount; and on the feast of St. Benedict, at the close of this sameyear, I, with the saints' aid, having completed my noviciate, took thegreat vows and became a cloister-monk, with much credit and applausefrom the whole community, the sweetmeats and all delicate cates beingfurnished for that feast by the bountiful Ladie Alfgiva, and both SirAlain de Bohun and his son Arthur being present at the feast. That nightthere came from the plashy margent of Thamesis a meteor of rare size andbrightness, and it stopped for the space of an Ave Maria over our house,and shined in all its brightness upon the tower; as was noted by all thebrotherhood, who did please to say that it was a good omen, portendingthat I should rise high in office, and be an ornament and shining lightto the house: and truly since then I have passed through offices oftrust and honour, and my name hath been made known unto some of ourorder in foreign parts, and I am now by the grace of our ladie sub-priorof this royal abbey of Reading. Also is it to be noted that in thisimportant year we, the monks of Reading, were enabled to keep our greatfair in the Falbury, on the day of St. Lawrence and the three days nextfollowing, according to the particular charter of privilege granted byour founder Henricus Primus, who commanded in the aforesaid charter thatno people should be hindered or troubled either in their coming to thefair or in their going from it, under heavy penalties to be paid in finesilver. And the wise Beauclerc had thus ordered, for that the men ofNewbury having a fair of their own about the same season, for the saleof cattle and much cheese, were likely to waylay and stop such as werecoming to our fair, as in verity they afterwards did, despite of ourcharter and to the peril of their own souls. But the castle-builders andthe robbers that were liege-men unto them, had done the Fair-wendingfranklins much more harm than had been done them by the wicked men ofNewbury; and in this sort our fair of St. Lawrence had been thinlyattended for some years, and had not brought to our house in tolls,fees, and droits, one-half so much as the value of the alms wedistributed upon that saint's day.

  In the year which followed upon my vows, the husband of Matilda, theCount of Anjou, much grieving for the long absence of his son Henry, andseeing that the presence of one so young did no good to his mother'scause in England, entreated that he might be sent back into Anjou, andyoung Henry was sent thither accordingly. It had been well for Englandif the count had gotten back his wife also, but he was too glad to leaveMatilda where she was, for there had not been for many a year any lovebetween them, and from the day of his marriage with her until Matilda'sreturn to her own country to wage war in it, the count was said never tohave known a day's peace. During his long abode in Bristowe Castle theboy Henry had been carefully nurtured and instructed by his uncle theEarl of Gloucester, and by some teachers gathered in England and inforeign parts; and, to speak the truth of all men, the said earl waswell nigh as learned as his father the Beauclerc, and a great encouragerof humanizing letters. That great earl was also much commended by hisfriends for his constancy to the cause of his half-sister Matilda, andfor his perseverance in all manner of fortunes, and for the equanimitywith which he bore defeat and calamity; but, certes, it had been betterfor us if his perseverance had been less, and if his equanimity had beendisturbed by the woes and unutterable anguishes the people of Englanddid suffer from his so long perseverance. But the hand of death was nowupon him, and the great earl died soon after the departure of HenryFitz-empress, and was buried at Bristowe in the choir of the church ofSt. James, which he had founded. And no long while after the departureof her son and the death of her valorous half-brother, the countess, tothe great trouble of her husband, quitted England and went into Anjou;and King Stephen, surprising and vanquishing his enemy the Earl ofChester, who had gotten possession of Lincoln town, did triumphantlyenter into that town and abide there, which no king durst do before him,for that certain wizards had prophesied evil luck to any king that wentinto Lincoln town. Being thus within Lincoln, and somewhat elated withthe smiles of capricious fortune, King Stephen summoned the greatbarons and magnates of the land unto him, and at the solemnization ofthe Nativity of our Lord, he wore the regal crown upon his head, or, asothers have it, he was re-crowned and consecrated anew in the motherchurch at Lincoln; and having the crown of England, to all seeming,firmly fixed on his brow, he caused the magnates all to swear allegianceto his son Prince Eustace as his lawful successor in the realm. No greatman gainsayed the king, but all present made a great show of loyalty andaffection as well to the son as to the father. Many there were of themwho had no truth or steadiness in their hearts; but Sir Alain, our goodLord of Caversham, was there, and likewise the young Lord Arthur, and itwas with a faith as pure and entire as that of a primitive Christianthat the nobles twain placed their hands within the hands of PrinceEustace and vowed to be his true men for aye. And as it was now timethat Arthur should enter upon a more active life, and put himself intraining for the honours of knighthood, and as Prince Eustace conceivedmuch affection for him, as did all who ever knew the hopeful youth,Arthur was left in the family of the prince to serve him as page andesquire. Yet was the young lord's absence from among us very short, forPrince Eustace came nigh unto Reading to prepare for the laying ofanother siege to Wallingford Castle, which still lay upon the fair bosomof the country like a hugeous and hideous nightmare, and whensoever itwas not beleaguered the wicked garnison went forth to do that which forso many years they had been doing. Brian Fitzcount, the lord ofWallingford, Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe, and others not a few, hadgone beyond sea with the countess; but they meditated a speedy returnwith more bands of foreign marauders, and many of their similars andfautors shut themselves up in their home-castles, which were spread allover the country. These things prevented the entire blessing of peace;yet was England more tranquil than she had been since the Beauclerc'sdeath, and by a succession of sieges Stephen would have gotten the menof anarchy within his power if other accidents had not happened.

  As the king (who had long and grievously mourned for the license andcastle-building he had permitted at the beginning of his reign, in thehopes of attaching the great lords to his interest) openly showed hisresolution to curb the excessive power and fierce lawlessness of thefeudal lords, a great outcry was raised against him, and divers of thelords of his own party began to plot and make league with the barons ofMatilda's faction. Others fell from his side because he could give themno money or fiefs, unless he robbed other men or laid heavy tallagesupon the poor people. As these selfish men deserted him. Stephenexclaimed, as he had done before, "False lords, why did ye make me kingto betray me thus! But, by the glory of God, I will not live adiscrowned king!" And so much was granted to him in the end, thatStephen did die with the crown upon his head. Peradventure might theking have had the better of his secular foes if in the midst of thesetroubles he had not quarrelled with the clergy and braved th
e wrath ofthe holy see. By the death of one pope and the election of another, theking's brother, the Bishop of Winchester, had ceased to be legatus alatere, and the legatine office had passed into the hands of Theobald,archbishop of Canterbury, who had ever leaned to the Angevin party. Thesaid lord archbishop was no friend to our Lord Abbat Reginald, or to anyof our community, but it becomes not me to rake up the ashes of thedead, or to disturb with a reproachful voice the grave of the primate ofEngland; and it needs must be said that the king was over violent in hisregard, and undutiful to our father the pope. For it must ever beacknowledged that the triple crown of Rome is more than the crown ofEngland, and that the head of the holy Roman Apostolic and Catholicchurch hath a power supreme in spiritualities over all the kings ofChristendom. Nevertheless did King Stephen in an ill hour give a doom ofexile against the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury, for that he hadattended at the bidding of the pope, but without consent of the king, agreat council of the church in the city of Rheims, in France. Instead ofsubmitting to this sentence, the archbishop went and put himself underthe protection of Hugh Bigod, the powerful Earl of Norfolk, who was ofthe Angevin faction, and then put forth a sentence of interdict againstKing Stephen, and all that part of the kingdom which obeyed the_usurper_. In the west country, and in some parts of the east and north,the priests shut up their churches and refused to perform any of theoffices of religion. Good men went between the king and the primate, andafter two years a reconciliation was brought about, Stephen agreeing tobe the most bountiful king and the best friend of the church that thechurch had ever yet known in this land. Yet when Archbishop Theobald wascalled upon to recognise and anoint Prince Eustace as heir to thethrone, he refused to do it, saying that he was forbidden by our lordthe pope, and that Stephen, being a usurper, could not, like alegitimate sovereign, transmit his crown to his posterity. The king,unto whom the archbishop had taken the oath of allegiance, waxed wroth,and threatened the archbishop with a punishment sharper than banishment;but, when the first passion of anger was over, he did nothing. Mencensured the archbishop at the time, but they afterwards thought he hadtaken the wisest course for putting an end to this long war. In theinterim Henry Fitz-empress had been again in our island. In the yeareleven hundred and forty-nine, having attained the military age ofsixteen, Henry Plantagenet came over to Scotland with a splendidretinue, to be made a knight by his mother's uncle, King David. Theceremony was performed with much magnificence in the city of Carlisle,where the old Scottish king did then keep his court; and most of thenobles of Scotland and many of our great English barons were present atthe celebration, and did then and there make note of the many highqualities of the truly great and ever to be remembered son of theCountess Matilda. All manner of honours and power alighted on the headof Henry Plantagenet soon after his being knighted at Carlisle. Thedeath of his father Geoffrey left him in full possession of the dukedomof Normandie, which he had governed for him, and of the earldom ofAnjou, which was his own birthright; and in that lucky year for thehouse of Plantagenet, the year of our redemption eleven hundred andfifty-two, by espousing Eleanor of Aquitaine, Henry acquired that greatdame's rights to the earldom of Poictou and the great duchy ofAquitaine. Henry was thus the greatest and richest prince in all themain land of Europe, and albeit he was only in his twentieth year, healready knew the arts of government and of war better than any of hisneighbours. A great prince was he from his cradle: he was born tocommand.

  Et interim, Eustace, the son of Stephen, being nearly of the same age asthe son of Matilda, had become a very worthy soldier, and our young Lordof Caversham had grown up with him, and improved under him. They hadmiscarried in the siege of Wallingford Castle, because that house of thedevil was so exceeding strong, and because they were called off toanother more urgent enterprise; but in other quarters they had been moresuccessful, beating divers of the castle-builders in the field, ortaking them in their dens. Every castle that they took was burned anddestroyed, like Sir Ingelric's castellum at Speen. They brought manyofferings to our shrines, for they were much in our part of the country,to keep in check the Angevin party to the westward; and whenever he wasnot engaged in these duties of war, the young Lord Arthur came to hishome. The winter season allowed him the longest repose, and thus itbefel that the Ladie Alfgiva and that little maiden which I and Philip,the lay-brother, did first convey to Caversham, became sad instead ofgay at the advance of spring. But Alice was no longer the little maidenthat could lie perdue in a basket, and there had already been manydiscourses and conjectures as to the day when she and the young LordArthur would be made one by holy church; for the great love that hadbeen between them from the days of their childhood was known to all thecountry side. Strange it was, but still most true, that Sir Ingelric ofHuntercombe never had made any attempt to recover his fair and gooddaughter. Great endeavours he made to get back that dark ladie of thecastle, his wicked and impenitent second wife, and he had at last, bymeans, it was said, of the Archbishop of Canterbury, obtained herrelease from the nunnery on the eastern coast; but he had never set onfoot any treaty, nor, as far as could be learned, had ever made anyinquiry touching the gentle Alice, who in her heart could not thinkwithout trembling and turning pale of her dark, stern step-mother, andthe days she had passed with her in that foul donjon at Speen.

  Though his hair had grown grey and scant under the cap of steel, and hissoul panted for peace as the hunted hart doth for running waters, SirAlain de Bohun kept the field almost as constantly as his son; and hisconstancy to King Stephen knew no abatement. So much virtue andsteadiness could not be understood in those changeable and treacheroustimes; and as it was thought that he put a monstrously high price uponhis services, and was true to one side because he had not beensufficiently tempted by the other, in the course of the year elevenhundred and fifty-two there came a secret emissary to offer him one ofthe greatest earldoms in England, and one of the richest and noblestdamsels in Anjou as a bride for his son. Sir Alain bound the emissarywith cords, like a felon spy, and sent him and his papers and credentialsignets unto King Stephen. No mind was ruffled in Caversham Castle uponthis occurrence except the tender mind of Alice, who bethought her thatshe was but a poor portionless maiden, the daughter of a proscribed manwhose estates had long been confiscated and held by the king; but Arthursaw and soon chased away these vain grievings. His father had manors andlands enow, and he wished never to be greater or richer than his father,and Alice was rich in herself, and she was his own Alice, and a greatertreasure than any that dukes or kings or emperors could bestow. Letthere be peace; let there only be peace in the land for the herdsman andthe tiller of the soil, and the industrious vassals, and what earthlyluxury or comfort would be wanting in the house at Caversham? Foolsmight contend for more, and barter their souls away to get it, but hisfather's son would never be this fool.

  I was myself at Caversham at the time of these occurrences, and it wasnot long after that I became sub-sacrist in our abbey, and did build atmine own cost a new rood-loft in the church.

  Also in this year deceased, to King Stephen's great grief, the goodQueen Maud, and she was buried at Feversham in Kent.