CanterburyShore, W. Teignmouth (William Teignmouth)
History
Canterbury
Shore, W. Teignmouth (William Teignmouth)
Canterbury (England) -- Description and travel
On the 20th April 1534, the unhappy girl and others were done to death
at Tyburn; and these were her last words: “Hither I am come to die; and
I have not been only the cause of mine own death, which most justly I
have deserved, but also I am the cause of the death of all those
persons, which at this time here suffer. And yet, to say the truth, I am
not so much to be blamed, considering that it was well known to these
learned men that I was a poor wench, without learning; and therefore
they might easily have perceived, that the things that were done by me
could not proceed in no such sort; but their capacities and learning
could right well judge from whence they proceeded, and that they were
altogether feigned: but because the thing which I feigned was profitable
to them, therefore they much praised me; and bore me in hand, that it
was the Holy Ghost, and not I, that did them; and then I, being puffed
up with their praises, fell into a certain pride and foolish fantasy
with myself, and thought I might feign what I would; which thing hath
brought me to this case; and for other which now I cry God and the
King’s highness most heartily mercy, and desire you all, good people, to
pray to God to have mercy on me, and on all them that here suffer with
me.”
There is tragedy lurking there, and light upon those days. But can we
laugh--we who are without superstition and too often without respect?
OTHER SHRINES
There is an old house outside the West Gate, built about 1563 on the
site of an hostel, where, when the city gates were shut of a night time,
belated pilgrims were wont to seek refreshment and rest. But as we stand
and look at the ancient gables, and think of those still more ancient
which these replaced, does any Canterbury Pilgrim come forth to greet
us? No; but we have “stopped before a very old house bulging out over
the road; a house with long, low lattice-windows bulging out still
farther, and beams with carved heads on the ends bulging out too, so
that,” we fancied, “the whole house was leaning forward, trying to see
who was passing on the narrow pavement below. It was quite spotless in
its cleanliness. The old-fashioned brass knocker on the low arched door,
ornamented with carved garlands of fruit and flowers, twinkled like a
star; the two stone steps descending to the door were as white as if
they had been covered with fair linen; and all the angles and corners,
and carvings and mouldings, and quaint little panes of glass, and
quainter little windows, though as old as the hills, were as pure as any
snow that ever fell upon the hills.”
We have never seen Uriah Heep peeping slyly out of those quaint little
windows, for somehow Uriah has never quite lived for us; but we have
seen Agnes there, to whom David eventually lost his heart--which has
always seemed to us an unwise proceeding, for men do not like taking a
permanent second place by marrying their
[Illustration: WESTGATE, CANTERBURY]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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