Eclectic Magazine of Foreign Literature, Science, and Art, June 1885Various
History
Eclectic Magazine of Foreign Literature, Science, and Art, June 1885
Various
American literature -- Periodicals; Literature -- Periodicals
The next morning Richard heard mass in Westminster Abbey, and, on
his return with sixty knights, encountered Wat Tyler and his men in
Smithfield “before the Abbey of St. Bartholomew.” As it appears, Tyler
had some further demands to make, not being altogether satisfied with
the charter of Mile End.[11] Sir John Newton rode up to invite him to
approach the king. According to some accounts the knight was received
insolently. “I shall come,” said Tyler, “when I please. If you are
in a hurry you can go back to your master now!” Another narrator
tells us that Wat began to abuse Sir John Newton for coming to him on
horseback, being met with the courteous reply, “You are mounted, why
should not I be so likewise?” In a third chronicle we read that Tyler
was approaching Richard covered, and was ordered by Walworth, the
mayor, to remove his cap, but roughly refused. There was, at any rate,
a brief dialogue between Richard II. and the peasant leader, in which
the latter insisted on the immediate issue of letters of manumission
to all, and added his new demand, to the effect that “all warrens,
waters, parks, and woods should be common, so that the poor as well
as the rich might freely fish in all waters, hunt the deer in forests
and parks, and the hare in the field.” This cry for the repeal of the
game and forest laws went to the heart of one of the chief grievances
of the people. What reply the king gave is not recorded, nor is it
easy to disentangle from the conflicting accounts any clear details.
One chronicler says that Tyler came too near the king’s horse, as
if intending some mischief against his majesty; others that he was
simply insolent, tossing his dagger from hand to hand as he parleyed;
others that blows were actually interchanged between Wat and Sir John
Newton. This much at any rate is clear, that the Mayor Walworth—_John_
Walworth, as Knighton calls him; _William_, as in the other
authorities—aimed a sudden blow at the bold demagogue, who fell at once
from his horse, and was dispatched by one of the king’s squires, named
Sandwich or Cavendish.
[11] It is possible that some of the points above mentioned were
among these reserved demands. If so, the king conceded them to
Tyler, verbally, before the catastrophe. But this is uncertain. The
concessions are enumerated in Rymer’s “Fœdera,” vol. vii. p. 317.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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