The King, with a noble and numerous train of lords spiritual and temporal, left his palace at Kingston-upon-Thames, and rode at a soft pace towards London. He was met and greeted by a countless throng of earls, barons, knights, squires, and other men of landed estate and consideration; and as he approached the city, a solemn procession of its clergy, and a gorgeous train of its merchants and tradesmen, hailed his approach. The King was conducted with every mark of honour to the Tower, where about fifty gallant young gentlemen of noble birth were waiting in expectation of receiving the honour of knighthood from the King, on occasion of the august ceremony of his coronation. The sovereign feasted his lords in the Tower; and these young candidates for chivalry, in testimony that they should not be compellable at any future time to perform the like service in the habit of esquires, served up the dishes at this royal festival according to the usage of chivalry in England; and immediately after the entertainment they retired to an apartment where dukes, earls, barons, and honourable knights, as their counsellors or directors, instructed them upon their behaviour, when they should become knights of the venerable order of the Bath. The young candidates, according to custom, went into the baths prepared severally for them, performing their vigils and the other rites and exercises of chivalric practice. Much of the night was passed in watching and prayer, the rest they slept away in rich golden beds. They arose on the first appearance of the next morning's dawn; and, after giving their beds to the domestic servants of the King's household, as their customary fee, they proceeded to hear mass. Their devotions concluded, they clad themselves in rich silk mantles, to whose left shoulders were attached a double cordon or strings of white silk, from which white tassels were pendent. This addition to the mantle was not regarded as a decoration, but a badge of gentle shame, which the knight was obliged to wear until some high emprise had been achieved by him. The proud calls of his knighthood were remissible, however, by his lady-love; for a fair and noble damsel could remove this stigma from his shoulder, at her own sweet will; for there were no limits to woman's power in the glorious days of chivalry.[88]