Part 1

THE BROKEN FONT.

A STORY OF THE CIVIL WAR.

BY THE AUTHOR OF “TALES OF THE WARS OF OUR TIMES,” “RECOLLECTIONS OF THE PENINSULA,” &c. &c. &c.

IN TWO VOLUMES.

VOL. I.

LONDON:

PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, REES, ORME, BROWN, GREEN, & LONGMAN, PATERNOSTER-ROW.

1836.

LONDON: Printed by A. SPOTTISWOODE, New-Street-Square.

PREFACE.

It is impossible to read or meditate concerning that period of history in which the scene and action of my tale are laid without partaking of the feelings of both parties in that great quarrel, and “being (in an innocent sense) on both sides.”

In such a spirit has my story been conceived and written. Until the sword was drawn, the more generous and constitutional Royalists were separated by but a faint line from the best and most patriotic men of the Parliament party.

I have, however, confined myself more particularly to the contemplation of those miseries and violent acts of persecution which the appeal to arms brought upon many private families, and especially upon those of the clergy.

In the contrivance of such a fiction, it became necessary to introduce pictures of fanaticism and hypocrisy, and to describe scenes of cruelty and of low interested persecution; but such parts of the story must not be considered separately from the rest. The general tenor of my volumes will, I trust, be found in strict consistency with that charity that “thinketh no evil,” but “hopeth all things.”

THE BROKEN FONT.

CHAPTER I.

Thus till man end, his vanities goe round, In credit here, and there discredited; Striving to binde, and never to be bound; To governe God, and not bee governed: Which is the cause his life is thus confused, In his corruption, by these arts abused. LORD BROOKE.

It was the early afternoon of a fine open day in the last week of April, in the year 1640. The sun shone warm; not a breath of wind was stirring the tender foliage of the tall trees, or the delicate flower of the lowly harebell beneath the hedge-rows. All was still, save that at intervals the voice of the cuckoo was heard--loud, but yet mellow--from the bosom of a neighbouring wood. The swains in the field lay stretched in the shade, as though summer were already come: in gardens and court-yards not a sound of labour or a clatter of life disturbed the silence of the hour.

In a shady alcove, which looked out on the bowling alley of Milverton House, sate the worthy old master of the mansion, with one leg crossed over the other, a book upon his knee, and a kindly smile playing across his manly features. Not far distant, upon the steps which led up to the near end of a stately terrace, was seated a fair little girl, about six years of age. A thick laurel protected her with its shadow; and it might be seen by the paper in her hand, by the motion of her lips, and by the sway of her little head and neck, that she was committing some task to memory, with that pleasure that makes a pastime even out of a lesson. Out on the smooth green an old flap-mouthed hound, whose hunting days were long past, lay basking in the sun, among the dispersed bowls, which the last players had idly neglected to put away; and with them a boy’s bow and arrow had been left, or forgotten, on the ground. The child’s murmur was lower than the soft coo from the dove-cote, or the gentle music of the fountain; and there was a hush of quiet about all these whispers of created life that was in harmony with the general silence.

The shadow of the dial had crept on nearly half an hour before this repose was broken. It was so at last, by a hot boy of fourteen, with vest unbuttoned, and without a hat, who came to seek his bow and arrow. The glad cry of “I have found them!” dispelled the silence: the little girl thrust her paper into her bosom, and jumped up at the sound of the welcome voice; and the old man looked up, and, putting his book down on the seat beside him, scolded the noble boy for having left the bowls out to be scorched and injured by the sun.

With no abatement of good humour, the cheerful boy, eagerly helped by the little girl, gathered them up, and carried them into the bowl-house. The old hound was too much accustomed to the thing even to stir for it, though one of the bowls almost touched his nose.

This duty done, the boy, upon whose mind one thing lay uppermost, with that abruptness which belongs to nature and to boyhood, propounded to his great-uncle, Sir Oliver Heywood, the following most startling question:--

“Was it not, sir, a very wicked thing to cut off Mr. Prynne’s ears?”

Had it suddenly thundered the old knight could not have been more surprised; and, if a wasp had stung him in a tender place, he could not have been less pleased.

“Master Prynne! what do you know about Master Prynne, you foolish boy?”

“O, I know--I know very well! they cut off his ears because he didn’t like plays; and that was very cruel! What a shame it would be to cut off the ears of old Josh. Cross, that takes care of your hawks, because he didn’t like to hear Stephen play upon the fiddle!”

“Why, Arthur, what has come to you, boy? who has been teaching you this nonsense? If Master Prynne had lost his head, instead of his ears, it would be no more than he deserved, and I hope he may live to own it.”

At this rebuke the boy coloured, and hung his head; but added, as if pleading for his fault,--

“It was Master Noble said so; and you know, sir, you have told us all to mind what he says, for he is always in the right.”

Sir Oliver bade him hastily go play; and the boy, taking his little niece by the hand, they ran out of the bowling-green at one angle, while the good old knight, not a little discomposed by the incident, ascended slowly to the terrace. Here he found old Philip, the keeper of the buttery, seated at the far end, in the shade, in the calm enjoyment of a pipe. Instead of the wonted word of pleasant greeting, Sir Oliver told him, in a rough tone, to go and seek instantly for Master Noble, and send him thither.

While the kind old serving man went away with his message in no comfortable mood--for the young tutor was as great a favourite in kitchen as in hall--the old gentleman paced the terrace with a leisurely and thoughtful step; and made frequent stops and soliloquies on the strange and unexpected words and sentiments which he had just heard from the lips of his open and artless boy. While thus engaged, we will leave him for a few moments to place before our reader the state of the family at the time of which we write.

At the village of Milverton, in Warwickshire, upon a sweet spot above the valley of the Avon, Sir Oliver Heywood, the descendant of a successful and honoured merchant, occupied a fair and pleasant mansion erected in the reign of Elizabeth by his wealthy father.

The family at Milverton House consisted of the worthy knight, a maiden sister, his daughter--an only child--and a boy who was the son of a favourite nephew slain in the German wars, in which he had been led to engage as a diversion of his grief on the loss of a beloved wife.

In addition to these regular members of the family there was a little orphan girl, whom his benevolent sister had adopted. This sister, Mistress Alice, was two years the junior of Sir Oliver, and had attained the age of sixty-one. She had taken up her abode with him at the death of Lady Heywood, about four years before the period of which we now speak.

Katharine, his daughter, was in her twentieth year, and his nephew’s son was about fourteen years of age.

Master Noble, of whom mention has been made, was tutor to the boy Arthur, and resided with the family.

This young scholar was the son of an old school-fellow and friend of Sir Oliver’s, who held the benefice of Cheddar, in Somersetshire. Cuthbert Noble, like his father before him, had been educated at William of Wykeham’s school of Winchester; but not succeeding so far as to obtain a fellowship at New College, Oxford, which is the usual aim and reward of the scholars upon the Winchester foundation, he had proceeded to Cambridge, and there graduated with good report. He had been now six months at Milverton.

Sir Oliver’s birthday was ever a high festival at the manor-house. This year it was the pleasure of his daughter to celebrate it by a masque; and all the arrangements for this masque were referred by Mistress Katharine to Cuthbert Noble. He cheerfully undertook them; and having gained some experience in these matters at college, and having some skill in painting, set himself to prepare scenes--then a very recent invention. As, with a painting brush in his hand, he was standing before a scene, nearly finished, and dashing in the white and foamy water upon canvass, that was fast changing into a torrent, falling from rocks, and rushing through a lonely glen,--and as he stood back surveying the effect, and humming the fragment of a song, Philip came slowly up the gallery, and said gravely,--

“Master Cuthbert, Sir Oliver wants to speak with you directly.”

“Where is he?”

“In the garden, on the lower terrace; and I wish he was looking more pleasant:--it’s my thought, Master, there’s something wrong; for it is not a small matter that can vex him.”

Cuthbert put down his brush and palette, and proceeded slowly towards the terrace. As he was descending the wide steps which led to it, he could not but observe that the good knight was serious, if not angry.

“Master Cuthbert,” said Sir Oliver with an air of gravity and displeasure, “I have sent for you to hear from your own lips some little explanation or defence of a matter that hath come to my knowledge by the accident of a child’s artless utterance. It may be that it was only a word lightly dropped by you--a passing levity--a lapsus of the tongue, not of the judgment--such an indiscretion as I may pass over in one of your unripe age and little experience, without further correction than a faithful reproof, and a timely warning of the danger of such vain observations, and of their unsuitableness and impropriety in one who fills so important an office in my family, and hath so far enjoyed my confidence as to have doubtless a great influence for evil or for good.”

This long preface Sir Oliver delivered, pacing slowly on the terrace with his eyes bent upon the ground. Cuthbert walked by his side, anxious for the direct charge, now too plainly whispered from within by his own swift thoughts.

Sir Oliver paused, and, looking full and steadily upon the serious countenance of the youthful tutor, demanded of him whether it were true that he had said publicly before any of his family or household, that it was a barbarous and cruel thing to cut off Master Prynne’s ears?

“I certainly so expressed myself,” was the calm answer of Cuthbert.

“Where and to whom did you thus speak?”

“It was in the library--the lady Alice was present, and Master Arthur was there at his lesson.”

“And are these the lessons that you teach in my house and to my children?--know you, sir, that Master Prynne is a traitor--that he speaketh evil of dignities, and soweth disloyalty--that he is a hypocrite and a fanatic?”

“Sir Oliver,” said Cuthbert, “there was no discourse upon this matter, save only the one remark of which you question me:--this fell from my heart when your good sister read out some news of him--and thereupon the lady Alice went forth without a word; for I presume not to intrude my poor thoughts of court affairs upon any one in this house. I know my place better.”

“Life of me! Thou dost not confess thy fault--thou dost not say thy pænitet for teaching this false lesson to my child!”

“I would not be slow to speak out my sorrow and shame if I felt them, but I am conscience-whole in this thing,--and my few words did give no other lesson than one of plain humanity.”

“Master Cuthbert, I do believe thee a true and gentle youth, of best intentions, and thou comest of a good stock. Thy father is my good friend from the gladsome days when we were school-fellows together at St. Mary, Winton; and where hath church or state a better parson or better subject than he? therefore, I would for his sake, as for thine own, entreat thee mildly. Youth is warm and tender, and wanting a far sight to the great end of punishment--the axe might rust and the scourge gather cobwebs before hearts like thine would give rogues their due.”

“I am of sterner stuff, Sir Oliver, than to wish a rogue safe from the beadle, or a traitor from the headsman; but I am not so taught as to think the mistakes of a severe piety treasons deserving of torture.”

“Odd’s life! I see how it is--thou art bitten by these gloomy fanatics--the venom is in thy veins:--well for me that I have seen its first workings. By my fathers! these new papists, these worse Carthusians, would drive sunshine from the earth, and kill the flowers, and stop the singing of birds, and give us a world of rock and clouds--hard as their stony hearts, and gloomy as their cold minds! Master Cuthbert, we must part. I’ll not have the path of my boy shadowed over before it be God’s will. The earth is green and goodly, and pleasant to the eyes; and long may his heart rejoice in it, as mine has before him. Look you, we must part.”

“At your pleasure I came, Sir Oliver, and I am ready, at your pleasure, to return to my father’s. My stay with you has been short, and I would fain hope that I have not failed in my duty to you. May you be more fortunate in your choice of a tutor for Master Arthur than you have been in me!”

Cuthbert spoke these words with so much self-command that not one syllable trembled in the utterance; yet the tone was at once mournful and resolved.

The better feelings of Sir Oliver were touched: the expression of his eye showed plainly that he was repenting of his hastiness, relenting in his decision. What his reply might have been, may, in its spirit, be easily imagined; but a sudden interruption checked the words that were rising to his lips; and a sounder and more prudential reason for desiring the departure of Cuthbert was presented to his judgment than any objection which could have been urged at that time, with any semblance of fairness, against his errors as a churchman, or his sins as a subject.

“Master Noble,” called a rich clear voice from above them,--“Master Noble, we poor players do wait your pleasure, and are ready with our parts; but we cannot go on with our rehearsal till the manager doth come to us.” Looking up, Sir Oliver saw his daughter leaning over the balustrade, with a paper in one hand, and a tall wand wreathed with flowers in the other; and, as he turned his eyes upon Cuthbert Noble, the strong emotions with which Cuthbert was evidently struggling did not escape his observation.

“I have business with him just now, Kate,” said her father: “go thy way. He shall come to thee in the hall anon.” But as he spoke, the boy Arthur came down the steps, leading in his hand the little girl; and, running up to Cuthbert with joyous eagerness, cried out, “Kitten can do her part--she can say every word quite perfect--you must hear her.” With that, the little girl letting go his hand, and putting back her sunny curls, which had fallen over her blue eyes, repeated, with an air of sweet intelligence and pretty innocence, these lines:--

“I do childhood represent, Listen to my argument: Mine the magic power to bring Pleasure out of every thing; Sunbeams, flowers, and summer air, Music, wonders, visions fair, All my happy steps attend; Mine is peace without an end;-- All things are at peace with me, Beast in field, and bird on tree; The sheep that lie upon the grass Never stir as I do pass; If by the singing bird I stray, He never quits his chosen spray; If to the squirrel’s haunt I go, He comes with curious eye below; Earth and I are full of love, I fear no harm from Heav’n above, For there, as here, all things do tell A Father God doth surely dwell:-- O! could I be a child alway, How happy were life’s holyday!”

The countenance of Sir Oliver recovered all its wonted expression of good humour, as the child prettily recited these lines; and patting her on the head, as she concluded, he turned to Cuthbert and said, in his usual kind tone, “We will talk our matter over another time: I see that you are no joy-killer, and would never mar an innocent pleasure-making--I was ever fond of a good play--a pox on these prick-eared knaves that would forbid them!

“‘Why kings and emperors have taen delight To make experience of their wits in plays,’

as Master Kyd hath it, in his Spanish tragedy.”

Cuthbert said nothing; but having a recollection of the passage from which Sir Oliver had quoted, thought he might have found a more comfortable sanction and a much better authority.

“But, prithee,” continued Sir Oliver, “whose rhymes be these that the child has just spoken?”

“They are my poor doggerel,” answered Cuthbert; “for this dear child would give me no rest till I made a part for her in the Birthday Masque.”

“Marry,” rejoined the knight, “the fancy of them pleaseth me, and for the verse I care not.”

They all now turned to ascend the steps; and as they did so, apparent at the same instant to both Sir Oliver and Cuthbert was Mistress Katharine, leaning over the balustrade of the upper terrace, with an air of grave and perplexed curiosity.

As soon as they reached the top, which was level with the lawn in front of the mansion, Katharine caught Kitten in her arms, kissed her fair brow, and ran with her towards the house; the happy child calling out the while, “Come along, Master Noble, pray, come,” and at the same time clapping together her two little hands at thought of the coming pleasure.

CHAP. II.

“White, I dare not say good, witches (for woe be to him that calleth evil good!) heal those that are hurt, and help them to lost goods.

“Methinks she should bewitch to herself a golden mine, at least good meat, and whole clothes.” FULLER’_s_ _Profane State_.

While a select few among the maidens and the serving men, who were, to their great contentment, to figure beneath strange dresses and uncouth vizards in the antimasque, and while some neighbouring gentles of quality, who were to take part in the masque itself, were rehearsing in the hall, old Philip, the butler, betook himself to the outer gate, and there sitting down on the porter’s stone, replenished his pipe, and fell a-thinking about Sir Oliver and Master Noble. But the more he thought, the more he was puzzled; and so he opened his vest to catch the breeze from the valley, and smoked with half-closed eyes, too much accustomed to the glorious scene before him to be always moved by its beauties. Below him, in the rich bottom of the vale, flowed the shining Avon. The white foam of the water at Guy’s mill might be seen, and the rush of it might be almost heard.

The cliff of the renowned Guy presented a fine scarp of stone, the summit of which was overhung with knotted and rude shrubs of a fantastic growth; and far away to the left, at a distance of two miles, might be seen the lordly towers, and the tall and ivied wall of Warwick Castle. Such were the objects, which might, we say, have been discerned from the spot where old Philip sate, together with broad and pleasant meadows, well stocked with kine and sheep, and many goodly trees of a stately size, and many a distant coppice of rich underwood. Doubtless the old man had often felt the glad influence of that scene,--but now, overcome with heat, tobacco, and the labour of perplexed guesses about the grave mood of his master, he fell fast asleep. Philip was one of those good faithful old creatures whose world was his master’s, and whose greatest sin was the love of victual. This sin was duly punished by black dreams; and now, as he lay snoring against the wall, his indulgence over a rich mutton pie at dinner was visited with the terrors of one of those nightmare visions with which he was deservedly familiar. He dreamed that it was the statute fair, and that they were roasting an ox whole in the market-place of Warwick. The frontlet of the poor beast was gaily gilded, and the horns were painted blue, and gilt at the tips. The mighty spit turned slowly round. On one side stood a fat cook basting the brown loins that the beast might not burn, and on the other a stout and expert carver occasionally stopped the rude spit, and with a long broad knife detached savoury portions for the greedy by-standers, who, on receiving the same, dropped their penny of thanks into the cap of the carver, and, slipping out of the crowd, made way for others. Dreams are to the dreamer realities. Philip’s mouth watered: he thought he had never before seen beef so delicious; fat and lean in their exact proportions; the meat of the finest grain, juicy, and full of gravy; but then his suit, his badge, his pride of place, forbade his wishes: partake of the dainty he could not, but he might go near, just out of curiosity, and for mere amusement. Lo and behold! with an angry bellow forth leaped the furious beast, his eyes all fire, the spit point issuing from his foaming mouth, his carcass smoking and dripping, and half the sirloins cut away. He singled old Philip from the crowd; he lowered his blue and gilded horns; he shook the spit between his grinning teeth; and as he made his rush, old Philip died a thousand deaths in one, and woke into another world,--that other he had so shortly quitted. Nor was the object on which his waking eyes first rested exactly calculated to compose his terrors. A crowd of noisy clowns was standing round him; and in the midst of them, upon a hurdle, they bore an old withered and bony woman, crooked and blear-eyed, who was counted the witch of that neighbourhood, and well known by the name of yellow Margery of the Sand Pit.

They set down the hurdle close at Philip’s feet, and called loudly for justice and Sir Oliver. “Hag!”--“Crone!”--“Beldame!”--“To the faggot!”--“To the river,”--“Justice in the King’s name!”--were the various cries by which the impatient rustics frighted all the household of Milverton from their propriety and their pleasures, and brought most of them forth to the gate, and the rest to the hall steps, or the casements. Sir Oliver himself came forth, among the first, loudly rating them. “Why, how now, ye rude varlets; is Milverton a pot-house, and the seat of justice an ale bench? Speak--what would you?--speak, you, Morton,--you should know better than to head a rabble rout of this fashion.”

“Why then, troth, Sir Oliver, as thou art a worshipful knight, and a king’s justice, not man, woman, nor child in the whole parish can sup their porridge in peace or sleep o’ nights for this old witch Margery: we’ve crown witness enough to hang, drown, and burn her twenty times over.”

“Not so fast, not so fast, neighbour,” said Sir Oliver, seating himself on the stone from which old Philip had retired melting with fear. “Where are the witnesses, and what have they to say? Let them stand forth.”

“First, here’s Master Crumble, the clerk; then, afore him, here’s Master Screw, the great witch-finder from Coventry; and here’s Jock, my carter; and old Blow, the blacksmith, and Pollard, your worship’s woodman.”

“Stop, stop, I can’t hear all at once,--say thy say, Crumble.”

“Why, your worship, my sow--your worship, my sow is dead: all of a sudden, this blessed morn, as I poured out her wash, down she lay all in the shivers; and if the poor dumb creature had been her own flesh and blood, my old woman could not ha’ taken on more. Says I, directly, ‘This is a bit of Margery’s work; for I see her brush the old sow with her black petticoat at the lane end, Sunday was a week.’ It’s quite a plain case you see, Sir Oliver.”

“Stand back, you silly man.”