Part 13

But to return to our story. It may be supposed that Cuthbert Noble was no indifferent or unmoved spectator of the great public events which every day brought forth in the winter of 1640. With his serious and peculiar notions, the questions that affected liberty of conscience and church reform were those which most deeply interested him; and when, upon the morning of the 23d of November, Prynne and Burton entered triumphantly into Westminster, followed by many thousands of the people, Cuthbert was foremost in the crowd; and not a zealot among them was more wildly excited than himself.

Laughter and tears succeeded to each other, as those around expressed their rude sympathy;--now in remarks quaint and comical--now in pious commiseration, or in the stern tones of indignant and just anger.

“Which is old Prynne?” said one.--“That’s he,” said his neighbour, “with his black head clipped close, looking, for all the world, like a skull-cap.”--“See how the old boy grins.”--“He’s no beauty.”--“Hurrah! hurrah!”--“Can you hear, old boy?”--“I wonder if a man can hear without his ears.”--“To be sure a’ can, all the better.”--“Well, he can’t have the ear-ache no more.”--“Don’t talk so unfeeling.”--“Look, poor dear good man, he is as white as a sheet.”--“That is prison and hunger.”--“This is your bishops’ work--od rot ’em--their turn shall come.”

With such vulgarities were mixed the solemn tones and pious expressions of many a sincere Christian, giving utterance to praise and thanksgiving for the deliverance of these persecuted men; while, here and there, a strong voice would be heard, above the crowd, denouncing the tyranny of the church and the crown in coarse language, in which the Establishment was likened to the whore of Babylon,--and the Archbishop of Canterbury was pointed out to the vengeance of the rabble.

Such language would, in a moment of calm reflection, have been utterly revolting to the feelings of Cuthbert. He would have shut his ears to the base and bloody cry, and hurried away from the wretches who gave it utterance, as from the company of sinners, whose feet were already planted in the paths of wickedness, and were swift to shed blood. But now, though such fierce cries gave a jar to his better dispositions and nobler nature, they were regarded as the natural ebullitions of an irritated mob; and he stood among them as a partaker of their guilt by the sanction of his presence.

Nothing is so blind--nothing is so deaf--nothing can stoop so low--as party spirit;--and at no period of English history was this more fully exemplified than at that of which we are now speaking. The Cavaliers, on their side, were not without the support of a rabble of their own; and by these, the slang of the tavern, the bear garden, and the brothel, was exhausted to furnish epithets of scorn, contempt, and ridicule, by which they might insult their fanatical opponents.

To the mental eye of Cuthbert the two victims of a severe and intolerant hierarchy stood out in large and disproportionate grandeur,--filling all the foreground of the picture upon which he now gazed to the exclusion of all other objects.

He saw them bearing the evident marks of torture and degradation on their mutilated forms. They had been thus treated, according to his notion, for a mere error in judgment--they were sufferers for conscience-sake:--his heart grew hot within him,--and he would have called down fire from heaven on the heads of their oppressors.

He accompanied the crowd all through Westminster; and, in the eagerness of his excited mood, pressed in once close to the horse of Prynne, that he might utter a “God save you, master!” to the stern Puritan, face to face.

There was a keen twinkle of triumph in the little eyes of the sour precisian, which showed that he felt his day of revenge would soon come, and that it would be his turn to play inquisitor towards his late haughty oppressor.

However, he would have been more than human had he been superior to such an infirmity, after sustaining injuries so great.

It happened on the day of this public entry of Prynne and Burton that Cuthbert was alone in the quarter of Westminster; and having remained a long time gazing on the show, he went into a tavern in a narrow street behind the Abbey to refresh.

After satisfying his hunger over a fine joint of roast beef in company with a grave looking lawyer, who sat opposite him at the same table, with a roll of parchments and papers by his side, the man of law proposed a cup of canary to the health of Masters Prynne and Burton, in which he was readily seconded by Cuthbert.

“Ah,” said the stranger bitterly, “this is a different kind of procession to the fool’s mummery which they made us play seven years ago, before the wanton queen and her dancing French gentlemen.”

“What! you mean the mask of the inns of court, on Candlemas-day, seven years ago?” asked Cuthbert.

“Just so: that was got up to tickle the court party, and trample down Prynne and his book; but tables are turning.”

“Well, though I think they were very tyrannical about Prynne, I did not like his book; and never saw any harm in a mask or an interlude.”

“Why, to judge by your looks, you could only have been a boy when that mask was given, and perhaps you did not see it.”

“That is true; but I read the account of it that was printed, and surely it was a brave and glorious show; and, methinks, there were some witty hints given his Majesty in the anti-masks, which he might be the wiser for.”

“The man Charles Stuart,” said the stranger, “will never be the better for hints.”

It was the first time that Cuthbert had ever heard from any lips so irreverent a mention of the King, and he coloured and was silent.

“I say he will never be the better for hints,--though it is true that some of them were broad enough, and too humorous for offence; but you have forgotten that there was one anti-mask got up by the serviles to insult the poor. If it may not have a sneer of ridicule for poverty and misfortune, the pleasure of the proud wanteth its best relish.”

“I do not understand you,” said Cuthbert; “of what speak you, master?”

“Of that which has been played in joke, and shall come to pass in earnest. Little they thought, with their gibes and their mockery, that they were but foreshowing events, which the turn of the wheel is even now bringing to pass. I do remember all their gilded chariots and rich apparel, and gay liveries; and in the midst of that costly show, there rode an anti-mask of cripples and beggars, clothed in rags, and mounted on sorry lean jades, gotten out of dust carts, with dirty urchins snapping tongs and shovels before them for music,--and thus was the noble music, and thus were the gallant horses, and the velvets and silks and spangled habits, made more pleasing to the painted court Jezebels by the pitiful contrast. Shall not the Lord visit for these things?” he added, raising his voice, and changing the tone of it to a solemn sternness: “Yea, verily, he shall visit:--in his hand there is a cup,--and the dregs thereof shall be drunk out by the oppressors,--and the sword shall go through the land, and it shall be drunk with blood.”

The severe inference thus forced by the speaker from a trifling circumstance, of which the joyous projectors of the interlude thought perhaps very differently, and which might have been so turned by a playful mind, as a caricature against the foreign musicians, then so much about court; or, again, by a thoughtful mind, as a memento of those dark realities of human misery which invite and demand compassion. This inference was at once received by Cuthbert as just. It touched a chord in his heart that immediately responded, and he was played upon as a lute by his companion; till, at last, the latter opening a roll of parchment requested him to put down his name as a subscriber to the necessities of a few godly and persecuted men now suffering imprisonment for the great cause of liberty of conscience, and whose families were quite destitute.

From his slender purse Cuthbert instantly took the few crowns it contained, and only reserving sufficient money to pay for his dinner, shook his new acquaintance heartily by the hand, and set forth on his way to the city, where he lodged, with a heart glowing with the love of God, of his country, and of mankind. His evil angel had only to appear clothed like an angel of light, and Cuthbert would follow, nothing doubting, whithersoever he was led. The false fire, which glimmered over the dangerous quagmire of gloomy fanaticism, was mistaken by Cuthbert for light from Heaven; and by the frequent perusal of controversies on religion, and a constant attendance on the private ministries of those fierce zealots, who were urging forward the overthrow of the Established Church, he became at length totally bewildered. It was in vain that Francis Heywood exposed to him the hypocrisy and inconsistency of some of those wolves in sheep’s clothing by whom he was now continually surrounded, to the neglect of Heywood’s own society and that of the higher and better order of the Parliamentarian supporters. He listened with pity to remonstrances which he considered as proceeding from a man of the world, and a deceived soul wandering in darkness; nevertheless his affectionate disposition survived the strength of his reason. He looked up to and loved Francis Heywood as a model of what the natural man might attain to; and as in their political views they were altogether agreed, they very often met. The ardent Francis might indeed have well doubted of the soundness of a political creed which numbered among its supporters such diversified and crazy characters as those whom he saw daily embrace it: but although he was not able to endure their sanctimonious professions, and morose manners, he viewed them as instruments necessary to the present warfare of principles; and, having returned from America on purpose to stand up for the popular rights, he remained steadfastly at his post, watching with intense interest the proceedings of parliament, and eager for the moment when those services, which he came to offer, might be required in the field.

In one particular the lives of Francis Heywood and of Cuthbert Noble during the two following years corresponded well. Never were those hard duties which self-denial enjoins, practised with a more resolute and cheerful virtue. The means of both were slender; and they supported themselves by the exercise of their respective talents with credit and success.

Cuthbert attended daily in the families of two or three merchants of the Puritan party as classical tutor to their boys; while Francis Heywood, reserving with great care the sum necessary to purchase a good charger, and military equipments, whenever he might need them, maintained his current expenses by the drawing of maps, plans, and views illustrative of the late campaigns of Gustavus Adolphus, and of the actual warfare in Germany which was then carrying on. These drawings found a sufficient sale, among the curious in such matters, to remunerate the light labour of producing them; and though the printseller, who purchased them from Francis, told him that gentlemen, very capable of advancing his interests, had made inquiries after him, yet he was forbidden by Francis to disclose his residence, or to answer any questions about him. His leisure from this easy occupation was employed in useful studies or in manly exercises. He daily frequented a school of arms, not for instruction, indeed, for he was a master of all weapons, but for health and diversion; and for the same end he went often to the grand manège in the quarter of the court; where he was so great a favourite with the chevalier, who taught the graces of horsemanship, that he was asked as a kindness to exercise the most spirited and beautiful animals of his stud in the open country:--an offer which, from the delight he took in the amusement of schooling a young and high bred horse, he very often accepted.

Francis Heywood was not unknown to many families with whom his father had been intimate; and by some of them, notwithstanding his fortunes and his politics, and by others on account of them, he was invited to several houses, where he might have enjoyed all the pleasures and the refinements of social life; but he very rarely accepted their invitations, not merely from mistaken pride, but from a disrelish of scenes which would always so strongly and painfully suggest to him the happy intercourse he had once enjoyed in that domestic circle, of which his adored Katharine was at once the charm and the idol.

Upon this sweet memory, in lonely hours of leisure, his mind would feed, and he would discourse of it, not indeed in words, but in the soft breathings of his lute; till, suddenly, by the strong effort of a manly will, he would tear himself from the dangerous indulgence, and sit closely down to his writing desk, that he might complete the minute journal of public events which he kept for his father, and despatched, as opportunities offered, to New England.

To the review of these grave subjects he brought a generous spirit; and it was not without an occasional pang that he related the progress and triumph of the cause to which he was sincerely attached.

He could not but exult to see the principles of government openly examined, and the just rights and liberties of the people clearly defined.

He looked with veneration upon the labours of the Commons; and he watched with jealousy the advisers of the crown, and the sycophants about the court. He saw many abuses rectified, many grievances redressed. He saw the iniquitous Star Chamber and the High Commission Court abolished,--and a noble security against a return of misgovernment and tyranny in the famous bill for a triennial parliament.

This last measure, the main pillar of the new constitution, was received by the whole nation with rejoicings; and when it passed solemn thanks were presented to his Majesty by both houses of parliament. But the sincerity of the court party and the moderation of the reformers were alike suspicious. The passions, the prejudices, and the interests of conflicting parties had been too rudely aroused by discussion to subside without an explosive collision; and it was evident to Francis that the struggle between the prerogatives of the crown and the privileges of parliament would never terminate without an appeal to arms.

He shuddered to see the scaffold stained with the blood of Strafford; and though he was among those who clamoured against the minister, he profoundly commiserated the man, as the abandoned victim of his party,--and in his heart he despised Charles for signing the death-warrant of his favourite.

CHAP. XVII.

There let the pealing organ blow, To the full-voiced quire below, In service high and anthems clear, As may with sweetness through mine ear Dissolve me into ecstasies, And bring all heaven before mine eyes. MILTON.

The affliction of the good parson of Cheddar at the strange and painful conduct of his son Cuthbert was heavy to bear. However, from a sense of duty to his weaker partner, he made great efforts to preserve his wonted serenity and composure in her presence; but when alone he was bowed down in the dust.

Nothing could possibly present a greater contrast to the tone of religious profession which was, at this period, obtaining a wide reception among men than that in which old Noble lay prostrate in his closet before his God.

He had ever been a meek and cheerful Christian; but there were depths of humiliation which he had not as yet fathomed; and he would have fainted at the waves of trouble, which his prescient eye saw rolling onward, if he had not felt the hand, which led him down into the deep, was that of a heavenly Father, if he had not heard a voice that whispered in his ear, “_It is I, be not afraid_.”

In vain did he exhaust his heart in sound, pious, and affectionate remonstrances, meditated and penned in the spirit of prayer, that he might recall his dear and wandering child to the bosom of the church, or, at all events, so far recover him from gross delusions as to see him join that upright and devout portion of the community, which, though differing from the discipline of the church, maintained a pure and practical doctrine.

In vain did he press the return of Cuthbert to Cheddar, by every argument which parental love could suggest.

The letters of Noble and his wife were replied to in the words of love; but the fruit of his new persuasion was an obstinate self-will; and while he implored them, at great length, to consider his views, and urged the danger of despising them, he evinced to others, what was not perhaps suspected by himself, a degree of spiritual pride only to be exceeded by the strength of his delusion.

He had adopted the notions of those fanatics who were styled Fifth-monarchy Men, and who ranged themselves where, indeed, any sect, however extravagant, might have found a place, under the banner of the Independents.

It was some consolation to these troubled parents to hear from the Philips’s, their relations, and also from other friends, that the life and the conduct of Cuthbert were, as regarded all moral and social duties, a credit to any theory, and such as became the pure precepts of the Gospel.

His intellect was clear upon every other subject, except on that which, if it be rashly touched, seems to be guarded by invisible angels, who put forth their hands and smite the daring intruder with madness. “Oppression,” saith the preacher, “will make a wise man mad;”--a truth abundantly proved by the events, which, leading first to a secret and salutary reform, ended at last in a bloody revolution and an iron rule.

It may be added, that he who seeketh to meddle with the hidden mysteries of unfulfilled prophecy is often smitten with blindness and confusion for his presumption. Thus it was with Cuthbert:--sensible, amiable, and affectionate in all the relations of life, he was now the subject of a monomania, and turned a deaf ear to the voice of truth and wisdom, though it spoke with all the authority and all the earnestness of a father.

These were not times in which a minister could leave his parish for a distant journey, nor, indeed, was it at all likely that the presence of his parents would have effected that change in the sentiments or the course of Cuthbert, which their admirable and Christian letters had failed to produce.

Time wore on gloomily enough, even in the peaceful parsonage at Cheddar. Many a time as old Noble paced his garden amid sunbeams and flowers, praising that “mercy which endureth for ever,” his thanksgivings ended in tears and lamentations, not for his domestic troubles, but for the great evils which he feared and expected would befall the church and the nation.

Laud was already paying the penalty of his mistaken, but certainly conscientious, severity, in a prison, from whence it might be plainly foretold he would at length be conducted to the block. The bishops’ votes in parliament were taken away, and the deans and chapters were already voted against in the Commons, although their spoliation had not yet taken place, neither were the cathedral services as yet discontinued. As regularly, therefore, as the Thursday came round, Noble, if not prevented by a special call of duty at home, made his weekly visit to the fair city of Wells; where he in the first instance always bent his steps to the cathedral, and joined the congregation assembled for morning service.

It was on a saint’s day, in the summer of 1641, that, as usual, he proceeded to that venerable and glorious temple, and took his seat in the vacant stall which it was his wont to occupy. Directly opposite he observed a tall uncouth man of harsh features and a sour countenance, sitting very upright, and glancing a severe and restless eye at the organ, the first tones of which were pealing through the long aisles, as the dean, the prebends, and other officers of the choir, preceded by the vergers with their maces, slowly entered, and reverently took their seats.

The service began, and was conducted with that solemn decency, and with those clear fine chants, which dispose most hearts to a subdued feeling of intense devotion.

There is a something in sacred music which does wonderfully compose the mind, and cleanse it of all earthly-rooted cares. Upon the stranger above mentioned, however, it produced no such effect. He sat erect, cold, and contemptuous: he put aside the Book of Common Prayer with a rude thrust; and taking a small volume from his pocket opened it with ostentatious gravity, and, not joining in the worship that he witnessed, either by response, gesture, or any conformity of posture with those around him, sat, now casting his eyes on the page of his book, now severely around, and now raising them to Heaven after a manner that left nothing but the jaundiced whites visible.

This strange conduct disturbed, irritated, or amused the observers, according to the impression that was made upon them. Some of the prebends and vicars choral looked red and angry. The dean was greatly distressed, and knew not what to do. At first he called the verger, with a design to remove the intruder; but, upon second thoughts, he feared that a yet greater interruption and indecency might take place if such a course was attempted, he therefore commanded his feelings with as much dignity as he could. But his grave frowns were totally without power upon the youthful choristers, whose laughter would have been loud and audible, but for the thick folds of the surplice with which they stuffed their rebellious and aching jaws.

Noble himself was mournfully agitated, and prayed in the spirit with that deep and melancholy fervour which hath no outward expression but the abased eyes.

By degrees, the congregation recovered their composure, and never was an anthem performed with more earnest solemnity, or a sweetness more touching to the inmost soul, than the “_Ne Irascaris_,” the “Be not Wroth,” or “Bow thine Ear” of the famous composer Bird. At the words “Sion, thy Sion is wasted and brought low,” which are set to a tender and solemn passage, and are sung very soft and slow, the effect was sublime. Moved by the deep pathos of the expression, the cheeks of Noble, as of a few others present, were bathed in tears.

But the stranger remained in his seat without rising, and perused his book with a kind of resolved and insulting inattention to it all.

The service was not permitted to close without this mysterious personage marking his contempt of it yet farther, by rising suddenly, while all the congregation were on their knees, and stalking slowly down the middle of the aisle with a loud and measured stamp of his great thick boots.

He wore by his side a long heavy-looking sword, and had certainly the air of a man who could use it, if he chose, with little fear and no favour.

Noble joined the clergy in the chapter-room directly after the morning prayers were ended, and there learned that there had been a riot the night before in the streets, excited by some mischievous emissary from London; and that some of the rabble had burned a bishop in effigy, in the close just under the windows of the dean. It seemed, however, that this outrage had been committed by a band of low persons, who had come up from Bristol to attend a fair, and had brought with them sundry printed papers and ribald songs to distribute in the lanes and alleys of the city: the object of which was to bring the church and clergy into public contempt.