shall no more be beaten. One penny every week the good priest
that teacheth me shall have; mother, Nan, and Bet the other four.
We be done with hunger and rags, now, done with fears and frets
and savage usage.”
In his dream he reached his sordid home all out of breath, but
with eyes dancing with grateful enthusiasm; cast four of his
pennies into his mother’s lap and cried out–
“They are for thee!–all of them, every one!–for thee and Nan and
Bet–and honestly come by, not begged nor stolen!”
The happy and astonished mother strained him to her breast and
exclaimed–
“It waxeth late–may it please your Majesty to rise?”
Ah! that was not the answer he was expecting. The dream had
snapped asunder–he was awake.
He opened his eyes–the richly clad First Lord of the Bedchamber
was kneeling by his couch. The gladness of the lying dream faded
away–the poor boy recognised that he was still a captive and a
king. The room was filled with courtiers clothed in purple
mantles–the mourning colour–and with noble servants of the
monarch. Tom sat up in bed and gazed out from the heavy silken
curtains upon this fine company.
The weighty business of dressing began, and one courtier after
another knelt and paid his court and offered to the little King
his condolences upon his heavy loss, whilst the dressing
proceeded. In the beginning, a shirt was taken up by the Chief
Equerry in Waiting, who passed it to the First Lord of the
Buckhounds, who passed it to the Second Gentleman of the
Bedchamber, who passed it to the Head Ranger of Windsor Forest,
who passed it to the Third Groom of the Stole, who passed it to
the Chancellor Royal of the Duchy of Lancaster, who passed it to
the Master of the Wardrobe, who passed it to Norroy King-at-Arms,
who passed it to the Constable of the Tower, who passed it to the
Chief Steward of the Household, who passed it to the Hereditary
Grand Diaperer, who passed it to the Lord High Admiral of England,
who passed it to the Archbishop of Canterbury, who passed it to
the First Lord of the Bedchamber, who took what was left of it and
put it on Tom. Poor little wondering chap, it reminded him of
passing buckets at a fire.
Each garment in its turn had to go through this slow and solemn
process; consequently Tom grew very weary of the ceremony; so
weary that he felt an almost gushing gratefulness when he at last
saw his long silken hose begin the journey down the line and knew
that the end of the matter was drawing near. But he exulted too
soon. The First Lord of the Bedchamber received the hose and was
about to encase Tom’s legs in them, when a sudden flush invaded
his face and he hurriedly hustled the things back into the hands
of the Archbishop of Canterbury with an astounded look and a
whispered, “See, my lord!” pointing to a something connected with
the hose. The Archbishop paled, then flushed, and passed the hose
to the Lord High Admiral, whispering, “See, my lord!” The Admiral
passed the hose to the Hereditary Grand Diaperer, and had hardly
breath enough in his body to ejaculate, “See, my lord!” The hose
drifted backward along the line, to the Chief Steward of the
Household, the Constable of the Tower, Norroy King-at-Arms, the
Master of the Wardrobe, the Chancellor Royal of the Duchy of
Lancaster, the Third Groom of the Stole, the Head Ranger of
Windsor Forest, the Second Gentleman of the Bedchamber, the First
Lord of the Buckhounds,–accompanied always with that amazed and
frightened “See! see!”–till they finally reached the hands of the
Chief Equerry in Waiting, who gazed a moment, with a pallid face,
upon what had caused all this dismay, then hoarsely whispered,
“Body of my life, a tag gone from a truss-point!–to the Tower
with the Head Keeper of the King’s Hose!”–after which he leaned
upon the shoulder of the First Lord of the Buckhounds to regather
his vanished strength whilst fresh hose, without any damaged
strings to them, were brought.
But all things must have an end, and so in time Tom Canty was in a