a very quiet life was led by avice and bertha. the house work was done by the two in the early morning—cleaning, washing, baking, churning, and brewing, as they were severally needed; and in the afternoon they sat down to their work, enlivened either by singing or conversation. sometimes both were silent, and when that was the case, unknown to avice, bertha was generally watching her features, and trying to read their meaning. at length, one evening after a long silence, she suddenly broke the stillness with a blunt question.
“aunt, i wish you would tell me what you are thinking of when you look so.”
“how do i look, bertha?”
“as if you were looking at something which nobody could see but yourself. sometimes it seems to be something pretty, and sometimes something shocking; but oftener than either, something just a little sad, and yet as if there were pleasantness about it. i don’t know exactly how to describe it.”
“that will do. when a woman comes to fifty years, little bertha, there are plenty of things in the past of her life, which nobody can see who did not go through them with her. and often those who did so cannot see them. that will leave a scar upon one which makes not a scratch upon another.”
“but of what were you thinking, aunt, if i may know?”
“that thou mayest. i fancy, when thou spakest, i was thinking—as i very often do—about my little lady.”
“now, if aunt avice is very good,” said bertha insinuatingly, and with brightened eyes, “that means a story.”
aunt avice smiled. “ay, thou shalt have thy story. only let us be sure first that all is done which need be. cast a few more chips on the fire, and light another pine-torch; that is burnt nigh out. and see thy bodkin on the floor—careless child!”
bertha jumped up and obeyed. from one corner of the room, where lay a heap of neatly-cut faggots, she brought a handful, and threw it into the wide fire-place, which stretched across half one side of the room, and had no grate, the fire burning on the stone hearth: then from a pile of long pointed stakes of pitch pine, she brought one, lighted it, and set it in an iron frame by the fire-place made for that purpose; and lastly, she picked up from the brick floor an article of iron, about a foot in length, and nearly as thick as her little finger, which she called a bodkin, but which we should think very rude and clumsy indeed.
“hast thou heard, bertha,” said avice, “that when i was young, i dwelt for a season in the castle of windsor, and my mother was nurse to some of the children of the lord king that then was? brothers and sister they were of our lord king edward that reigns now.”
bertha’s eyes brightened. she liked, as all girls do, to hear a story which had to do with great people.
“no, aunt avice, i never knew that. won’t you tell me all about it?”
so avice began and told her what we know already—how the bishop had recommended agnes to the queen, and all about the journey, and the castle, and the queen herself. then she went on to tell the rest of the story.
“we lived nigh five years,” said avice, “in the castle of windsor—until the lord richard was dead, and the lord william was nearly four years old. then the lady queen removed to the royal palace of westminster, for the lord king was gone over seas, and she with earl richard his brother was left to keep england. it was in august, the year of our lord 1253, at we took up our abode in thorney island, where the palace of westminster stands. it is a marshy place—not over healthy, some folks say; but i never was ill while we dwelt there. and it was there, on saint katherine’s day”—which is the 25th of november—“that our little lady was born. her royal mother named her katherine, after the blessed saint. she was the loveliest babe that eye could rest on, and she was christened with great pomp. and on saint edward’s day, when the lady queen was purified”—namely, churched—“there was such a feast as i never saw again while i dwelt with her. the provisions brought in for that feast were fourteen wild boars, twenty-four swans, one hundred and thirty-five rabbits, two hundred and fifty partridges, sixteen hundred and fifty fowls, fifty hares, two hundred and fifty wild ducks, thirty-six geese, and sixty-one thousand eggs.”
“only think!” cried bertha. “did you get some, aunt?”
“surely i did, child. the lady queen, i told thee, was then keeper of england, for the lord king was away across the seas; and good provision she made. truly, she was free-handed enough at spending. would she had been as just in the way she came by her money!”
“why, aunt, what mean you?” asked bertha, when avice expressed her wish that queen eleanor had been as just in gaining money as she was liberal in spending it.
“why, child, taxes came heavy in those days. when the lord king needed money, he sent home to his treasurer, and it was had as he could get it—sometimes by selling up divers rich folks, or by levying a good sum from the jews, or any way man could; not always by equal tenths or fifteenths, as now, which comes not nigh so heavy on one or two when it is equally meted out to all. but never was there king like our late lord king henry (whom god pardon) for squeezing money out of his poor subjects. yet old folks did use to say his father king john was as ill or worse.”
taxes, in those days, were a very different thing from what they are now, and were far more at the mere pleasure of the king, not only as to the collecting of them, but as to the spending. ignorant people fancy that this is the case still; but it is not so. queen victoria has no money from the taxes for her private spending. when she became queen, she gave up all the land belonging to her as queen, on condition that her daughters should be portioned, and that she should receive a certain sum of money every year, of less value than the land she gave up; so that it would be fraud and breach of trust in the people if they did not keep their word to pay the sum agreed on to the queen. there is so much misunderstanding on this point that it is worth while to mention it.
“then were the king and queen—” bertha began.
avice answered the half-asked question. “they were like other folks, child. they liked their own way, and tried to get it. and they liked fine clothes, and great feasts, and plenty of company, and so forth; so they spent their money that way. i’ll not say they were bad folks, though they did some bad things they were folks that only thought what they liked, and did it; and folks that do that are sure to bring sorrow to themselves and others too, whether they be kings and queens or cooks and haymakers. the kings and queens can do it on a larger scale; that is all the difference. there are few enough that think what god likes, as holy bishop robert did, and like to do his will better than their own; those that do scatter happiness around them, as the other sort scatter misery.
“well, after a while, the lady queen left england, to join the lord king across seas; but before she went, she took our little lady down to the castle of windsor to the rest of the king’s children. there was first the lady beatrice, who was a maiden of twelve years; and the lord edmund, a very pretty little boy of nine; and the lord william, who was but four; and there were also with them other children of different ages that were brought up with them; but only one was near our little lady’s age, or had much to do with her. that was alianora de montfort, daughter of earl simon of leicester, that bold baron that headed the lords against the king; and her mother was the king’s own sister, the lady alianora. she was fifteen months older than our little lady, and being youngest of all, the two used to play together. a sweet child she was, too; but not like my own little lady—there never was a child like her.”
“what was she like, aunt?”
“tell me what the angels are like in heaven, and thou shalt hear then. she is an angel now—she hath been one these three-and-twenty years. but methinks there can have been little to change in her face when she blossomed into a cherub, and the wings would unfold themselves from her as by nature. never a child like her!—no, there never was one. she had bright, dark eyes, wonderful eyes—eyes that her whole soul shone in, and that took in everything which passed. she spoke with her eyes; she had no other way. the souls of other children came out of their lips; but she had not spent many months in this lower world, before we saw with bitter apprehension and deep sorrow that god had sealed her sweet lips with eternal silence. she saw all; she heard nothing; she could never speak. my darling was deaf and dumb.”
“o aunt avice!”
“ay, verily at times i wondered if she were indeed an angel that god had sent down to earth, for whose pure lips our english was too rough, and our french too rude, and who could only speak the tongue they speak in heaven. she went back but whence she came; we were not fit company for her. methinks she was sent to let our earthbound hearts have one glimpse of that upper world; and when her work was done, her father sent for her back home.
“though our little lady could never speak, yet long before we discovered that, we found how lively, and earnest, and intelligent she was. as i told thee, she talked with her eyes. nothing could be done in her presence but she must see and know all about it. a little pull at my gown would tell me she was there; and then i turned to see the bright eager eyes looking into mine, and asking me as plainly as eyes could ask to let her know all about it. she would never rest till she knew what she wanted. ay me, those eager eyes look into angels’ faces now, and maybe into the face of god upon the throne.”
“but, aunt, how could she understand, if she could not hear?”
“god told her somehow, child. he taught her, not we. we did our best, truly; but our best would have been a poor business, if he had not taken her in hand. many a time, before i had finished trying to explain something to her, that quick little nod would come which meant, ‘i understand.’ then she had certain signs for different things. she made those herself; we never taught them to her. she stroked what she liked, as man would stroke a dog; when she disliked anything, she made a feint of throwing her open hand out from her, as though she were pushing it away. she had odd little ways of indicating different persons, by something in them which struck her. master russell, the queen’s clerk, and keeper of the royal children, used often to have a sprig of mint or thyme in his lips as he went about; her sign for him was a bit of stick or thread between her lips. for the priest, she tolled a bell. for the lady beatrice, her sister, who had a little airy way of putting her head on one side when anything vexed her, and my lord henry de lacy, who pouted if he were cross (which he was pretty often)—my little lady imitated them exactly. the lady alianora flourished her hands when she spoke; that was the sign for her. for the lord king, her father, whose left eyelid drooped over his eye, she pulled her own down. she had some such sign for everybody. she noticed everything.”
“could she not say one word, aunt?”
“yes, she could say three. verily, sometimes i marvelled if she might not have been taught more; but we knew not how, and how she got hold of those three we could never tell.”
“what were they?”
“they were, ‘up,’ ‘who,’ and ‘poor.’”
“well, she could not do much with those.”
“could she not! ‘who’ asked all her questions. it answered for who, what, where, when, how, and why. she went on saying it until we understood and replied to the sense in which she meant it. ‘poor’ was the word of emotion; it signified ‘i pity you,’ ‘i love you,’ ‘i am sorry,’ and ‘forgive me.’ and sometimes it meant, ‘forgive him,’ or ‘don’t you feel sorry for her?’ and i think ‘up’ served for everything else.”
“aunt,” said bertha softly, “how did you teach the little lady to pray? she could tell her beads, i suppose; but would she know what they meant?”
for bertha, like everybody else at that time, thought it necessary to keep count of her prayers. prayer, in her eyes, was not so much communion with god, as it was a kind of charm which in some unaccountable way brought you good luck.
“beads would have meant nothing to her but toys,” was avice’s reply. “the lady de la mothe taught her the holy sign”—by which avice meant the cross—“and led her to the image of blessed mary, that she might do it before her. but i do not think she ever properly understood that she seemed only to have an idea that it was something she must do when she saw an image; and she did it to the statue of the lady queen in the great hall. we could not make her understand that one image was not the same thing as another image. but i fancy she had some idea—strange and dim it might be—of what we meant when we knelt and put our hands together and looked up. i know she did it very often, without telling—always at night, before she slept. but it was strange that she never went to the holy images at that time; she always seemed to go away from them, and kneel down in a corner. and in her last illness, several times, coming into the chamber, i found her lying with her hands folded in prayer, and her eyes lifted up to heaven. perhaps god himself told her how to speak to him. one of the strangest things of all was when the little lord william died; she was nearly three years old then. she had been very fond of her little brother; he was nearest her age of all her brothers and sisters, though he was almost four years older than herself. she came to me sobbing bitterly, and with her little cry of ‘who? who?’ i took it to mean ‘what has happened to him?’ and i was completely puzzled how to explain it to her. but all at once, while i was beating my brains to think what i could say that would make her comprehend it, she told me herself what i could not tell her. making the sign for the little lord who was dead, she laid her headupon her hand, and closed her eyes; and then all at once, with a peculiar grace that i never saw in any child but herself, she lifted her arms, fluttering her fingers like a bird flaps its wings, and gazing up into the sky, while she said, ‘up! up!’ in a kind of rapture. and i could only smile and bow my head to the truth which god had told her.” (see note 1.)
“but how could she know it?” asked astonished bertha.
avice shook her head. “i cannot explain it; i can only tell what happened. she was always very tender-hearted; she never could bear to see any quarrelling, or cruelty, or injustice. if two of the children strove together, our little lady would run to them with a face of deep distress, and take a hand of each and draw them together, as though she were begging them to be friends; and if she could not get them to kiss each other, she would kiss first one and then the other. i missed her one day, and, after hunting a long while, i found her in the gallery before a fresco of our lord upon the cross. she was stroking it and kissing it, with tears in her eyes; and she turned to me saying, ‘poor! poor!’ her eyes always filled with tears when she saw the crucifix. the moon used to interest her exceedingly; she would sit and watch it, and kiss her hand to it. but, dear me! how the time must be getting on! jump up, bertha, and prepare supper.”
bertha folded up her work and put it aside. she drew one of the high stools between her aunt and herself, and put out upon it the two wooden trenchers and two tin mugs. going to a corner cupboard, bertha brought out a few cakes of black bread, which she set on a smaller stool beside the other; and then, lifting a pan upon the fire, she threw into it some pieces of mutton fat. as soon as these were melted, bertha broke four eggs into them, stirring this indigestible mixture with a wooden thible—an article of which my northern readers will not require a description, but the southern must be told that it is a long flat instrument with which porridge is stirred. for the eggs were not merely fried in the fat, but were beaten up with it, the dish when finished bearing the name of franche-mule. a sprig or two of dried herbs were then shred into the pan, and the whole poured out, half on each of the trenchers. it is more than possible that the extraordinarily rich, incongruous, indigestible dishes wherein our fathers delighted, may have something to do with the weaker digestions of their children. the tin mugs were filled with weak ale from a barrel which stood under the ladder. it was an oddity at that time to drink water.
when supper was finished, bertha washed the mugs and scraped the trenchers clean (water never touched those), putting them back in their places. she had scarcely ended when a tap was heard at the door.
“step in, hildith,” said bertha, as she opened it. “christ give thee a good even!”
“the like to thee,” was the answer, as a rather worn-looking woman came in. “mistress avice, your servant. pray you, would you lend me the loan of a tinder-box? i am but now come home from work, and am that weary i may scarce move; and yon careless jaket hath let the fire out, and i must needs kindle the same again ere i may dress supper for the children.”
it was no wonder if hildith looked worn out, or if she could not afford a tinder-box. that precious article cost a penny, and her wages were fifteen pence a year. if we do a sum to find out what that would be now, when money is much more plentiful, we shall find that hildith’s wages come to twenty-two shillings and sixpence, and the tinder-box was worth eighteen-pence. we should fancy that nobody could live on such a sum. but we must remember two things: first, they then did a great deal for themselves which we pay for; they spun and wove their own linen and woollen, did their own washing, brewed their own ale and cider, made their own butter and cheese, and physicked themselves with herbs. secondly, prices were very much lower as respected the necessaries of life; bread was four loaves, or cakes, for a penny, of the very best quality; a lamb or a goose cost fourpence, eight chickens were sold for fivepence, and twenty-four eggs for a penny. clothing stuffs were dear, but then (as people sometimes say) they wore “for everlasting,” and ladies of rank would send half-worn gowns to one another as very handsome presents. fourpence was a good price to give for a pair of shoes, and a halfpenny a day for food was a liberal allowance.
“any news to-night, hildith?” asked avice, as she handed her neighbour the tinder-box.
“well, nay; without you call it news that sheriffs man brought word this morrow that the lord king had granted the half of her goods to old barnaba o’ the lichgate.”
“she that was a jew, and was baptised at whitsuntide? i am glad to hear that.”
“ay, she. i am not o’er sorry; she is a good neighbour, jew though she be.”
“then i reckon she will tarry here, and not go to dwell in the house of converts in london town?”
“marry, she will so, if she have any wisdom teeth left. i would not like to be carried away from all i know, up to yon big town, though they do say the houses be made o’ gold and silver.”
avice smiled, for she knew better.
“nay, hildith, london town is built of brick and stone like lincoln.”
“is it, now? i always heard it was made o’ gold. but aren’t there a vast sight o’ folk there? nigh upon ten thousand?”
“ay, and more.”
“however do they get victuals for them all?”
“i got mine when i lived there,” said avice, laughing.
“and don’t they burn sea-coal?”
“they did once; it is forbidden now.”
“dirty, poisonous stuff! i wouldn’t touch it. well, good-even. shut the door quick, bertha, and don’t watch me out o’ sight; ’tis the unluckiest thing man can do.”
and bertha believed it, as she showed by shutting the door.
old barnaba, the jewess, had been dealt with tenderly. in those days, if a jew were baptised, he forfeited all he had to the king. most unaccountable it is that any christian country should have let such a law exist for an hour! these destitute jews, however, were provided for in the house of converts, in london, which stood at the bottom of chancery lane, between it and saint dunstan’s church.
it was bed-time soon after. avice put away her distaff, bertha folded up her sewing, and they mounted the ladder. this was about seven o’clock, which was then as late an hour as it was thought that respectable people ought to be about. but by two o’clock the next morning, bertha was sweeping the kitchen, and avice carding flax in the corner. they did not trouble themselves about breakfast; it was an unknown luxury, except for people who were very old or very delicate. two meals a day were the rule: dinner, at nine in the morning: supper, at three in the afternoon. in those days they lived in a far harder and less comfortable way than we do, and they had generally better health. but, it must be admitted, they did not live nearly so long, and the infant mortality among them was very great.
morning was no time for story-telling. the rooms had to be swept, the bread to be baked, the clothes to be washed, the pigs and chickens to be fed. moreover, to-day was the first day of the michaelmas fair, and things must be bought in to last till christmas. the active work was finished by about seven o’clock. dinner was now got ready. it consisted of two bowls of broth, then boiled dumplings, and lastly some stewed giblets. having made things tidy, our friends now tied on woollen hoods, and each taking down from the rafter-hooks a capacious basket, they went forth to do their shopping.
note 1. the peculiar ways attributed to the little princess, and especially this incident, are taken from an account of a real deaf and dumb child, published many years ago. there was certainly something about the princess which her attendants considered wonderful and beautiful.
