pardoned; upon which giving a great Shout, they threw up their Halters towards the Roof of the Hall, crying, God save the King. When this News was bruited abroad, several that had been in the Insurrection, and had escaped, came in upon their own accords with Ropes about their Necks, and received the Benefit of the King's Pardon; after which the Cardinal gave them several good Exhortations tending to Loyalty and Obedience; and so dismissed them, to their no small Joy; and within a while after the Gallowses that were set in the several Parts of the City, were taken down, which so far pleased the Citizens, that they expressed infinite Thanks to the King for his Clemency.

"This Company was called the Black Waggon; and the Day whereon this Riot and Insurrection happened, bears the Name of Evil May-Day to these our present Times. And thus have you heard how the Citizens escaped the King's Displeasure, and were again received into Favour; though, as it is thought, not without paying a considerable Sum of Money to the Cardinal to stand their Friend, for at that Time he was in such Power, that he did all with the King.

"These great Mayings and May-Games, with the triumphant Setting-up the great Shaft, a principal May-pole in Leadenhall-Street before the Parish Church of St. Andrew, thence called Undershaft, were not so commonly used after this Insurrection on May-Day, 1517, as before."

The story must be finished, though this part of it does not belong to Westminster, by showing the end of the shaft.

After the Evil May-Day it was never raised again.

This proves the growing dread, in the minds of the officials, of the mob when they came together. The after history of London is full of this dread, which experience fully justifies. The famous May-pole hung upon its hooks from the year 1517 to the year 1549, the third of Edward VI. There flourished at that time a certain person named Sir Stephen, a curate of St. Katharine Cree, a fanatic of the most abominable kind. He wanted to turn the Reformation into a Revolution; all the ancient ways were to be abandoned or turned upside down. He wanted the names of churches to be altered; the names of the days of the week to be altered-"Saturday" is sheer pagan, and so is Friday, for we all know who Freya was; he wanted fishdays to be any days except Friday and Saturday; and Lent to be observed at any time of the year except the time between Shrove Tuesday and Easter Sunday. "I have often," says Stow, "seen this man forsaking the pulpit of his said parish church, preach out of a high elm tree in the midst of the churchyard, and then entering the church, forsaking the altar, to have sung his high mass in English upon a tomb of the dead towards the north." Now on one occasion Sir Stephen preached at Paul's Cross, and he told the people that by naming the church St. Andrew Undershaft they made an idol of a May-pole. “I heard his sermon," says Stow," and I saw the effect that followed, for in the afternoon of that present Sunday, the neighbours and tenants to the said bridge over whose doors the said shaft then leaned, after they had well dined, to make themselves strong, gathered more help and with great labour rending the shaft from the hooks, whereon it had rested two and thirty years, they sawed it in pieces, every man taking for his share so much as had

lain over his door and stall, the length of his house: and they of the alley divided among them so much as had lain over their alley gate. Thus was this idol, as he, poor man, termed it, mangled and after burned."

Many great and memorable events took place in the Hall, apart from the grand functions of State, or beside them. For instance, here began the massacre of the Jews at the coronation of Richard I. Here, in the same reign, the Archbishop and the Lords sat to pronounce sentence upon William Longbeard, who came with thousands of followers, so that they dared not pronounce sentence upon him. Here they brought the prisoners of Lincoln, a hundred and two Jews charged with crucifying a child, Hugh of Lincoln. That must have been a strange sight, this company of aliens who could never blend with the people among whom they lived: different in face, different in ideas, different in religion. They are dragged into the Hall, roped together: the prospect of death is before them; they are accused of a crime which they would not dare to commit, even at the very worst time of oppression; even when the wrongs and injustices and hatred of the people had driven them well-nigh mad. At the end of the Hall sit their judges; the men-at-arms are at their side to let none escape; the Hall is filled with people. eager for their blood. The witnesses are called: they have heard this said and that said; it is all hearsaythere is nothing but hearsay; and at the close eighteen of them are sentenced to be hanged, and the rest are driven back to prison, lucky if, after many years, they live to receive the King's release.

Stalls and shops for books, ribbons, and other things were set up along the sides of the Hall; and it was

always a great place for lawyers. Lydgate says, speaking of the Hall:

Within this Hall, neither riche nor yet poore,

Wolde do for aught, althogh I sholde dye :
Which seeing I gat me out of the doore,
Where Flemynge on me began for to cry,
Master, what will you require or by?

Fyne felt hatts or spectacles to rede,

Lay down your sylver and here you may spede.

And so enough of Westminster Hall and the History of England.

LAVREATIES

CHAPTER III.

THE ABBEY-I.

LEAVE to courtly hands, to ecclesiastics of rank, to those who understand the pomp and dignity of history, the Abbey Church, with its royal memories and national associations. It is for Deans to dwell at length upon this stately shrine of England's story. Those whose place is duly assigned and reserved for them at Coronations, Functions, and Funerals in this Church; those whose office brings them into personal relations with Kings and Queens, Princes and Princesses; those who belong to the Palace as much as to the Abbey, are the fittest persons to write on the events and episodes belonging to the Church, and to enumerate the chapels, altars, tombs, and monuments. within its walls. Again, there is the building itself: this has been described over and over again by architects and the students of architecture; stone by stone the structure has been examined; hardly one that has not been assigned to its builder and its date. We have been taught all that remains of Edward the Confessor; all that Henry the Third began and his son continued; what Richard the Second raised; what is due to Henry the Seventh and what to Wren. We may leave aside, for the most part, the ceremonies of state, Corona