Most districts throw up, every now and again, a character who for some reason is remembered long after his death. Sometimes he is remembered for what he is, sometimes for what he does, and the more extraordinary his personality or exploits when alive, the more likely he is to become a legend afterwards. The link between all five of the characters in this section is that they were, in their own way, somewhat larger than life.
This man was not a mythical or magic giant – simply ‘a giant of a man’, akin to Tom Hickathrift of Wisbech, or Little John whose grave is still to be seen at Hathersage in Derbyshire (or so it is claimed). He did, however, apparently emulate the more mythical giants in his belief that might was right.
Jack o’ Legs he was called, and no wonder, for he was the very giant of a man. So tall was he that when he walked down the middle of the narrow streets of Baldock, he could peer into the upper storey windows on either side; and when he spied a friend in one of the upper rooms (or a pretty woman going about her toilet, as she believed, in privacy) he would stop, lean his elbows on the window sill, and peer in, either for a chat or to leer and guffaw at the poor woman’s consternation and discomfiture. Some said he was a pleasant enough fellow, and that there was no harm in him, but others had less comfortable tales to tell.
Jack lived in a cave near the village of Weston, for no house was large enough to accommodate him, and his huge frame took a good deal of food to keep it going. But as he did no work, he had no means of supplying his body’s needs. This gave him some very strange and questionable ideas on the subject of property. What he coveted, wanted or needed, he took, and that’s all there was to the matter; and because of his huge strength, that matched his huge size, there was never a man to gainsay him.
His neighbours in Baldock and the surrounding villages had little enough to keep body and soul together in any case. They certainly had nothing to spare for their gigantic ‘friend’, and though they took care not to show their resentment to his face, they were very bitter on the subject of his depredations on their households. They were not his only enemies, either, for when his neighbours failed to supply his wants, Jack strolled down to the village of Graveley, and there he waited till wealthy travellers came by on the road to or from London. Then he would play the part of a highwayman, and take from them everything they carried, whether it was little or much. Many were left dying or dead by the roadside, and the dread of journeying up or down Jack’s Hill spread the story of the Weston Giant’s doings far and wide.
Such accomplishments as he had only added to the fear people had of him. He was an expert with a bow, and his boast was that an arrow from it would travel three miles at least before it landed. Moreover, he could pick off a rook as it sat on a tree top half a mile away. That he was no simpleton only made his neighbours more bitter about him. For him, might was right, and he cared little who suffered, as long as his wants were satisfied.
There came a time when the resentment of Jack’s victims turned to desperation, and they were driven to attempt some long-deserved revenge upon him. What could not be achieved by strength must be done by guile and numbers. There were few who had not suffered at his hands, and as soon as the secret word went round that there was a plot afoot to capture Jack and put an end to his wants forever, men flocked to offer their services in the project.
Meanwhile, they kept up their pretence of friendliness towards him, and gave him no inkling of what was to come. The evening before the attack was to be made, a message passed from mouth to mouth throughout the whole neighbourhood. Let all women and children, and such men as were afraid, keep to their houses next morning; but let all those of stout heart and good courage meet early in the morning in the churchyard at Baldock, and hide themselves from sight until orders were given to sally forth.
Came the dawn, and with it Jack left his cave at Weston and strolled towards Baldock, carrying his great bow, as was his wont. Having no reason to suspect mischief, he did not notice how deserted were the little streets, and how quiet the town as the women and children cringed inside their tiny houses at the thought of the danger still to come for their men hidden in Baldock churchyard.
The giant strolled up towards the church, but saw no man on his way; nor did he when he paused by Baldock church, debating, so it seemed to the breathless watchers, which way he should take.
After what seemed an uncertain age to the crouched or prostrate men, Jack turned and made his way down the road that led eventually to Radwell. Then they all crept out from their hiding places and, craftily and warily, followed in his tracks. There was one man among them who was a good head and shoulders above his fellows, and to him they gave their chief weapon, a huge club made of wood. As silently yet as speedily as might be, they made after the giant, who, with his mind only upon a purloined breakfast, heard nothing, saw nothing and suspected nothing. Then, as the giant paused in his stride for a moment, they leapt upon him. The man with the club, stretching up, struck with all his might and main at the back of their tormentor’s neck, which he could just reach. The blow was tremendous, and like a tree felled by lightning, the giant crashed to the ground. Then all the other men leapt forward, pinioning him by their weight and numbers, till others bound him with stout ropes and leather thongs. When he returned to consciousness, he could not move; and all round him stood the men who had been his erstwhile providers, rejoicing to see him brought low at last. Wicked and cruel as he had been, Jack o’ Legs was no coward.
‘What would you with me, friends?’ he asked.
‘Your death!’ replied the spokesman. ‘There is no way but that. Therefore, prepare to die.’
Jack read the resolution in their faces, and knew that his time had come.
‘So be it,’ he said. ‘Unbind my arms, and give me my bow. I would let fly just one more arrow. Follow it where it flies, and at the spot where it falls, there dig my grave.’
Silent and watchful, they did as he requested, and set the bow once more into his mighty hands. The bow bent, the bowstring twanged, and the arrow was loosed. Up, up it soared, high over fields and hedgerows till it struck the tower of Weston church, and fell to the ground. No man had ever seen such a powerful flight, and they stood in wonder at it; but there was still a deed to be done, and they did not flinch from their task.
As soon as the giant lay dead, they bethought themselves of his last wish, and of their word given to him that it should be granted. It took all their numbers, all their skill, and all their strength to carry the body of their defeated adversary back to Weston. Once there, they set about digging a grave for him. Long, long they dug, taking the heavy task in turn, till a grave yawned before them twelve feet long from end to end.
‘ ’Tis nowhere near long enough yet,’ said one, ‘but it is as long as we have room to make it.’
They took counsel together again, and at last it was settled.
‘Dig it yet deeper,’ said the wisest among them. So they set to work again, and deepened it along the whole twelve feet of it.
Then they took the dead body of the giant, and folded it in two like a jack-knife. That way, it just fitted the grave they had dug, and with satisfaction they spat on their hands and began again on the task of filling it in.
So that was the end of Jack o’ Legs, but the grave of Jack o’ Legs still remains to be seen, so they say, near the gate in Weston churchyard, with a stone to mark one end of it, and a second stone to mark the other end; and the distance between the gravestones is still four yards.
Here was an amiable and contented parson doomed to extraordinary adventures by events over which he had no control – only to finish up where he started, back in his peaceful parsonage.
Rich folk start wars, and poor folk suffer, as anybody who lived on the coast of Dorset could have told you at any time after the Romans came until the end of the Civil War; for whoever was attacking, and whoever was defending, there always seemed to be, as one chronicler put it, ‘endless forays, alarms and assaults, carnage and burnings, battle, murder and sudden death’ in the region, especially in the town and environs of Wareham.
But of all wars there is none so cruel and heartrending as a civil war, when brother is turned against brother, friend against friend, and from day to day nobody knows on which end of the seesaw of fortune he is likely to sit.
So it was in Wareham. The town was held for the Royalists, but was under constant attack from the Parliamentary garrison at Poole, and at last it fell.
It was at this time that a certain Robert Moreton, of Wareham, received orders from the Parliamentary Commander to fortify and garrison Wareham, and hold it for Parliament against the king. Now the loyal citizens of Wareham were very incensed that one of their own number should be chosen, and be willing, to go against the forces of their sovereign – none more so than the ‘merry, true-hearted parson’, William Wake, who was at that time Rector of Wareham.
Much puffed up by authority, Robert Moreton chose a Sunday afternoon to ride to the town cross, and make publicly a declaration of the authority vested in him by Parliament. A crowd soon gathered to hear the proclamation, made up mainly of the members of Parson Wake’s flock, who, having been to church dressed in their best, were taking an afternoon stroll. The rector, too, had left his peaceful rectory, where the roses bloomed and the trout played in the stream at the far end of the orchard, for a walk among his parishioners in the street. So it was that he stood at the cross while Robert Moreton sat on his horse and read his piece to the vulgar. Now the jolly little parson’s anger got the better of his prudence, and he begged the crowd to listen to him, not to Moreton, telling them they should regard Moreton’s authority as nothing more than the wind blowing, and give no obedience whatever to his words.
At this, the enraged Moreton rode at the parson with his arm raised, and brought down on the reverend gentleman’s head the butt end of his pistol, which was, in the words of the chronicler ‘somewhat to his detriment’. However, as he was not badly hurt, and Moreton had ridden off by he time he had picked himself up, the crowd dispersed, and went home.
Next day, being Monday, the poor went about their work as usual, and the rector, as was his wont, also went out to take the air. And it was his misfortune to meet with Robert Moreton again. Moreton swaggered up to him, and bade him repeat what it was he had said at the town cross on the previous day; but before the Reverend Wake could give him any reply, the furious Moreton drew his pistols, took aim, and fired both point blank at him. It was well that Moreton’s aim was somewhat marred by his passion. With one pistol he missed, but the bullet from the other took the little parson straight in the forehead, just on the hairline, with a glancing blow that knocked him out, so that he fell to the ground at Moreton’s feet unconscious. Then the cowardly Parliamentarian leapt from his horse, drew his heavy backsword, and slashed at the clergyman two hasty blows which resulted in two nasty cuts in the head. Not satisfied with this, either, Moreton continued to lay about his prostrate adversary with passion, and would no doubt have killed him, had not rescue been at hand.
In one of the fields bordering the path on which the encounter took place was a strapping young woman named Susan Bolt, who worked for the rector, and was indeed at that moment busy harvesting his crop of peas – or, more probably, clearing the ground of the stripped pea-vines, for it is certain that she had in her hands an implement named in the story as ‘a corn-pike’, but which was more than likely a long-handled, two-tined fork known later as a pitchfork. Hearing the commotion and looking round to see her beloved, saintly master in danger of his life, she kilted up her skirts, levelled her corn-pike as a weapon, and charged.
Now it is a brave man indeed who will stand before a strong and determined woman at the other end of a long-handled, deadly-tined pitchfork! Moreton’s pistols were empty, and his sword not nearly long enough to protect vulnerable parts only thinly covered by cloth breeches. He turned, and began to retreat, but Susan by this time also had her dander up, for she had seen the many wounds her pastor had sustained. So she pricked Moreton on in no ladylike manner, and made him dance all the way through Wareham till at length he reached the safety of his own house.
The infuriated man was not long in taking his revenge. Within a few days, William Wake was seized by the Parliamentarians, and thrown into Dorchester gaol. His wife and family were turned neck and crop out of house and home, and all his goods confiscated. While he languished in gaol, however, the fortunes of war temporarily put Dorchester in Royalist hands. He was set free, but promptly joined the king’s army, and entered the fray in real earnest. He was at Sherborne Castle when that was besieged, and when it fell, was once more taken prisoner.
This time, it was his turn to be publicly humiliated. With several other prisoners, he was stripped stark naked, and paraded through the town for all to gawp at. Next, he was sent to Poole, where, in addition to the hazards of war, there was a dreadful outbreak of the plague to contend with; but he managed to survive, and soon after, in an exchange of prisoners, found himself one of the garrison at Corfe Castle. It was here that he had his second lesson on the ability of women to pit themselves against men.
Corfe Castle was at this time held for the king by Sir John Bankes, and was in 1643 one of the few strong places in Dorset to remain in Royalist hands. Sir John himself was away with the king in Yorkshire, and his wife had taken refuge with her children in the castle, attended by her menservants and maidservants, and a tiny garrison. When Sir John was safely out of the way, a local Parliamentary leader, one Sir Walter Erie, laid siege to the castle, expecting it to fall without much trouble.
Lady Bankes had other ideas. She had no intention of yielding, and used every ounce of her authority, every nuance of her charm, every aspect of her own indomitable courage and every scrap of her ingenious wit to rally her tiny band of supporters and retainers into like resistance with herself. All the fire-power the Parliamentary army could spare was ranged against the castle from the hills all round, and even from the church tower: but the lady did not blench. Sir Walter tried bribery and corruption of the household servants turned warriors. He might as well have offered bribes to the stones themselves. The little home-made garrison stood shoulder to shoulder with their gallant leader, who continued to defy everything the army could bring against her.
They then tried bribery of a different colour. Poole was largely for Parliament, and the mariners of that town were known to be a rough, tough and courageous lot. The army recruited some hundred and fifty of these seamen on a special assignment with a promise of £20 for the first man to scale the walls; and to put Dutch courage into them, in case this type of warfare proved not to their liking when it came to it, a good deal of the kind of liquid refreshment all mariners are partial to was ladled out free well in advance. By the time the hour approached for the assault to be mounted, the assault force was, if not exactly drunk, well under the influence of alcohol, or ‘drinky’ as the local population would have put it. So the extraordinary attack was begun, with men unaccustomed to dealing with army equipment staggering under scaling ladders, finding their feet unsteady beneath them while carrying containers full of petards and grenadoes, and all the time they were cursing in the forthright language of the fo’c’sle, bursting into sea-songs from their bawdy and blasphemous repertoire, and thrusting forward with more wine-induced valour than prudence.
When they reached their target area, they were, of course, confronted with the green, steep, slippery slope on top of which the castle wall stands. It is difficult enough in any event to climb, unencumbered and sober. The mariners were neither, and their skill in climbing rigging stood them in little stead as they tried to scramble up the slope with their unwieldy ladders and baskets of bombs. When, finally, some of them reached the foot of the walls, the defenders were ready for them. Lady Bankes was not the only woman to cry scorn on such pitiful attackers. Legend has it that it was a kitchen-maid who was in command of the defence at the Plucknett Tower. She had her deterrents at the ready, and at the crucial moment discharged upon the attackers bucket after bucket of red-hot cinders and still-glowing ashes.
This was not quite the retaliation the ale-pert seamen had envisaged, and breathing in hot ash while attempting to get rid of a burning cinder clinging to your shirt is certainly likely to puncture alcoholic valour. They let go of their ladders and weapons and beat a hasty retreat to the bottom of the slope where a wet ditch provided at least temporary ease from discomfort. Those storming the Gloriette Bastion were served no better, if differently. There were stalwart menservants, together with a few of the garrison, of whom William Wake might have been one. They hurled down whatever ammunition they had, as in the Middle Ages – consisting largely of huge stones and small boulders, which the attackers liked as little as their fellows did the cinders. They took to their heels and fled pell-mell, and the extraordinary tragi-comedy petered out. Perhaps shame at this ignominious defeat, at the hands of a redoubtable woman, was the deciding factor in the mind of Sir Walter Erie. Whatever the reason, he raised his siege of Corfe Castle that very night, after more than three months of bold defence by Lady Bankes.
The castle fell eighteen months later in another siege, when treachery, not force, opened the gates; and as punishment for its brave resistance it was slighted, and reduced to the ruin that still stands.
Then William Wake was once more taken prisoner, and put to shame and punishment with all the ferocity such barbarous times were breeding. But war dealt like a shuttlecock with the cheery parson, tossing him into captivity and setting him free again no less than nineteen times in all. Yet at the end of the war, he was still able to return, with his family, to the quiet rectory of Wareham. And if he talked of his exploits in after years, it was probably only in contest with those of his son, who also returned safe to the rectory after having been taken by the enemy only on eighteen occasions; but no doubt the parson could clinch any argument about who had endured the most with his Parthian shot that he had been sentenced twice, with all due solemnity, to the awful fate of being hanged, drawn and quartered! So much for the romantic notion of idyllic peace and hallowed quiet of life in an English rectory.
Ursula Shipton’s prophecies are known world-wide, but other accounts of her doings (and those of her mother, Agatha Southed) are just as extraordinary.
The Breakfast Party
Agatha Southeil was a witch. It became evident to her neighbours in Yorkshire that she had made the usual contract, and sold her soul to the Devil, while she was still young – only fifteen, so they said. Certainly she soon began to exercise very unusual powers. In the year 1486, belief in witchcraft was rife, and to have a witch in your midst was not only a bit frightening, it was also intensely interesting and exciting.
As Agatha soon found, she was forever in the public eye. Her neighbours even began to spy on her in her own home, delighted to be able to report any tit-bit of new information as to what ‘t’witch’ had or had not done.
This Agatha regarded as a breach of good manners, besides being a great nuisance. She made up her mind to teach them a lesson when a suitable occasion should present itself. This happened when she was in attendance at a breakfast party to which many of her most influential antagonists had been invited.
All was proceeding with much hearty eating and bucolic jocosity when one worthy, who was wearing a fine ruff around his neck, according to the latest fashion, put up his hand to finger it, whereupon it disappeared in the most astonishing manner. What is worse, in its place he found that he was wearing a string of the faggots – a greasy dish of pigs’ intestines wrapped in the lardy membrane called ‘the apron’ – which the previous instant had been part of the breakfast spread.
His discomfiture was great, and not made any better by the fact that his fellow guests were having great difficulty in restraining their mirth. When the desire to laugh became so great that he could no longer contain it, the man next to the first unfortunate burst into a bellow of guffaws. His laughter was short-lived, however, for suddenly his own hat was whipped from his head, and replaced in the wink of an eye with a pewter utensil more often than not kept under a bed.
At this, a young lady sitting opposite at the table let forth a shriek of high-pitched laughter – and another – and another, till it became evident that she could not stop. She grew breathless, and her eyes streamed with water, but still she went on laughing. All eyes turned towards her, but still the peals of laughter went on, until gradually all the other ladies present began to titter at her predicament, and one by one they burst into giggles as loud and uncontrollable as her own; at which the men started to guffaw, and then to roar with paroxysms that bent them double, and made their breathless sides ache in an agony of laughter which it seemed would be the death of them. For a full quarter of an hour they rocked and roared, shrieked and guffawed, and the noise they made was well-nigh unbelievable.
Now all this was happening in the upstairs room of an inn, but the noise of such uncontrollable laughter going on for so long penetrated to the kitchens below, and at last the landlord thought he ought to go upstairs and find out what was going on. As his steps sounded outside the door, the noise within suddenly ceased, and he opened the door to complete silence as everyone turned their eyes towards him. Next moment, pandemonium broke out anew, as they took in what they saw. The landlord was wearing on his forehead the biggest pair of cuckold’s horns that any of them had ever imagined even in his wildest cups!
Then, without warning, all witchery ceased, though the sound of demonic laughter seemed to surround them. Exhausted and frightened, they agreed that it was time to break up the gathering, and go home. They descended into the yard, and called for their horses; but before they could be brought, a rain of well-aimed rotten apples descended on them, directed from nowhere or everywhere at once, by unseen hands.
They set foot in stirrup, and spurred fast to get away from the bewitched inn, but no sooner were they in the saddles than every rider discovered to his dismay that he had a pillion passenger – a bent and deformed old hag with a whip in her hand. With this whip she cut and stung the horse until the poor maddened beast travelled as if it had wings, and by the time horse and rider arrived in town both were covered with sweat, foaming at the mouth, and utterly exhausted. The hag on the pillion had gone.
Next day, some of the more sober of the victims felt it their duty to make a report of these events to the magistrates in Knaresborough. They named Agatha as the most probable cause of their discomfiture, and in due course she was summoned to appear in court.
She did so, in a frame of mind that boded no good. Asked if she had bewitched the breakfast party, she admitted it at once. Told what punishment could be handed out to witches, she broke into ironic laughter; spoken to even more sternly, she scoffed openly, and replied that if they threatened her with punishment, she could do more by far than she had already done. The case against her dragged on with all the normal tedium of the law, while she yawned and snoozed and showed by everything about her that she found the proceedings utterly boring and pointless. And when she felt that she had had enough, she shouted loudly, ‘Up draxi, call Stygician Helluei!’
Before the words were out of her mouth, the thunderstruck people saw above their heads the most terrible, ferocious black dragon, whose lurid green-tinted scales and fiery red eyes transfixed them all with horror. It spread its dreadful wings and hovered while Agatha climbed on its back, and then carried her clean away and out of their reach.
Now it had been noticed by many a practised eye at the trial that Agatha appeared to be with child; and there were many who thought that the father of her child could be none other than Old Nick himself. Be that as it may, she was brought to bed a few months later of a girl, among such ‘strange and terrible noises’ that once again the whole neighbourhood was affrighted; but of this particular witch they had not much more to fear. She lived only long enough to name her child Ursula, and then died.
The Witch’s Child
Agatha’s child, Ursula Southeil, became a charge upon the town, and was given into the care of a worthy townswoman till she should be of an age to look after herself. However, from the very beginning, she proved more than a difficult handful for her nurse.
In the first place, she was exceedingly ugly, even as a baby. She was misshapen in body, and hideous of face, but from the first, she was extremely forward and ‘knowing’, always seeming to get the better of her adult attendants.
One day, it is told, she was left alone in her cradle while her nurse went out for a gossip with her neighbours. While out, she told her neighbours some of the extraordinary things the child had recently done, and they expressed a wish to see the strange infant for themselves. So they returned in a body, with the nurse, to her house. On entering, they looked around for Ursula’s cradle, but it was nowhere to be seen. While they were looking for it, all sorts of extraordinary things began to happen. There appeared above their heads a beam of wood, from which a strange woman was hanging by her toes, and as the beam with its burden turned and twisted in the air up above the astounded people, it passed close to one of the men. Immediately, he felt himself rising upwards towards it, as if lifted by an unseen hand; and in less time than it takes to tell, he found himself strapped securely to the beam, which then pursued every other man present till all of them were yoked to the floating beam from which the strange woman still hung among them, upside down.
When all the men had been so hoisted into the air, the women were compelled to form themselves into a circle, and dance. They danced till they were breathless and exhausted, but they could not stop. Their legs ached and they panted with the excruciating pain of ‘the stitch’ in their sides, but they danced on and on, while the helpless men tethered to the twirling beam above them shared their frightened bewilderment and apprehension. When, finally, one after another of the women began to slow up out of sheer exhaustion, they discovered amongst them a little black imp in the form of a monkey, armed with a sharp pin. As soon as they flagged, he chased them and literally pricked them on, till they were all sobbing with pain and misery.
Then, without warning, the beam disappeared, the men fell heavily into a huddled heap, and the women collapsed gasping on the floor. Of the little black imp there was no sign, but sounds from the huge chimney above the hearth caused them to investigate it. Suspended in mid-air, nine feet up the chimney, was the missing cradle, and in it the unprepossessing infant, Ursula.
She grew to womanhood as unlovely as she had been as a baby, with an overlarge body, a huge head, and a hooked nose and chin that showed, so the people said, her family likeness to the Devil. Wherever she went, there was trouble of a supernatural kind. In the cottage where she lived, it was nothing to see the furniture move from place to place, even up and down the tiny stairway, of its own accord. Plates and mugs took themselves from shelves, and hurled themselves at walls, or twirled on edge till they crashed to the floor. Kettles boiled over on dead fires, and food disappeared from plates set before hungry people.
It might have been expected that with form and face so lacking beauty, and a reputation for mischief so dubious as that of Ursula Southeil, a suitor would be hard to find, but it proved otherwise. Whether or not she ‘witched herself a husband’, the fact remained that in 1512, at the age of twenty-five, or thereabouts, she married one Tony Shipton. It was after that that she became renowned, most of all, for her ability to see both into the near, and into the still-distant future.
Mother Shipton and Cardinal Wolsey
News was abroad that the great cardinal, second in importance only to the king himself, was to pay a visit to York. On being told this. Mother Shipton at once gave voice to a prophecy.
‘He may plan to do so,’ she said, ‘but set foot in York he never will.’
Now by this time people in the neighbourhood had received a good deal of evidence that Ursula’s prophecies were likely to prove accurate. Word of mouth quickly carried her presentiment about Wolsey’s visit to York to the great man’s ears. He was angry, and sent orders for her to be interviewed with regard to her statement about his proposed visit. He dispatched northwards, immediately, three noblemen, to question her – the Duke of Suffolk, Lord Percy, and Lord Darcy. They came to York, where they sought out a gentleman called Besley, and put their case to him. He said he could take them to the witch’s house, and after arranging heavy disguise in case they should be recognized, they set off. Led by Besley, they approached her door, and knocked. A voice from the inside called out at once.
‘Come in, Master Besley. Bring the honourable lords with you!’
Astounded, they dropped back, and Master Besley motioned them to precede him, as their station in life dictated that they should; but while they hesitated Mother Shipton called out again.
‘Come your way in. Master Besley, and let the noble lords follow. You know the way, and they don’t.’
Staggered by her foreknowledge of who her visitors were, they ventured in. Mother Shipton was sitting by the fire. She welcomed each one by his name, in spite of his disguise, and sent for refreshments with as much poise as if she were a great lady, instead of a humble cottager with the reputation of being a witch.
The noble Duke of Suffolk was embarrassed, for he could not help feeling he was being entertained under false pretences.
‘My good woman,’ said the duke, ‘when you know what we have come for, you will not be so lavish of your hospitality. You have prophesied that Cardinal Wolsey shall never see York!’
‘Nay man, that I did not,’ she replied tartly. ‘What I said was that he might see York, but would never set foot in it!’
‘It is the same thing,’ said the duke, losing his temper. ‘I tell you, woman, that prophecy is an evil thing. When the cardinal does come, you shall be burned at the stake for the witch you undoubtedly are.’
‘Shall I indeed?’ she cackled, and to their astonishment she pulled off the kerchief that covered her head, and threw it into the heart of the fire. The flames rose and licked all round it, but the kerchief did not even show signs of scorching. After a few minutes, she leaned forward and picked the head-covering up again, replacing it on her head just as before.
‘What did you do that for?’ asked the startled duke. ‘What does that mean?’
‘Do you not understand? If my kerchief had burned in the fire, then I might have burned at the stake. But as the one did not burn, neither will the other!’
‘We shall see,’ said the angry duke menacingly, and without waiting for further proof of her powers, he made off, followed by the others.
Soon afterwards, Cardinal Wolsey set out, and on his way visited Cawood, which is a mere eight miles or so distant from York.
‘I am on my way to York,’ he told his hosts. ‘But I hear that some crazed old woman has said that I am never to see it.’
The host, who lived in Cawood and knew not only of the prophecy, but of the uncanny way Mother Shipton’s words had of coming true, was careful to put him right as to the exact wording of the prophecy.
‘Nay my Lord,’ he said. ‘Her words were that you should see it, but not set foot inside its walls.’
‘You can see it from here,’ said another in his retinue. ‘Look, there are its walls, clearly to be seen.’
Then the great man looked, and sure enough, the walls of York eight miles away were caught by the evening sunlight, and showed up clearly against the surrounding hills.
‘Tomorrow I shall come there,’ said His Eminence. ‘And as soon as I am within the gates, this woman shall be brought to execution, and die at the stake. And so shall perish all witches.’
He had barely finished speaking when the clatter of hooves was heard on the cobbled courtyard, and looking down, he saw men in the livery of King Henry VIII. They had come with orders to arrest him, and take him back to London, to answer charges of treason brought by the monarch against him.
So he never set foot in York, nor ever saw London again. Worn out with ill-health and sorrow, he died at Leicester soon after. Mother Shipton had proved a true prophetess once again.
As she grew older and poorer, she was reduced to living in a cave, from which she emerged from time to time to give voice to other prophecies which at the time few people could make head or tail of:
Carriages without horses shall go
And accidents fill the world with woe.
Iron on the water shall float
As easy as a wooden boat.
Under the water men shall walk,
Shall ride, shall sleep, shall eat, shall talk.
Up in the air men shall be seen
In white, in black, in red, in green.
A house of glass shall come to pass
In England here, but alas!
War will follow with the work
In lands of the Pagan, and the Turk.
Around the world men’s thoughts shall fly
All in the twinkling of an eye.
Gold shall be found again, and found
In a land that is not yet known –
and much more. Those of us who live in the twentieth century have good reason to believe in her ability to see into the future, if indeed it was she who made the rhymed prophecies. At any rate, nobody can deny that most of them have by now become reality.
The extraordinary exploits of Robert Lyde, of Topsham in Devon
Robert Lyde made himself a legend in his own time by an extraordinary exploit, only to be utterly disbelieved and discredited by his own people. Perhaps his name has lived on longer just because he was forced into making a deposition to a magistrate, and but for that this nine days’ wonder from Devon might have been forgotten.
They that go down to the sea in ships, and occupy their business in great waters: these men see the works of the Lord, and His wonders in the deep.
Robert Lyde was one who went down to the sea in ships, as most of his fellows did when Topsham was the chief centre of Exeter’s trade, with large ships unloading there instead of going further up-river. This was in the seventeenth century, at a time when life at sea meant facing far greater hazards than those occasioned by wind and weather and the storms and typhoons of relatively unknown parts. It was the heyday of the pirates, ‘the Sallee Rovers’ (always said to be Turks) and the privateers, which might come from anywhere or everywhere, including the homeland, but which, as far as Topsham was concerned, were most of all likely to be French.
To be taken by a Turkish pirate was indeed a fate worse than death, for it often occasioned starvation and many forms of brutal oriental torture, ending as often as not with the starved and mutilated prisoners being forced to ‘walk the plank’. This bit of devilish apparatus consisted of a single plank hinged in the middle upon the bulwarks, with a very gentle slope looking safe and solid, so that even the most terrified or frail could walk up it with little help, till they passed the hinge – when they went down the other side before they had much time to think about it. It was adopted, sad to say, by parties on all sides, and as one English ballad has it:
Four and twenty Spaniards,
Mighty men of rank.
With their signorinas
Had to walk the plank.
Little more mercy could be expected from the master or crew of a victorious privateer for those of the defeated and captured vessel, for there were no international rules to be observed with regard to the treatment of prisoners-of-war. Yet in spite of all these hazards, British seamen set out for the ends of the earth with courage and confidence, secure in the knowledge that they were as brave, as strong, as ingenious and as enduring as most, and as seamen second to none. Moreover, the strong puritanism which had held the country in its sway during the middle of the seventeenth century was still as strong as ever down in the West, and few seamen entered a fight without a prayer and the satisfying conviction that God was on their side. If, in spite of this, a struggle went against them, they averred that this was because God had willed it so, and far from railing at Him for so deserting them, prayed earnestly to know in what way they had offended, and that He might now sustain them in their trials.
Such a man was Robert Lyde, of Topsham. In February 1689, he shipped aboard a vessel bound for the new colony of Virginia. They had a successful outward voyage, and returned home without serious mishap until they reached the English Channel, when they were set upon by a French privateer. The fight went against them, and they were boarded and carried back by their French conquerors to St Malo. There, at the hands of the French, the English seamen were treated to such privations and indignities that would make the heart of the bravest quail. ‘We were used with such inhumanity and cruelty that if we had been taken by the Turks we could not have been used worse’ said Robert; and to give some example of the food situation, he declared that for twenty-five men, a day’s rations consisted of six pounds of coarse bread and ‘a bullock’s cheek’, adding that a man who got half a bullock’s eye for his share of the meat had done better than most!
The privations he had to endure made a deep and lasting impression on him, and only served to strengthen both his courage and his faith in God. He made a vow that if once he regained his freedom, he would never be taken alive again by any man, but most of all by a Frenchman; and he called on his God to witness his vow, confirm his resolution at all times, and assist him in keeping it if ever he were put to the test.
When at last he was set free, he went home to Devon and stayed on shore for a time; but the sea was in his blood, and he could not resist the call of it, so that in 1691 he was once more looking for a berth, and shipped aboard the Friend’s Adventure for another trip. History repeated itself, and once more on the way back they were attacked by a French privateer, and taken prisoner almost within sight of home.
The Frenchmen plundered the ship of everything of value that she carried. Then they took prisoner the crew, transferring them to their own vessel, with the exception of Robert Lyde and the young ship’s boy, whose very first voyage it was. These they left aboard the Friend’s Adventure to be of assistance to ‘the prize-master’ and his six Frenchmen, whose orders were to sail the English ship into St Malo.
It was now that Robert began to endure the gnawings of terrible apprehension, for he knew towards what misery he was travelling; and his resolution never to be taken back to France alive swelled inside him like a ball of fire, and engaged all his thoughts – or would have done, had it not been for another, very Devonian-British one that overbore it. That was that he would not die willingly without an attempt to save himself and the boy somehow, and if he must die, to take as many of the French prize-crew with him as could possibly be expected of one man.
He sought about in his mind for some plan of action, and his first idea was to make the Frenchmen drunk; but in this he had reckoned without the natural aptitude of the French to deal with any variety of liquor, or any amount that would subdue a Britisher used only to home-brewed ale. It was borne upon him more and more that his only hope was to attack them, though one against seven were heavy odds. Even the boy would reduce the odds a bit, though he was but a child still, and unversed in the skills of fighting to the death. The boy, however, did not know the horrors and privations of captivity in French hands, and thought life at any price preferable to almost certain death. Lyde did not blame him, but the boy’s reluctance even to stand by him cast him deeper into despair. While he was still trying to get the boy to change his mind, they began to come in to shore near Brest, and the French prize master fired off a ‘pattereroe’, to summon a pilot to bring them into harbour.
Terror struck Robert at the thought of how near he now was to breaking his vow, and of how helpless he was, except for his faith in God. The only thing he could do was to pray, so he immediately went down between decks, threw himself on his knees, and put up a most passionate prayer for help; but being of a practical nature, he couched his prayer in practical terms, and begged his Protector for a southerly wind that would prevent the ship going into harbour.
Then he rose – but not before his experienced ear had caught the sounds and his seaman’s instinct and practice given him all the signs of a sudden change in the direction of the wind. It had swept round to the south, and was taking the Friend’s Adventure steadily away from the harbour. Lyde turned his prayer to praise and thanksgiving, now heartened and confident once more that the Lord was on his side. Eagerness urged him to strike at once, but prudence overruled foolish haste; he now felt he could afford to wait, at least till next morning. No other recounting could better his own words of the events.
At eight in the morning all the Frenchmen sat round the cabin table at breakfast, and they called me to eat with them; and accordingly I accepted of their invitation, but the sight of the Frenchmen did immediately take away my stomach, and made me sweat as if I had been in a stove, and was ready to faint with eagerness to encounter them … but could stay no longer in sight of them, and so went betwixt decks to the boy, and did earnestly entreat him to go up presently with me into the cabin, and stand behind me, and I would kill and command all the rest presently.
The boy would still have nothing to do with what seemed to him a reckless gamble with almost certain death. Very well then, Robert Lyde must attempt the impossible odds alone; but at least he would get what aid he could from Heaven, and prepare himself for death at the same time, if that must be the outcome. So he applied himself once more to prayer. He begged God to pardon his sins, and to have mercy on his soul, if he should die, and receive it into His everlasting mercy. He then bethought him that the Frenchmen, so near to their native land and with no notion that one mad Englishman could be plotting their deaths, would, if he were successful, go to their deaths without the chance to make their peace with God. So individually and collectively, he prayed for them and their immortal souls; and lastly, he prayed again for strength and courage and for resolution that his own heart might not fail him in the heat of action.
Then he tried once more to persuade the boy to help him, this time giving him detailed and horrifying accounts of what he had himself endured, and what the boy might equally expect if he allowed himself to be landed on French soil.
The boy appeared at last to be impressed by the story, and after giving it some thought, returned a most unexpected answer.
‘Well,’ said he, ‘if I do find it as hard as you say, when I am in France, I will join them, and go along myself with them as a privateer.’
These words cut Robert Lyde to the quick, both with regard to his own hopes, and as a loyal Englishman. He rounded on his young companion with the full force of his honest indignation.
‘You dog!’ he exclaimed. ‘What are you saying? That you will go with them – against your king and your country, your father and your mother and every other honest Englishman? I tell you, Sirrah, I was in France for four months, and no tongue could tell the miseries I endured there; but no suffering could induce me to turn Papist and go along with them! I tell you, if I were to take prisoner my own brother in a French privateer and know that he had sailed with them of his own accord, I would hang him at once for the rogue he was to give him his just deserts!’
His vehemence had the effect that none of his previous pleading or argument had achieved, and the boy began to waver. Seeing it was so, and trusting in God’s mercy to keep the wind where it lay, and so prevent them from running into harbour, he was content to let the matter rest there for the moment, with the result that before the next day dawned, the boy had proclaimed himself ready to risk all in joining the attack. The moment seemed to be ripe. Of the seven Frenchmen two were asleep in the cabin. Let Robert Lyde himself take up the heroic tale:
Then the boy coming to me, I leapt up the gun-room scuttle, and said, ‘Lord be with us and strengthen us in the action’; and I told him that the drive-bolt was by the scuttle in the steerage, and then I went softly aft into the cabin, and put my back against the bulkhead and took the iron crow and held it with both my hands in the middle of it and put my legs out to shorten myself, because the cabin was very low. But he that lay nighest to me, hearing me, opened his eyes, and perceiving my intent and upon what account I was coming, he endeavoured to rise to make resistance against me, but I prevented him by a blow upon his forehead which mortally wounded him; and the other man, which lay with his back to the dying man’s side, hearing the blow, turned about and faced me; and as he was rising with his left elbow on the deck, very fiercely endeavouring to come against me, I struck at him, and he let himself fall from his left arm and held his arm for a guard, whereby he did keep off a great part of the blow, but still his head received a great part of the blow.
The master lying in his cabin on my right hand, rose and sat in his cabin and seeing what I had done, he called me ‘Boogra!’ and ‘Footra!’ But I having my eyes every way I pushed at his ear betwixt the turnpins with the claws of the crow; but he falling back for fear thereof, it seemed afterwards that I struck the claws of the crow into his cheek, which blow made him lie still as if he had been dead. And while I struck at the mast, the fellow that fended off the blow with his arm rose upon his legs, and running towards me with his head low, I pushed the point at his head, and stuck it an inch and a half into his forehead; and as he was falling down, I took hold of him by the back and turned him into the steerage.
I heard the boy strike the man at the helm two blows after I knocked down the first man, which two blows made him lie very still; and as soon as I turned the man out of the cabin, I struck one more blow at him, thinking to have no man alive further aft than myself, and burst his head, so that his blood and brains run out upon the floor.
Then I went out to attack the two men who were at the pump, where they continued pumping without hearing or knowing what I had done; and as I was going to them I saw that man that I had turned out of the cabin into the steerage crawling out upon his hands and knees upon the deck, beating his hands upon the deck to make a noise that the men at the pump might hear, for he could not cry out nor speak. And when they heard him and saw his blood running out of the hole in his forehead, they came running aft to me, grinding their teeth as if they would have eaten me; but I met them as they came within the steerage door and struck at them; but the steerage not being above four foot high, I could not have a full blow at them, whereupon they fended off the blow and took hold of the crow with both their hands close to mine, striving to haul it from me; then the boy might have knocked them down with much ease, but that his heart failed him … The master that I thought I had killed in his cabin, coming to himself, came out of his cabin and also took hold of me … Then ensued a desperate fight, in the midst of which the boy, thinking his champion overthrown, cried out for fear. Then I said, ‘Do you cry, you villain, now I am in such a condition? Come quickly and knock this man on the head that hath hold of my left arm.’ The boy took some courage, but struck so faintly that he missed his blow, which greatly enraged me; and I, feeling the Frenchman about my middle hang very heavy, said to the boy, ‘Go round the binnacle and knock down that man that hangeth on my back’; so the boy did strike him one blow on the head, and he went out on deck staggering to and fro … Then casting my eye on my left side and seeing a marlin spike hanging with a strap to a nail in the larboard side, I jerked my right arm forth and back, which cleared the two men’s hands from my right arm, and took hold of the marlin spike, and struck the point four times into the skull of that man that had hold of my right arm, but he caught the strap and hauled the marlin spike out of my hand … But through God’s wonderful providence it either fell out of his hand or else he threw it down; for it did fall so close to the ship’s side that he could not reach it again.
At this time I said, ‘Lord, what shall I do now?’ And then it pleased God to put me in mind of my knife in my pocket; and although two of the men had hold of my right arm, yet God Almighty strengthened me so that I put my right hand into my right pocket and took out my knife and sheath, holding it behind my hand that they should not see it; but I could not draw it out of the sheath with my left hand, so I put it between my legs and drew it out, and then cut that man’s throat with it that had his back to my breast, and he immediately dropped down and scarce ever stirred after.
Seeing their companions go down one by one before this ferocious, determined Britisher, the other Frenchmen lost heart, and sued for quarter. Then seaman Lyde took charge, and within an hour had five injured but living Frenchmen in irons and under hatches, and set course for Topsham with no one to help him but the scared and exhausted boy.
Now, it seemed, his God put him to an even greater test of faith, for the weather turned so foul that the boat could hardly live in it. As he was, to all intents and purposes, sailing singlehanded, he had no sleep; and stiff and sore, worn out with emotion and exertion, he still had to do the work of a crew. When, at last, he came within sight of home, and reached Topsham bar, he signalled for a pilot to take him in.
Then consternation reigned in the little port, for news had already arrived there that the Friend’s Adventure was missing – yet here she was, just outside the bar, asking to be brought in. The pilot refused to come off, declaring it was a cunning Frenchy trap.
Lyde himself was too utterly weary and exhausted to dare to attempt taking the ship in himself at night, and resolved to wait till morning; but the wind was unkind, and took him out to sea yet again. However, next day he came into Topsham safely of his own accord, and once being ashore, went home to rest.
Then, on being questioned, he told his tale – and the severest blow of all awaited him. In the first place, nobody would believe him; and in the second, those who heard from him (and from others, as the tale went round) accused him of making up the details to cover up foul deeds.
The story grew that he had attacked some innocent Frenchmen in cold blood, and murdered two of them out of hand, forcing the boy to help him; and that since coming ashore he had gone mad, being haunted continually, night and day, by the ghosts of the victims. Moreover, said his detractors, that was no more than he deserved, and no doubt the ghosts would haunt him until the day he was hanged, which he undoubtedly would be before long.
So injured in spirit and pride was he, that in the end he sought out a magistrate and made a deposition, from which the quotations given above are taken. Robert Lyde lived in a violent age, and violence breeds violence. Whether he was a courageous hero or a bloodthirsty fanatic depends on the point of view, but it seems a little difficult to impute mortal sin to a man who, in the extreme of battle, prays for help and receives such practical and prompt aid as to be told that he has a knife in his pocket.
The whole of the escapade was afterwards written for those who would read for themselves:
A True and Exact Account of the retaking a ship called the Friend’s Adventure of Topsham from the French … where one Englishman and a Boy set upon Seven Frenchmen, killed Two of them, took the other Five Prisoners, and brought the Ship and them safe to England. Performed and Written by Robert Lyde, Mate of the same Ship. 1693.
This is a typical tale-telling ballad of more exploits on the high seas – too good in its ballad form to be rendered into prose.
The First Part
When Flora with her fragrant flowers
Bedecked the earth so trim and gay.
And Neptune with his dainty showers
Came to present the month of May;
King Henry rode to take the air.
Over the river of Thames passed he;
When eighty merchants of London came.
And down they knelt upon their knee.
‘O ye are welcome, rich merchants;
Good sailors, welcome unto me.’
They swore by the rood, they were sailors good.
But rich merchants they could not be:
‘To France nor Flanders dare we pass:
Nor Bourdeaux voyage dare we fare;
And all for a rover that lies on the seas,
Who robs us of our merchant ware.’
King Henry frowned, and turned him round,
And swore by the Lord, that was mickle of might,
‘I thought he had not been in the world,
Durst have wrought England such unright.’
The merchants sighed, and said, alas!
And thus they did their answer frame,
‘He is a proud Scot, that robs on the seas.
And Sir Andrew Barton is his name.’
The king looked over his left shoulder,
And an angry look then looked he:
‘Have I never a lord in all my realm,
Will fetch yond traitor unto me?’
‘Yea, that dare I;’ Lord Howard says;
‘Yea, that dare I with heart and hand;
If it please your grace to give me leave.
Myself will be the only man.’
‘Thou art but young,’ the king replied:
‘Yond Scot hath numbered many a year.’
‘Trust me, my liege, I’ll make him quail,
Or before my prince I will never appear.’
‘Then bowmen and gunners thou shalt have,
And choose them over my realm so free;
Besides good mariners, and ship-boys,
To guide the great ship on the sea.’
The first man that Lord Howard chose
Was the ablest gunner in all the realm,
Though he was three score years and ten;
Good Peter Simon was his name.
‘Peter,’ says he, ‘I must to the sea,
To bring home a traitor live or dead:
Before all others I have chosen thee;
Of a hundred gunners to be the head.’
‘If you, my lord, have chosen me
Of a hundred gunners to be the head.
Then hang me up on your main-mast tree.
If I miss my mark one shilling bread.’*
My lord then chose a bowman rare.
Whose active hands had gained fame.
In Yorkshire was this gentleman born.
And William Horseley was his name.
‘Horseley,’ said he, ‘I must with speed
Go seek a traitor on the sea.
And now of a hundred bowmen brave
To be the head I have chosen thee.’
‘If you,’ quoth he, ‘have chosen me
Of a hundred bowmen to be the head;
On your main-mast I’ll hanged be.
If I miss twelvescore one penny bread.’
With pikes and guns, and bowmen bold.
This noble Howard is gone to the sea;
With a valiant heart and a pleasant cheer.
Out at Thames mouth sailed he.
And days he scant had sailed three,
Upon the voyage he took in hand,
But there he met with a noble ship.
And stoutly made it stay and stand.
‘Thou must tell me,’ Lord Howard said,
‘Now who thou art, and what’s thy name;
And show me where thy dwelling is:
And whither bound, and whence thou came.’
* broad
‘My name is Henry Hunt,’ quoth he,
‘With a heavy heart, and a careful mind;
I and my ship do both belong
To the Newcastle, that stands upon Tyne.’
‘Hast thou not heard, now, Henry Hunt,
As thou hast sailed by day and by night.
Of a Scottish rover on the seas?
Men call him Sir Andrew Barton, knight!’
Then ever he sighed, and said, ‘Alas!
With a grieved mind, and wellaway!
But over-well I know that wight,
I was his prisoner yesterday.
As I was sailing upon the sea,
A Bourdeaux voyage for to fare;
To his hatchboard he clasped me.
And robbed me of all my merchant ware:
And mickle debts, God wot, I owe.
And every man will have his own;
And am I now to London bound.
Of our gracious king to beg a boon.’
‘That shall not need,’ Lord Howard says;
‘Let me but once that robber see,
For every penny ta’en thee fro
It shall be doubled shillings three.’
‘Now God forfend,’ the merchant said,
‘That you should see so far amiss!
God keep you out of that traitor’s hands!
Full little ye wot what a man he is.
He is brass within, and steel without.
With beams on his topcastle strong;
And eighteen pieces of ordinance
He carried on each side along:
And he hath a pinnace dearly dight,
St Andrew’s cross that is his guide;
His pinnace beareth ninescore men.
And fifteen cannons on each side.
Were ye twenty ships, and he but one;
I swear by kirk, and bower, and hall;
He would overcome them every one.
If once his beams they do down fall.’
This is cold comfort,’ says my lord.
To welcome a stranger thus to the sea:
Yet I’ll bring him and his ship to the shore.
Or to Scotland he shall carry me.’
Then a noble gunner you must have.
And he must aim well with his ee.
And sink his pinnace into the sea.
Or else he never o’ercome will be:
And if you chance his ship to board.
This counsel I must give withal.
Let no man to his topcastle go
To strive to let his beams down fall.
And seven pieces of ordinance,
I pray your honour lend to me.
On each side of my ship along,
And I will lead you on the sea.
A glass I’ll set, that may be seen.
Whether you sail by day or night;
And tomorrow, I swear, by nine of the clock
You shall meet with Sir Andrew Barton, knight.’
The Second Part
The merchant set my lord a glass
So well apparent in his sight.
And on the morrow, by nine of the clock,
He showed him Sir Andrew Barton knight.
His hatchboard it was gilt with gold.
So dearly dight it dazzled the ee:
‘Now by my faith,’ Lord Howard says,
This is a gallant sight to see.
Take in your ancients, standards eke,
So close that no man may them see;
And put me forth a white willow wand,
As merchants use to sail the sea.’
But they stirred neither top, nor mast;
Stoutly they passed Sir Andrew by.
‘What English churls are yonder,’ he said,
‘That can so little courtesy?
Now by the rood, three years and more
I have been admiral over the sea;
And never an English nor Portingall
Without my leave can pass this way.’
Then called he forth his stout pinnace;
‘Fetch back yond pedlar now to me:
I swear by the mass, yon English churls
Shall all hang at my main-mast tree.’
With that the pinnace it shot off.
Full well Lord Howard might it ken;
For it struck down my lord’s fore-mast.
And killed fourteen of his men.
‘Come hither, Simon,’ says my lord,
‘Look that thy word be true, thou said;
For at my main-mast thou shalt hang.
If thou miss thy mark one shilling bread.’
Simon was old, but his heart it was bold;
His ordinance he laid right low;
He put in chain full nine yards long.
With other great shot less and moe;
And he let go his great gun’s shot:
So well he settled it with his ee.
The first sight that Sir Andrew saw.
He see his pinnace sunk in the sea.
And when he saw his pinnace sunk,
Lord, how his heart with rage did swell!
‘Now cut my ropes, it is time to be gone;
I’ll fetch yond pedlars back mysell.’
When my lord saw Sir Andrew loose.
Within his heart he was full fain:
‘Now spread your ancients, strike up your drums,
Sound all your trumpets out amain.’
‘Fight on, my men,’ Sir Andrew says,
‘Well howsoever this gear will sway;
It is my Lord Admiral of England,
Is come to see me on the sea.’
Simon had a son, who shot right well.
That did Sir Andrew mickle scare;
In at his deck he gave a shot.
Killed threescore of his men of war.
Then Henry Hunt with rigour hot
Came bravely on the other side.
Soon he drove down his fore-mast tree.
And killed fourscore men beside.
‘Now, out alas!’ Sir Andrew cried,
‘What may a man now think, or say?
Yonder merchant thief, that pierceth me.
He was my prisoner yesterday.
Come hither to me, thou Gordon good.
That aye wast ready at my call:
I will give thee three hundred marks.
If thou wilt let my beams down fall.’
Lord Howard he then called in haste,
‘Horseley, see thou be true in stead;
For thou shalt at the main-mast hang.
If thou miss twelvescore one penny bread.’
Then Gordon swarved the main-mast tree.
He swarved it with might and main;
But Horseley with a bearing arrow.
Struck the Gordon through the brain;
And he fell into the hatches again.
And sore his deadly wound did bleed:
Then word went through Sir Andrew’s men,
How that the Gordon he was dead.
‘Come hither to me, James Hambilton,
Thou art my only sister’s son,
If thou wilt let my beams down fall,
Six hundred nobles thou hast won.’
With that he swarved the main-mast tree.
He swarved it with nimble art;
But Horseley with a broad arrow
Pierced the Hambilton through the heart:
And down he fell upon the deck.
That with his blood did stream amain:
Then every Scot cried, ‘Wellaway!
Alas! a comely youth is slain.’
All woebegone was Sir Andrew then.
With grief and rage his heart did swell:
‘Go fetch me forth my armour of proof.
For I will to the topcastle mysell.
Go fetch me forth my armour of proof;
That gilded is with gold so clear:
God be with my brother John of Barton!
Against the Portingalls he is ware;
And when he had on this armour of proof.
He was a gallant sight to see:
Ah! ne’er didst thou meet with living wight.
My dear brother, could cope with thee.’
‘Come hither, Horseley,’ said my lord,
‘And look your shaft that it go right.
Shoot a good shot in time of need.
And for it thou shalt be made a knight.’
‘I’ll shoot my best,’ quoth Horseley then,
‘Your honour shall see, with might and main;
But if I were hanged at your main-mast,
I have now left but arrows twain.’
Sir Andrew he did swarve the tree.
With right good will he swarved then:
Upon his breast did Horseley hit.
But the arrow bounded back again.
Then Horseley spied a privy place
With a perfect eye in a secret part;
Under the spole of his right arm
He smote Sir Andrew to the heart.
‘Fight on, my men.’ Sir Andrew says,
‘A little I’m hurt, but yet not slain;
I’ll but lie down and bleed a while.
And then I’ll rise and fight again.
Fight on, my men,’ Sir Andrew says,
‘And never flinch before the foe;
And stand fast by St Andrew’s cross
Until you hear my whistle blow.’
They never heard his whistle blow –
Which made their hearts wax sore adread:
Then Horseley said, ‘Aboard, my lord.
For well I wot Sir Andrew’s dead.’
They boarded then his noble ship.
They boarded it with might and main;
Eighteen score Scots alive they found.
The rest were either maimed or slain.
Lord Howard took a sword in hand.
And off he smote Sir Andrew’s head,
‘I must have left England many a day.
If thou wert alive as thou art dead.’
He caused his body to be cast
Over the hatchboard into the sea,
And about his middle three hundred crowns:
‘Wherever thou land this will bury thee.’
Thus from the wars Lord Howard came.
And back he sailed o’er the main.
With mickle joy and triumphing
Into Thames mouth he came again.
Lord Howard then a letter wrote.
And sealed it with seal and ring;
‘Such a noble prize have I brought to your grace.
As never did subject to a king:
‘Sir Andrew’s ship I bring with me;
A braver ship was never none:
Now hath your grace two ships of war.
Before in England was but one.’
King Henry’s grace with royal cheer
Welcomed the noble Howard home,
‘And where,’ said he, ‘is this rover stout.
That I myself may give the doom?’
‘The rover, he is safe, my liege,
Full many a fathom in the sea;
If he were alive as he is dead,
I must have left England many a day:
And your grace may thank four men i’ the ship
For the victory we have won.
These are William Horseley, Henry Hunt,
And Peter Simon, and his son.’
To Henry Hunt, the king then said,
‘In lieu of what was from thee ta’en,
A noble a day now thou shalt have.
Sir Andrew’s jewels and his chain.
And Horseley, thou shalt be a knight,
And lands and livings shalt have store;
Howard shall be Earl Surrey hight
As Howards erst have been before.
Now, Peter Simon, thou art old,
I will maintain thee and thy son:
And the men shall have five hundred marks
For the good service they have done.’
Then in came the queen with ladies fair
To see Sir Andrew Barton, knight:
They weened that he were brought on shore.
And thought to have seen a gallant sight.
But when they see his deadly face.
And eyes so hollow in his head,
‘I would give,’ quoth the king, ‘a thousand marks.
This man were alive as he is dead:
Yet for the manful part he played.
Which fought so well with heart and hand.
His men shall have twelvepence a day.
Till they come to my brother king’s high land.’
