Flos Mercatorum
FLOS MERCATORUM! On that night of nights
We drew from out our Mermaid cellarage
All the old glory of London in one cask
Of magic vintage. Never a city on earth--
Rome, Paris, Florence, Bagdad--held for Ben
The colours of old London; and, that night,
We staved them like a wine, and drank, drank deep!
'Twas Master Heywood, whom the Mermaid Inn
Had dubbed our London laureate, hauled the cask
Out of its ancient harbourage. "Ben," he cried,
Bustling into the room with Dekker and Brome,
"The prentices are up!" Ben raised his head
Out of the chimney-corner where he drowsed,
And listened, reaching slowly for his pipe.
"Clerk of the Bow Bell," all along the Cheape
There came a shout that swelled into a roar.
"What! Will they storm the Mermaid?" Heywood laughed,
"They are turning into Bread Street!"
Down they came!
We heard them hooting round the poor old Clerk--
"Clubs! Clubs! The rogue would have us work all night!
He rang ten minutes late! Fifteen, by Paul's!"
And over the hubbub rose, like a thin bell,
The Clerk's entreaty--"Now, good boys, good boys,
Children of Cheape, be still, I do beseech you!
I took some forty winks, but then...." A roar
Of wrathful laughter drowned him--"Forty winks!
Remember Black May-day! We'll make you wink!"
There was a scuffle, and into the tavern rushed
Gregory Clopton, Clerk of the Bow Bell,--
A tall thin man, with yellow hair a-stream,
And blazing eyes.
"Hide me," he clamoured, "quick!
These picaroons will murder me!"
I closed
The thick oak doors against the coloured storm
Of prentices in red and green and ray,
Saffron and Reading tawny. Twenty clubs
Drubbed on the panels as I barred them out;
And even our walls and shutters could not drown
Their song that, like a mocking peal of bells,
Under our windows, made all Bread Street ring:--
"Clerk of the Bow Bell,
With the yellow locks,
For thy late ringing
Thy head shall have knocks!"
Then Heywood, seeing the Clerk was all a-quake,
Went to an upper casement that o'er-looked
The whole of Bread Street. Heywood knew their ways,
And parleyed with them till their anger turned
To shouts of merriment. Then, like one deep bell
His voice rang out, in answer to their peal:--
"Children of Cheape,
Hold you all still!
You shall have Bow Bell
Rung at your will!"
Loudly they cheered him. Courteously he bowed,
Then firmly shut the window; and, ere I filled
His cup with sack again, the crowd had gone.
"My clochard, sirs, is warm," quavered the Clerk.
"I do confess I took some forty winks!
They are good lads, our prentices of Cheape,
But hasty!"
"Wine!" said Ben. He filled a cup
And thrust it into Gregory's trembling hands.
"Yours is a task," said Dekker, "a great task!
You sit among the gods, a lord of time,
Measuring out the pulse of London's heart."
"Yea, sir, above the hours and days and years,
I sometimes think. 'Tis a great Bell--the Bow!
And hath been, since the days of Whittington."
"The good old days," growled Ben. "Both good and bad
Were measured by my Bell," the Clerk replied.
And, while he spoke, warmed by the wine, his voice
Mellowed and floated up and down the scale
As if the music of the London bells
Lingered upon his tongue. "I know them all,
And love them, all the voices of the bells.
FLOS MERCATORUM! That's the Bell of Bow
Remembering Richard Whittington. You should hear
The bells of London when they tell his tale.
Once, after hearing them, I wrote it down.
I know the tale by heart now, every turn."
"Then ring it out," said Heywood.
Gregory smiled
And cleared his throat.
"You must imagine, sirs,
The Clerk, sitting on high, among the clouds,
With London spread beneath him like a map.
Under his tower, a flock of prentices
Calling like bells, of little size or weight,
But bells no less, ask that the Bell of Bow
Shall tell the tale of Richard Whittington,
As thus."
Then Gregory Clopton, mellowing all
The chiming vowels, and dwelling on every tone
In rhythm or rhyme that helped to swell the peal
Or keep the ringing measure, beat for beat,
Chanted this legend of the London bells:--
Clerk of the Bow Bell, four and twenty prentices,
All upon a Hallowe'en, we prithee, for our joy,
Ring a little turn again for sweet Dick Whittington,
Flos Mercatorum, and a barefoot boy!--
"Children of Cheape," did that old Clerk answer,
"You will have a peal, then, for well may you know,
All the bells of London remember Richard Whittington
When they hear the voice of the big Bell of Bow!"--
Clerk with the yellow locks, mellow be thy malmsey!
He was once a prentice, and carolled in the Strand!
Ay, and we are all, too, Marchaunt Adventurers,
Prentices of London, and lords of Engeland.
"Children of Cheape," did that old Clerk answer,
"Hold you, ah hold you, ah hold you all still!
Souling if you come to the glory of a Prentice,
You shall have the Bow Bell rung at your will!"
"Whittington! Whittington! O, turn again, Whittington,
Lord Mayor of London," the big Bell began:
"Where was he born? O, at Pauntley in Gloucestershire
Hard by Cold Ashton, Cold Ashton," it ran.
"Flos Mercatorum," moaned the bell of All Hallowes,
"There was he an orphan, O, a little lad alone!"
"Then we all sang," echoed happy St. Saviour's,
"Called him, and lured him, and made him our own.
Told him a tale as he lay upon the hillside,
Looking on his home in the meadow-lands below!"
"Told him a tale," clanged the bell of Cold Abbey;
"Told him the truth," boomed the big Bell of Bow!
Sang of a City that was like a blazoned missal-book,
Black with oaken gables, carven and inscrolled;
Every street a coloured page, and every sign a hieroglyph,
Dusky with enchantments, a City paved with gold;
"Younger son, younger son, up with stick and bundle!"--
Even so we rung for him--"But--kneel before you go;
Watch by your shield, lad, in little Pauntley Chancel,
Look upon the painted panes that hold your Arms a-glow,--
Coat of Gules and Azure; but the proud will not remember it!
And the Crest a Lion's Head, until the new be won!
Far away, remember it! And O, remember this, too,--
Every barefoot boy on earth is but a younger son."
Proudly he answered us, beneath the painted window,--
"Though I be a younger son, the glory falls to me:
While my brother bideth by a little land in Gloucestershire,
All the open Earth is mine, and all the Ocean-sea.
Yet will I remember, yet will I remember,
By the chivalry of God, until my day be done,
When I meet a gentle heart, lonely and unshielded,
Every barefoot boy on earth is but a younger son!"
Then he looked to Northward for the tall ships of Bristol;
Far away, and cold as death, he saw the Severn shine:
Then he looked to Eastward, and he saw a string of colours
Trickling through the grey hills, like elfin drops of wine;
Down along the Mendip dale, the chapmen and their horses,
Far away, and carrying each its little coloured load,
Winding like a fairy-tale, with pack and corded bundle,
Trickled like a crimson thread along the silver road.
Quick he ran to meet them, stick and bundle on his shoulder!
Over by Cold Ashton, he met them trampling down,--
White shaggy horses with their packs of purple spicery,
Crimson kegs of malmsey, and the silks of London town.
When the chapmen asked of him the bridle-path to Dorset,
Blithely he showed them, and he led them on their way,
Led them through the fern with their bales of breathing Araby,
Led them to a bridle-path that saved them half a day.
Merrily shook the silver bells that hung the broidered bridle-rein,
Chiming to his hand, as he led them through the fern,
Down to deep Dorset, and the wooded Isle of Purbeck,
Then--by little Kimmeridge--they led him turn for turn.
Down by little Kimmeridge, and up by Hampshire forest-roads,
Round by Sussex violets, and apple-bloom of Kent,
Singing songs of London, telling tales of London,
All the way to London, with packs of wool they went.
"London was London, then! A clean, clear moat
Girdled her walls that measured, round about,
Three miles or less. She is big and dirty now,"
Said Dekker.
"Call it a silver moat," growled Ben,
"That's the new poetry! Call it crystal, lad!
But, till you kiss the Beast, you'll never find
Your Fairy Prince. Why, all those crowded streets,
Flung all their filth, their refuse, rags and bones,
Dead cats and dogs, into your clean clear moat,
And made it sluggish as old Acheron.
Fevers and plagues, death in a thousand shapes
Crawled out of it. London was dirty, lad;
And till you kiss that fact, you'll never see
The glory of this old Jerusalem!"
"Ay, 'tis the fogs that make the sunset red,"
Answered Tom Heywood. "London is earthy, coarse,
Grimy and grand. You must make dirt the ground,
Or lose the colours of friend Clopton's tale.
Ring on!" And, nothing loth, the Clerk resumed:--
Bravely swelled his heart to see the moat of London glittering
Round her mighty wall--they told him--two miles long!
Then--he gasped as, echoing in by grim black Aldgate,
Suddenly their shaggy nags were nodding through a throng:
Prentices in red and ray, marchaunts in their saffron,
Aldermen in violets, and minstrels in white,
Clerks in homely hoods of budge, and wives with crimson wimples,
Thronging as to welcome him that happy summer night.
"Back," they cried, and "Clear the way," and caught the ringing
bridle-reins:
"Wait! the Watch is going by, this vigil of St. John!"
Merrily laughed the chapmen then, reining their great white horses back,
"When the pageant passes, lad, we'll up and follow on!"
There, as thick the crowd surged, beneath the blossomed ale-poles,
Lifting up to Whittington a fair face afraid,
Swept against his horse by a billow of madcap prentices,
Hard against the stirrup breathed a green-gowned maid.
Swift he drew her up and up, and throned her there before him,
High above the throng with her laughing April eyes,
Like a Queen of Faërie on the great pack-saddle.
"Hey!" laughed the chapmen, "the prentice wins the prize!"
"Whittington! Whittington! the world is all before you!"
Blithely rang the bells and the steeples rocked and reeled!
Then--he saw her eyes grow wide, and, all along by Leaden Hall,
Drums rolled, earth shook, and shattering trumpets pealed.
Like a marching sunset, there, from Leaden Hall to Aldgate,
Flared the crimson cressets--O, her brows were haloed then!--
Then the stirring steeds went by with all their mounted trumpeters,
Then, in ringing harness, a thousand marching men.
Marching--marching--his heart and all the halberdiers,
And his pulses throbbing with the throbbing of the drums;
Marching--marching--his blood and all the burganets!
"Look," she cried, "O, look," she cried, "and now the morrice comes!"
Dancing--dancing--her eyes and all the Lincoln Green,
Robin Hood and Friar Tuck, dancing through the town!
"Where is Marian?" Laughingly she turned to Richard Whittington.
"Here," he said, and pointed to her own green gown.
Dancing--dancing--her heart and all the morrice-bells!
Then there burst a mighty shout from thrice a thousand throats!
Then, with all their bows bent, and sheaves of peacock arrows,
Marched the tall archers in their white silk coats,
White silk coats, with the crest of London City
Crimson on the shoulder, a sign for all to read,--
Marching--marching--and then the sworded henchmen,
Then, William Walworth, on his great stirring steed.
Flos Mercatorum, ay, the fish-monger, Walworth,--
He whose nets of silk drew the silver from the tide,
He who saved the king when the king was but a prentice,--
Lord Mayor of London, with his sword at his side!
Burned with magic changes, his blood and all the pageantry;
Burned with deep sea-changes, the wonder in her eyes;
Flos Mercatorum! 'Twas the rose-mary of Paphos,
Reddening all the City for the prentice and his prize!
All the book of London, the pages of adventure,
Passed before the prentice on that vigil of St. John:
Then the chapmen shook their reins,--"We'll ride behind the revelry,
Round again to Cornhill! Up, and follow on!"
Riding on his pack-horse, above the shouting multitude,
There she turned and smiled at him, and thanked him for his grace:
"Let me down by Red Rose Lane," and, like a wave of twilight
While she spoke, her shadowy hair--touched his tingling face.
When they came to Red Rose Lane, beneath the blossomed ale-poles,
Light along his arm she lay, a moment, leaping down:
Then she waved "farewell" to him, and down the Lane he watched her
Flitting through the darkness in her gay green gown.
All along the Cheape, as he rode among the chapmen,
Round by Black Friars, to the Two-Necked Swan
Coloured like the sunset, prentices and maidens
Danced for red roses on the vigil of St. John.
Over them were jewelled lamps in great black galleries,
Garlanded with beauty, and burning all the night;
All the doors were shadowy with orpin and St. John's wort,
Long fennel, green birch, and lilies of delight.
"He should have slept here at the Mermaid Inn,"
Said Heywood as the chanter paused for breath.
"What? Has our Mermaid sung so long?" cried Ben.
"Her beams are black enough. There was an Inn,"
Said Tom, "that bore the name; and through its heart
There flowed the right old purple. I like to think
It was the same, where Lydgate took his ease
After his hood was stolen; and Gower, perchance;
And, though he loved the Tabard for a-while,
I like to think the Father of us all,
The old Adam of English minstrelsy caroused
Here in the Mermaid Tavern. I like to think
Jolly Dan Chaucer, with his kind shrewd face
Fresh as an apple above his fur-fringed gown,
One plump hand sporting with his golden chain,
Looked out from that old casement over the sign,
And saw the pageant, and the shaggy nags,
With Whittington, and his green-gowned maid, go by.
"O, very like," said Clopton, "for the bells
Left not a head indoors that night." He drank
A draught of malmsey--and thus renewed his tale:--
"Flos Mercatorum," mourned the bell of All Hallowes,
"There was he an orphan, O, a little lad alone,
Rubbing down the great white horses for a supper!"
"True," boomed the Bow Bell, "his hands were his own!"
Where did he sleep? On a plump white wool-pack,
Open to the moon on that vigil of St. John,
Sheltered from the dew, where the black-timbered gallery
Frowned above the yard of the Two-Necked Swan.
Early in the morning, clanged the bell of St. Martin's,
Early in the morning, with a groat in his hand,
Mournfully he parted with the jolly-hearted chapmen,
Shouldered his bundle and walked into the Strand;
Walked into the Strand, and back again to West Cheape,
Staring at the wizardry of every painted sign,
Dazed with the steeples and the rich heraldic cornices
Drinking in the colours of the Cheape like wine.
All about the booths now, the parti-coloured prentices
Fluted like a flock of birds along a summer lane,
Green linnets, red caps, and gay gold finches,--
What d'ye lack, and what d'ye lack, and what d'ye lack again?
"Buy my dainty doublets, cut on double taffetas,
Buy my Paris thread," they cried, and caught him by the hand,
"Laces for your Heart's-Delight, and lawns to make her love you,
Cambric for her wimple, O, the finest in the land."
Ah, but he was hungry, foot-sore, weary,
Knocking at the doors of the armourers that day!
What d'ye lack? they asked of him; but no man lacked a prentice:
When he told them what he lacked, they frowned and turned away.
Hard was his bed that night, beneath a cruel archway,
Down among the hulks, with his heart growing cold!
London is a rare town, but O, the streets of London,
Red though their flints be, they are not red with gold.
Pale in the
We drew from out our Mermaid cellarage
All the old glory of London in one cask
Of magic vintage. Never a city on earth--
Rome, Paris, Florence, Bagdad--held for Ben
The colours of old London; and, that night,
We staved them like a wine, and drank, drank deep!
'Twas Master Heywood, whom the Mermaid Inn
Had dubbed our London laureate, hauled the cask
Out of its ancient harbourage. "Ben," he cried,
Bustling into the room with Dekker and Brome,
"The prentices are up!" Ben raised his head
Out of the chimney-corner where he drowsed,
And listened, reaching slowly for his pipe.
"Clerk of the Bow Bell," all along the Cheape
There came a shout that swelled into a roar.
"What! Will they storm the Mermaid?" Heywood laughed,
"They are turning into Bread Street!"
Down they came!
We heard them hooting round the poor old Clerk--
"Clubs! Clubs! The rogue would have us work all night!
He rang ten minutes late! Fifteen, by Paul's!"
And over the hubbub rose, like a thin bell,
The Clerk's entreaty--"Now, good boys, good boys,
Children of Cheape, be still, I do beseech you!
I took some forty winks, but then...." A roar
Of wrathful laughter drowned him--"Forty winks!
Remember Black May-day! We'll make you wink!"
There was a scuffle, and into the tavern rushed
Gregory Clopton, Clerk of the Bow Bell,--
A tall thin man, with yellow hair a-stream,
And blazing eyes.
"Hide me," he clamoured, "quick!
These picaroons will murder me!"
I closed
The thick oak doors against the coloured storm
Of prentices in red and green and ray,
Saffron and Reading tawny. Twenty clubs
Drubbed on the panels as I barred them out;
And even our walls and shutters could not drown
Their song that, like a mocking peal of bells,
Under our windows, made all Bread Street ring:--
"Clerk of the Bow Bell,
With the yellow locks,
For thy late ringing
Thy head shall have knocks!"
Then Heywood, seeing the Clerk was all a-quake,
Went to an upper casement that o'er-looked
The whole of Bread Street. Heywood knew their ways,
And parleyed with them till their anger turned
To shouts of merriment. Then, like one deep bell
His voice rang out, in answer to their peal:--
"Children of Cheape,
Hold you all still!
You shall have Bow Bell
Rung at your will!"
Loudly they cheered him. Courteously he bowed,
Then firmly shut the window; and, ere I filled
His cup with sack again, the crowd had gone.
"My clochard, sirs, is warm," quavered the Clerk.
"I do confess I took some forty winks!
They are good lads, our prentices of Cheape,
But hasty!"
"Wine!" said Ben. He filled a cup
And thrust it into Gregory's trembling hands.
"Yours is a task," said Dekker, "a great task!
You sit among the gods, a lord of time,
Measuring out the pulse of London's heart."
"Yea, sir, above the hours and days and years,
I sometimes think. 'Tis a great Bell--the Bow!
And hath been, since the days of Whittington."
"The good old days," growled Ben. "Both good and bad
Were measured by my Bell," the Clerk replied.
And, while he spoke, warmed by the wine, his voice
Mellowed and floated up and down the scale
As if the music of the London bells
Lingered upon his tongue. "I know them all,
And love them, all the voices of the bells.
FLOS MERCATORUM! That's the Bell of Bow
Remembering Richard Whittington. You should hear
The bells of London when they tell his tale.
Once, after hearing them, I wrote it down.
I know the tale by heart now, every turn."
"Then ring it out," said Heywood.
Gregory smiled
And cleared his throat.
"You must imagine, sirs,
The Clerk, sitting on high, among the clouds,
With London spread beneath him like a map.
Under his tower, a flock of prentices
Calling like bells, of little size or weight,
But bells no less, ask that the Bell of Bow
Shall tell the tale of Richard Whittington,
As thus."
Then Gregory Clopton, mellowing all
The chiming vowels, and dwelling on every tone
In rhythm or rhyme that helped to swell the peal
Or keep the ringing measure, beat for beat,
Chanted this legend of the London bells:--
Clerk of the Bow Bell, four and twenty prentices,
All upon a Hallowe'en, we prithee, for our joy,
Ring a little turn again for sweet Dick Whittington,
Flos Mercatorum, and a barefoot boy!--
"Children of Cheape," did that old Clerk answer,
"You will have a peal, then, for well may you know,
All the bells of London remember Richard Whittington
When they hear the voice of the big Bell of Bow!"--
Clerk with the yellow locks, mellow be thy malmsey!
He was once a prentice, and carolled in the Strand!
Ay, and we are all, too, Marchaunt Adventurers,
Prentices of London, and lords of Engeland.
"Children of Cheape," did that old Clerk answer,
"Hold you, ah hold you, ah hold you all still!
Souling if you come to the glory of a Prentice,
You shall have the Bow Bell rung at your will!"
"Whittington! Whittington! O, turn again, Whittington,
Lord Mayor of London," the big Bell began:
"Where was he born? O, at Pauntley in Gloucestershire
Hard by Cold Ashton, Cold Ashton," it ran.
"Flos Mercatorum," moaned the bell of All Hallowes,
"There was he an orphan, O, a little lad alone!"
"Then we all sang," echoed happy St. Saviour's,
"Called him, and lured him, and made him our own.
Told him a tale as he lay upon the hillside,
Looking on his home in the meadow-lands below!"
"Told him a tale," clanged the bell of Cold Abbey;
"Told him the truth," boomed the big Bell of Bow!
Sang of a City that was like a blazoned missal-book,
Black with oaken gables, carven and inscrolled;
Every street a coloured page, and every sign a hieroglyph,
Dusky with enchantments, a City paved with gold;
"Younger son, younger son, up with stick and bundle!"--
Even so we rung for him--"But--kneel before you go;
Watch by your shield, lad, in little Pauntley Chancel,
Look upon the painted panes that hold your Arms a-glow,--
Coat of Gules and Azure; but the proud will not remember it!
And the Crest a Lion's Head, until the new be won!
Far away, remember it! And O, remember this, too,--
Every barefoot boy on earth is but a younger son."
Proudly he answered us, beneath the painted window,--
"Though I be a younger son, the glory falls to me:
While my brother bideth by a little land in Gloucestershire,
All the open Earth is mine, and all the Ocean-sea.
Yet will I remember, yet will I remember,
By the chivalry of God, until my day be done,
When I meet a gentle heart, lonely and unshielded,
Every barefoot boy on earth is but a younger son!"
Then he looked to Northward for the tall ships of Bristol;
Far away, and cold as death, he saw the Severn shine:
Then he looked to Eastward, and he saw a string of colours
Trickling through the grey hills, like elfin drops of wine;
Down along the Mendip dale, the chapmen and their horses,
Far away, and carrying each its little coloured load,
Winding like a fairy-tale, with pack and corded bundle,
Trickled like a crimson thread along the silver road.
Quick he ran to meet them, stick and bundle on his shoulder!
Over by Cold Ashton, he met them trampling down,--
White shaggy horses with their packs of purple spicery,
Crimson kegs of malmsey, and the silks of London town.
When the chapmen asked of him the bridle-path to Dorset,
Blithely he showed them, and he led them on their way,
Led them through the fern with their bales of breathing Araby,
Led them to a bridle-path that saved them half a day.
Merrily shook the silver bells that hung the broidered bridle-rein,
Chiming to his hand, as he led them through the fern,
Down to deep Dorset, and the wooded Isle of Purbeck,
Then--by little Kimmeridge--they led him turn for turn.
Down by little Kimmeridge, and up by Hampshire forest-roads,
Round by Sussex violets, and apple-bloom of Kent,
Singing songs of London, telling tales of London,
All the way to London, with packs of wool they went.
"London was London, then! A clean, clear moat
Girdled her walls that measured, round about,
Three miles or less. She is big and dirty now,"
Said Dekker.
"Call it a silver moat," growled Ben,
"That's the new poetry! Call it crystal, lad!
But, till you kiss the Beast, you'll never find
Your Fairy Prince. Why, all those crowded streets,
Flung all their filth, their refuse, rags and bones,
Dead cats and dogs, into your clean clear moat,
And made it sluggish as old Acheron.
Fevers and plagues, death in a thousand shapes
Crawled out of it. London was dirty, lad;
And till you kiss that fact, you'll never see
The glory of this old Jerusalem!"
"Ay, 'tis the fogs that make the sunset red,"
Answered Tom Heywood. "London is earthy, coarse,
Grimy and grand. You must make dirt the ground,
Or lose the colours of friend Clopton's tale.
Ring on!" And, nothing loth, the Clerk resumed:--
Bravely swelled his heart to see the moat of London glittering
Round her mighty wall--they told him--two miles long!
Then--he gasped as, echoing in by grim black Aldgate,
Suddenly their shaggy nags were nodding through a throng:
Prentices in red and ray, marchaunts in their saffron,
Aldermen in violets, and minstrels in white,
Clerks in homely hoods of budge, and wives with crimson wimples,
Thronging as to welcome him that happy summer night.
"Back," they cried, and "Clear the way," and caught the ringing
bridle-reins:
"Wait! the Watch is going by, this vigil of St. John!"
Merrily laughed the chapmen then, reining their great white horses back,
"When the pageant passes, lad, we'll up and follow on!"
There, as thick the crowd surged, beneath the blossomed ale-poles,
Lifting up to Whittington a fair face afraid,
Swept against his horse by a billow of madcap prentices,
Hard against the stirrup breathed a green-gowned maid.
Swift he drew her up and up, and throned her there before him,
High above the throng with her laughing April eyes,
Like a Queen of Faërie on the great pack-saddle.
"Hey!" laughed the chapmen, "the prentice wins the prize!"
"Whittington! Whittington! the world is all before you!"
Blithely rang the bells and the steeples rocked and reeled!
Then--he saw her eyes grow wide, and, all along by Leaden Hall,
Drums rolled, earth shook, and shattering trumpets pealed.
Like a marching sunset, there, from Leaden Hall to Aldgate,
Flared the crimson cressets--O, her brows were haloed then!--
Then the stirring steeds went by with all their mounted trumpeters,
Then, in ringing harness, a thousand marching men.
Marching--marching--his heart and all the halberdiers,
And his pulses throbbing with the throbbing of the drums;
Marching--marching--his blood and all the burganets!
"Look," she cried, "O, look," she cried, "and now the morrice comes!"
Dancing--dancing--her eyes and all the Lincoln Green,
Robin Hood and Friar Tuck, dancing through the town!
"Where is Marian?" Laughingly she turned to Richard Whittington.
"Here," he said, and pointed to her own green gown.
Dancing--dancing--her heart and all the morrice-bells!
Then there burst a mighty shout from thrice a thousand throats!
Then, with all their bows bent, and sheaves of peacock arrows,
Marched the tall archers in their white silk coats,
White silk coats, with the crest of London City
Crimson on the shoulder, a sign for all to read,--
Marching--marching--and then the sworded henchmen,
Then, William Walworth, on his great stirring steed.
Flos Mercatorum, ay, the fish-monger, Walworth,--
He whose nets of silk drew the silver from the tide,
He who saved the king when the king was but a prentice,--
Lord Mayor of London, with his sword at his side!
Burned with magic changes, his blood and all the pageantry;
Burned with deep sea-changes, the wonder in her eyes;
Flos Mercatorum! 'Twas the rose-mary of Paphos,
Reddening all the City for the prentice and his prize!
All the book of London, the pages of adventure,
Passed before the prentice on that vigil of St. John:
Then the chapmen shook their reins,--"We'll ride behind the revelry,
Round again to Cornhill! Up, and follow on!"
Riding on his pack-horse, above the shouting multitude,
There she turned and smiled at him, and thanked him for his grace:
"Let me down by Red Rose Lane," and, like a wave of twilight
While she spoke, her shadowy hair--touched his tingling face.
When they came to Red Rose Lane, beneath the blossomed ale-poles,
Light along his arm she lay, a moment, leaping down:
Then she waved "farewell" to him, and down the Lane he watched her
Flitting through the darkness in her gay green gown.
All along the Cheape, as he rode among the chapmen,
Round by Black Friars, to the Two-Necked Swan
Coloured like the sunset, prentices and maidens
Danced for red roses on the vigil of St. John.
Over them were jewelled lamps in great black galleries,
Garlanded with beauty, and burning all the night;
All the doors were shadowy with orpin and St. John's wort,
Long fennel, green birch, and lilies of delight.
"He should have slept here at the Mermaid Inn,"
Said Heywood as the chanter paused for breath.
"What? Has our Mermaid sung so long?" cried Ben.
"Her beams are black enough. There was an Inn,"
Said Tom, "that bore the name; and through its heart
There flowed the right old purple. I like to think
It was the same, where Lydgate took his ease
After his hood was stolen; and Gower, perchance;
And, though he loved the Tabard for a-while,
I like to think the Father of us all,
The old Adam of English minstrelsy caroused
Here in the Mermaid Tavern. I like to think
Jolly Dan Chaucer, with his kind shrewd face
Fresh as an apple above his fur-fringed gown,
One plump hand sporting with his golden chain,
Looked out from that old casement over the sign,
And saw the pageant, and the shaggy nags,
With Whittington, and his green-gowned maid, go by.
"O, very like," said Clopton, "for the bells
Left not a head indoors that night." He drank
A draught of malmsey--and thus renewed his tale:--
"Flos Mercatorum," mourned the bell of All Hallowes,
"There was he an orphan, O, a little lad alone,
Rubbing down the great white horses for a supper!"
"True," boomed the Bow Bell, "his hands were his own!"
Where did he sleep? On a plump white wool-pack,
Open to the moon on that vigil of St. John,
Sheltered from the dew, where the black-timbered gallery
Frowned above the yard of the Two-Necked Swan.
Early in the morning, clanged the bell of St. Martin's,
Early in the morning, with a groat in his hand,
Mournfully he parted with the jolly-hearted chapmen,
Shouldered his bundle and walked into the Strand;
Walked into the Strand, and back again to West Cheape,
Staring at the wizardry of every painted sign,
Dazed with the steeples and the rich heraldic cornices
Drinking in the colours of the Cheape like wine.
All about the booths now, the parti-coloured prentices
Fluted like a flock of birds along a summer lane,
Green linnets, red caps, and gay gold finches,--
What d'ye lack, and what d'ye lack, and what d'ye lack again?
"Buy my dainty doublets, cut on double taffetas,
Buy my Paris thread," they cried, and caught him by the hand,
"Laces for your Heart's-Delight, and lawns to make her love you,
Cambric for her wimple, O, the finest in the land."
Ah, but he was hungry, foot-sore, weary,
Knocking at the doors of the armourers that day!
What d'ye lack? they asked of him; but no man lacked a prentice:
When he told them what he lacked, they frowned and turned away.
Hard was his bed that night, beneath a cruel archway,
Down among the hulks, with his heart growing cold!
London is a rare town, but O, the streets of London,
Red though their flints be, they are not red with gold.
Pale in the
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