RICHARD,son of the Black Prince,a boy eleven years of age,succeeded to the Crown under the title of King Richard the Second.
The whole English nation were ready to admire him for the sake of his brave father.As to the lords and ladies about the Court,they declared him to be the most beautiful,the wisest,and the best-even of princes-whom the lords and ladies about the Court,generally declare to be the most beautiful,the wisest,and the best of mankind.To flatter a poor boy in this base manner was not a very likely way to develop whatever good was in him;and it brought him to anything but a good or happy end.
The Duke of Lancaster,the young King's uncle-commonly called John of Gaunt,from having been born at Ghent,which the common people so pronounced-was supposed to have some thoughts of the throne himself;but,as he was not popular,and the memory of the Black Prince was,he submitted to his nephew.
The war with France being still unsettled,the Government of England wanted money to provide for the expenses that might arise out of it;accordingly a certain tax,called the Poll-tax,which had originated in the last reign,was ordered to be levied on the people.This was a tax on every person in the kingdom,male and female,above the age of fourteen,of three groats (or three four-penny pieces)a year;clergymen were charged more,and only beggars were exempt.
I have no need to repeat that the common people of England had long been suffering under great oppression.They were still the mere slaves of the lords of the land on which they lived,and were on most occasions harshly and unjustly treated.But,they had begun by this time to think very seriously of not bearing quite so much;and,probably,were emboldened by that French insurrection I mentioned in the last chapter.
The people of Essex rose against the Poll-tax,and being severely handled by the government officers,killed some of them.At this very time one of the tax-collectors,going his rounds from house to house,at Dartford in Kent came to the cottage of one WAT,a tiler by trade,and claimed the tax upon his daughter.Her mother,who was at home,declared that she was under the age of fourteen;upon that,the collector (as other collectors had already done in different parts of England)behaved in a savage way,and brutally insulted Wat Tyler's daughter.The daughter screamed,the mother screamed.Wat the Tiler,who was at work not far off,ran to the spot,and did what any honest father under such provocation might have done-struck the collector dead at a blow.
Instantly the people of that town uprose as one man.They made Wat Tyler their leader;they joined with the people of Essex,who were in arms under a priest called JACK STRAW;they took out of prison another priest named JOHN BALL;and gathering in numbers as they went along,advanced,in a great confused army of poor men,to Blackheath.It is said that they wanted to abolish all property,and to declare all men equal.I do not think this very likely;
Because they stopped the travellers on the roads and made them swear to be true to King Richard and the people.Nor were they at all disposed to injure those who had done them no harm,merely because they were of high station;for,the King's mother,who had to pass through their camp at Blackheath,on her way to her young son,lying for safety in the Tower of London,had merely to kiss a few dirty-faced rough-bearded men who were noisily fond of royalty,and so got away in perfect safety.Next day the whole mass marched on to London Bridge.
There was a drawbridge in the middle,which WILLIAM WALWORTH the Mayor caused to be raised to prevent their coming into the city;
But they soon terrified the citizens into lowering it again,and spread themselves,with great uproar,over the streets.They broke open the prisons;they burned the papers in Lambeth Palace;they destroyed the DUKE OF LANCASTER'S Palace,the Savoy,in the Strand,said to be the most beautiful and splendid in England;they set fire to the books and documents in the Temple;and made a great riot.Many of these outrages were committed in drunkenness;since those citizens,who had well-filled cellars,were only too glad to throw them open to save the rest of their property;but even the drunken rioters were very careful to steal nothing.They were so angry with one man,who was seen to take a silver cup at the Savoy Palace,and put it in his breast,that they drowned him in the river,cup and all.
The young King had been taken out to treat with them before they committed these excesses;but,he and the people about him were so frightened by the riotous shouts,that they got back to the Tower in the best way they could.This made the insurgents bolder;so they went on rioting away,striking off the heads of those who did not,at a moment's notice,declare for King Richard and the people;
and killing as many of the unpopular persons whom they supposed to be their enemies as they could by any means lay hold of.In this manner they passed one very violent day,and then proclamation was made that the King would meet them at Mile-end,and grant their requests.
The rioters went to Mile-end to the number of sixty thousand,and the King met them there,and to the King the rioters peaceably proposed four conditions.First,that neither they,nor their children,nor any coming after them,should be made slaves any more.Secondly,that the rent of land should be fixed at a certain price in money,instead of being paid in service.Thirdly,that they should have liberty to buy and sell in all markets and public places,like other free men.Fourthly,that they should be pardoned for past offences.Heaven knows,there was nothing very unreasonable in these proposals!The young King deceitfully pretended to think so,and kept thirty clerks up,all night,writing out a charter accordingly.