young king would confer with them at Mile End, and Richard, leaving the Tower, gave such assurances that the men of Essex and Hertford went quietly home.

'When the people had been appeased at Mile End,' says Froissart, and were setting off for their different towns as speedily as they could receive the king's letters, King Richard went to the Wardrobe, where the princess was in the greatest fear. He comforted her, as he was very well able to do, and passed there the night. On the Saturday morning the king left the Wardrobe, and went to Westminster, where he and all the lords heard mass in the abbey.'

Matters were still in a most unsatisfactory state. The Kentish men, under Wat Tyler, maintained their position, and affairs were at the worst, when the king, after hearing mass at Westminster, mounted and rode eastward. Attended by William Walworth, Mayor of London, and sixty other persons, he encountered the multitude, and Wat Tyler spurring forward to address him, came so close that the head of the demagogue's horse touched the tail of the king's. While Wat with one hand played with his dagger, he with the other seized Richard's rein, as if with violent intent. But the mayor seeing this, drew his sword and inflicted a severe wound on the demagogue's neck, and when Wat wheeled round to address the mob, an esquire, named Standish, felled him to the ground.

"You have killed our captain,' shouted the Kentish men, bending their bows.

'My lieges,' said Richard, riding forward, 'I am your king, and I will be your captain.'

This appeal from the young king to the better nature of the Kentish men touched them as Englishmen. Some of them knelt for pardon; others taking to the fields, decamped; and the insurrection was at an end. 'The king,' says Froissart, 'immediately took the road to the Wardrobe, to visit the princess, his mother, who had remained there two days and two nights, under the greatest fears, as indeed

she had cause. On seeing the king her son, she was mightily rejoiced, and said, "Ha! ha! fair son, what pain and anguish have I not suffered for you this day! "Certainly, madam," replied the king, "I am well assured of that, but now rejoice and thank God; for it behoves us to praise him, as I have this day regained my inheritance and the kingdom of England, which I had lost." The king remained the whole day with his mother.

The lords retired to their own houses. A proclamation was made through all the streets, that every person who was not an inhabitant of London, and who had not resided there for a whole year, should instantly depart. After this proclamation had been heard, no one dared to infringe it, but all departed instantly to their homes quite discomfited.'

At the time of Wat Tyler's insurrection, the princessmother had, under peculiar circumstances, the company of her daughter Joan Holand, who after the battle of Aurai, had been espoused by John Duke of Brittany. It seems that the duke's alliance with the English exposed him to the inconvenience of being expelled from his province, and that with his duchess he sought an asylum in England. Wearying of exile, however, he returned to the continent, and finding the English alliance less profitable than in other days, made his peace with the King of France. This step highly exasperated the barons and knights of England; and they manifested their indignation by preventing the return of the duchess to her husband.

'Since,' said they, 'the Duke of Brittany has so ill and treacherously acquitted himself, whenever he shall demand back his duchess, let us not consent, but send him his two enemies, the sons of Charles of Blois. He is duke through our power; and an ungrateful return does he make for what he has had from us. We ought therefore to act in like manner to him for his disgraceful conduct.'

So the Duchess of Brittany remained in England with her mother, and was residing there, when Anne of Bohemia,

sister of the Emperor Wenceslaus, came to England as King Richard's bride.

Early in Richard's reign, Sir Simon Burley was sent to the emperor to demand the hand of his sister for the young King of England. The emperor had no objections to the match; but he entertained some doubts as to the state of the country of which it was proposed to make the princess queen; and he deemed it prudent to send the Duke of Saxony to view the land, and inquire. The duke came, saw, and was satisfied; and, as time passed on, he conducted the princess to England.

'They conducted her to Calais,' says Froissart, when the Brabanters returned, after they had delivered her to the barons of England. The young lady made no stay at Calais, but till the wind was favourable. She embarked on a Wednesday morning when the vessels were manned, and the same day arrived at Dover, where she halted to repose herself. On the third, she set out for Canterbury, where the Earl of Buckingham received her very grandly. The lady pursued her journey to London, and was most honourably received by the citizens, the ladies and damsels of the town and country, who were all assembled to meet her. She was married to the king in the chapel of the palace of Westminster, the twentieth day after Christmas.

'On the wedding-day, there were great feastings. That gallant and noble knight, Sir Robert de Namur, had always accompanied her from the time he quitted Germany until she was married, for which the Emperor and the King of England held themselves much obliged. The king carried his queen to Windsor, where he kept an open and noble house. They were very happy together. She was accompanied by the Princess of Wales and the Duchess of Brittany, who was, at that time, separated from her husband.'

Meantime Joan's other daughter, Maude Holand, had been given in marriage. In fact, the young Count of St.