The San Juan islander. [volume] (Friday Harbor, Wash.) 1898-1914, 1902-07-03
CHAPTER XXIII.

Amid the confusion and panic that
prevailed at court when it became fully
apparent that the insurgents were
marching on London, it was suggested
to the king that he might again make
use of the young man who had once
before acted as his emissary to the dis
contented.
All through the troubles of the
month of Mav-the weariest return of
the merry month that England ever
saw-Ralph had been left in the Mar
shalsea. Once or twice in Sudbury's
perplexites, when the baffled desire to
get hold of the moving spirits in the
popular discomfort rose to the height of
passion, the angry chancellor had
thought of sending for Ralph, and put
ting him on the rack till he should tell
all he knew. But partly because his
conscience had scruples, and partly be-
cause he felt that the torture would fail
of it's purpose, he put the temptation
aside.
1t was the princess that asked what
had become OF him, and suggested that
he might be useful in the crisis. 1t
happened in this way. The princess
was the first to bring to court authentic
news of the scope and purpose OF the
insurrection. She had encountered the
main body under Wat Tyler while on
her way to the shrine of st. Thomas on
the morrow of Trinity Sunday. No
violence had been offered to herself or
to her train when she was recognized.
They had cheered the kings mother,
the Fair Maid of Kent. They had
been loud in their professions of 10y
atty, and had testified it besides in an
indirect way by exacting from her reti-
nue. an oath that they would never ac-
cept king of the name of John. The
boisterous exclusion of aspiring Lancas-
ter from the succession was not un-
pleasing to Richards mother; still the
appearance of the half-clad men, with
their murderous looking, barbarous
weapons, maces, hatchets, hedge bills,
fails and scythes was so alarming their
clamor so uproarious, their gestures so
uncouth, that the incident had put her
in panic, and she had turned her car
and jolted along at full speed OF her
horses, never stopping but to change
them till she reached London.
All the mothers instincts were
awake in the interest of her sons safety
and honor. Something she had heard
and clearly remembered through all
her fears from the captain himself,
Wat Tyler, who had begged her to
assure the king of the devotion of his
poor commons, and that they demand
ed nothing but freedom and justice.
Also her attendants had gathered for
her the flying rumors as they hurried
through the disturbed country. And
when she came to London, and found
how things stood there. the council dis
tracted, resolving upon nothing, adj
iourning from day TO day, waiting upon
events, strong suspicion of treachery,
confirmed by what she had heard as
she fled along. took possession OF her
mind. She had heard that agents oil
John Of Gaunt were busy in Kent, dis
seminating the report that it was his
intention to liberate all his bondmen.
What could this mean but that the
crafty Lancaster was trying to GUST her
son? Ii was a suspicious circumstance
that none of the kings uncles were in
London. John OF Gaunt was at Der.
wick, negotiating a treaty with the
Scots. The Earl of Cambridge had just
set sail for Portugal. Buckingham