ante-chamber which connects it with the rest of the abbatial buildings was of later date, probably under Abbot Islip; but it derived its name doubtless from its proximity to its greater and more famous neighbour. As the older and larger was called the Jerusalem parlour,' so this was called the Jericho 'parlour.'1 Death of 1413. If the Jerusalem Chamber was perhaps the scene of the conspiracy against the first Lancastrian king, it certainly was the scene of his death. Henry IV., as his son after 2 him, had been filled with the thought of expiating his usurpation by a crusade. His illness, meanwhile, had grown upon him during the last years of his life, so as to render him a burden to himself and to those around him. He was covered with a hideous leprosy, and was almost bent double with pain and weakness. In this state he had come up to London for his last Parliament. The galleys were ready for the voyage to the East. All haste and possible speed was made.' It was apparently not long after Christmas that the King was making his prayers at St. Edward's Shrine, to take there his leave, and so to speed him on his journey,' when he became so sick, that such as were about him feared 'that he would have died right there; wherefore they for his comfort bore him into the Abbot's Place, and lodged him in a Chamber, and there upon a pallet laid him before the fire, where he lay in great agony a certain time.' He must have been brought through the Cloisters, the present ready access from the Nave not being then in existence. The 'fire' was doubtless where it now is, for which the Chamber then, as afterwards in the seventeenth century, was remarkable amongst the parlours of London, and which, as afterwards, so now, was the immediate though homely occasion of the historical interest of the Chamber. It was the early spring, when the Abbey was filled with its old deadly chill, and the friendly warmth naturally brought the King and his attendants to this spot. At length when he was come to himself, not knowing His illness. 6 in Henry IV.'s time, implies that there had been an earlier one, a certain chamber called of old time Jerusalem.' (Rer. Angl. Script. Vet. i. 499.) To this, perhaps, belonged the fragments of painted glass, of the time of Henry III., chiefly subjects from the New Testament, but not specially bearing on Jerusalem, in the northern window. 1 Inventory. On one of the windows is scratched the date 1512. 2 See Chapter III. This was probably added in Islip's time, with the passage communicating directly into the Abbot's House. See Chapter VI. It had a fire'fork' of iron and two 'andirons.' (Inventory.) 'where he was, he freined (asked) of such as were about him, 'what place that was. The which showed to him that it belonged to the Abbot of Westminster; and, for he felt himself so sick, he commanded to ask if that Chamber had any special name. Whereto it was answered that it was named 'Hierusalem. Then said the King, Laud be to the Father of Heaven! for now I know that I shall die in this Chamber, according to the prophecy made of me beforesaid, that I should 'die in Hierusalem.' All through his reign his mind had been filled with predictions of this sort. One especially had run through Wales, describing that the son of the eagle 'should 'conquer Jerusalem.?? The prophecy was of the same kind as that which misled Cambyses at Ecbatana, on Mount Carmel, when he had expected to die at Ecbatana, in Media; and (according to the legend) Pope Sylvester II., at Santa Croce in 'Gerusalemme,' when he had expected to avoid the Devil by not going to the Syrian Jerusalem; and Robert Guiscard, when he found himself unexpectedly in a convent called Jerusalem in Cephalonia.3 With this predetermination to die, the King lingered on Bear me to that Chamber: there I'll lie In that Jerusalem shall Harry die ;4 and it was then and there that occurred the scene of his son's removal of the Crown, which Shakspeare has immor- Conversion talised, and which, though first mentioned by Mon- of Henry V. strelet, is rendered probable by the frequent discussions which had been raised in Henry's last years as to the necessity of his resigning the crown: — Ceux qui de luy avoient la garde un certain iour, voyans que de son corps, n'issoit plus d'alaine, cuidans pour vray qu'il fut transis, luy avoient couvert le visage. Or est ainsi que comme il est accoutumé de faire en pays, on avoit mis sa courônne Royal sur une couch assez près de luy, laquelle devoit prendre presentement apres son trepas son dessusdit premier fils et successeur, lequel fut de ce faire assez prest: et print la dicte courrone, & emporta sur la donner à entendre des dictes gardes. Or advint qu'assez tost apres le Roy ieeta un soupir si fut descouvert, & retourna en assez bonne mémoire: & tant qu'il regarda où auoit esté sa couronne mise: & quand il ne la veit demanda où elle estoit, & ses gardes luy réspondirent, Sire, monseigneur le Prince vostre fils l'a emporté : & il dit qu'on le feit venir devers luy & il y vint. Et adonc le Roy lui demanda pourquoi il avoit emporté sa couronne, & le Prince dit: Monseigneur, voicy en presence ceux qui' m'avoient donné à entendre & affermé, qu'estiez trespassé, et pour ce que suis vostre fils aisné, et qu'à moy appartiendra vostre couronne & Royaume apres que serez allé de vie à trepas, l'avoye prise. Et adonc le Roy en soupirant luy dit: Beau fils-comment y auriez vous droit car ie n'en y euz oncques point, & se sçaúez vous bien. Monseigneur, respondit le Prince, ainsi qui vous l'avez tenu et gardé à l'éspée, c'est mon intention de la garder & deffendre toute ma vie ; & adonc dit le Roy, or en faictes comme bon vous semblera: ie m'en rapporte à Dieu du surplus, auquel ie prie qu'il ait mercy de moy. Et bref apres sans autre chose dire, alla de vie à trepas.1 The English chroniclers speak only of the Prince's faithful attendance on his father's sick-bed; and when, as the end drew near, the King's failing sight prevented him from observing what the ministering priest was doing, his son replied, with the devotedness characteristic of the Lancastrian House, My Lord, he has just consecrated the body of our Lord. I entreat you to worship Him, by whom kings reign and princes 'rule.' The King feebly raised himself up, and stretched out his hands; and, before the elevation of the cup, called the Prince to kiss him, and then pronounced upon him a blessing,3 variously given, but in each version containing an allusion to the blessing of Isaac on Jacob--it may be from the recollection of the comparison of himself to Jacob on his first accession, or from the likeness of the relations of himself and his son to the two Jewish Patriarchs. These were the last words of the vic'torious Henry.' The Prince, in an agony of grief, retired to an oratory, as it would seem, within the monastery; and there, on his bare knees, and with floods of tears, passed the whole of that dreary day, till nightfall, in remorse for his past sins. At 5 night he secretly went to a holy hermit in the Precincts (the successor, probably, of the one whom Richard II. had consulted), and from him, after a full confession, received absolution. Such was the tradition of what, in modern days, would be called the 'conversion of Henry V.' More, April The last historical purpose to which the Abbot's House was turned before the Dissolution was the four days' confinement of Sir Thomas More, under charge of the last Abbot, who Sir Thomas strongly urged his acknowledgment of the King's 14-17, 1534. Supremacy. From its walls he probably wrote his Appeal to a General Council,' and he was taken thence by the river to the Tower. Priors and On leaving the Abbot's House, we find ourselves in the midst of the ordinary monastic life. It is now that we come upon the indications of the unusual grandeur of the The establishment. The Abbot's House was, as we have Subpriors. seen, a little palace. The rest was in proportion. In most monasteries there was but one Prior (who filled the office of Deputy to the Abbot), and one Subprior. Here, close adjoining to the Abbot's House, was a long line of buildings, now forming the eastern side of Dean's Yard, which were occupied by the Prior, the Subprior, the Prior of the Cloister, and the two inferior Subpriors, and their Chaplain. The South Cloister near the Prior's Chamber was painted with a fresco of the Nativity. The number of the inferior officers was doubled in like manner, raising the whole number to fifty or sixty. The ordinary members of the monastic community were, at least in the thirteenth century, not admitted without considerable scrutiny as to their character and motives. Their number seems to have amounted to about eighty. The whole suite was called 'the Long House,' or the 'Calbege,' or the 'House with the Tub in it '-from the large keel or cooling tub used in the vaulted cellarage. It terminated at the Blackstole Tower' still remaining at the entrance of Little Dean's Gate.' 6 The Abbot's House opened by a large archway, still visible, into the West Cloister. The Cloisters had been begun by the Confessor, and were finished shortly after the Conquest. THE Part of the eastern side was rebuilt by Henry III., and part of the northern by Edward I. The eastern was finished by Abbot Byrcheston in 1345, and the southern and 1 More's Works, 282; Doyne Bell's Tower Chapel, p. 77. 2 Ware, p. 275. 3 Cartulary. CLOISTERS. |