GUY HAVING SLAIN ARMARANT.
THE HISTORY
OF THE
LIFE AND DEATH
OF THAT NOBLE KNIGHT
SIR BEVIS
OF
SOUTHAMPTON
Newcastle: Printed in this present Year.
According to Ebert, the French editions of this romance are very early; he quotes two, "Le livre de Beufoes de Hantonne et de la Belle Josienne sa mye. Par. Verard." no date, folio, G.L., and "Beufues Danthonne nouvellement imprimé a Paris. Par le Noir 1502," small folio, Gothic letter; whilst the British Museum possesses an earlier Italian book on the subject, "Buovo de Antona di Guidone Palladius Rezunto & reuisto. Caligula di Bazalieri. Bologna 1497," octavo, Gothic letter. The Bodleian Library possesses a very early English copy of "Sir Beuys of Hamton," "Emprynted by Rycharde Pynson in Flete-strete at the Sygne of the George," quarto, black letter; and Hazlitt says there also is a fragment of two leaves by Wynkyn de Worde, printed with the same types as the "Memorare Novissima."
The frontispiece is an engraving belonging to an edition of 1690. Sir Bevis was born in the reign of Edgar, and his parents were Sir Guy of Southampton, and a daughter of the King of Scotland, who was desperately in love with Sir Murdure, brother of the Emperor of Almaine. She managed to keep up appearances for some years after the birth of Bevis, until her passion for Sir Murdure became uncontrollable, and she sent a message to him to come over to England and slay her husband. He obeyed, and with his men lay in wait for Sir Guy, who was hunting for a wild boar for his wife. They assaulted him, and, after a desperate resistance on his part, killed him, and Sir Murdure was received joyfully by the false wife, and duly installed in her husband's stead. Naturally, Bevis was wroth, and having expressed his opinion freely, was duly hated by his mother, who sent to Sir Sabere, her husband's brother, to privately murder him. Sir Sabere, however, dressed him in old clothes and put him to keep sheep, whilst he showed Bevis's blood-stained garments, as a token of having killed him. However, the impulsive Bevis could not brook the situation, but went to the castle, crook in hand, and with it knocked Sir Murdure under the table, and would have murdered his mother, had not better thoughts prevailed. His mother was furious, and ordered Sir Sabere and another knight to cast him into the sea, which they promised to do; but meeting with merchants of Armony, they sold Bevis to them.
The merchants presented him to the king (Ermine), who was prepossessed with his looks, and on questioning him, remembered having heard of the prowess of his father Sir Guy. "I have but one fair Daughter, said the King, and if thou wilt forsake thy God, and serve Apoline our God, thou shalt have my Daughter to Wife, and enjoy my Kingdom after me. Not so, my Lord, said Bevis, for all the Beauties in the World, I would not deny my Creator; Then, said the King, wilt thou be my Chamberlain, and when I find thy Desert, I'll dub thee a Knight, and thou shalt bear my Standard in the Field against my Foes. What you please to command me, my Lord, said he, save the denying of my God, I will do.
"Bevis was so beloved of the king that none durst speak against him; nay Josian the King's daughter was in love with him." But it happened, one Christmas Day, Bevis met sixty Saracens, who, taunting him with his religion, he encountered, and slew them all. At which the king swore he should die. But Josian on her knees begged his life, which was granted; she dressed his wounds, nursed him, and he was in as great favour as ever.
He next, after many difficulties, slew a mighty wild boar of cannibal propensities, and won great honour thereby.
Josian must have been fair indeed, for, all through the story, Bevis is perpetually getting into trouble through her fatal beauty. It now happened to have attracted King Brandmond, who sent to King Ermine demanding her hand, or he would depose him. The nobles were for yielding; but Josian suggested that if Bevis were made general, and invested with command, things would speedily be righted. This was done; he was dubbed knight, and Josian armed him, and gave him a sword, Morglay, and a wonderful steed, Arundel. He defeated Brandmond, and took him prisoner. "So Bevis returned with great Victory and was royally entertained by the King, and then Josian broke her mind to Bevis; quoth she, by Mahomed, I do desire to be thy Love: Not so, Lady, said Bevis, I'll wed no Heatheness; which words she took very scornfully." But her love prevailed, and she went to Bevis, offering to do anything, even turn Christian, could she but win his love. Sir Bevis could only act as he did—take her in his arms, and kiss her. Her speech and behaviour being reported to the king, he was mad, and wrote letters to Brandmond, to put Sir Bevis to death, and gave them to him, to be the unconscious bearer of his own death-warrant.
Meanwhile, Sir Sabere had sent his son, Terry, travelling in search of Sir Bevis, and the two met near Damas; but Bevis did not make himself known. He rode into Damas, insulted the inhabitants by asking them, "What devil do you serve here?" and pulled down their idol Mahomed, throwing it into the gutter. This naturally exasperated the Saracens, and they set upon him; but before they could secure him, two hundred of them were slain. He was brought before the king, who read the letters of which he was the bearer. Bevis, finding he had only himself to trust to, went Berserk again and killed sixty more Saracens, was overpowered and thrown into a dungeon with two dragons, which, however, he slew with the truncheon of a spear he opportunely found, "and then he was at rest awhile."
Josian's fatal beauty was to bring trouble. "Father, said Josian where is Bevis? He reply'd he is gone to his own country. At this Time came King Jour, Intending for to wed Josian which he obtained. And Ermine gave Jour, Arundel and Morglay, which belonged to Bevis; this Josian could in no way avoid."
Bevis's captors thought they would go and see him, and as he had been in prison seven years, fed only on bread and water, they thought he would be weak; but he killed them all, and seizing on a horse, escaped. He met with a giant whom he slew, and then proceeded on his search for Josian. He met a poor palmer who told him that in that castle opposite lived King Jour and his wife, the fair Josian. They exchanged clothes, and Bevis entered the castle. He saw and conversed with Josian, who did not know him; but when Arundel heard him speak, he "broke seven Chains asunder, and neighed;" and then Josian recognized him. The sequel may be imagined. King Jour was sent off on an imaginary errand, and Josian and Bevis eloped, taking with them the chamberlain Boniface. They were pursued, and hid in a cave, where, Bevis being absent hunting for their sustenance, two lions entered, killed and eat Boniface, and then meekly laid their heads in Josian's lap. On Bevis's return, she called out to him the state of things, when he told her to let the lions loose, and he killed them.
They then continued their journey, until they were stopped by Ascapart, "an ugly Giant, who was thirty Foot high, and a Foot between his Eyebrows; he was bristled like a Swine, and his Blubber Lips hung on one side." Naturally he had to be fought and overcome, and on his life being spared, he promised to be a faithful servant. They reached the shore, where they wanted to take ship, but, being unable to procure a boat, they first had to fight and slay many Saracens, and then Ascapart waded to the ship, carrying Sir Bevis and Josian, and tucking Arundel under his arm. They reached the land of Colen, where the bishop was a relation of Bevis. Josian was baptized, but Ascapart refused the rite.
"Bevis being in bed heard a Knight cry, I rot, I rot, at which Noise Bevis wondered; and the next Morning he ask'd what was the Cause of that Noise; He was a Knight, they said, that coming through the street, the Dragon met him and cast her Venom upon him, whereof he rotted and died." Bevis could not stand this, but sought and encountered the dragon, which he slew, after the hardest of his many fights.
Then he set about recovering his lost inheritance, and sailed for England, landing near Southampton. But no sooner was his back turned than the Earl of Milo, having got rid of Ascapart by stratagem, married Josian; but she strangled him in bed, whereupon she was sentenced to be burned. Ascapart, however, had broken prison, joined Bevis, and they together arrived just in the nick of time to save Josian.
Sir Bevis and Sir Sabere then seriously took Sir Murdure in hand, defeated him, and boiled him in a cauldron of pitch and brimstone; which treatment had such an effect on the mother of Sir Bevis, that she threw herself from the top of her castle and broke her neck. Sir Bevis then, somewhat tardily, married Josian, and went to do homage to Edgar; but the king's son, having been refused Arundel at any price, went to take him by force, and had his brains kicked out by the horse. Sir Bevis was banished, and having left his estates in the hands of his uncle Sabere, started on his journey, when Josian, whilst passing through a forest, was taken ill and delivered of twins. She had requested her husband, Terry, and Ascapart to leave her alone for a time; so the former two went one way, and the latter another. But when Sir Bevis and Terry returned, they found the two boys, but not the mother, who had been carried off by Ascapart. Bevis left his children with a forester, with strict injunctions to return them to one Bevis of Hampton in seven years' time; but Sabere and twelve knights tracked and slew the villain Ascapart, and restored Josian to her husband. They redeemed the children; and then, finding there was war between the kings Ermine and Jour, Bevis naturally helped his father-in-law, and captured Jour, whose ransom was "twenty Tun of Gold and three hundred White Steeds."
King Ermine turned Christian, and before his death crowned his grandson Guy King of Armony, and knighted his grandson Miles. Not unnaturally King Jour hated Sir Bevis, and beseiging him in Armony, was of course overcome and slain, and Bevis took possession of his kingdom, and converted all the inhabitants to Christianity.
But his troubled life was drawing to a close. King Edgar had disinherited Sabere's wife, so he, Bevis, and Josian, with their two sons Guy and Miles, marched to London with a great army, fought the king, slew two thousand of his men, and then went back to Southampton. The king wisely parleyed with them, and ultimately agreed to marry his eldest daughter to Miles, whom he created Earl of Cornwall; after which they all separated and went home. Bevis and Josian retired to the late King Jour's capital of Mambrant, where both he and Josian fell sick, and died the same day. "They were solemnly interred in one Grave, by Guy their Son, who raised a stately Tomb over them, to the everlasting Memory of so gallant a Knight, and his most royal and constant Lady.
So I conclude his famous Acts here penn'd,
For Time and Death brings all Things to an End."
THE
LIFE AND DEATH
OF
St. George
THE NOBLE
CHAMPION OF ENGLAND.
Printed and Sold in Aldermary Church Yard
Bow Lane London
Although there are, as may be expected from the great popularity of this patron saint of England, very numerous illustrations of him in manuscripts, even as far back as the eleventh century, yet there seems, with the exception of the "Legenda Aurea" of Caxton and Wynkyn de Worde, to be very little early printed matter about him, although Dibdin (Ames) notices "The Lyfe of that glorious Martyr Saint George," quarto, printed by Pynson.
Alban Butler gives a very etherealized life of this saint, and says, "George is usually painted on horseback and tilting at a dragon under his feet; but this representation is no more than an emblematical figure, purporting, that by his faith and Christian fortitude he conquered the Devil, called the Dragon in the Apocalypse."
Caxton's "Legenda Aurea" ("Westmestre, 1483") gives the following account of the Cappadocian saint, and his encounter with the Dragon:—"Saynt George was a knyght and borne in capadose / On a tyme he came to the prouynce of Lybye to a cyte which is sayd Sylene / And by this cyte was a stagne or a ponde lyke a see / wherein was a dragon whyche envenymed alle the contre / And on a tyme the peple were assemblid for to slee hym / And whan they sawe hym they fledde / And whan he came nyghe the citte / he venymed the peple wyth his breeth / And therfore the peple of the citte gaue to hym euery day two sheep for to fede hym / by cause he shold doo no harme to the peple / And whan the sheep fayled there was taken a man and a sheep /
"Thenne was an ordenaunce made in the towne / that there shold be taken the chyldren and yonge peple of them of the towne by lotte / And eueryche as it fyl were he gentil or poure shold be delyuered whan the lotte fyl on hym or hyr / So it happed that many of them of the towne were thenne delyuerd / In soo moche that the lotte fyl vpon the kynges doughter / Wherrof the kyng was sory and sayd vnto the people /
"For the loue of the goddes take golde and syluer and alle that I haue / and lett me haue my doughter / they sayd how syr ye haue made and ordeyned the lawe / and our chyldren been now deed / And now ye wold doo the contrarye / your doughter shal be gyuen / or ellys we shal breune you & your hows. Whan the kyng saw he myght nomore doo he began to wepe and sayd to his doughter / Now shal I neuer see thyn espousayls / Thenne retorned he to the peple and demauded viij dayes respyte And they graunted hit to hym / and whan the viij dayes were passed they came to hym and sayd / thou seest that the cyte perissheth / Thēne dyd the kyng doo[*] araye his doughter / lyke as she shold be wedded / and embraced hyr kyssed hir and gaue hir his benedyccion / And after ledde hyr to the place where the dragon was / whan she was there / saynt george passed by / And whan he sawe the lady / he demaunded the lady what she made there, And she sayd / goo ye your waye fayre yonge man / that ye perysshe not also /
"Thenne sayd he telle to me what haue ye / and why ye were / and doubte ye of no thynge / whan she sawe that he wold knowe she sayde to hym how she was delyuered to the dragon / Thenne sayd saynt george / Fayre doughter doubte ye no thynge herof / For I shall helpe the in the name of Jhesu Cryste / She said for goddes sake good knyght goo your waye / and abyde not wyth me / for ye may not delyuer me /
"Thus as they spake to gyder the dragon apperyd & came rennyng to them and saynt George was vpon his hors & drewe out his swerde & garnysshed hym wyth the signe of the Crosse / and rode hardely ageynst the dragon which came toward hym and smote hym with hys spere and hurte hym sore & threwe hym to the grounde / And after sayde to the mayde / delyuer to me your gyrdel and bynde hit about the necke of the dragon / and be not aferde / whan she had doon soo the dragon folowed hyr as it had been a make beest and debonayr / Thenne she ledde hym in to the cyte / & the peple fledde by mountayns and valeyes / and sayd / alas / alas / we shal be alle deed / Thenne saynt George sayd to them / ne doubte ye no thynge / without more byleue ye in god Jhesu Cryste / and doo you to be baptysed / and I shal slee the dragon /
"Thenne the kyng was baptysed and al his peple / and saynt george slewe the dragon and smote of his heed / And commaunded thathe shold be throwen in the feldes / and they took iiij cartes wyth oxen that drewe hym out of the cyte / Thenne were there wel fyftene thousand men baptised without wymmen and chyldren / And the kyng dyd doo make a chirche there of our lady and of saynt George / In the whiche yet sourdeth a founteyn of lyuynge water whiche heleth seek peple that drynke therof / After this the kyng offred to Saint george as moche money as there myght be nombred / but he refused alle and commaunded that it shold be gyuen to poure peple for goddes sake / and enioyned the kynge iiij thynges / that is / that he shold haue charge of the Chyrches / and that he shold honoure the preestes / and here theyr seruyce dylygently / and that he shold haue pite on the poure peple / And after kyssed the kyng and departed /"
[*] Dyd doo, i.e. caused to be.
The Chap-book version is far more marvellous, and is, as the reader will note, strangely similar, in some places, to the romance of Sir Bevis.
Coventry, not Cappadocia, is made his birth-place; his father was "a renowned peer named Lord Albert," and his mother was the King's daughter, who before St. George's birth dreamed her child would be a dragon. So Lord Albert went to consult the enchantress Kalyb, which he did by blowing a trumpet at the entrance of her cave, when a voice replied that his son should be as fierce as a dragon in deeds of chivalry. The mother died in childbirth, and St. George was stolen in his infancy by Kalyb, which so grieved Lord Albert that he died.
Kalyb grew very fond of the boy, and in a moment of confidence she showed him the brazen castle where the other six champions of Christendom were confined, and made him a present of some invincible armour. She also lent him her magic wand, a kindness which he requited by enclosing her in a rock. He then released the six champions, who went their several ways, and he went to Egypt. There he found the whole kingdom desolate because of a dragon which every day devoured a virgin, and had destroyed all but the king's daughter, who was that day to be given to him unless some one should slay the dragon, in which case she would be given in marriage to her deliverer. St. George, of course, undertook the adventure, and reached the place soon after the king and queen had taken leave of their daughter.
St. George held a short parley with the damsel, whose name was Sabra, when the dragon approached and the combat took place. We know its issue—St. George cut off the dragons head, released Sabra, and entered the city, but was withstood by some of the inhabitants, stirred up by Aminder, King of Morocco, in love with Sabra, whom he had to fight and overcome.
The king, however, received him graciously; but Aminder spread reports of St. George trying to convert the princess to Christianity, and the king wrote a letter to the Sultan of Persia, making St. George the bearer, asking him to slay him. On its delivery St. George was thrown into a dungeon, and when he had been there two days, they let down two hungry lions to devour him, but he killed them with an old sword he found.
He was seven years in prison, during which time Sabra had been forced by her father to marry Aminder, when one day he found an iron crowbar and effected his release, stole a horse, was stopped by and fought with a giant, whom he killed. He journeyed on till he came to where Sabra lived, changed clothes with a peasant, applied to her for alms, showed her a ring which she had given him, and was immediately recognized.
Accompanied by a servant, they fled; met with two lions, who eat the servant but did Sabra no harm, and were duly killed by St. George.
He returned to Coventry, where he was but a little while, when St. David and the other champions asked him for his assistance against the pagans who had invaded Hungary. He went with them, leaving Sabra at home, and duly overthrew the pagans. Then came messengers to him saying that Sabra, who it appears the Earl of Coventry had attempted to seduce, had stabbed and killed him, and was condemned to die unless a champion could be found to fight for her. St. George came at the right moment, fought, conquered, and freed Sabra. They now lived quietly, and three sons, Guy, Alexander, and David, were born to them, who were sent to Rome, England, and Bohemia, to be educated at the Courts of the several sovereigns. After eighteen years' absence they all returned, and after they had rested a few days a hunt was proposed, in which Sabra joined. Her horse, however, fell and threw her "into a thorny briar, which tore her tender flesh so terribly, that she found she had not long to live, whereupon calling to St. George and her sons, she very affectionately embraced them, not being able to speak, and soon died."
St. George undertook a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and on his return home he fought with a dragon on Dunsmore Heath and slew it. "But this proved the most fatal of all his adventures, for the vast quantities of poison thrown upon him by that monsterous beast, so infected his vital spitals, that two days afterwards he died in his own house."