XXXII
The men pressed on through the night wearilessly. In the hearts of all was the joy of living a moment which had lit up the horizon for two-score years and more. Of a large body of men some there were whose throats craved the rare wines that were stored in my lord's cellars, whose stomachs hungered for the grain of the well-filled garner-houses, whose fingers longed for the contents of the great oaken chests, bursting with precious stuffs. Yet the large majority of them scorned such base motives. These were idealists, throwing away the small advantage of the moment for the greater advantage of the morrow. Many, strong in the faith of their leaders, had flung hand from the plough which at least had kept starvation from their bodies. Surely the moon looking down that night witnessed a strange sight—a deeply significant, portentous sight—the laborers, ill clad, with the marks of their toil yet upon them, armed only with cracked bows, broken swords, rusty staves, axes, scythes, whips, and even stout sticks, going forth fearlessly to meet trained armies. And the moon, looking down that night, found not only the highroad between Ely and Sudbury alive with marching men, but also the highroad that lay between Canterbury and Mile End, and that between Peterborough and St. Alban's, and that which led from Lincoln to Huntington, and the one from Southampton to Maidstone. From the north, from the east, and from the south, wherever the moon turned its face, the roads were black with the men, for the signal had been given, and the great Uprising had begun.
On the way, small wonder that some bodies of men, grown sullen by the long wait, broke the bounds their leaders would have put upon them, and satisfied their private enmities. Some set fire to all the homes of lawyers that they came upon, for too long had the lawyers lived off the slavery of the people; others cut off the heads of all the clerks they encountered, because the land was lumbered with them; others attacked monasteries and burned the records, that their bondage could not be proven to the future, doing their work so thoroughly as to toss on the flaming pile every book and bit of writing they could lay their hands on; still more waylaid teachers of grammar, and made them take great oaths that they would henceforth cease teaching youngsters to read and write,—for what was the good of clerkliness save to gain a mysterious and unjust power over the workers of the fields?
The great god Demos, after centuries of dreamless sleep, throwing off his sluggishness with effort, only partially articulate as yet, staggering on awkwardly, aimlessly, blindly,—drunk with the sudden revelation of his own huge strength, a tragic picture enough with his great heart reaching out toward some Ideal, but not quite knowing what it was, nor how to get it. When at last this great monster, in the shape of ten thousand laborers on the banks of the Thames, was to appear before the King—what was the welcome that would be tendered? Demos was politely informed by a noble earl that he was not costumed fitly to meet the King. The giant, tamed by the very insolence and unexpectedness of the weapon used, the one weapon perchance before which he would have quailed—acknowledged a temporary defeat. Not dressed to appear before the King! And who, forsooth, had made the laws that poor men may not go abroad save in russet cloth? Why had they not made that answer?
When the men of Cambridgeshire reached the Manor of the Baron de Leaufort, he awoke and sent his bailiff down to them. The bailiff was a man who trusted in the stability of the feudal structure of society as few trust in the permanence of heaven.
"What would ye," he cried; "wot ye no better than to disturb his Lordship at this time o' night? Disperse instanter, and if it be that ye have aught to say on the morrow when ye are sober, my Lord bids me say he will hold a love-day, and listen to your complaints."
"We want no love-day," sang out one, surlily.
"Who are we?" cried another, "we are those who want no bailiff to tell us what to do. We want to see the Baron. Order him to come straightway."