Fig. 47.—The Knight of Death on a White Horse—After Albert Durer. From a fac-simile of the original engraving, dated 1513, by one of the Wiericx (1564). This famous engraving, which so perfectly characterises the weird genius of the Middle Ages, passing into the Renaissance, represents a knight armed, going to the wars, accompanied by terrible thoughts of Death and Sin, whose incarnations follow him on his dismal journey.
NE of the saddest, and certainly the simplest of royal funerals, was that of King Charles I. After his lamentable execution, his body lay at Whitehall from January 28, 1649, to the following February 7, when it was conveyed to Windsor, placed in the vault of St. George's Chapel, near the coffins of Henry VIII. and Jane Seymour. The day had been very snowy, and the snow rested thick on the coffin and on the cloaks and hats of the mourners. The remains were deposited without any service whatever, and left inscriptionless, save for the words "Charles Rex, 1649," the letters of which were cut out of a band of lead by the gentlemen present, with their penknives, and the lead fastened round the coffin. In this state it remained until the year 1813, when George IV. caused it to be more fittingly interred. In striking contrast were the obsequies of the unfortunate King's great rival and enemy, Cromwell, "who lay in glorious state" at Somerset House, all the ceremonial being copied from that of the interment of Philip II. of Spain. The rooms were hung with black cloth, and in the principal saloon was an effigy of the Protector, with a royal crown upon his head and a sceptre in his hand, stretched upon a bed of state erected over his coffin. Crowds of people of all ranks went daily during eight weeks to see it, the place being illuminated by hundreds of candles. The wax cast of the face of Cromwell after death is still preserved in the British Museum. His body, however, was carried away secretly, and at night, and buried privately at Westminster, for fear of trouble. Later, in 1660, the remains of the great Protector, and those of his friends Ireton and Bradshaw, were sacrilegiously taken from their graves, dragged with ignominy through the streets, and hanged at Tyburn, to the apparent satisfaction of Mrs. Pepys and her friend Lady Batten, and all and sundry in London, as is recorded in the "immortal diary." By the way, Mr. Pepys himself, who died in 1703, was buried with much state and circumstance in Crutched Friars Church, but at night, the service being said by Dr. Hickes, the author of the Thesaurus.
