“The Survey concludes with an abstracted list of rents paid by London Bridge for lands and tenements held in various places, both in, and out of, the City; but as I have already given you several particulars of these, and as they do not contain any great additional information, I shall but observe from them that their total amount appears to be £20. 0. 9¼d.; and as we are occasionally informed that the lands were let out to farm, we may conclude that the Bridge-keepers were amply recompensed for the payment of a sum even so great as this. The disbursements of London Bridge were, indeed, always considerable, for Stow observes in his ‘Survey,’ page 59, that the account of William Mariner and Christopher Elliott, Wardens of that edifice, from Michaelmas, in the 22nd year of Henry VII.—1506,—to the Michaelmas ensuing, amounted to £815. 17s. 2½d., all payments and allowances included.
“We must now set sail again on the ocean of English History, as it is connected with London Bridge; and you are to remember that we are yet in the reign of King Henry VI., though we have mentioned a multitude of dates since the commencement of our digression: and the next event in its Chronicles, relates to the destruction of a considerable portion of it in the year 1437. I have already cited to you some of the writings of William of Worcester, and in another work of which he was also the author, entitled ‘Annales Rerum Anglicarum,’ he gives a slight notice of this event, which you will find in the edition printed in Hearne’s ‘Liber Niger,’ volume ii. page 458, taken from an autograph manuscript in the Library of the College of Arms. The best accounts, however, are furnished by Fabyan, on page 433, of his Chronicle, and by Stow in his ‘Annals,’ page 376. From these we learn that on Monday, January the 14th, the Great Stone Gate, and Tower standing upon it, next Southwark, fell suddenly down into the River, with two of the fairest arches of the same Bridge: ‘and yet,’ adds the habitually pious Stow, ‘no man perished in body, which was a great worke of God.’
“In the year 1440, the Annals of London Bridge became again interwoven with the great historical events of the kingdom, which impart such dignity to its own records, inasmuch as the Bridge-Street, by which is meant as well the passage over the Thames as the main street beyond it on each side, was one scene of the public penance of Eleanor Cobham, Duchess of Gloucester, for Witchcraft. The inflexible honesty of the Duke, who was Protector of England during the minority of Henry VI., and presumptive heir to the crown, had created a violent party against him, the heads of which were Cardinal Henry Beaufort, Bishop of Winchester, and William de la Pole, first Duke of Suffolk. With regard to his Sovereign, however, not all the spies, which were placed about Humphrey Plantagenet, Duke of Gloucester, by these powerful and inveterate enemies, could find even a pretence for the slightest charge; though that which they were unable to discover in him, they found in his Duchess, who was then accused of Witchcraft and High Treason: it being asserted that she had frequent conferences with one Sir Roger Bolinbroke, a Priest, who was supposed to be a necromancer, and Margaret Jourdain, a witch, of Eye, near Westminster; assisted and advised by John Hum, a Priest, and Thomas Southwell, Priest, and Canon of St. Stephen’s, Westminster. Shakspeare, in his ‘Second Part of Henry the Sixth,’ Act i. Scenes 2 and 4, and Act ii. Scenes 1 and 4, has recorded several particulars of this circumstance; and makes the Duchess ask some questions concerning the King’s fate; though she was, in reality, charged with having his image made of wax, which, being placed before a slow fire, should cause his strength to decay as the wax melted. The result of the enquiry was, that Jourdain was burned in Smithfield; Southwell died before his execution, in the Tower; Bolingbroke was hanged, drawn, and quartered, at Tyburn; and, on November the 9th, the Duchess was sentenced to perform public penance at three open places in London. On Monday the 13th, therefore, she came by water from Westminster, and, landing at the Temple-bridge, walked, at noon-day, through Fleet-street, bearing a waxen taper of two pounds weight to St. Paul’s, where she offered it at the High Altar. On the Wednesday following she landed at the Old Swan, and passed through Bridge-street and Grace-Church-street to Leadenhall, and at Cree-Church, near Aldgate, made her second offering: and on the ensuing Friday, she was put on shore at Queen-Hythe, whence she proceeded to St. Michael’s Church, Cornhill, and so completed her penance. In each of these processions her head was covered only by a kerchief, her feet were bare; scrolls, containing a narrative of her crime, were affixed to her white dress, and she was received and attended by the Mayor, Sheriffs, and Companies of London.
“The leading features of these events are of course in all the numerous volumes of English History, but for the more particular circumstances I must refer you to Stow’s ‘Annals,’ pages 381, 382; to folio lxiiii. a, of the Chronicle of Edward Hall, an eminent Lawyer who died in 1547, and whose work is entitled ‘The Vnion of the two Noble Houses of Lancastre and Yorke,’ London, 1550, folio; and, finally, to the Harleian Manuscript No. 565, page 96 a. Of which latter most curious work we now take leave, for soon after recording this event it terminates imperfectly; though I may observe, that when speaking of the fate of Roger Bolingbroke, on page 96 b, it adds, concerning him, that the same day on which he was condemned at Guildhall, he ‘was drawe fro ye Tower of London to Tiborn and there hanged, hedyd, and quartered, and his heed set up on London Bridge.’ His quarters were disposed of at Hereford, Oxford, York, and Cambridge.
“In 1444, William de la Pole, whom I have just mentioned, was one of the King’s Ambassadors in France, when, with his usual lofty and impetuous spirit, he suddenly proposed a marriage between Henry VI., and Margaret, daughter of Réné, Duke of Anjou, and titular King of Jerusalem, Sicily, Arragon, Valence, &c. without any instructions from his Sovereign, or even acquainting his fellow-commissioners with his design. Notwithstanding the Duke of Gloucester opposed this union at the Council Board in England, yet the Earl managed his proposal so skilfully, that he procured himself to be created a Duke, and despatched into France to bring over the Queen: and on Thursday, the 22nd of April, 1445, she was consequently married to Henry at Tichfield Abbey, Southwick, in the County of Southampton. It was, probably, in her way from Eltham Palace to Westminster, before her Coronation, that she was greeted by the famous pageants prepared for her on London Bridge, on Friday, the 28th of May; for you will remember that she was crowned at Westminster Abbey, on Sunday, the 30th of the month, by John Stafford, Archbishop of Canterbury. However it might be, she was met at several places by many persons of rank, with numerous attendants having their sleeves embroidered, or decorated in the most costly manner, with badges of beaten goldsmith’s work; and especially by the Duke of Gloucester, who received her with 500 men habited in one livery. At Blackheath, according to custom, the Mayor, Sheriffs, and Aldermen, clothed in scarlet, attended her with the several City companies, all mounted and dressed in blue gowns, having embroidered sleeves and red hoods: and in this manner Queen Margaret and her followers were conducted through Southwark and the City, ‘then beautified,’—says Stow in his ‘Annals,’ page 384, where he relates all these particulars,—‘with pageants of diuers histories, and other showes of welcome, maruellous costly and sumptuous.’ He gives, however, but a very brief statement of them in his printed book; though in his Manuscripts, several of which are extant in the Harleian Collection in the British Museum, there are the very verses spoken to the Queen on the Bridge, composed, as he says, by John Lydgate. The Manuscript I allude to, is one to which I have already made a reference, being No. 542, a small quarto volume written on antique paper, in Stow’s own plain, but minute hand-writing. In this volume, therefore, article 16, on page 101 a, is entitled, ‘The speches in the pagiaunts at ye cominge of Qwene Margaret wyfe to Henry the syxt of that name Kynge of England, the 28th of Maye, 1445, ye 23rd of his reigne.’ The first pageant, which was an allegorical representation of Peace and Plenty, was erected at the foot of London Bridge, and the motto attached to it was ‘Ingredimini et replete Terram,’—Enter ye and replenish the earth,—taken from Genesis ix. according to the Vulgate Latin. The verses addressed to Queen Margaret were as follow:—
‘Most Christian Princesse, by influence of grace,
Doughter of Jherusalem, owr plesáunce
And joie, welcome as ever Princess was,
With hert entier, and hoole affiáunce:
Cawser of welthe, ioye, and abundáunce,
Youre Citee, yowr people, your subgets all,
With hert, with worde, with dede, your highnesse to aváunce,
Welcome! Welcome! Welcome! vnto you call.’
“Upon the Bridge itself appeared a pageant representing Noah’s Ark, bearing the words ‘Jam non ultra irascar super terram,’—Henceforth there shall no more be a curse upon the earth,—Genesis viii. 21. and the following verses were delivered before it:—
‘So trustethe your people, with assuráunce
Throwghe yowr grace, and highe benignitie.—
’Twixt the Realmes two, England and Fraunce,
Pees shall approche, rest and vnité:
Mars set asyde with all his crueltyé,
Whiche too longe hathe trowbled the Realmes twayne;
Bydynge yowr comforte, in this adversité,
Most Christian Princesse owr Lady Soverayne.
Right as whilom, by God’s myght and grace,
Noé this arké dyd forge and ordayne;
Wherein he and his might escape and passe
The flood of vengeaunce cawsed by trespasse:
Conveyed aboute as god list him to gye.
By meane of mercy found a restinge place
Aftar the flud, vpon this Armonie.