The Abbot's house built by Litlington is the present Deanery; but the College Hall, once the Abbot's refectory, now the dining-hall of the Westminster scholars, and the Jerusalem Chamber, the room into which the Abbot's guests used to pass when they had dined, are open to the public at certain hours, and you must not forget them when you are walking through the cloisters. The Jerusalem Chamber has been restored since the days of Litlington, though the fine roof and the actual building stand now as then. The glass in one of the windows, however, is very old, as is the wonderful stone reredos, which once must have been part of the high altar. In the dining-hall you must notice the gallery at the one end in which the minstrels used to perform, and the fine pointed windows; for as the Norman architecture had given way to the Early English, and the Early English had developed into the beautiful Decorated style, so now another change was taking place, of which Litlington's building is an early example, and the Perpendicular style, which was entirely English, was creeping in.
While Litlington was abbot, another royal funeral took place in the Confessor's Chapel, for in 1369, "that moost gentyll, moost lyberall, and moost courtesse fayre lady, Phillipp of Heynault, died."
This is how a writer living at the time quaintly describes the sad event: "There fell in England a heavy case and a comon, righte pyteouse for the King, his children and all his realme. For the good Queen of England fell sicke, the which sickenesse contynewed on her so longe, that there was no remedye but deathe. And the good lady whenne she this knewe and perceyved, desyred to speke with the Kynge, her husbande. And she sayde, 'Sir, we have in peace, ioye, and great prosperyte, used all our time toguyer. Sir, nowe I pray you at our departyng, that ye will grant me my desyres.... I requyre you, that it may please you to take none other sepulture whensoever it shall please God to call you out of this transytorie lyfe, but besyde me in Westmynster.'
"The Kynge all weepynge sayde, 'Madam, I graunt all your desyre.' Then the good ladye made on her the sign of the Cross, and anone after she yielded up her spiryte, the which I beleeve surely the Holy Angels receyved with great ioy up to Heven, for, in all her lyfe, she dyd neyther in thought nor dede, thynge whereby to lose her soule, so farr as any creature coulde knowe."
Her tomb was ordered to be made of "neat black marble, with her image thereon in polished alabaster, and round the pedestal, sweetly carved niches, with images therein." But what makes this monument specially interesting is that the figure of Queen Philippa is really a likeness and not a beautiful fancy picture, so that as you look at that kind, motherly face you can quite easily picture to yourself the queen who pleaded for the lives of the citizens of Calais, and of whom it was said at her death, "She had done many good deeds in her lyfe; having succoured so many knyghts and comforted ladyes and damosels."
Eight years later, King Edward was laid beside her, all the glory of his life having passed from him with her.
"In his time, England had seemed to shine in her meridian; learning was encouraged; gallantry, and that the most honourable, was practised; the subjects were beloved; the king was honoured at home and feared abroad." But after Philippa's death strength of mind and body alike failed him; his favourite son, the Black Prince, had died; his other sons neglected him, his courtiers robbed him, and when the end came, there was only a poor priest by his bedside, who pressed the crucifix to his lips and caught his last dying word—Jesus.
His funeral, however, was magnificent; he was carried through London with his face uncovered, followed by his children and by the nobles and prelates of England, and afterwards a fine tomb was set up to him with figures of his twelve children kneeling around.
But it was only round the tomb and in the sculptor's fancy that those strong, high-spirited sons of Edward and Philippa knelt in one accord, for from them arose the quarrels and strife which later on brought to England the greatest calamity which can come to any nation—a civil war in its midst.
