and followed him."

At the same place, too, a company of the principal civic dignitaries
of the town appeared, bearing a gorgeous canopy of blue silk, adorned
and embroidered in the most beautiful manner with royal emblems. This
canopy they held over the king as he advanced into the town.

[Sidenote: Curious pageants.]

At one place farther on, where there was a little bridge to be
crossed, there was a pageant of three savages fighting about a woman
in a mimic forest. The savages continued fighting until the king had
passed by. Next came a fountain flowing with wine, with mermaids
swimming about in it. The wine in this fountain was free to all who
chose to come and drink it.

Then, farther still, the royal party came to a place where an
artificial forest had been made, by some means or other, in a large,
open square. There was a chase going on in this forest at the time
when the king went by. The chase consisted of a living stag hunted by
real dogs. The stag came and took refuge at the feet of the king's
horse, and his majesty saved the poor animal's life.

[Sidenote: The coronation.]

Thus the king was conducted to his palace. Several days were spent in
preliminary pageants and ceremonies like the above, and then the
coronation took place in the church, the king and his party being
stationed on a large platform raised for the purpose in the most
conspicuous part of the edifice.

[Sidenote: 1441.]

[Sidenote: The banquet.]

After the coronation there was a grand banquet, at which the king,
with his lords and great officers of state, sat at a marble table in a
magnificent ancient hall. Henry Beaufort, the Bishop of Winchester,
was the principal personage in all these ceremonies next to the king.
Gloucester was very jealous of him, in respect to the conspicuous part
which he took in these proceedings.

[Illustration: Henry VI. in his Youth.]

Henry was quite young at the time of his coronations. He was a very
pretty boy, and his countenance wore a mild and gentle expression.

[Illustration: The Penance.]

[Sidenote: The old quarrel broke out again.]

[Sidenote: The duchess's penance.]

The quarrel between the Duke of Gloucester and the bishop was kept, in
some degree, subdued during this period, partly by the influence of
the Duke of Bedford while he lived, and partly by Gloucester's mind
being taken up to a considerable extent with other things, especially
with his campaigns in France; for he was eng