ing over Wakefield
Bridge before he reduced his enormous company.

The two priests, William Kaye and William Bull, stand waiting for the
King outside the new Saint Mary's Chapel. First come the guard of
four-and-twenty archers in the King's livery; then a Marshal and his
servants (the other King's Marshal has ridden by some twenty-four
hours ago); then comes the Chancellor and his clerks, and with them a
good horse carrying the Rolls (this was stopped in the fourth year of
Edward's reign); then they see the Chamberlain, who will look to it
that the King's rooms are decent and in order, furnished with benches
and carpets; next comes the Wardrobe Master, who keeps the King's
accounts; and, riding beside the King, the first personal officer of
the kingdom, the Seneschal; after that a gay company of knights and
their ladies, merchants, monks dressed as ordinary laymen for
travelling, soldiers of fortune, women, beggars, minstrels--a motley
gang of brightly-clothed people, splashed with the mud and dust of the
cavalcade.

[Illustration: {Two men of the time of Edward III.}]

Remembering the condition of the day, the rough travelling, the
estates far apart, the dirty inns, one must not imagine this company
spick and span.

The ladies are riding astride, the gentlemen are in civil garments or
half armour.

Let us suppose that it is summer, and but an hour or so after a heavy
shower. The heat is oppressive: the men have slung their hats at their
belts, and have pushed their hoods from their heads; their heavy
cloaks, which they donned hastily against the rain, are off now, and
hanging across their saddles.

These cloaks vary considerably in shape. Here we may see a circular
cloak, split down the right side from the neck, it buttons on the
shoulder. Here is another circular cloak, jagged at the edge; this
buttons at the neck. One man is riding in a cloak, parti-coloured,
which is more like a gown, as it has a hood attached to it, and
reaches down to his feet.

[Illustration: {A man of the time of Edward III.; two types of hood}]

Nearly every man is alike in one respect--clean-shaven, with long hair
to his neck, curled at the ears and on the forehead.

[Illustration: {A man of the time of Edward III.}]

Most men wear the cotehardie, the well-fitting garment buttoned down
the front, and ending over the hips. There is every variety of
cotehardie--the long one, coming nearly to the knees; the short one,
half-way