. Froissart describes with
consummate detail the jousts in the fourteenth year of Richard II,
before a grand company, when sixty coursers gaily apparelled for the
jousts issued from the Tower of London ridden by esquires of honour,
and then sixty ladies of honour mounted on palfreys, each lady leading
a knight with a chain of gold, with a great number of trumpets and
other instruments of music with them. On arriving at Smithfield the
ladies dismounted, the esquires led the coursers which the knights
mounted, and after their helmets were set on their heads proclamation
was made by the heralds, the jousts began, "to the great pleasure of
the beholders." But it was not all pomp and pageantry. Many and deadly
were the fights fought in front of the old gate, when men lost their
lives or were borne from the field mortally wounded, or contended for
honour and life against unjust accusers. That must have been a sorry
scene in 1446, when a rascally servant, John David, accused his
master, William Catur, of treason, and had to face the wager of battle
in Smithfield. The master was well beloved, and inconsiderate friends
plied him with wine so that he was not in a condition to fight, and
was slain by his servant. But Stow reminds us that the prosperity of
the wicked is frail. Not long after David was hanged at Tyburn for
felony, and the chronicler concludes: "Let such false accusers note
this for example, and look for no better end without speedy
repentance." He omits to draw any moral from the intemperance of the
master and the danger of drunkenness.

But let this suffice for the jousts in Smithfield. The old gateway
heard on one occasion strange noises in the church, Archbishop
Boniface raging with oaths not to be recited, and sounds of strife and
shrieks and angry cries. This foreigner, Archbishop of Canterbury, had
dared to come with his armed retainers from Provence to hold a
visitation of the priory. The canons received him with solemn pomp,
but respectfully declined to be visited by him, as they had their own
proper visitor, a learned man, the Bishop of London, and did not care
for another inspector. Boniface lost his temper, struck the sub-prior,
saying, "Indeed, doth it become you English traitors so to answer me?"
He tore in pieces the rich cope of the sub-prior; the canons rushed to
their brother's rescue and knocked the Archbishop down; but his men
fell upon the canons and beat them and trod them under foot. The old
g