JOUSTS AND TOURNAMENTS.

E learn from Fitz Stephen that seven

centuries ago it was the custom on every Sunday in Lent, immediately after crowds of young

dinner, for "6
"great crowds of

Londoners, mounted on war horfes well

trained to perform the neceffary turnings and evolutions, to ride into the fields in distinct bands, armed, haftelibus ferro dempto, with fhields and headless lances; where they exhibited the reprefenta

tion of battles, and went through a variety of warlike exercises; at the same time many of the young noblemen who had not received the honour of knighthood, came from the king's court, and from the houses of the great barons, to make trial of their skill in arms, the hope of victory animating their minds. The youth being divided into oppofite companies, encountered one another in one place they fled, and others pursued, without being able to overtake them; in another place one of the bands overtook and overturned the other." Thefe diverfions in which the citizens indulged became afterwards the exclufive sport of the nobility,

and all under the rank of efquires were prohibited from taking part in jouft or tournament. The firft Richard made laws and regulations for the conduct of grand tournaments, which were announced to the world in thefe terms:

"Hear now, lords, knights, and esquires, ladies and gentlewomen; you are hereby acquainted that a superb achievement at arms and a grand and noble tournament will be held in the parade of Clarencieux king-at-arms, on the part of the most noble baron, lord of — and on the part of the moft noble baron, the lord of in the parade of Norrais king-at-arms. The two barons on whose parts the tournament is undertaken fhall be at their pavilions two days before the commencement of the sports, when each of them shall cause his arms to be nailed to his pavilion, and fet up his banner in the front of his parade; and all those who wish to be admitted as combatants on either fide muft in like manner fet up their arms and banners before the parades allotted to them. Upon the evening of the fame day they fhall fhow themselves in their stations, and expofe their helmets to view at the windows of their pavilions; and then they may depart to make merry, dance, and live well."

On the appointed day, the heralds fummoned the barons and knights to the lifts, crying aloud, "To achievement, knights and esquires, to achievement!" and shortly after this first notice the company of heralds again went to the pavilions, crying out, "Come forth, knights and efquires, come forth!" In obedience to the fummons, the combatants placed themselves in the lifts, "each

armed with a pointless fword having the edges rebated, and with a bafton or truncheon hanging from their faddles, and they may use either the one or the other fo long as the speakers shall give them permiffion by repeating the fentence, Laiffer les aler.'" The award of the prizes for the fuccefsful combatants was reserved always to "the queenes highness and the ladyes there present.”

Thefe tournaments were conducted with great display and magnificence. Strutt fays, "At the celebration of these paftimes, the lifts were fuperbly decorated and furrounded by the pavilions belonging to the champions, ornamented with their arms, banners, and banerolls. The scaffolds for the reception of the nobility of both fexes, who came as fpectators, and those efpecially appointed for the royal family, were hung with tapestry and embroideries of gold and filver. Every perfon, upon fuch occafions, appeared to the greatest advantage, decked in sumptuous array, and every part of the field prefented to the eye a rich display of magnificence. We may also add the fplendid appearance of the knights engaged in the fports; themselves and their horfes were most gorgeously arrayed, and their efquires and pages, together with the minstrels and heralds who fuperintended the ceremonies, were all of them clothed in coftly and glittering apparel. Such a fhow of pomp, where wealth, beauty, and grandeur were concentrated as it were in one focus, muft altogether have formed a wonderful spectacle, and made a strong impreffion on the mind, which was not a little heightened by the cries of the heralds, the clangour of the trumpets, the clashing of the arms, the rushing

N

together of the combatants, and the fhouts of the beholders; and hence the popularity of these exhibitions may be easily accounted for. The tournament and the jouft, especially the latter, afforded to those who were engaged in them an opportunity of appearing before ladies to the greatest advantage; they might at once difplay their taste and opulence by the coftlinefs and elegancy of their apparel, and their prowefs as foldiers; therefore these paftimes became fashionable among the nobility; and it was probably for the fame reafon that they were prohibited to the

commoners."

But though the commoners might not take part in the sports, they were permitted to be prefent at their celebration; and when it was spread that at Sarum, or Wilton, or Warwick, or Kenilworth, or Stamford, or Wallingford, or Brakeley, or Mixeburg, or Blye, or Tykehill the places appointed by royal ordinance for fuch fports, a tournament would take place, then occurred fuch a scene as that which Thornbury has recently fo graphically described in his ballads-it was the Derby-day of Old England:

Pilgrims with their hood and cowl,

Pursy burghers cheek by jowl;
Archers with the peacock's wing

Fitting to the waxen string.

Pedlars with their pack and bags,
Beggars with their coloured rags,
Silent monks, whose stony eyes
Rest in trance upon the skies,
Children sleeping at the breast,
Merchants from the distant West,

:

All in gay confusion went
To the Royal Tournament.

Players with the painted face

And a drunken man's grimace;

Grooms who praise their raw-boned steeds,
Old wives telling maple beads:

Blackbirds from the hedges broke,

Black crows from the beeches croak;

Glossy swallows in dismay

From the mill-stream fled away;

The angry swan, with ruffled breast

Frown'd upon her osier nest;

The wren hopp'd restless on the brake,
The otter made the sedges shake;

The butterfly before our rout,

Flew like a blossom blown about;
The colour'd leaves, a globe of life,
Spun round and scatter'd as in strife,
Sweeping down the narrow lane
Like the slant showers of the rain;

The lark in terror from the sod

Flew up and straight appeal'd to God;

As a noisy band we went,

Trotting to the Tournament.

This fpectacle was fuch an one, perhaps, as that which Scott

has defcribed in the "Talifman."

The Baptist's fair morrow beheld gallant feats

There was winning of honour, and losing of seats—

There was hewing with falchions, and splintering of staves,

The victors won glory, the vanquish'd won graves.

O, many a knight there fought bravely and well,

Yet one was accounted his peers to excel,

And 'twas he whose sole armour on body and breast,

Seem'd the weed of a damsel when bourne for her rest.