Page images
PDF
EPUB

King's grace and, the countye of Northumberland by the labour of Johanne, the Countess of Westmerland: "

"Sister of haughty Bolingbroke

His house's ancient foe:".

"Whose daughter Allanor" Nevill "he had wedded* in coming into England: "+

"She, suppliant at her nephews throne,

The royal grace implored :-

To all the honors of his race

The Percy is restored."

The Hermit of Warkworth by bishop Percy.

* According to ballad authority the wedding was preceded by an elopement.
+ Note to the Hermit of Warkworth.

The Battle of Nevill's Cross.

BY LAURENCE MINOT.

WRITTEN ANNO 1352.

HE only manuscript copy of Minot's poems known to exist, is to be found in the Cottonian Collection in the British Musuem. Ritson, who first presented them to the public in a collected form in the year 1825, says "It seems pretty clear, from our author's dialect and orthography, that he was a native of one of the northern counties, in some monastery whereof the manuscript which contains his poems, along with many others in the same dialect, is conjectured to have been written; and to which at the same time, it is not improbable that he himself should have belonged."

That Minot's poems were written, or at least completed, in the beginning of the year 1352, according to the present stile, is not a mere circumstance of probability, but may be clearly demonstrated by internal evidence and matter of fact. He, of course, is to be regarded as a poet anterior to Chaucer, who, in 1352, was but twentyfour years of age."-Ritson's Preface.

The battle which is the subject of the following poem, was fought between Durham and the village of Kirk-Merrington, and is called

[graphic]

the battle of Nevil's-Cross, from an ancient stone-cross erected by one of that family, about a mile from Durham, and demolished by some puritanical enthusiasts, in 1569, near which was probably the heat or conclusion of the fight. Modern writers suppose this cross to have been erected in consequence of the battle; whereas it was clearly a well-known station at the time. battle, according to Stow, continued as far as Prudhow and Corbridge, on the north side of the Tyne.

The pursuit after the

John Copland, in taking king David prisoner, according to Wynton, had two of his teeth knocked out by that monarch :

"Jhon off Cowpland thare tuk the kyng

Off forss noucht yholdyne in that takyng;
The kyng twa teth owt off his hevyd
With a dynt off a knyff hym revyd."

"This battell," says Stow," was fought ber [1346]. The prisoners were conveyed to London about Christmasse, David le Bruse except, which might not travell by reason of two deadly woundes in his head with arrowes; but the second of January he was brought up, and conveyed from Westminster to the tower of London, in sight of all the people, and there lodged in the blacke nooke of the sayde tower, neere to the constables guard, there to be kept.” -Annales, &c.

was fought on the seventeenth of Octo

SIR DAVID HAD OF HIS MEN GRETE LOSS,
WITH SIR EDWARD, AT THE NEVIL-CROSS.

IR David the Bruse,

Was at distance,

When Edward the Baliolfe

Rade with his lance;

The north end of Ingland

Teched him to daunce,
When he was met on the more

With mekill1 mischance.

Sir Philip the Valayse

May him noght avance, 2

The flowres that faire war
Er fallen in Fraunce;

1 Much, great. 2 Advance.

[blocks in formation]
[blocks in formation]
[blocks in formation]
« ՆախորդըՇարունակել »