Bill Nye's History of England from the Druids to the Reign of Henry VII (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1896 edition. Excerpt: ...worm couchant on a field uncultivated. Then, seating herself behind the knight, she must escape for days, and even weeks, --one escape seeming to call for another, as it were. Thus, however, the expense of a wedding was saved, and the knight with the biggest chest measurement generally got the heiress with the copper-colored hair. He wore a crest on his helmet adorned with German favors given him by lady admirers, so that the crest of a popular young knight often looked like a slump at the Ban Marc/ze. The most peculiar condition required for entry into knighthood was the "vigil of arms," which consisted in keeping a long silent watch in some gloomy spot--a haunted one preferred--over the arms he was about to assume. The illustration representing this subject is without doubt one of the best of the kind extant, and even in the present age of the gold-cure is suggestive of a night-errant of to-day. A tournament was a sort of refined equestrian prize-fight with one-hundred-ounce jabbers. Each knight, clad in tin-foil and armed cap-a-pie, riding CREST OF A POPULAR KNIGHT. in each other's direction just as fast as possible with an uncontrollable desire to push one's adversary off his horse, which meant defeat, because no man could ever climb a horse in full armor without a feudal derrick to assist him. The victor was entitled to the horse and armor of the vanquished, which made the castle paddock of a successful knight resemble the convalescent ward of the Old Horses' Home. This tourney also constituted the prevailing court of those times, and the plaintiff, calling upon God to defend the right, charged upon the defendant with a charge which took away the breath of his adversary. This, of course, was only...