Part 3 (1/2)
'Jan. 10, 1636 (O.S.)
'Honorable Sir,--How much you obliged me I shall endeavour to demonstrate to you upon better opportunities. For ye present I returne y^r books and promise you ye sight of another some^{wt} of them(?) w^{ch} phaps you will not dislike, though I begin to think your exact diligence hath lefte none of those monuments lye undiscryed, where they might be gained. I send back likewise Sir John Finet's Paps; whereof I reserve ye copyes. And now that I begin to finde a little respiration, I will draw y^m up into acte.
Till I had y^m I could not well begin, and now that you are pleased to send me ye last, drawne up into forme, I shall ye better accomplish ye whole business of my little time. Whereof I will send you ye whole contextures, Deo dante, ere longe. I should however give you a formall thanks that you imploy yourselfe soe largely, soe n.o.bly for me in present, and in promise more. Knowing your reality in all worth, I abstain from other compliments then those wherein Affection must pforce speake yf she speake at all. Once for all, that branch of our comon oath is never out of my minde: Sustentabis Honores hujus Ordinis atq. omni^m qui in eo sunt. Of w^{ch} omni^m you are Pars Magna and shall ever be to your affectionate ob: servant friend,
'CHR. WREN.
'To the Honble Sr. Tho. Row Chancelor of ye most Honble Order of ye Garter.'
The Garter history appears to have been carefully continued, and Dean Wren describes, in a long picturesque account, the admission on May 19, 1638, of the Prince of Wales, then but eight years old, as a 'companion of the Garter.' The little Prince, Dean Wren says, acquitted himself admirably during the three days of intricate ceremonial, doing his part with accuracy and spirit, a sweet dignity, and an unwearied patience until all was completed.
He must have been a very hopeful, engaging, boy, and it is sad to think how little his after life fulfilled its early promise: had he remained in his father's care a very different record might have been left of him in English history. The Service of Admission is a curious one, and the prayers on the putting on the Garter, the ribbon, the collar, and the mantle have considerable beauty. On this occasion the festival was celebrated with great splendour. King Charles presented two large silver flagons, cunningly carved and very richly gilt, offering them on his knees with these words: 'Tibi, et perpetuo Tuo servitio, partem bonitatis Tuae offero Domine Deus Omnipotens.'[24]
These were added to the treasury of the Garter, which contained many articles of great value. There was a set of triple gilt silver plate wrought by Van Vianen[25] of Nuremberg, estimated at over 3,000_l._, several other pieces of plate, Edward IV.'s steel armour, gilt, and covered with crimson velvet embroidered with pearls, rubies and gold, fifteen rich copes embroidered in gold, altar-cloths and hangings worked with the same costly material.
[GUSTAVUS ADOLPHUS.]
There was also the blue velvet mantle, the George and Garter of Gustavus Adolphus, each letter of the motto made in diamonds. These had been sent to the King of Sweden by Charles I. at the close of the campaign in 1627 as a mark of friends.h.i.+p and respect for his valour, and were the richest ever sent even to a sovereign.
After the heroic king's death on the field at Lutzen, in 1634, a solemn emba.s.sy brought the mantle and the jewels back to England, when they were consigned to the Dean and Chapter of Windsor, with a charge from King Charles to lay them up in the treasury 'for a perpetual memorial of that renowned King, who died in the field of battle wearing some of those jewels, to the great honour of the Order, as a true martial prince and companion thereof.'
A few years later King Charles presented Dean Wren to the rectory of Great Haseley[26] near Oxford, with a fine old church containing two crusaders' tombs.
In the parish of Haseley is the manor of Ryecote (or Ricot), which by marriage had become the property of Sir Henry Norris, Queen Elizabeth's amba.s.sador to France, whom she created Baron Norris (or Norreys) of Ryecot, and whose descendants, now the Earls of Abingdon, possess the manor to this day. During Dr. Wren's inc.u.mbency, a strange event took place. Among the retainers of Lord Norris was an old man who had charge of the fish ponds; he had one nephew, who was the heir of all his uncle's possessions and savings. The nephew enticed the old man out one night, waited till he fell asleep under an oak tree, murdered him by a blow on the head, dragged the body to one of the ponds, tied a great stone to the neck and threw the corpse in. There it lay _five weeks_, during which time Lord Norris and all the neighbours wondered what had become of the old man. At length the body was found by the men who were about to clean the pond, and were attracted to the spot by the swarms of flies; they raised the corpse with great difficulty and recognised it.
[AN AWFUL WITNESS.]
The stone tied to the neck was evidence of foul play, though no one could guess at the murderer. Lord Norris, in order to detect the criminal, after the usual manner, commanded that the corpse, preserved by the water from the last extremity of decay, should on the next Sunday be exposed in the churchyard, close to the church door, so that everyone entering the church should see--and touch it. The wicked nephew shrank from the ordeal, feigning to be so overwhelmed with grief as to be unable to bear the sight of his dearest uncle. Lord Norris, suspecting that the old man had been murdered by the one person whom his death would profit, compelled him to come, and to touch with his finger, as so many had willingly done, the hand of the dead. At his touch, however, 'as if opened by the finger of G.o.d, the eyes of the corpse were seen by all to move, and blood to flow from his nostrils.' At this awful witness the murderer fell on the ground and avowed the crime, which he had secretly committed and the most just judgment of G.o.d had brought to light. He was delivered to the judge, sentenced, and hanged.
The event must have made a deep impression on Dean Wren, who recorded it at length in Latin and signed the record to attest its truth.
He also mentions that in the east window of the church was the
'Coat of France azure frette and seme of Flower de Lyces or, put there together with his own coat by Lord Barentine, knight of Rhodes and a great benefactor to that church. A man of great valour and possessions in France as well as in England, his tomb at the north-east side of the chancel shows he was of a gigantic stature; and his statue of one entire stone, which I digged out of a heap of rubbish there, makes it appear he was (not two inches lower than) seven foot high.'
Dr. Wren seems to have divided his residence between Haseley and Windsor, probably spending most of his time at the Deanery, where many of the learned men and philosophers of the day sought his society. Among these was the Prince Palatine Charles, who was a frequent guest at the Deanery, enjoying its learned quiet, and interested in his host's young son, whose great gifts were early remarkable. Many a little note did Dean Wren make of curious things that came under his observation, particularly of an oak that grew in the New Forest and sent out young fresh leaves on Christmas Eve. So much discussion was raised about it at court and King James would so little believe it, that good Bishop Andrewes sent a chaplain on Christmas Eve to the forest, who gathered about a hundred fresh shoots, stuck them into wet clay, and sent them straight to the court, where Dr. Wren witnessed the opening of the boxes. The tree was then cut down by some spiteful fellow, 'who,' says the Dean, 'made his last stroke on his own leg, whereof he died, together with the old wondrous tree.'
King Charles engaged Dr. Wren to make an estimate for a building at Windsor for the use of the Queen; it was to be of considerable size, containing a chapel, a banqueting room, galleries and rooms for the Lord Chamberlain and court officials. The estimate exists in business-like detail, the total amounting to 13,305_l._; but it was probably not even begun.
[CHRISTOPHER AT WESTMINSTER.]
To his other employments the Dean added the tender care of his young son. Christopher's case was one of those rare ones in which a precocious child not only lives to grow up, but also amply fulfils his early promise. His delicate health was the cause of much anxiety to his father and to his sister Susan, and it may be that the skill in nursing and medicine for which she was afterwards famous, had their beginning in her watchful care of her little brother.
His frail health seems to have been rather a spur than a hindrance to his studies, and when very young he had a tutor, the Rev. W. Shepheard, who prepared him for Westminster, where he was sent in his ninth or tenth year. Westminster was then under the rule of its famous headmaster Dr. Busby, to whose especial care young Christopher was committed.
The school with its stir of life, the grand abbey, the Houses of Parliament then empty and silent, Lambeth, from which his uncle's friend, Archbishop Laud, might be seen frequently coming across the river in his barge; the whole surroundings must have been wonderful to the country-bred boy who was one day to connect his name indissolubly with that of London. Did he, one cannot but wonder, ever on a holiday take boat down the river, shooting the dangerous arches of London Bridge, and look at S. Paul's with its long line of roof, its tall tower and shattered spire; little S. Gregory's nestling by its side, and all the workmen busied on the repairs which had been begun after King James's solemn thanksgiving in 1620? Laud, while Bishop of London, had carried on the works with a vigour that had given them a fresh impetus, and was one great cause of his unpopularity. Inigo Jones had superintended them and finished the interior, and at the west end, the stately portico of Portland stone, which, though incongruous, was in itself beautiful, was being erected by King Charles's orders. How little could the boy have guessed at the ruin which was approaching those pious builders, or the desecration and destruction that awaited the fine old building itself!
At school no pains were spared with so promising a pupil as young Wren soon showed himself to be. His sister Susan married, in 1643, Mr.
William Holder, subdean of the Chapel Royal, of a Nottinghams.h.i.+re family, a good mathematician, and one 'who had good skill in the practic and theoretic parts of music'[27] Susan Wren was sixteen when she married, and though childless the marriage was a very happy one.
Mr. Holder early discerned his young brother-in-law's talent for mathematics and gave him private lessons. Mr. Holder was subsequently appointed to the living of Bletchingdon in Oxfords.h.i.+re, which he held until 1663.
[THE FIRST FRUITS OF HIS PAINS.]