Part 6 (2/2)

The origin of the Order of the Garter is traceable to the spirit of chivalry; it was inst.i.tuted by Coeur de Lion, and in 1344 was revived by Edward III. Froissart appears to credit the story which connects the revival of the order to Edward's pa.s.sion for the Countess of Salisbury, whose garter he is said to have picked up and presented to her in the presence of the court, with this exclamation: _Honi soit qui mal y pense!_ The chronicler gives us a full account of the attachment of Edward for the countess, and places in excellent light the integrity of her character. When she was besieged in her husband's castle at Wark, Edward advanced to her relief, compelling the Scots to retreat. At the interview which followed, the king looked upon her with such an air of profound thoughtfulness that she was led to inquire: ”Dear sire, what are you musing on? Such meditation is not proper for you, saving your grace.” ”Oh, dear lady!” replied the monarch; ”you must know that since I have been in this castle, some thoughts have oppressed my mind that I was not before aware of.” ”Dear sire, you ought to be of good cheer, and leave off such pondering; for G.o.d has been very bountiful to you in your undertakings.” Whereupon the king replied with more directness: ”There be other things, O sweet lady, which touch my heart, and lie heavy there, beside what you talk of. In good truth, your beauteous mien and the perfection of your face and behavior have wholly overcome me; and my peace depends on your accepting my love, which your refusal cannot abate.” ”My gracious liege,” the countess exclaimed, ”G.o.d of his infinite goodness preserve you, and drive from your n.o.ble heart all evil thoughts; for I am, and ever shall be, ready to serve you; but only in what is consistent with my honor and your own.”

The first chapter of the Garter was graced by another queen who adorns the history of England's women of rank--Queen Philippa. She was attended by the princ.i.p.al ladies of the court, who, with herself, were admitted dame-companions of the order, and the wives of the knights continued to enjoy this dignity during several succeeding reigns.

In even the best homes of the Middle Ages we must not expect to find the refinements which are regarded as the commonplaces of modern life. The essence of refinement is the same in all ages, and, while it involves manners, these change with the standards and conventions of different times. Much that is amusing, absurd, or even disgusting, as we regard manners to-day, was entirely in good form during the Middle Ages. It will be of interest to notice some of the things which were regarded as commendable in the deportment of the young ladies of the aristocratic cla.s.s of mediaeval society, and what they were cautioned to avoid. A _trouvere_ of the thirteenth century, named Robert de Blois, compiled a code of etiquette which he put in French verse under the t.i.tle, _Chastis.e.m.e.nt des Dames_. The young ladies who would deport themselves in an irreproachable manner must avoid talking too much, and especially refrain from boasting of the attentions paid to them by the other s.e.x. They were recommended to be discreet, and, in the freedom of games and amus.e.m.e.nts, to leave no room for adverse criticism of their actions. In going to church, they were not to trot or run, but to walk with due seriousness, with eyes straight before them, and to salute _debonairely_ all persons they met. They were enjoined not to let men kiss them on the mouth, as it might lead to too great familiarity; they were not to look at a man too much unless he were an acknowledged lover; and when a young woman had a lover, she was not to talk too much of him. They were not to manifest too much vanity in dress, and to be entirely delicate in the matter of costume; nor were they to be too ready in accepting presents from the other s.e.x. The ladies are particularly warned against scolding and disputing, against swearing, against eating and drinking too freely at the table. They were exhorted not to get drunk, a practice from which, they were advised, much mischief might arise. That the restrictions were, on the whole, sensible is apparent from our statement of them, and the good sense of the times receives special point from the rule of society which recommended the ladies not to cover their faces when in public, as a handsome face was made to be seen. An exception is made in the case of ugly or deformed features, which might be covered.

Another rule was as follows: ”A lady who is pale-faced or who has not a good smell ought to breakfast early in the morning, for good wine gives them a very good color; and she who eats and drinks well must heighten her color.” Anise seed, fennel, and c.u.min were recommended to be taken at breakfast to correct an unsavory breath, and persons so affected were told not to breathe in other persons' faces.

A special set of rules was given for the lady's behavior while in church, and if she could sing she was to do so when asked and not require too much pressing. Ladies were further recommended to keep their hands clean, to cut their nails often, and not to suffer them to grow beyond the finger or to harbor dirt. When pa.s.sing the houses of other people, ladies were not to look into them: ”for a person often does things privately in his house, which he would not wish to be seen, if anyone should come before his door.” For the same reason a lady was not to go into another person's house, or into another's room, without coughing or speaking to give notice to the inmates. The directions for a lady's behavior at the table were also very precise.

”In eating, you must avoid much laughing or talking. If you eat with another (i.e., in the same plate, or of the same mess), turn the nicest bits to him and do not go picking out the finest and largest for yourself, which is not courteous. Moreover, no one should eat greedily a choice bit which is too large or too hot, for fear of choking or burning herself.... Each time you drink, wipe your mouth well, that no grease go into the wine, which is very unpleasant for the person who drinks after you. But when you wipe your mouth for drinking, do not wipe your eyes or nose with the tablecloth, and avoid spilling from your mouth or greasing your hands too much.” Added to these directions for deportment, particular emphasis was laid on the avoidance of falsehoods, which suggests the prevalence of the vice.

The modern ”servant question” was not without its counterpart in the Middle Ages. We find instances of advice tendered upon the subject to the ladies of those times. An early writer on domestic economy divided the servants who might be found in a manorial establishment into three cla.s.ses: those who were employed on a sudden and only for a certain work, and for these a previous bargain should be made regarding their payment; those who were employed for a certain time in a particular description of work, as tailors, shoemakers, butchers, and others, who always came to work in the house upon materials provided there, or the harvest men for the gathering of the crops; and domestic servants who were hired by the year, these latter being expected to pay an absolute and pa.s.sive obedience to the lord and lady of the household and any others who were set in authority over them.

Naturally, it was the female servants who came under the supervision of the lady of the house, and minute directions are given for their ordering. She was to require her maids to repair early in the morning to their work; the entrance to the hall and all other places by which people enter, or places in the hall where they tarry to converse, were to be swept and made clean, ”and that the footstools and covers of the benches and forms be dusted and shaken, and after this that the other chambers be in like manner cleaned and arranged for the day.” After this, the pet animals were to be attended to and fed. At midday the servants were to have their first meal, which was to be bountiful, but ”only of one meat and not of several, or of any delicacies; and give them only one kind of drink, nouris.h.i.+ng but not heady, whether wine or other; and admonish them to eat heartily, and to drink well and plentifully, for it is right that they should eat all at once, without sitting too long, and at one breath, without reposing on their meal or halting, or leaning with their elbows on the table; and as soon as they begin to talk or to rest on their elbows, make them rise and remove the table.” After their ”second labor” and on feast days also--when seemingly the workday was not so long as usual--they were to have another lighter repast, and in the late evening, after all their duties were performed, another abundant meal was served. It then devolved upon the lady of the house or her deputy to see that the manor was closed, and to take charge of the keys, preventing anyone from going in or out; and then, having had all the fires carefully ”covered,” she sent the servants to bed and saw that their candles were extinguished to prevent the risk of fire. The lady was always careful as to whom she received into her house as servitors; female servants who came to her as strangers were not well regarded, and were not given trusts of importance, and their characters, so far as was possible, were looked into, as well as the circ.u.mstances of their leaving their former place of employment.

The term ”spinster,” which is now confined to unmarried women, was a term of consideration applied to all women of the better cla.s.s during the Middle Ages. It was indicative of her superior rank, and was especially adhered to by gentlewomen who married out of their station, as a sign of their good birth and gentle breeding.

The term ”gentle blood,” as now understood, means only that some persons have the fortunate circ.u.mstance of refined parentage or ancestry; but in the Middle Ages, when the pride of gentle blood was one of the most distinguis.h.i.+ng characteristics of the prevailing feudal society, it was seriously believed that through the whole extent of the aristocratic cla.s.ses there ran one blood, distinguishable from the blood of all other persons. So strongly was this view entertained, that it was commonly thought that if a child of gentle blood should be stolen or abandoned in infancy, and then bred up as a peasant or a burgher, without knowledge of its origin, it would display, as it grew toward manhood, unmistakable proofs of its gentle origin, in spite of education and example. Whatever the fallacy of this belief, its effect upon the ladies of superior birth was to make them prize their station highly; but it also created a spirit of haughtiness toward those who were below their station, and a harshness in their relation to their domestics which was not always conformable to the graciousness and consideration which these very ladies often displayed where there was no question involving their caste.

In considering the dress of the women of the Middle Ages, we remarked upon the censure and sarcasm which were pa.s.sed upon the vanities into which women were led by their devotion to the changing fas.h.i.+ons of the day. Every cla.s.s of society was pervaded by a love of dress, which expressed itself in the greatest extravagances and absurdities. A knight of the fourteenth century compiled for three young ladies, the daughters of a knight of Normandy, a ma.n.u.script which contains advice and directions for the regulation of their conduct through life.

It contains several very curious pa.s.sages relative to dress: ”Fair daughters,” says their mentor, ”I pray you that ye be not the first to take new shapes and guises of array of women of strange countries.” He then inveighs against the wearing of superfluous quant.i.ties of furs as edging for their gowns, their hoods, and their sleeves. After commenting upon the sinfulness of useless fas.h.i.+ons and their effect upon the lower cla.s.ses, he proceeds to portray the absurdities into which the latter were led by aping their betters, and suggests that the furs which they wore in profusion had better at least be dispensed with in summer, as they served only ”for a hiding place for the fleas.” The knight whose daughters are thus counselled is unable to deter them from falling into extravagances of attire, and has recourse to the legend of a chevalier whose wife was dead and who made application to a hermit to know if her soul had gone to Paradise or to punishment. The holy man, after long praying, fell asleep, and saw the soul of the fair lady weighed in the balance; with Saint Michael standing on one side and the Devil on the other. The latter addressed Saint Michael and claimed the woman as his own on the score that she had ten diverse gowns, and a less number than that would have sufficed to lose her soul; besides which, with what she had wasted she might have clothed two or three persons who for the lack of her charity died of want. So saying, the fiend gathered up all her gay attire, ornaments, and jewels, and cast them in the balance with her evil deeds, which determined the balance against her, and he bore her away to the lake of fire. The same night, in order to deter his daughters from painting their faces, the knight recounts a horrible legend of a fine lady who was punished in h.e.l.l because she had ”popped and painted her visage to please the sight of the world.”

It is not by such incidentals as dress, but by the enduring qualities of character, that the women of the higher circles of the English Middle Ages were able to make an indelible impress upon the life and character of the nation. And more especially may this be said of the women whose lives were largely spent in the sheltered circle of a pure domesticity,--the women of the manors.

CHAPTER VII

THE WOMEN OF THE MONASTERIES

In general, the routine of the nunnery was the same as that of a monastery. There was the same rotation, hour by hour, of sacred services, with monotonous regularity and repet.i.tion; the only variety offered was that of labor of one sort or another, with brief intervals for rest and refreshment. The industry of the nuns usually took the form of working in wool, for it devolved upon them to make the clothing of the monks, who were a.s.sociated with the convents to perform the outdoor labor and to serve as confessors for the female inmates. Great care was necessary to prevent too close proximity of the nunneries and monasteries and to limit the intercourse of the inmates of the respective inst.i.tutions to the bare necessities of their mutual dependence.

The rules by which women were governed in the life of the convent did not differ much from those for the men. Some of these regulations were very rigorous: the inmates were to have nothing of their own, nor were they allowed to go out of the convent, and they were permitted the luxury of a bath only in time of sickness. Continual silence, frequent confessions, a spare diet, and hard labor were to be endured uncomplainingly, on penalty of excommunication.

In the fifth century, prohibitions were issued proscribing the founding of any more monasteries for monks and nuns together and ordering the part.i.tioning of those which already existed. No man excepting the officiating clergy, the bishop, and the steward of the convent was allowed to enter within its walls; and, indeed, one of the rules enjoined that the nuns were to make confession to the bishop through the abbess. Under no pretext whatever were the nuns to lodge under the roof of a monastery, nor was any person who was not a monk or a cleric of high repute to be allowed within the precincts of the convent on temporal business; but in spite of the many rules by which they were hedged about, in the eighth century nuns are found admitted into the monasteries on the ground of the necessity for their presence in sickness and similar emergencies.

Besides the nuns, strictly so called, in the eighth and subsequent centuries there were canonesses, who differed from the nuns in retaining more of their secular character. Their vows were not perpetual, and they confined their labors chiefly to the instruction of the children of the n.o.bles.

Having cited some of the rules for the government of those who committed themselves to the life of the nun, it now remains to perform the delicate task of showing the degree of success which attended the attempt to isolate a cla.s.s of unmarried women, that, by religious offices and meditations, they might wholly dedicate their time and their faculties to the cultivation of the Christian graces, and serve as the benefactresses of the poor in giving alms at the convent gate. The century that witnessed the outbreak of the Reformation is commonly regarded as exceptional for laxity of religious principle and perversion of the inst.i.tutional ideals of the Church; but, from the eighth century, the ecclesiastical morality was of such a low order as seriously to affect the moral tone of the people and to invalidate the efficacy of the Church as a teacher of religion. The celibacy which was enjoined upon the clergy was largely responsible for this state of affairs. It is unfortunately not true that the ages of faith, so called, were ages of great moral purity. In spite of the interdict of councils, priestly marriages were looked upon as common events. The marriage of priests being under the ban of the Church, concubinage was regarded as almost a legitimate relations.h.i.+p, and carried less of stigma than the proscribed marriages. It is not singular that such impairment of moral ideas was not confined to the priests, and that the same low moral tone invaded the convents, many of whose inmates became the partners of the priests in their derelictions.

”The known luxury and believed immoralities of the wealthy monasteries” in England, says Sharon Turner, ”made a great impression on the public mind. Even some of the clergy became ashamed of it, and contributed to expose it, both in England and elsewhere.” Nor was the tone of morals outside the cloister of higher grade than that of the monks. In 1212 a council commanded the clergy not to have women in their houses, nor to suffer in their cloisters a.s.semblies for debauchery, nor to entertain women there. Nuns were ordered to lie single. In England, these and many other moral prohibitions were repeated at various intervals, showing that, in spite of the prevailing corruption, there was an appreciation of pure ideals; and in its councils the Church took cognizance of and endeavored to stem the rising tide of unchast.i.ty. Thus, inquiries were made in 1252 as to whether the clergy frequented the nunneries without reasonable cause, and a year or two afterward an inquisition was made all over England into the character and actions of the various religious personages.

The conduct of the nuns is frequently alluded to in terms of the severest censure, while the ecclesiastics were enjoined not to frequent taverns or public spectacles, or to resort to the houses of loose characters, or to visit the nuns; they were not to play at dice or improper games, nor to leave their property to their children.

The vices of the clergy were the unavoidable consequence of the independence of their hierarchy from civil control. The release of the clergy from secular jurisdiction was productive of much personal depravity. They had to fear their abbot only, and he was frequently a mild censor of their morals. At a time when any profligate woman of position might retire to a convent and, by elevation or appointment, become abbess, it is not strange that the moral tone of the convent was not determined by the rules of the order, but by the standards which were actually established.

Yet, in spite of many instances of reprehensible conduct, the nuns as a cla.s.s did not break the vows that bound them to chast.i.ty, and within the convent walls were found many examples of women of ill.u.s.trious character. In the Anglo-Saxon times, women of the most admirable traits are found in charge of convents; the names of some of the abbesses of the seventh century, and earlier, are notable as those of women of high rank as well as of high character. Saint Werburga of Ely, the daughter of Wulfere, King of Mercia, was made ruler over all the female religious houses, and became the founder of several convents of note. Her qualities and character were set forth in the following lines:

”In beaute amyable she was equall to Rach.e.l.l, Comparable to Sara in fyrme fidelyte, In sadness and wysedom lyke to Abygaell: Replete as Deibora with grace of prophecy, aeqyvalent to Ruth she was in humylyte, In purchrytude Rebecca, lyke Hester in Colynesse, Lyke Judyth in vertue and proued holynesse.”

But such examples of high worth among the abbesses, while not exceptional in the early Middle Ages, are not frequently met with in the closing centuries of the period.

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