Havergal College - Magazine Yearbook (Winnipeg, Manitoba Canada)

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Havergal College Magazine story out of their writings. However he had not been able to resist the temptation of putting it in himself ! His account of each reign follows a very definite plan, and is divided up under a number of headings. The first section is generally devoted to a sketch of the King ' s doings during his reign ; then follow ' ' His taxations and wayes for raising of money, Laws and Ordinances of his time, Affairs of the Church in his time, Works of Piety [It is sometimes neces- sary in the case of Kings like AYilliam Rufus and John to vary this last heading, and to make it read Works of Piety done by him or by others in his time ], His Wives and Children, His Personage and Conditions, Casualties happening in his time, His death and burial, Men of special note in his time. It is in the last four or five sections that one must look to find a good deal that we do not learn now-a-days, and to gather Sir Richard ' s private opinions. Just as one always turns in a book of poetry to the poems one knows best, or in a new commentary looks first to discover the author ' s views on one ' s own pet subjects, so in a fresh history book it is quite natural to see what the historian has to say about the Kings and great men one has always admired or detested. Here to one ' s delight one finds quaint or refresh- ing criticisms, stories that show an amazing credulity, and an unexpected mingling of the important and unimportant. But it has proved a most difficult task to make a selection of such passages, for in an essay where space is limited, extracts must necessarily be brief, and so there are many good things in the book that must be passed over. Possibly the extracts that are quoted will send readers of the Magazine to the Chronicle it- self to search for more treasures for themselves. On Alfred, Sir Richard is undoubtedly disappointing (there is no mention of the cakes ; perhaps it seemed an undignified story to the Royalist historian, and he scorned to repeat the well-known legend). He seems to suspect something apocryphal in the records concerning Alfred: The virtues of this King, if they were not incredible, they were at least admirable ; and he hardly approves of Alfred ' s many-sidedness: Besides his great piety, he was also learned, and as far as it might be a commendation in a Prince, a skilful Musician and excellent Poet. Finally, the whole of that fascinating reign is dismissed in a single column. In discussing Edward the Confessor, Sir Richard shows a certain independence of judgment, and review- ing his reign is at a loss to discover his claim to saintship, so what the virtues were, for which after his death he should be reputed a St. doth not easily appear. However, he admits that he was raised above the pitch of ordinary Kings by his power of curing King ' s Evil by his touch. The reign of AYil- liam I. occupies many pages and receives a fairly just treatment 26

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Havergal College Magazine columns on every page, with marginal notes and dates. The pages are plentifully besprinkled with capital letters; every pro- per name, either of a person or a place, is written in italics, and every quotation is printed in the same way. Added to this the type is set up with the old long s, which always tempts one to read it as f, and with the c and t linked to- gether. There can be no doubt as to the genuine age of the book ! The Publisher has inserted two curious front pages ; on the left hand page is a picture of Charles II. ; on the right — a frontispiece of rather elaborate design. In the centre is the full title of the book — A Chronicle of the Kings of England, From the Time of the Romans Government unto the Death of King James, containing all Passages of State and Church, with all other observations proper for a Chronicle. Faithfully col- lected out of Authours Ancient and Moderne ; and digested into a new method hy Sr. Richard Baker Kt. The rest of the page is adorned with pictures of Charles I. — inter Reges ut Lilium inter Flores — (among Kings as the Lily is among flowers), and Archbishop Laud; four little pictures of the cities of Verulam, Lincoln, London and York — as they never could have been ; and four more representing a Roman, a Saxon, a Dane and a Norman, none of them in the least like any soldier that ever existed. There are many pages to be turned before the anxious reader can begin the History. There is a Preface, a Catalogue of Writers, a table showing the descent of Charles II, in a literally straight line from Egbert, a Catalogue of the Nobility, Arch- bishops, Bishops, Privy Councillors, Judges and Baronets of England (and there are 700 baronets!) and then at last the Chronicle. Sir Richard may have been qualified by nature to write a very pleasant and readable book, but he was not a scientific historian. One of the most difficult tasks for the historian is the distinguishing of fact from fable ; of discovering the sub- stratum of truth under the masses of fiction. Sir Richard Baker appreciated this difficulty, as the opening sentences of his his- tory show: As the first writers were poets, so the first writ- ings have been fictions. And nothing is delivered to Posterity of the most ancient times but very Fables. . . . And when we are once gotten out of Fables, and come to some truth, yet that truth is delivered in such slender draughts, and such broken pieces, that very small benefit can be gotten by the knowing of it. But the labour of separating fable from fact proved too great for the seventeenth century historian, and the History is a positive storehouse of amusing and improbable stories. Some- times Sir Richard seems conscience stricken, as for example, when he has quoted a somewhat improper story, he adds — But writers perhaps had been more compleat, if they had left this 25

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Havergal College Magazine at the historian ' s hands. However, he seemed to think that greater than all his conquests and his laws is the fact that from him we begin the Computation of our Kings of England. His end is recorded in a sentence which is quite beautiful: And thus he who was Conqueror of men, was conquered himself by death, the ninth day of September. It would be unjust to Sir Richard not to quote at least one of the Casualties which he so carefully recorded. In John ' s reign a great marvel was seen. In Suffolk was taken a fish in form like to a man, and was kept six months upon land with raw flesh and fish ; and then, for that they could have no speech of it, they cast it into the sea again. Richard III. is altogether condemned and the record of his reign concludes with these words: Of men of note for wickedness and villainy, enough hath been men- tioned in the body of the story : of men of valour and learning they will fitter be placed in a better King ' s reign. The History becomes more and more detailed as it draws nearer the historian ' s own time. One half of the whole volume is occupied with the affairs from 1558-1679. The plots and intrigues of Elizabeth ' s reign are given with much circumstance, and it is plain that Sir Richard admired his sovereign very much. The list of the men of note is, of course, a long one, but the order is at first surprising. Robert, Earl of Leicester, comes first: an exquisite statesman for his own ends. Then follow other statesmen, seamen, writers, divines, the actors Richard Burbidge and Edward Allen, and at the very end the names we should have put among the first. In writers of plays and such as had been Players themselves William Shakspere and Benjamin Jonson have specially left their names recommended to Posterity. Verily, a prophet hath no honour in his own country. We should expect Sir Richard Baker to be Royalist in his sympathies, so we are not surprised at the very flatter- ing estimate of the character of James I., which concludes : He was a Prince after Plato ' s own heart for his Learning, and what is infinitely more worth, after God ' s own heart for his religiousness and Piety. We do not know what he thought of Charles for he died in 1645, and so was spared the pain of seeing the Royalist cause fail, and Charles I. die on the scaffold. But the History was continued by another hand into the reign of Charles II. Except for the fact that the whole of the Com- monwealth period is counted as part of the reign of Charles II., there is little to show the sympathies of the writer. Indeed, he is extraordinarily just to Cromwell. But it must be remem- bered that it was Edward Philipps who carried on the story; he was the nephew of Milton, and possibly leaned towards the Puritan side. From his uncle too he must have learned to admire the great soldier and ruler, and his final verdict on his character is this: Had he not employed that Policy and Sagacity of 27