Oldalképek
PDF
ePub
[merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small]

is key passed each leadly conflict upon

asey, resting upon hacked te leaping heart was Puritans and Cavaliers Terd of English history sage of the seventeenth cassonni collision, the curthe one, a brilliant towing with its flowery vich its waters ran;— *27, sweeping sternly on to grey stone.

ea Puritan and Cavalier ce of their dress and of verd was borrowed from 1.6 silk or satin doublet

fich point lace, a short Scalder, and a broad-leafed

WILD LIFE OF THE CAVALIERS.

177

low-crowned hat of Flemish beaver, from which floated one or two graceful feathers. His broad sword-belt, supporting a Spanish rapier, was a marvel of costly embroidered-work. A laced buff coat and silken sash sometimes took the place of the doublet; and when the steel gorget was buckled over this, the gallant Cavalier was ready for the fray. Long waves of curled hair, rippling on the shoulders, formed a graceful framework for the finely moulded features of a high-bred English gentleman; and to this class of the nation the Cavaliers for the most part belonged. But, unhappily, these silks and ringlets filled the taverns and surrounded the gaming-tables of London by night and day. Great fortunes were lost then, as in later times, on a single throw of the dice; and many a fair-plumed hat was dashed fiercely with curses in the mud, when the half-sobered reveller, staggering with torn and wine-splashed finery out of the tavern into the cold grey light of the breaking day, found every gold piece vanished from his shrunken purse. Well might he pluck at the dishevelled lovelock-special eye-sore to the Puritans-which hung over his pallid brow, and curse his drunken folly. Such a life lived many of the Cavaliers. Tennis, billiards, drinking, masquerading, dressing, intriguing, composing and singing love songs, filled their days and their nights. Madly the whirlpool spun round with its reckless freight of gaily dressed debauchees, who, seeing one and another wasted face sink from view, only drowned the cry of dying remorse in a wilder burst of revelry. A few were flung out from the fatal circles with ruined fortune and broken health, to find nothing left them but a painful dragging out of days in some lonely country farm-house; or, if the pure air and quiet hours restored them, a life of exile, as a soldier in some foreign service, and then, perhaps, a grave in unknown soil. Yet even all this vicious round could not destroy the pluck of Englishmen. Gallantly and gaily did Rupert's horsemen, the very flower of the Cavaliers, ride in the face of hailing bullets upon the Puritan musketeers. While we condemn the vices of the Cavaliers, and pity the wretched end of so many of these brilliant English gentlemen, we cannot help respecting the bravery of the men who rallied so loyally round 12

(15)

176

DRESS OF THE CAVALIERS.

FOURTH ERA OF ENGLISH LITERATURE.

FROM THE SHUTTING OF THE THEATRES IN 1648 A.D. TO THE DEATH OF MILTON IN 1674 A.D.

[blocks in formation]

JOSTLING in London streets, and scowling as they passed each other on leafy country roads; grappling in deadly conflict upon many a battle-field from Edgehill to Naseby, resting upon hacked sword or bloody ash-wood pike only till the leaping heart was still enough to begin the strife again-Puritans and Cavaliers stand out in violent contrast during that period of English history which is filled with the great central struggle of the seventeenth century. Close and deadly though their occasional collision, the currents of their domestic lives flowed far apart;-the one, a brilliant stream flashing along its noisy way, and toying with its flowery banks, all unheeding of the great deep to which its waters ran ;— the other, a dark, strong, and solemn river, sweeping sternly on to its goal between rugged shores of cold grey stone.

The violence of the opposition between Puritan and Cavalier was strikingly expressed by the difference of their dress and of their amusements. The Cavalier (the word was borrowed from the Spanish) in full dress wore a brilliant silk or satin doublet with slashed sleeves, a falling collar of rich point lace, a short cloak hanging carelessly from one shoulder, and a broad-leafed

WILD LIFE OF THE CAVALIERS.

177

low-crowned hat of Flemish beaver, from which floated one or two graceful feathers. His broad sword-belt, supporting a Spanish rapier, was a marvel of costly embroidered-work. A laced buff coat and silken sash sometimes took the place of the doublet; and when the steel gorget was buckled over this, the gallant Cavalier was ready for the fray. Long waves of curled hair, rippling on the shoulders, formed a graceful framework for the finely moulded features of a high-bred English gentleman; and to this class of the nation the Cavaliers for the most part belonged. But, unhappily, these silks and ringlets filled the taverns and surrounded the gaming-tables of London by night and day. Great fortunes were lost then, as in later times, on a single throw of the dice; and many a fair-plumed hat was dashed fiercely with curses in the mud, when the half-sobered reveller, staggering with torn and wine-splashed finery out of the tavern into the cold grey light of the breaking day, found every gold piece vanished from his shrunken purse. Well might he pluck at the dishevelled lovelock-special eye-sore to the Puritans—which hung over his pallid brow, and curse his drunken folly. Such a life lived many of the Cavaliers. Tennis, billiards, drinking, masquerading, dressing, intriguing, composing and singing love songs, filled their days and their nights. Madly the whirlpool spun round with its reckless freight of gaily dressed debauchees, who, seeing one and another wasted face sink from view, only drowned the cry of dying remorse in a wilder burst of revelry. A few were flung out from the fatal circles with ruined fortune and broken health, to find nothing left them but a painful dragging out of days in some lonely country farm-house; or, if the pure air and quiet hours restored them, a life of exile, as a soldier in some foreign service, and then, perhaps, a grave in unknown soil. Yet even all this vicious round could not destroy the pluck of Englishmen. Gallantly and gaily did Rupert's horsemen, the very flower of the Cavaliers, ride in the face of hailing bullets upon the Puritan musketeers. While we condemn the vices of the Cavaliers, and pity the wretched end of so many of these brilliant English gentlemen, we cannot help respecting the bravery of the men who rallied so loyally round 12

(15)

178

THE PURITAN DRESS AND MIEN.

the banner of their erring king, and, for the cause of monarchy, spilt their blood on English battle-fields with the same careless gaiety as if they were pouring out bumpers of red wine in the taverns by St. Paul's.

The literature of the Cavaliers, we may almost guess, did not, for the most part, go very deep. The poetry was chiefly lyric,the sparkling, spontaneous effusions of a genius, that poured forth its sweet and living waters in spite of overwhelming floods of wine and dense fumes of tobacco-smoke. Herrick, Suckling,

Waller, and the unhappy Lovelace were the chief poets of the Cavaliers; and the works of all are stamped with characters that proclaim their birth-place and their fostering food. The Cavalier was graceful and gay, polite and polished; so are the verses of Lovelace and his brother bards. The Cavalier was dissipated, and often vicious; there are many works of these men that bear deepest stains of immorality and vice. History, on the Cavalier side, is best represented by Lord Clarendon; theology, by the witty Thomas Fuller and the brilliant Jeremy Taylor. The quaint oddities of the former divine, and the gentle pictures, rich in images of loveliness, with which the sermons of the latter are studded, afford the most pleasing examples of English literature written in the atmosphere of Cavalier life.

Of a totally different stamp were the Puritan and his writings. Instead of the silk, satin, and lace which decked his gay antagorists, he affected usually a grave sobriety of dress and manners, which should place him at the utmost possible distance from the fashion of the vain world from which he sought to separate himself. His tastes were simple, his pleasures moderate, and his behaviour reverent and circumspect. Living in an atmosphere of habitual seriousness, the Bible was much in his hands and its sacred words often on his lips; while, disdaining lighter recreations, he often found his chief enjoyment in the hearing of sermons and the singing of psalms. As in other days of high religious fervour, his children at their baptism were called by sacred names, either drawn from the genealogical lists of Old Testament times, or expressive of his Christian faith and hope. That the perfor

« ElőzőTovább »