who went to the tournament in the following manner:-" From the time when a knight, earl, baron, or any other tourneyer, shall depart from his own house toward the tournament and from it, he shall take nothing unjustly by the way, without licence or paying for it, whether meat or drink, or any other necessary. Moreover, he shall not in any case do injury to any on the road, whether by himself or servants; nor, to the best of his power, by himself or his attendants, suffer any one to be unjustly molested. And if he shall find any person so offending, and is able himself or by his attendants to cause reparation to be made, he shall accordingly see it done. And if he be not able to cause reparation to be made, let him therewith acquaint the barons, who have sworn to see the peace of the lord and king kept by the tourneyers; and their judgment shall set it right." The unsettled state of the land, and the inadequacy of the laws, are forcibly exemplified in the foregoing passage. The character of the knights and nobles too, from the prohibition of their robbing on the king's highways, would seem to be far below the chivalric model. But the concluding paragraph breathes the genuine spirit of chivalry, and proves that, whatever might be the character of his ruder nobles, Richard himself possessed a mind to appreciate, and a heart to feel, all those lofty and generous sentiments which rendered the knight, in the following centuries, the disinterested avenger of all injustice. To these enactments, the form of the oath to be administered to all desirous of tourneying is appended. It recapitulates the foregoing

articles, and also binds each tourneyer to "give lawful truce in the tournament" to whatever enemy he may meet on that occasion. It is a subject of regret, that no account has been handed down to us of these the first tournaments ever witnessed in England; and it is the more singular that none of the monkish historians should have recorded their introduction, since these splendid military spectacles had been but lately forbidden by three councils of the continental clergy; in the last of which, so vehement was their opposition, that it was enacted, that whoever in these sports lost his life should be denied Christian burial.

From the period of Richard's return from captivity to that of his early death, but little information respecting Elinor can be found. About the year 1194, we find her granting some lands in Kent to the monks of Christ church, Canterbury, in exchange for the port of Sandwich.* In 1195, she was summoned to Fontevraud, to join in the funeral services of her youngest daughter, Joanna, the widow of the king of Sicily, who had accompanied her brother Richard to Acre, and on her return married the earl of Thoulouse; she died at Rouen, and her body was conveyed to Fontevraud, where, not improbably, the aged queen dowager, during some part of the short remainder of Cœur de Lion's reign, took up her residence.†

* Vide "Boy's Collections toward a History of Sandwich."

+ Some part of this time, however, was spent in England, since, in more than one instance, her name as regent appears in the "Rolls of the King's Court."

Although it has been computed, from a careful calculation, that, of the ten years of Cœur de Lion's reign, not more than eight months were passed in his native land, still he appears to have been most laudably interested in its welfare, and to have paid more attention to its legislation, than might have been expected from a monarch so devoted to war. In 1194, on occasion of a scarcity, he issued a proclamation, prohibiting the exportation of corn, "that England might not suffer from the want of its own abundance."* In 1197, he passed a law for uniformity of weights and measures, ordering that the measure-lengths should be made of iron, and those of capacity to have rims of the same; and that standard weights and measures should be kept by the sheriffs, and mayors or magistrates of every town. An act relating to woollen cloths, directing that they should measure two yards within the lists, which had been passed in the preceding reign, was renewed. One provision in this act appears in the present day most singular ;—it is, that if any weaver mixed Spanish wool with English, the cloth should be burnt by the chief magistrate.t Nor was Cœur de Lion inattentive to he Jews: he prohibited all secret bargains between them and Christians; and ordered that three copies should be made of every agreement, one of which was to be kept in a public repository. But, in the midst of all his plans of military enterprize, in the full vigour of his years, in the full flower of his fame, Cœur de Lion, in an obscure fortress, but by whose

Macpherson's Anuals of Commerce.

+ Ibid.

hands it is unknown,* received his fatal wound, and died April 6th, 1100; bequeathing his kingdom, and three-fourths of his treasure (so those who brought the intelligence declared), to his brother John; and directing that his body should be conveyed to Fontevraud.

son.

The affliction of the aged Elinor at this most severe and unexpected stroke, must have been overwhelming. Of all her children, Richard seems to have been peculiarly the favourite; and ardently was the attachment of the mother returned by the affectionate For her, when a mere stripling, he advanced the banner of her hereditary dominions against an unjust and tyrannical father. The first act of his government, when advanced to the throne, was to endeavour to compensate for her long exclusion from power, by decreeing "that all should be disposed of according to her will." To her, he committed the charge of selecting a suitable bride; and on every occasion his conduct towards her, was marked by the most respectful and devoted attention. From John, the darling of his father, and the cowardly enemy of his chivalrous brother, the sorrowful mother of eight children, of whom but two now remained, seems to have expected but little. His conduct, however, was most praiseworthy, and it deserves to find a place among the very few laudable actions which he performed. Soon

* The reader will find a collection of the statements of every contemporary writer respecting the circumstances of Richard's death in Sir F. Palgrave's interesting Introduction to the "Rolls of the King's Court. From these it appears that the common account is most apocryphal, and that he very probably fell a victim to treachery.

after his accession, he confirmed "to his most beloved and venerable mother, to have and to hold, all the days of her life, the whole of Poictou, and all pertaining." She seems also to have held the see of Oleron; for in the same year she grants a charter to the commons of Oleron, confirming their liberties and ancient customs, which was also confirmed by John.

The following year she is represented, in a letter addressed to John,* as being at Fontevraud, and in bad health. She most probably soon after recovered; since in the same year, at the request of her son, she undertook her last journey, which was to arrange with her son-in-law, Alphonso the Eighth of Castile, the marriage of his daughter Blanche with Louis, the heir to the French crown. This mission, Elinor, although now verging on the age of fourscore, performed; and she arrived safely with the young princess at Bourdeaux. After resting there awhile, "exhausted with great age and many trials, the queen transferred herself to the abbey of Fontevraud, and there remained." Not yet, however, did Elinor take her final abode in this, her favourite convent. In 1202, young Arthur of Britany, her grandson, at the instigation of Philip, took up arms to assert his right to the English crown ;-a right which, as a question of primogeniture, certainly belonged to him; but which was contested by John, both on the ground that Richard, according to the custom of the age, which frequently superseded the right of primogeniture, had actually bequeathed the kingdom

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* Fœdera, vol. i.

+ Hoveden, p. 802.