of his wife and children was not such as to beget love and dutiful
conduct.

After tarrying some months in France, attending to matters in his
provinces of Anjou, Poitou, Normandy, and Aquitaine, Richard crossed
over to England. There he was received most joyfully by his new
subjects.

In Westminster Abbey, on Sept. 3, 1189, his coronation took place with
great splendor. It is the first coronation ceremony of an English king
fully described by eye-witnesses.

The Archbishop of Canterbury and other bishops, richly robed, and
carrying the cross, holy water, and censers, led the stately procession
that escorted the king from his palace to the Abbey. After these
dignitaries of the Church, came four barons in court dress, bearing each
a golden candlestick; then four earls, carrying the king's cup, the
golden spurs, the scepter of state, and the royal rod of majesty--a mace
adorned with a golden dove. Four great earls walked next, brandishing
aloft their glittering swords; and behind these noblemen marched six
more, as bearers of the royal robes and regalia. William, Earl of Essex,
proudly carried the gold and jeweled crown immediately before Richard
himself, who walked beneath a magnificent canopy of state, upheld by
richly clad nobles.

Before the brilliant assemblage of lords Richard took the solemn oath to
be a just and righteous ruler. Then after the archbishop had anointed
him with holy oil, shoes of golden tissue were put on the king's feet,
the golden spurs were buckled on, and he was clad in the vestments of
royalty and led to the high altar. There he promised to be faithful to
his kingly oath, and was crowned with the royal diadem and given the
scepter and rod of office.

So Richard Plantagenet became King of England. No one beholding the
proud bearing of the new monarch would have supposed that his family
emblem, the lowly broom-plant (_Planta genista_), from which came the
name Plantagenet, had been adopted by an ancestor of Richard's in token
of humility. For, in very truth, the Plantagenets were an arrogant race,
and Richard was the proudest of his line.

As he strode down the aisle of Westminster in all the glittering and
jeweled splendor of his coronation robes, Richard's appearance was truly
royal. He looked every inch a king. The people gazed with delight on his
tall, powerful frame, graceful and strong as that of Mars himself; on
his proudly poised head, whose red-gold curls waved beneath the jeweled