g
after them, should be made slaves any more. Secondly, that the rent of
land should be fixed at a certain price in money, instead of being paid
in service. Thirdly, that they should have liberty to buy and sell in
all markets and public places, like other free men. Fourthly, that they
should be pardoned for past offences. Heaven knows, there was nothing
very unreasonable in these proposals! The young King deceitfully
pretended to think so, and kept thirty clerks up, all night, writing out
a charter accordingly.

Now, Wat Tyler himself wanted more than this. He wanted the entire
abolition of the forest laws. He was not at Mile-end with the rest, but,
while that meeting was being held, broke into the Tower of London and
slew the archbishop and the treasurer, for whose heads the people had
cried out loudly the day before. He and his men even thrust their swords
into the bed of the Princess of Wales while the Princess was in it, to
make certain that none of their enemies were concealed there.

So, Wat and his men still continued armed, and rode about the city. Next
morning, the King with a small train of some sixty gentlemen--among whom
was WALWORTH the Mayor--rode into Smithfield, and saw Wat and his people
at a little distance. Says Wat to his men, 'There is the King. I will
go speak with him, and tell him what we want.'

Straightway Wat rode up to him, and began to talk. 'King,' says Wat,
'dost thou see all my men there?'

'Ah,' says the King. 'Why?'

'Because,' says Wat, 'they are all at my command, and have sworn to do
whatever I bid them.'

Some declared afterwards that as Wat said this, he laid his hand on the
King's bridle. Others declared that he was seen to play with his own
dagger. I think, myself, that he just spoke to the King like a rough,
angry man as he was, and did nothing more. At any rate he was expecting
no attack, and preparing for no resistance, when Walworth the Mayor did
the not very valiant deed of drawing a short sword and stabbing him in
the throat. He dropped from his horse, and one of the King's people
speedily finished him. So fell Wat Tyler. Fawners and flatterers made a
mighty triumph of it, and set up a cry which will occasionally find an
echo to this day. But Wat was a hard-working man, who had suffered much,
and had been foully outraged; and it is probable that he was a man of a
much higher nature and a much braver spirit than any of the parasites who
exulted th