seeing their leader fall, prepared
themselves for revenge; and this whole company, with the king
himself, had undoubtedly perished on the spot, had it not been for an
extraordinary presence of mind which Richard discovered on the occasion.
He ordered his company to stop; he advanced alone towards the enraged
multitude, and accosting them with an affable and intrepid countenance,
he asked them, "What is the meaning of this disorder my good people? Are
ye angry that ye have lost your leader? I am your king: I will be your
leader." The populace, overawed by his presence, implicitly followed
him. He led them into the fields, to prevent any disorder which might
have arisen by their continuing in the city. Being there joined by Sir
Robert Knolles, and a body of well-armed veteran soldiers, who had
been secretly drawn together, he strictly prohibited that officer from
falling on the rioters, and committing an undistinguished slaughter upon
them; and he peaceably dismissed them with the same charters which had
been granted to their fellows.[*] Soon after, the nobility and gentry,
hearing of the king's danger, in which they were all involved, flocked
to London, with their adherents and retainers; and Richard took the
field at the head of an army forty thousand strong.[**] It then behoved
all the rebels to submit: the charters of enfranchisement and pardon
were revoked by parliament; the low people were reduced to the same
slavish condition as before; and several of the ringleaders were
severely punished for the late disorders. Some were even executed
without process or form of law.[***] It was pretended, that the
intentions of the mutineers had been to seize the king's person, to
carry him through England at their head; to murder all the nobility,
gentry, and lawyers, and even all the bishops and priests, except the
mendicant friars; to despatch afterwards the king himself, and,
having thus reduced all to a level, to order the kingdom at their
pleasure.[****] It is not impossible but many of them, in the delirium
of their first success, might have formed such projects: but of all the
evils incident to human society, the insurrections of the populace, when
not raised and supported by persons of higher quality, are the least
to be dreaded: the mischiefs consequent to an abolition of all rank and
distinction become so great, that they are immediately felt, and soon
bring affairs back to their former order and arrangement.

*