coachman, filed a chink between his front teeth,
to enable him to whistle to his nags in the
orthodox manner. It was not a very high ambition,
but it led Mr. Akers to a coach-box,
and left him there firmly planted.

Up in the air again the crow darts, and a
few quick pulses of his coal black wings bring
him to Staines. Antiquaries derive the name
of the town from a stone which marked the
western bounds of the jurisdiction of the Corporation
of London. Lord mayors and aldermen
of old times used to make great days of the
swan-upping, coming in gay barges on an August
afternoon past Staines to their annual dinner
at Medmenham. The Thames swans are chiefly
the property of the Dyers' and Vintners' Companies.
The birds build in the eyots about
Hurley, and in the osier beds by the river,
and firm structures of twigs cradle their huge
eggs. The keepers receive a small sum for
every cygnet that is reared, and it is their duty
to guard the eggs, and to build the foundations
of the nests. The mark of the Vintners'
Company is two nicks, which mark originated
the well known sign of the swan with two
necks, or nicks. The upping used to begin on
the Monday after Saint Peter's day.

Now the crow skims on his glossy wings to
that little island meadow on the Thames where
King John signed Magna Charta, forced by
his barons, who had gathered together at
Hounslow, under pretence of a tournament.
There were first pronounced those memorable
words:

"No free man shall be apprehended, imprisoned,
disseised, outlawed, banished, or in any way destroyed;
nor will we go upon him, nor will we send
upon him, excepting by the legal judgment of his
peers, or by the law of the land. To no man will
we sell, to no man will we deny or delay right and
justice."

O high Court of Chancery! O patient and
suffering suitors! O grimy law-haunted houses,
dumb and blind in the midst of crowded
streets, see how well our kings or nobles have
obeyed this solemn clause! Lawyers, pay a pilgrimage
to the green race meadow near Egham
and repent of your sins and the shortcomings
of tardy justice. That meeting at Runnymede
ended as it began, with a tournament. In less
than a year the faithless king had broken all
his promises, and Louis of France had landed
at Dover as the ally of the barons.

From Runnymede to the royal battlements of
the " proud keep of Windsor," is but a short
flight for the crow. The very prettiest legend
about Windsor is connected with the little garden
at the foot of the proud tower on which the
crow first alights, and from which twelve tributary
counties can be seen in clear weather.
A young Scotch prince, sent to France to be out
of the way of his dangerous uncle, the Duke of
Albany, was captured off the coast of Norfolk,
and sent to Windsor, where he remained a
prisoner eighteen years. In his poem, the
King's Quaire, the prince has described how he
fell in love with Lady Jane Beaufort, as she
walked in this garden, unconscious of the admiration
of the young prisoner. The garden,
he says, had an arbour in the corner, and was
railed in with wands and close-knit hawthorn
bushes; and in the midst of every arbour was
"a sharp, green, sweet juniper." Suddenly,
the prisoner's eyes fell on

     The fairest or the freshest young flower,
     That ever I saw methought before that hour,
     For which sudden abate anon astart
     The blood of all my body to my heart.

Then the enraptured man describes the dress
of the maiden; her golden hair fretted with
pearls and fiery rubies, emeralds, and sapphires;
on her head a chaplet of plumes, red,
white, and blue, mixed with quaking spangles;
about her neck a fine gold chain, with a ruby
in the shape of a heart:

          That as a spark of fire so wantonly
          Seemed burning upon her white throat.

But suddenly, the fair fresh face passed
under the boughs, out of sight, and then began
the lover's torments, and his day darkened
into night. Altogether, a prettier love story
is not to be found in all the Castle history.
James eventually married this incomparable
lady, niece of the cardinal, and daughter of
the Earl of Somerset, and took her back with
him to Scotland. The accomplished prince
was assassinated at Perth in 1437.

At the old deanery door, took place the
parting between Richard the Second and his
young Queen Isabella, then only eleven years
of age. Froissart says, when the canons had
chanted very sweetly, the king having made
his offerings, he took the queen in his arms
and kissed her twelve or thirteen times, saying,
sorrowfully, " Adieu, madame, until we
meet again." Then the queen began to weep,
saying: "Alas, my lord, will you leave me
here?" The king's eyes filled with tears, and
he said: "By no means, Mamie; but I will
go first, and you, ma chère, shall come afterwards."
After that, the king and queen partook
of wine and comfits at the deanery, with their
court. Then the king stooped down and lifted
the queen in his arms, and kissed her at least
ten times, saying: " Adieu, ma chère, until we
meet again," and placing her on the ground,
kissed her again. " By our Lady," adds the
chronicler, "I never saw so great a lord make
so much of, or show such affection to, a lady,
as did King Richard to his queen. Great pity
it was they separated, for they never saw each
other more." Soon afterwards came the death
struggle at Pontefract, and the child became a
widow.

It was in St. George's Chapel that, in 1813,
the body of King Charles the First was discovered.
Charles the Second had pretended to
search for it, but probably did not wish to find
it or to incur the cost of a sumptuous monument.
The corpse had been carried to the grave in
1648, in a snow storm, and the dead monarch
obtained secretly the name of " the white king"
among his adherents, from the fact of the
snow that day settling upon the pall. There
was no service read over the body, as the