Ch. 19 - Richard the Second

RICHARD, son of the Black Prince, a boy eleven years of age,
succeeded to the Crown under the title of King Richard the Second.
The whole English nation were ready to admire him for the sake of
his brave father. As to the lords and ladies about the Court, they
declared him to be the most beautiful, the wisest, and the best -
even of princes - whom the lords and ladies about the Court,
generally declare to be the most beautiful, the wisest, and the
best of mankind. To flatter a poor boy in this base manner was not
a very likely way to develop whatever good was in him; and it
brought him to anything but a good or happy end.

The Duke of Lancaster, the young King's uncle - commonly called
John of Gaunt, from having been born at Ghent, which the common
people so pronounced - was supposed to have some thoughts of the
throne himself; but, as he was not popular, and the memory of the
Black Prince was, he submitted to his nephew.

The war with France being still unsettled, the Government of
England wanted money to provide for the expenses that might arise
out of it; accordingly a certain tax, called the Poll-tax, which
had originated in the last reign, was ordered to be levied on the
people. This was a tax on every person in the kingdom, male and
female, above the age of fourteen, of three groats (or three four-
penny pieces) a year; clergymen were charged more, and only beggars
were exempt.

I have no need to repeat that the common people of England had long
been suffering under great oppression. They were still the mere
slaves of the lords of the land on which they lived, and were on
most occasions harshly and unjustly treated. But, they had begun
by this time to think very seriously of not bearing quite so much;
and, probably, were emboldened by that French insurrection I
mentioned in the last chapter.

The people of Essex rose against the Poll-tax, and being severely
handled by the government officers, killed some of them. At this
very time one of the tax-collectors, going his rounds from house to
house, at Dartford in Kent came to the cottage of one WAT, a tiler
by trade, and claimed the tax upon his daughter. Her mother, who
was at home, declared that she was under the age of fourteen; upon
that, the collector (as other collectors had already done in
different parts of England) behaved in a savage way, and brutally
insulted Wat Tyler's daughter. The daughter screamed, the mother
screamed. Wat the Tiler, who was at work not far off, ran to the
spot, and did what any honest father under such provocation might
have done - struck the collector dead at a blow.

Instantly the people of that town uprose as one man. They made Wat
Tyler their leader; they joined with the people of