104
NOTES AND QUERIES. [ii s. iv. AUG. 5, ion.
The " standing in state" and the delay are
explained by the removal of the " bed of
state " to the Abbey. This exhibition
excited the wrath of the Puritans to such
an extent that, as Ludlow says, mud was
thrown on the escutcheon placed outside
Somerset House.
On 23 November :
" The effigies of his highness standing under a rich cloth of state, having been beheld by those persons of honour and quality which came to attend it, was afterwards removed and placed upon a herse richly adorned and set forth with -escutcheons and other ornaments, the effigies itself being vested with Royal robes, a scepter ha one hand, a clobe in the other, and a Crown on the head. After it had been a while thus placed in the middle of the room, when the time came that it was to be removed into the carriage, it was carried on the herse by ten of the gentlemen of his highness forth into the Court, where a canopy -of state very rich ivas borne over it by six other gentlemen of his highness till it was brought and piaffed on the carriage." Mercurius Politicus, '18-25 Nov., 1658.
There is no mention of Cromwell's body in "this account of the procession, and the state of mind of the Puritans themselves about this display may be seen from a tract (by Edward Burrough, the Quaker) entitled " A testimony against a great idolatry committed. And a true mourning of the Lords servant upon the many con- siderations of his heart upon that occasion of the great stir about an image made and carryed from one place to another, happen- ing the 23 day of the ninth month. By E. B." This tract states :
" Certainly all the people in the nation that fear God will be offended and judge in their hearts such work the framing of an image, and sound- ing trumpets and beating drums before it, and clothing horses in mourning, and trayling their -pikes, and even the very honourable of the nation -clad in mourning and following the image. And all this stir and cost and preparation for many weeks beforehand, and such decking in mourning attire of great and noble men, and all "but to accompany an image from one place to another. Whereby people are deceived who might look upon it to be the burial of Oliver -protector, when as it was but an image made by hands and decked and trimmed in a vain manner as if it had been some poppet play, which if it had been indeed his bones they had accom- panied to the grave in such a manner, that had been Jess condemnable, and T should not have had aught against it, but for the wise men in the nation to be chiefe in these things and to exercise themselves in such folly and vanity, this grieves the righteous soul."
When the image was carried into the Abbey, the car underwent a public insult which the newsbooks do not record. What -was known as a " Majesty scutcheon " was
displayed on the car over the image ; that
is to say, a white satin banner exhibiting
Cromwell's arms, with the royal crown of
England emblazoned over them. In imita-
tion of the custom at royal funerals the boys
of Westminster School had been drawn up
at the entrance to the Abbey. One of them,
afterwards the Rev. Robert Uvedale, LL.D.,
rushed forward, tore the offending banner
from its place, and, aided by the evening
gloom, safely beat his retreat with his
booty. Dr. TJvedale afterwards had the
banner framed, with a long Latin inscrip-
tion on its back, which is set out in The
Gentleman's Magazine for 1792, p. 114.
There is an illustration of this banner with
its further history in Lady F. P. Verney's
' Memoirs of the Verney Family during the
Civil War ' (vol. iii. p. 424).
The Commonwealth Mercury, cited by Dean Stanley in his ' Memorials of West- minster Abbey ' when describing this funeral, should be dismissed. It is a clumsy modern forgery, condemned by its very title.
In the Abbey, when the imagte was placed on the bed of state, there were no prayers, sermon, or funeral oration, says the French ambassador, M. de Bordeaux (Guizot's ' Richard Cromwell,' vol. i. p. 268). Candles had been forgotten, so after the trumpets had sounded a while, every one went home in no particular order.
The image remained on the site of the high altar until Cromwell's monument was completed. A pamphlet entitled ' Eighteen New Court Queries ' (26 May, 1659) includes the following inquiries on the subject :
" Whether the old protector's cradles stand- ing in Westminster Abbey in the same place where the High Altar ; or, Communion table, formerly stood is not the setting up of one super- stition where another superstition (as 'twas termed) was pull'd down. And whether the effigies while it was there might not be call'd, without any abuse of Scripture, the abomina- tion of desolation in the Holy Place ? "
Cromwell's monument was erected in Henry VII. 's Chapel, and was, no doubt, the cause of the mutilation of the chapels to the extreme east. There appears to be no engraving of it extant, probably because it was destroyed almost as soon as it was completed. An engraving of Cromwell's image, standing under a canopy surrounded by numerous lighted tapers, is prefixed to a small octavo tract entitled " The Pour- raiture of his Royal Highness Oliver, late Lord Protector, &c., in his life and death. With a short view of his government, as also a description of his standing and lying in
