The Prince and the Pauper, Mark Twain [fantasy novels to read .TXT] 📗

Project Gutenberg’s The Prince and The Pauper, by Mark Twain

#14 in our series by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens)

 

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Title: The Prince and The Pauper

 

Author: Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens)

 

Release Date: July, 1999 [EBook #1837]

[This file was last updated on March 18, 2003]

 

Edition: 11

 

Language: English

 

Character set encoding: ASCII

 

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PRINCE AND THE PAUPER ***

 

Produced by David Widger [widger@cecomet.net]

The previous edition was prepared by Les Bowler, St. Ives, Dorset

 

The Prince and the Pauper

 

by Mark Twain

 

Hugh Latimer, Bishop of Worcester, to Lord Cromwell, on the birth of the

Prince of Wales (afterward Edward VI.).

 

From the National Manuscripts preserved by the British Government.

 

Ryght honorable, Salutem in Christo Jesu, and Syr here ys no lesse joynge

and rejossynge in thes partees for the byrth of our prynce, hoom we

hungurde for so longe, then ther was (I trow), inter vicinos att the

byrth of S. J. Baptyste, as thys berer, Master Erance, can telle you.

Gode gyffe us alle grace, to yelde dew thankes to our Lorde Gode, Gode of

Inglonde, for verely He hathe shoyd Hym selff Gode of Inglonde, or rather

an Inglyssh Gode, yf we consydyr and pondyr welle alle Hys procedynges

with us from tyme to tyme. He hath over cumme alle our yllnesse with Hys

excedynge goodnesse, so that we are now moor then compellyd to serve Hym,

seke Hys glory, promott Hys wurde, yf the Devylle of alle Devylles be

natt in us. We have now the stooppe of vayne trustes ande the stey of

vayne expectations; lett us alle pray for hys preservatione. Ande I for

my partt wylle wyssh that hys Grace allways have, and evyn now from the

begynynge, Governares, Instructores and offyceres of ryght jugmente, ne

optimum ingenium non optima educatione deprevetur.

 

Butt whatt a grett fowlle am I! So, whatt devotione shoyth many tymys

butt lytelle dyscretione! Ande thus the Gode of Inglonde be ever with

you in alle your procedynges.

 

The 19 of October.

 

Youres, H. L. B. of Wurcestere, now att Hartlebury.

 

Yf you wolde excytt thys berere to be moore hartye ayen the abuse of

ymagry or mor forwarde to promotte the veryte, ytt myght doo goode. Natt

that ytt came of me, butt of your selffe, etc.

 

(Addressed) To the Ryght Honorable Loorde P. Sealle hys synguler gode

Lorde.

 

To those good-mannered and agreeable children Susie and Clara Clemens

this book is affectionately inscribed by their father.

 

I will set down a tale as it was told to me by one who had it of his

father, which latter had it of HIS father, this last having in like

manner had it of HIS father—and so on, back and still back, three

hundred years and more, the fathers transmitting it to the sons and so

preserving it. It may be history, it may be only a legend, a tradition.

It may have happened, it may not have happened: but it COULD have

happened. It may be that the wise and the learned believed it in the old

days; it may be that only the unlearned and the simple loved it and

credited it.

 

Contents.

 

I. The birth of the Prince and the Pauper.

II. Tom’s early life.

III. Tom’s meeting with the Prince.

IV. The Prince’s troubles begin.

V. Tom as a patrician.

VI. Tom receives instructions.

VII. Tom’s first royal dinner.

VIII. The question of the Seal.

IX. The river pageant.

X. The Prince in the toils.

XI. At Guildhall.

XII. The Prince and his deliverer.

XIII. The disappearance of the Prince.

XIV. ‘Le Roi est mort—vive le Roi.’

XV. Tom as King.

XVI. The state dinner.

XVII. Foo-foo the First.

XVIII. The Prince with the tramps.

XIX. The Prince with the peasants.

XX. The Prince and the hermit.

XXI. Hendon to the rescue.

XXII. A victim of treachery.

XXIII. The Prince a prisoner.

XXIV. The escape.

XXV. Hendon Hall.

XXVI. Disowned.

XXVII. In prison.

XXVIII. The sacrifice.

XXIX. To London.

XXX. Tom’s progress.

XXXI. The Recognition procession.

XXXII. Coronation Day.

XXXIII. Edward as King.

Conclusion. Justice and Retribution.

Notes.

 

‘The quality of mercy … is twice bless’d;

It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes;

‘Tis mightiest in the mightiest: it becomes

The throned monarch better than his crown’.

Merchant of Venice.

 

Chapter I. The birth of the Prince and the Pauper.

 

In the ancient city of London, on a certain autumn day in the second

quarter of the sixteenth century, a boy was born to a poor family of the

name of Canty, who did not want him. On the same day another English

child was born to a rich family of the name of Tudor, who did want him.

All England wanted him too. England had so longed for him, and hoped for

him, and prayed God for him, that, now that he was really come, the

people went nearly mad for joy. Mere acquaintances hugged and kissed

each other and cried. Everybody took a holiday, and high and low, rich

and poor, feasted and danced and sang, and got very mellow; and they kept

this up for days and nights together. By day, London was a sight to see,

with gay banners waving from every balcony and housetop, and splendid

pageants marching along. By night, it was again a sight to see, with its

great bonfires at every corner, and its troops of revellers making merry

around them. There was no talk in all England but of the new baby,

Edward Tudor, Prince of Wales, who lay lapped in silks and satins,

unconscious of all this fuss, and not knowing that great lords and ladies

were tending him and watching over him—and not caring, either. But

there was no talk about the other baby, Tom Canty, lapped in his poor

rags, except among the family of paupers whom he had just come to trouble

with his presence.

 

Chapter II. Tom’s early life.

 

Let us skip a number of years.

 

London was fifteen hundred years old, and was a great town—for that day.

It had a hundred thousand inhabitants—some think double as many. The

streets were very narrow, and crooked, and dirty, especially in the part

where Tom Canty lived, which was not far from London Bridge. The houses

were of wood, with the second story projecting over the first, and the

third sticking its elbows out beyond the second. The higher the houses

grew, the broader they grew. They were skeletons of strong criss-cross

beams, with solid material between, coated with plaster. The beams were

painted red or blue or black, according to the owner’s taste, and this

gave the houses a very picturesque look. The windows were small, glazed

with little diamond-shaped panes, and they opened outward, on hinges,

like doors.

 

The house which Tom’s father lived in was up a foul little pocket called

Offal Court, out of Pudding Lane. It was small, decayed, and rickety,

but it was packed full of wretchedly poor families. Canty’s tribe

occupied a room on the third floor. The mother and father had a sort of

bedstead in the corner; but Tom, his grandmother, and his two sisters,

Bet and Nan, were not restricted—they had all the floor to themselves,

and might sleep where they chose. There were the remains of a blanket or

two, and some bundles of ancient and dirty straw, but these could not

rightly be called beds, for they were not organised; they were kicked

into a general pile, mornings, and selections made from the mass at

night, for service.

 

Bet and Nan were fifteen years old—twins. They were good-hearted girls,

unclean, clothed in rags, and profoundly ignorant. Their mother was like

them. But the father and the grandmother were a couple of fiends. They

got drunk whenever they could; then they fought each other or anybody

else who came in the way; they cursed and swore always, drunk or sober;

John Canty was a thief, and his mother a beggar. They made beggars of

the children, but failed to make thieves of them. Among, but not of, the

dreadful rabble that inhabited the house, was a good old priest whom the

King had turned out of house and home with a pension of a few farthings,

and he used to get the children aside and teach them right ways secretly.

Father Andrew also taught Tom a little Latin, and how to read and write;

and would have done the same with the girls, but they were afraid of the

jeers of their friends, who could not have endured such a queer

accomplishment in them.

 

All Offal Court was just such another hive as Canty’s house. Drunkenness,

riot and brawling were the order, there, every night and nearly all night

long. Broken heads were as common as hunger in that place. Yet little

Tom was not unhappy. He had a hard time of it, but did not know it. It

was the sort of time that all the Offal Court boys had, therefore he

supposed it was the correct and comfortable thing. When he came home

empty-handed at night, he knew his father would curse him and thrash him

first, and that when he was done the awful grandmother would do it all

over again and improve on it; and that away in the night his starving

mother would slip to him stealthily with any miserable scrap or crust she

had been able to save for him by going hungry herself, notwithstanding

she was often caught in that sort of treason and soundly beaten for it by

her husband.

 

No, Tom’s life went along well enough, especially in summer. He only

begged just enough to save himself, for the laws against mendicancy were

stringent, and the penalties heavy; so he put in a good deal of his time

listening to good Father Andrew’s charming old tales and legends about

giants and fairies, dwarfs and genii, and enchanted castles, and gorgeous

kings and princes. His head grew to be full of these wonderful things,

and many a night as he lay in the dark on his scant and offensive straw,

tired, hungry, and smarting from a thrashing, he unleashed his

imagination and soon forgot his aches and pains in delicious picturings

to himself of the charmed life of a petted prince in a regal palace. One

desire came in time to haunt him day and night: