Page:Elizabethan People.djvu/294

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234
THE ELIZABETHAN PEOPLE

upon the Castle of Beauty. The rowling trench or artificial mound was then moved near to where the Queen sat. Music within played pleasantly and two songs were sung by pages, one bidding the Queen to surrender, the other exhorting the challengers to bravery.

"Which ended, the two cannons were shot off, the one with sweet powder, the other with sweet water, very odoriferous and pleasant, and the noise of the shooting was very excellent consent of melody within the mound. And after that was store of pretty scaling ladders, and the footmen threw flowers and such fancies against the walls, with all such devices as might seem fit shot for Desire. All which did continue till the time the defendants came in.

"Then came in the defendants in most sumptuous manner, with every one his servants, pages, and trumpeters (having some more, some less) on such order as I have hereunder placed them, with every one his sundry invention."

After the entrance of twenty-one gentlemen and their attendants, came "Sir Henry Leigh, as unknown, and when he had broken his six staves, went out in like manner again." For the rest of the day the gayly dressed courtiers rode backwards and forwards, each arriving in order before the Queen, where his page on the behalf of his