My name
is Julian Plectrum and I am but a fool in love, they tell me. I guess I should
begin by telling you about myself, but I am not that interesting, really. I
would prefer to tell you about my prized possession, Luisa, my lute, and how I
got her, for starters. Because I would not be who I am today, had I not had the
good fortune to have her placed in my hands, by a noble benefactor. And so I
shall tell you of how that happened, and what I have done with her. Luisa goes
wither I gambol, and all of my minstrelsy would be paltry, had I not her
advantage.
I was ten and four years of age, when it
happened. I had been spending a day swimming in the Dee. There was a group of
older lads up the stream a way, who were also swimming. It was a hot day in
July and there were many bluejays in the air as well as many blackbirds on the
banks. I floated in the river upon my back.
I heard a shout, a yell, what sounded most like
a cry of distress. As I looked toward the group of older boys, I noticed one of them had gone under the
water, or was struggling with something in the water, and was not able to keep
his head up above it. He was crying for help, but his companions were doing
nothing but laughing, and his head would keep disappearing. It was as if he
were being held back by something deep in the water.
Since his friends were not helping, I came to
his aid.
As I reached him, he noted to me that he was
caught- his cloak, in which he swam, had been snagged by some sort of
tree-stump, and it was not possible for him to unravel the kink or to find the
spot on the cloak which was fast held. It was the manner in which he had been
swimming, and the direction, as well as the speed of the current, but he was
fighting to keep his nose out of water.
I told him to be quiet, since an open mouth
invites only more water inside, and he was silent.
I struggled with the cloak. The snag had
actually wrapped the cloak in such a way that a knot in his belt was the source
of his distress. This was, actually, easily remedied. But he was overjoyed when
I helped drag him from the water.
“I cannot really swim,” he told me.
“Why then do you seek refreshment in the
water?”
His companions had fallen silent at the
riverbank.
“Because- I must keep up- with them.”
He nodded in the direction of his companions,
who, falling back, now began to grab their other garments from the bank and
began to scatter, back in the direction of Chester, our large town and the fief
of the great Earl. Chester was where I was born, and have sometimes lived.
Nowadays I live in the forest, though, and go where I will. As I hoisted him
out and he flopped onto the bank, he thanked me, and told me his name (Stephen)
and said that he was the son of a traveling merchant, who was now gone on
another journey over to France. He wanted to thank me, somehow, in such a way
that would express much gratitude for saving his life. So he asked me to go
with him to the manor of his father.
This was a large home located still yet outside
the city, on many acres of pasture, with great expanse of wheat and rye and
oats, as well as many stock of sheep and also much fowl. There were also
apiaries and pens for bees and for geese, and there were many servants at the
manor. I wanted to wait outside at the door, but he bid me enter, so I
followed.
Inside the great home was like few places I
have seen. It was not like my father’s home, as that was but a two-room cottage
covered with a ceiling of straw, but that it had oaken beams for its roof,
great gables that extended all the way down so far as I could see, and many
hallways, and even more upper floors than one.
As I hesitated out at the door, he indicated
that I should follow, and told me that as his father was well away there was no
need my worrying over that I might be welcome there.
“I want to thank you so much for saving my
life,” Stephen told me again. “I can think of only one way to repay you, which
is to give you something of such value to me that it would never be thought nor
said that I do not regard you most fondly.”
At that point, I was flabbergasted, as he
placed in my hands Luisa.
“This is an instrument which my father gave to me after his last visit to the Amiens
Fair. It comes from a land far south of the Spanish- indeed, they call it a
Moorish oud. In France it is called “l’oud” and so here, we call it the lute.
Do you know music?”
I told him, yes, indeed, I did know music, I
had studied music and the great works of Homer and the Lay of Arthur and Merlin
and that his gift would be most fondly appreciated. How much more, I could not
then say, but then, Luisa has now become my best friend of all, and as I said,
goeth with me everywhere.
“The trip he went on, he brought this back for
me, and he gave it to me as a trifle, perhaps. I can play it only some. It has strings
of gut in eight courses, as you see, but to get new ones you must go to Chester
and see Earnest on the street of Blodwyn and pay to have more. But they cost not more
than a ha’penny. These are all good as new, for I hardly play it.”
I told him much in the way of my thanks.
He bid me to stay for the meal of the evening.
The servants would wait on him, and myself as his guest, and I could eat my
fill of his father’s goose and the many fruits which would be brought to table.
This we did, and he told me more of his father’s line of trade.
Like me,
he had lost his mother in the Plague- but mine was killed earlier, when I was
but four. His mother just died three years ago, when the Plague last came to
Cheshire but spared both my own father and myself. I saw many people laid
waste, and everone wondered just what anyone may had done to deserve this. It
was even said many great noblemen and their ladies had died. Somehow for my
father and myself that Pale Horseman passed us by. I still shudder to think of
the things we saw, and the carts piled full of the dead.
But anyway, Stephen told me of his father’s
work. He traveled across the Channel to Calais, Harfleur, to Belgium, to Amiens, and
Provence, gathering various bolts of fine cloth, which he sold to nobles and
rich persons both in Chester, and on his way to and fro. He often left on his
trips from the South country, travelling overland until coming to Penzance,
where he had friends who owned cogs, and which holds he would fill high
with these rolls of cloth, gathered from his travels in France and Belgium. He
would rent a cart to convey them back from Chester. Often he rode with a guard
he would hire, a man named Roger of Wirral, who lived in Chester, and would
sometime accompany him the entire journey. Stephen told me that he hoped to go
on his father’s journey next year. But he was expected back by mid spring, and
by then, the older man might have decided to remain in Chester. So it was
expected.
I thought of these places he described, in France
and Belgium. While they seemed far away, in many ways we lived under the same
economy. I do not like to spend a lot of time thinking about economy- I would
rather study the world of nature and the creatures and the plants which grow
about us. But for Stephen business and economy was his prime thought.
While Stephen had lost his mother recently, my
own mother was but a far memory. In fact for most of my life all I have known
for a family was my father. My father is just a crofter, and makes his money
selling the wool of our sheep, and working for the Earl sometimes in the
fields. In fact Stephen tells me that perhaps my father’s wool sometimes goes
with his own father down to the coast and to Europe! This was news to me, and
set us another reason for becoming friends.
I played a game of chess with him after we had
supped, and had our dessert of stewed cherries and pears. a servant brought us
wine, which was very pleasant, and I had a pair of henaps of that. But still, I
beat him at the chess game! For that, he was very gracious, and said, he would
work to learn the game better, and do me better next time for it.
Then he gave me another surprise- he said that
in the event of my having saved him from the river, he would grant me a boon in
the absence of his father- that so long as I lived, I would be able to journey
at my leisure on his father’s lands, which one day would become his. That I
would be welcome to enjoy the fish of the streams and the coneys I caught- and
take the firewood I wished form his forest- provided that I show a special seal
to the woodward. I was still only 14 and still bound like my father and older
brother to the fief of the Earl, but I had a great plan- I was going to leave
Cheshire and head to another city. Maybe to London, but now that he had mentioned
it, Penzance! If I might stay uncaught for a full year, I might return as a
freeman to Cheshire. If I could win money somehow (and the lute beside me might
well be my ticket!) I could purchase lands of my own- perhaps, right beside my
father’s! And that would do me better than my brother..
My brother, Thomas, was born three years afore
me. He actually was very lucky, our mother had borne twins, but neither lived,
three years before Thomas. So we were long hoped for. Only I am the
disappointing one. I showed my father I was bright, and full of talents, but he
only wanted me to work the crofts and the fields, lend the sheep a shearing,
and my heart has never been in that. My learning of Homer and of Aurthur and
Merlin, and of late, the recently buried great Bard Chaucer, has encouraged me
to think on new things, and of the Muses. Now it came to my hands, this wonderful
machine! I swore to Stephen that I would do him right by his gift, and learn
and master it, and that in a year I would return to Chester.
Stephen was disappointed, and told me, one of
the catches to his boon was that, I must return to help with the yearly
harvest, and so, my journey to Penzance must of needs end before that year.
However he promised he would help to keep me from the learning of the shire
Reeve in that event, and keep me hidden, and I would be at liberty on his
lands, in any case! I wondered how his father would feel about all that, but,
for the nonce, I had my work cut out for me. If I could travel south to
Penzance and thence return in time for the harvest, then indeed, I could
fulfill all my obligations.
And that was three years ago. I will tell more
of that journey, and of others, quite soon.
Before I left his manor that night, to sleep on
my own out under the open sky, he gave me the seal that was to be my signature
of liberty walking his lands, and also a cord, with which I might sling Luisa
over my shoulders as I traveled. I thanked him most graciously for all his
kindnesses, and felt I had done so little to deserve all this great new good,
but he demurred, and told me that his friendship and gifts were sincere, and
that I should never doubt of our friendship. On those things I pondered as I
headed for sleep, and when I woke in the morning with the birds a'singing by me,
I filled my heart and mind with new ideas.
When I took Luisa home to my father’s cottage,
he was well disturbed to find her sitting in my seat at his table. “How did
such a thing come into your hands?” he asked. He seemed incredulous that such
could befall me, but I told him. I suppose it was then a mistake I also
mentioned Stephen’s boon to him, for then he only thought of what I might to do
for his increase by it, and not my own. “And you shall be able to catch game
and to fish and to bring home firewood? This is much to praise!”
But then I found myself to argue with him, as
my older brother Simon had already the favor of my gaining father’s
inheritance, and I was to go into the world with nothing. I spoke sharply to
him, in such a fashion as that I meant for him to understand I was going to be
my own man, and sooner than later, that I would leave his lands and go to a
faraway city, to make my own life, but that I should return for each harvest,
for Stephen had my word of that.
“So you see, Father, that this new boon is for
me a means to my freedom and wellbeing! And I shall take leave of you, and this
house on the morrow and you and Simon will be all so much the better for the
loss of me!”
Surely I spoke with anger and sharp tongue and
at the time no regret, for I knew that his not favoring me over Simon otherwise
could mean I should end up a conscript in the army of the Earl. And the Earl
was foresquare allied with the new King Henry, and would be for some long time to
come as he was, indeed, his own son. Yet it would surely be death to join an
army, for I have no patience for that type of toil, nor the stomach for mayhem.
Simon himself would be lucky that he would not end in the Earl’s army either,
if he were not careful, and not set out himself to learn a trade. Peace would
not be long in our lands because of the quarrel between the Earl, his arrogance
with the Welsh, and with Percy of Northumberland, who for the nonce marched against the Scots and the Welshmen of Owyn Glyndwr, who still rode roughshod and
free in the marches, calling on those who would to join him for a fight for
free Wales.
All of that, added up in my decision, of
course, to leave for the south, and to go from Father’s house, that I need be
no longer a burden on he or Simon. And filling my pack with a number of
victuals off the pantry shelf, I set forth that very next day, walking the high
street south, south towards Penzance.
When I left Father’s cottage, I took a few
things along with me. Surely I looked quite burdened, but these were what they
were: the lute, of course, on its cord over my back. I even found that I could
play whilst I walked along, which made for more pleasure in my going. A
blanket, which I also wore rolled over my shoulder and within, one change of
clothing. A wineskin, over my other shoulder, in which I kept either water or
wine, or whatever I should come across for drink. In my pouch on my belt I kept
a few things: A knife, and a whetstone, a flint stone and magnifying lens, that
I should have fire in light or darkness, a folding spoon, a handful of extra
lute strings Stephen gave me as well, a comb, and two smaller bags: one for my
chess pieces and the other for my coins. I took all I had in that way, [some 16
shillings worth, all I had saved in my life up to that time, just less than one
mark.]
In this fashion I found by walking I might cover
one, to two leagues per day, keeping to the roads, and if I were lucky perhaps
before I had left Cheshire I should have avoided being caught by the reeve or
his men. That is, of course, how it happened, and I kept on my path, for
a week or two, until I came to Penzance. Before I reached Penzance though, I had
had many adventures and met many people. Some of them were good, and kind, and
invited me into their lodgings, where I found succor and a place to lie me
down. When I could not, I ate from fruit trees, and slept out in the
fields. I would pay if I must for food,
when I hit a town, or for drink, but often as not if I came upon a tavern I
would be welcome, for where there are taverns there are carousings, and where
there is merriment or carousing, there must be music.
It was in this fashion I learned to master
Luisa: I knew my chords and I knew my notes, my breves and quavers. What I knew
not was how to slip my fingers round her neck most graciously and
expeditiously. This however, I forced myself to learn as I walked. The more I
played, the better I became. I also tuned her to a tone which I kept in my own
head, this would not be the intonation of the expert, I learned later, but just
an instinct I had. Nonetheless, it helped me to learn the frets and to work my
fingers well upon it.
The carousing that took place the night I
reached the tavern at Wroxeter was perhaps the worst of it. Without meaning to,
I nearly found myself robbed, by men who thought me miserable and oafish.
That however does not describe me or my mind.
These men thought to deceive me at my game of chess, for I set out the pieces
in the tavern on a board which was a tabletop. There is really no way one might
escheat at chess, save that, one might fain to move a piece while his opponent does
not look. But it is a bad chessman who does not know wither he left a piece.
One cannot then cheat at chess as one might at cards or dice, since there is
little honor and little to gain by such.
And I found them out, and they were ready to
strike me, but the taverner came to the table, and ousted them by the scruff of
their collar, and bid me to play on the lute, and I sang them the story of Robin
Hood and Friar Tuck, which earned me a trencher of stew and another tankard of
ale. This was most agreeable, and the taverner bid me to stay for several more
days, and at the end of that time I was weary to move on, and so I did.
Outside of Wroxeter I met a man traveling who
would tell me he was escaped of late from the dungeons at Stafford Castle where
he had been shackled, for speaking against King Henry. He was to have been
pilloried, but somehow had managed to break his shackles (“These men of Staffordshire
do not know how to work iron so well. There was a flaw in the seam of one of
the links. I fairly broke it quite easily”) but to travel with him was
disagreeable, and I made some excuse, and went on alone.
It was after a month’s travel I made it to Penzance.
Being a port, it was full of sailors, and wherever sailors be, there are
carousings and merriment, and of course, there be music as well.
I made my way to the shop of a maker of
instruments where I might find more catgut strings. This man became a great
friend in my year in Penzance. His name was Clarence and his shop was located
in a most out of the way area, the southern harbor of Mousehole. He took me
aside and showed me the proper tuning for my lute, and gave me lessons of songs
and melodies. I soon developed my own presentation of these. Some have said I
am a great improviser, but I only am because I had to learn so much of what I
do on my own. While there are minstrels like John the Jester of Exeter, of whom
I have heard much talk, who are boring and uncouth, and farters, there are also
those like me who value cleanliness and honesty and virtue. This I represent as
my gift of music, that I keep this vision of Luisa and my muse on its true and
proper course beneath the Lord’s stars- I have no use for the scatological and
crude.
Yet I was forced in Penzance to earn my keep by
writing at least one bawd. This was my original adaptation of the tale of
Oddysseus and Penelope. Homer tells of her as the faithful beseiged woman who
fight off the temptation of conducting herself unseemly with any suitors, who
have made claim upon her as Oddysseus has been gone so many years, such as to
be dead. But this,she saith, was not so.
In my version, however, she behaves much more like a common woman, and
welcomes in each suitor in his turn, and has her way with each. As such
Odysseus returns, to find himself a cuckold, and kills the suitors, one by one.
“What would you have expected me to do?” she asks at the end. This caused much
mirth and jollity with my hearers in the taverns, and soon I was being sought
after by more than one taverner, and paid a penny, even more, for a night of
song. In such a way I gathered much to my purse, and soon had many shillings to
speak of. Each night I slept with my head on the coin sack, with Luisa beside
me, her cord slung round me. In such a way
I hoped to cheat the spirit of ill-fortune, and did so, week by week,
month by month. When autumn had come, I began to make my way in return to
Cheshire and the lands of Stephen’s father, that I would fulfill my pledge to
him and help in the harvest. The road back took less time, in fact, it seemed I
traveled at a much quicker pace than I had before, even with my purse so full.
Mayhaps it was the colder air that put a push in my step, but the further north
I came the colder it grew, and my blanket was loth to warm me in the fields.
Often now I awoke encrusted with dew, and only the honor of my oblige to
Stephen was cause for my travel.
Stephen welcomed me, and bid me out among the
others working in the wheat. He gave me leave to work with the gleaners and
winnowers- this was quite welcome, and honestly I was able to do him justice,
filling more than two bushels a day, and he paid me my eight-penny in wages just as he
would the others. I buried my purse in a spot secret and known but to myself,
deep in a wooded copse, beneath a tree with a squirrel hole. While some might
have just placed their sack in the hole itself, I had presence of mind to dig a
burrow of my own beneath the stump to secure it. When I returned on my next
journey back from Penzance I would yet find it there.
But this is to move ahead quickly too. The
quandary was how to keep myself from discovery by the reeve as the harvest
continued. Stephen had set me in a part of their manor barn apart from the
horses and sheep, where I could hide during hours not in the fields. He brought
me good foods from the manor and oft sat with me and shared good talk. He
wanted to know more of the carousing sailors of Penzance- he had been there,
but only on his journey with his father. In fact it was in such a manner of
being social that his father came upon us one of those nights, and demanded to
know who I was, and why food had gone missing from pantry and table, and why I
was hiding out, there in the barn.
“Father,” he said, “this is Julian, the son of Davis
the Crofter in Upton. He had saved my life from drowning last year. I told him in
favor of that I would grant him free leave on our lands in perpetua, and did
give him that fine lute, which I cannot play upon in any way. For such it was,
my other firends had fain to laugh at my distress, but Julian, a stranger, came
forth and freed me from a wood in the water, and kept me from being drownt.”
“But that is outrageous, that he should take of
our table and fields, yet! The son of a crofter?
Well I know Davis of Upton and his other son,
Simon, who works hard to bring the woolsacks for his father. Of this son I
never heard.”
I spoke up.
“Sir, my father is not so proud of me as he is
my brother Simon, who though he be more dutiful, it yet less clever than I.”
“And Julian is not taking from your table,
Father, he is helping with the harvest, and has pledged to do so en perpetua,
that our boon to him be fairly compensated.”
At hearing that, his father then smiled on me,
and leaned over to me, and said “I will help keep you safe, then. Such shame as
might come from my helping you will fall upon me as it may. For you have saved
Stephen’s life, and that to me is no small matter. Feel free to do as you
choose when on our lands... I feel this to be a good and fair reward. That the
reeve should not learn of you we must make our concern, but rest assured then
Julian Crofter, we are in your favor and debt.”
I said to him I am no longer called Julian
Crofter, but Julian Plectrum, for this was the name I had chosen, and now what
the men of Penzance called me, and he laughed.
“Then so be it. Penzance, eh? You have been
there and back?”
I said that I had, and that I planned to return
after the harvest.
“Then you shall come with us. We will leave
after harvest too, for I have more sacks to trade for bolts in France, and Stephen
will be coming along with me this time. You will ride with us. So be at ease.”
The next two weeks were very happy ones, and
all I did was take a care not to let many of the others working the wheat to
know my name or face. I made me a pole with which I might fish, using one of my
spare lute strings for a line, and a hook from the kitchen which Stephen gave
me. The stream that bordered their manor land was full of perch and trout,
which were good to eat, and these I cooked out in the barn where the
wheat-workers did not see. So long as I kept the fire safe and free from the
stock feed, Stephen’s father paid no mind. And the days flew past! So quickly
that, before I knew, the harvest had been all in and the wagons set with goods,
and we were traveling on our way back south, to the sea.
We rode in the back of the large cart as
Stephen’s father drove, two horses he did have which both were tall and
handsome and strong. Roger of Wirral made a stern companion and was not so much
friendly, but Stephen and I arranged the sacks of wool that we could each sit
upon one with room for our legs outstretched upon another if we chose, and we
rode in the center of the cart, such that none might see us from the road,
unless they should stand in the saddle to peer over its edge. And Roger of
Wirral could not make bother with us, so far back we were from the lead. I made
up many new songs of my own on this trip, mostly they were but melodies, but
they were all fine, and I strove to put within them all the gladness of my
heart at the sights passing around me- what birds, what trees, what wind, what
clouds! For the storms were now coming, and in just a month or two would be
Christmastide.
This time my journey took much less time, but a
fortnight, for it was aided by the strong horses. We passed three leagues and a
half each day, and never were we burdened by accosters. In the city of Wroxeter
where I had stayed before, we took abed at that same tavern, after I had played
some of these new songs, and both Stephen’s father and the taverner were quite
pleased, for I lent to each of them word of their fame and their honesty in
coin.
His father’s name was Richard, Richard of Westchester,
and he had been a freeman all his days himself. The lands he owned had been
passed down by his own father, and the villeins who worked them, such as I met
on the harvest-wain, were in thrall to the Earl more than to he. But each year
all took part in the haying and wheating, and he paid them all fair, and was
not quite like the Earl, in that the Earl took their work as his due, but he
paid a wage. He also gave them generous of food and drink, and on the feast of
Mary the Magdalene (which was my birthday) promised me the next year he would
feast me alone, myself. Lest I grow too proud of my associations with Richard
and Stephen, and took too much pride in their bounty, I resolved that I would
keep these things between us, and never speak of them, and return each year,
once I was free, for the birthday feast and the harvest and that I would labor
for them honestly. For many there are who pray feel that minstrels know not any
honest toil, such that their wealth grows but from their wits, not their hands.
On our trip Richard continued his most generous
ways with me, faring me well with bread, and with stew, and also tankard of my
favorite drink, which is perry. Along the way at times when weather was fair he
would halt the horses and wagon, and leave Stephen and I to fish, where we
might. These we would share with him and our manner of travel was leisurely but
measured. We came to Penzance on the 18th of October. I remember because it was
the Feast of Saint Luke. I have always liked the Gospel of Luke most and there is not an association in my mind with the
other apostles, who seem reluctant to be of forgiveness as they are sure of
their place by the Lord’s side.
I
took Stephen with me to meet with Clarence of Mousehole. He was charmed by the
older youth with his fine speech and manner. Stephen garnered amongst all the
instruments hanging in the shop, looking for one which he might easily choose
to play upon. He bought him a small flute, of the type that blow straight
through the tube, and when he had it, we both went out on the streets ourselves
to make songs. We collected a number of ha’pennies and farthings, and this we
took to Richard, who pronounced us fine clever lads. I told Richard that I
would take me a room for lent someplace nearby, such that I could leave my
pouch and my lute and be of more assistance, as Stephen was called on, to move
the great number of woolsacks from the cart onto the drayage dock at the ship
they would be taking across to France. It took us the better part of a day to
move them all, but at say’s end, Richard again treated us to perry, ale, and
cider. But the combination of all three gave me a bellyache, and my head was
sore in the morning. When the ship sailed, the next day, and Stephen and
Richard were departing, I stood at the dock and waved farewell. It would be
another quarter year before I would see either again, and during that time, I
had to make do how I might with the winter of Mousehole and Penzance.
My little room was above a street full of
shops. There were always men coming and going with market carts, there was
always a stray cat in need of milk, there was always a cry in the street of the
mussel woman and the fishmonger. Here, life was not expensive to live, but one
must be careful. When I went out to the street to busk, I needed to watch my
cap, for there were rogues who would fain to rob me of my earnings when my back
might be turned. They often sat by the side as I played, offering their weak
comments on my playing. Sometimes I would get tired of them, and brush them
aside, calling them drunkards and layabouts, for that they were. I had to be
careful however- sometimes they would follow me to a tavern, thinking to steal
my lute, or to talk me into standing a round of ale on their behalf, but I said
I only would drink with friends, and they were as strange to me as none by
Adam.
At the end of the first winter week I made a
new friend, Ranulf, who was a piper. He played a bagpipe made of cloth and
skin, with several pipes and a chanter, and he played in what he called the
Breton style, of the northern French coast. There were many songs which he
taught to me, the melodies, at least, for he could not sing while he blew the
pipes, but he knew many. These if I could recall so many I turned into my
plainsong, without a lyric, and performed in the taverns when they were open to
me. Some nights I would be sent early on my way, being so young, but then there
were also taverners who enjoyed my playing so much that they would set me at a
high table with a good meal, and all the perry or ale I might regard for
myself, if I would but play all night for the publicans. Sometimes they would
offer in a penny as well, and again, the more pennies I earned, the more I
saved them, until the pouch in my little room where I kept my sleep was fat
with silver.
Ranulf came from France, and as such, spoke
both his tongue and mine. Where we could communicate best was on our
instruments, where speech was not needed. I would accompany him, or he I, and
in so doing, we reckoned ourselves to be more profitable by two than we were
each by one. The best night of all came when we had been heard by a local noble
Sir Anselm at the Bracken Eel, a dank tavern of the Penzance dock; and he took us aside that we should spent the
Christmastide at his manor, which was at the far north end of Penzance, and
entertain all the fine knights and ladies who would make their way to his table
fair. These knights were all loyal to King
Henry of Bolingbroke, and I made it a secret that my own loyalty would be to
the Earl of Chester, as I also wanted no one to know I was keeping my way
alone, that the Shire Reeve of Chester should not come to know my leaving
Cheshire. Were I to be found out I might be dragged back in chains and irons,
and forced into vassalage. So therefore I was no longer Julian Crofter of
Chestershire but Julian Plectrum, of the country of Bristol, my name I took from the bright, flat
greenstone which Clarence of Mousehole gave me for my plucking the strings of
Luisa. Green is my lucky color, and happy were the days and nights we spent at
the hall of Sir Anselm.
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