Pembury

“ This modest confession caused some amusement, and helped a good deal to restore the class to a better humour.
“After all, I don’t envy the fellow his feelings this minute,” continued Pembury, following up his advantage.
“And I envy his prospects in the Fifth still less,” said Ricketts.
“If you take my advice,” said Pembury, “you’ll leave him pretty much to himself. Greenfield is a sort of fellow it’s not easy to score off; and some of you would only make fools of yourselves if you tried to do it.”
Wraysford had stood by during this conversation, torn by conflicting emotions. ”

“ No one noticed him; and the only one that paid him the least attention appeared to look upon him as a nuisance.
“Here, Tony,” suddenly shouted Ricketts to Pembury, who was jogging along on his crutches a little way ahead, towards the school; “do you mind showing this kid the way up? I have to go back with Wren. There’s a good fellow.”
“Well, that’s cool,” replied Master Pembury; “I’m not a kid-conductor! Come on, youngster; I suppose you haven’t got a name, have you?”
“Yes, Stephen Greenfield.”
“Oh, brother of our dear friend Oliver ”

“ The photographs, which we handed in at Scotland Yard that same night, enabled the experts to identify the finger prints as those of Francis Dobbs, an escaped convict. The two photographs—profile and full-face—which were attached to his record, were sent down to Baysford with a description of the man, and were, in due course, identified with a somewhat mysterious individual, who passed by the name of Rufus Pembury and who had lived in the neighbourhood as a private gentleman for some two years. But Rufus Pembury was not to be found either at his genteel house or elsewhere. ”

“ Although Pembroke was the first of the council to do homage to Jane, Northumberland evidently doubted him. He was acting and would continue to act for his own personal interests only. With his vast estates and vast hereditary influence in South Wales and on the Border, he could bring a larger force into the field than any other single nobleman in England; and he could purchase the secure possession of his acquisitions by a well-timed assistance to Mary as readily as by lending his strength to buttress the throne of her rival. ”

“ Percy Mardner poured out a great deal of whisky and a very little soda-water. The glass clattered against his teeth as he drank. Then he wiped his ragged moustache with his hand and resumed with more confidence of manner.
"Thank you, Mr. Pembridge; that's done me good. Ill tell you the business at once; only don't send me away until I've told you the story as well. The business is buried treasure—money buried in a little piece of land that is for sale at this moment."
"Ah!" said Pembridge reflectively. "You seem a particularly candid person. ”

“ By-and-by, as we descend from the uplands, a broad reach of the tideway opens out right before us, where the twin streams of Cleddau merge into the widening Haven. Thus we enter the village of Langwm at its upper end, escorted by a rabble of noisy, unkempt urchins who cumber the narrow roadway.
Here, in the very heart of southern Pembrokeshire, stranded like a human jetsam upon one of the inmost recesses of Milford Haven, we find an isolated community, whose speech and physiognomy alike proclaim their Teutonic origin. ”

“ The Countess of Pembroke was always her mother's chief sympathiser in joy and sorrow. She retired with her behind the glass screen where the Queen, in her visits to Penshurst, always chose to summon her host, or any of her ministers for a private conversation or flirtation, as the case might be. By the opening of a panel of white Venetian glass, those who were seated behind the screen could watch unseen what was passing in the room beyond.
'You look weary, dear mother,' Lady Pembroke said—'weary and sad. Methinks pride in our Philip should overrule grief at his loss. ”

“ Many of the Earls of Pembroke were men of culture and patrons of learning. In 1629 William, the third Earl, gave to the University of Oxford, of which he was Chancellor, a very valuable series [Pg 138] of Greek manuscripts collected by Giacomo Barocci, a gentleman of Venice; and in 1649 his brother Philip, the fourth Earl, gave to the same University, of which he was also Chancellor, a splendidly bound copy of the Paris Polyglot Bible, printed in 1645 in nine volumes. These two brothers are 'the incomparable pair of brethren' to whom the first folio of Shakespeare is dedicated. ”

“ After the return of King Richard from his crusade and his captivity, Pembroke fought with him and for him in France, Normandy, and in Ireland; and on John’s accession he had made his name known to fame as one of the noblest men and foremost warriors in Christendom. Naturally enough, he was generally recognised as the most honourable and most sagacious person of rank in England at the time when the quarrel between the barons and the king reached a crisis. ”

“ Next, a great council met at Bristol, revised Magna Charta, and made Lord Pembroke Regent or Protector of England, as the King was too young to reign alone. The next thing to be done, was to get rid of Prince Louis of France, and to win over those English Barons who were still ranged under his banner. He was strong in many parts of England, and in London itself; and he held, among other places, a certain Castle called the Castle of Mount Sorel, in Leicestershire. To this fortress, after some skirmishing and truce-making, Lord Pembroke laid siege. ”

“ Earl Pembroke, slain so impiously!
That slender Youth, a scholar pale,
From Oxford come to his native vale,
He also hath his own conceit:
It is, thinks he, the gracious Fairy,
Who loved the Shepherd Lord to meet
In his wanderings solitary;
Wild notes she in his hearing sang,
A song of Nature’s hidden powers ”

“ The bishop, on his part, boasted that he had been the trusted adviser of the emperor, and would counsel no half-measures (Matt. Paris, iii. 240, 246; Annals of Winchester, ii. 86) . The news that foreign mercenaries had arrived led the barons to refuse to attend two councils summoned by the king, one at Oxford on 24 June 1233, and one at Westminster on 11 July (Rog. Wend iii. 51) . Pembroke fled to Wales and allied himself with Llywelyn, whereupon Peter and Stephen Segrave advised Henry to summon his military tenants to Gloucester on 14 Aug. ”

“ Pembroke, in Wilts and Somerset, where his new lands lay, was hated for his oppression of the poor, and had much to fear from a Catholic sovereign, could a Catholic sovereign obtain the reality as well as the name of power; Pembroke, so said Northumberland, had been the first to propose the conspiracy to him, while his eldest son had married Catherine Grey. But, as Northumberland's designs began to ripen, he had endeavoured to steal from the Court; he was a distinguished soldier, yet he was never named to command the army which was to go against Mary ”

“ Interesting examples of medieval domestic architecture are the ruins of the former episcopal mansions at Llawhaden, St Davids and Lamphey, the two latter of which were erected by Bishop Gower between the years 1328–1347. With the exception of the cathedral at St Davids and the principal churches of Haverfordwest and Tenby, the parish churches of Pembrokeshire are for the most part small, but many are ancient and possess fine monuments or other objects of interest, especially in “Little England beyond Wales.” ”

“ Although Pembrokeshire cannot pretend to lay claim to such striking scenery as the North Wallian counties display, yet its wind-swept uplands and deep, secluded dingles have a character all their own; while the loftier regions of the Precelly Hills, and the broken and varied nature of the seaboard, afford many a picturesque prospect as the traveller fares on his way. ”

“ It was surely better to have a husband and a home, and to be the recognized leader of middle-class Pembridge society, than to live and die in single blessedness, a wretched nobody, in her uncle's grand cold mansion at Wemley. Like a sensible woman, she made the best of her position. She had her little re-unions, her Tuesdays, when everybody that was worth knowing in Pembridge, met in the little drawing-room over her husband's office, and where her simple hospitalities were dispensed with a grace and refinement that would have done no discredit to Wemley itself. ”

“ PEMBRIDGE or PEMBRUGGE, Sir RICHARD de (d. 1375) , soldier, was a native of Herefordshire. His family had been settled at Pembridge in that county as early as the reign of Stephen, but it seems impossible to fix his parentage with certainty. Several members of the family were fairly prominent in the early part of the fourteenth century (cf. Roberts, Calendarium Genealogicum, i. 278, ii. 518–9; Palgrave, Parliamentary Writs, iv. 1271–2) . Richard at his death held, among other manors, those of Clehonger, Straddel, and Monyton, in Herefordshire. ”

“ Pembroke is a station on the South Wales system of the Great Western railway. The old-fashioned town, consisting chiefly of one long broad street, retains portions of its ancient walls. A large mill-dam is a conspicuous feature on the north of the town. St Mary's church in the centre of the town possesses a massive tower of the 12th century. Near the ruined West Gate is the entrance to Pembroke Castle, a splendid specimen of medieval fortified architecture. ”

“ Pembroke found more trustworthy allies than Warenne in Bartholomew, Lord Badlesmere, the sometime instigator of the Bristol troubles, and a bitter opponent of Lancaster, and in Roger of Amory, the husband of one of the three co-heiresses who now divided the Gloucester inheritance. Edward, who had profited by the divisions of his enemies to revive the court party, formed a coalition between his friends and the followers of Pembroke. All lovers of order, of moderation, and of the supremacy of the law necessarily made common cause with them. ”

“ Clarendon assigns Pembroke's conduct at Oxford to ‘the extreme weakness of his understanding and the miserable compliance of his nature.’ Wood describes him as better fitted by ‘his eloquence in swearing to preside over Bedlam than a learned academy.’ ‘He would make an excellent chancellor for the mews were Oxford turned into a kennel of hounds,’ writes the author of ‘Mercurius Menippeus,' variously identified with Butler and Birkenhead. ”

“ Beyond Kilgerran the line traverses some pretty furze-clad dingles, and, as we approach our destination, mounts in short, sharp curves tow [Pg 166] ards the high ground that forms the watershed of northern Pembrokeshire.
From the summit level, some 700 feet above the sea, we command a noble prospect of the Precelly range, and the more remote hills about Newport Bay and Fishguard; the effect being heightened by the sunset glow, while a brilliant rainbow spans the purple clouds that brood over the loftier crests of the distant mountains. ”

“ After having most truly lived her long life—a life faithful, devoted, and true—the Countess of Pembroke died at her town house in Aldersgate Street, on the 25th September, 1621. She was interred in the vault of her husband's family in Salisbury Cathedral.
A noble life is its own monument. To have influenced such a life as that of Philip Sidney; to have lived her own life—with its lasting impress on the literature of England, and its beneficial lessons to England's daughters—is to the subject of this sketch a more worthy and lasting memorial than stateliest pile of finest marble. ”

“ Pembroke pledged himself to die in the cause, amid general applause. The same evening Mary was proclaimed queen at the cross at Cheapside, and at St. Paul's. Pembroke took possession of the Tower, and Arundel, with Lord Paget, galloped off with the great seal and a letter from the council, which he delivered to Mary at Framlingham Castle in Suffolk (tjie draft of this letter is printed in Sir Henry Ellis's 2nd series of 'Original Letters,' ii. 243, from Lansdowne MS. 3) . He then hastened to Cambridge to secure Northumberland. ”

“ Pembroke, however, was well informed of all that was taking place, and acted with his wonted prudence. Knowing the impossibility of contending with so superior a force as that headed by the Count de Perche, the protector raised the siege, marched to Nottingham, and summoned the king’s adherents in all quarters to come to his support; and then removing from Nottingham to Newark-on-Trent, he calmly awaited the arrival of his friends and intelligence of his foes. ”

“ Mary's Church, with the time-worn stonework of the old arches and cutwaters spanning the trout stream in the foreground.
Here, then, we bid farewell to quaint old Pembrokeshire, and conclude our sketching rambles amidst its secluded byways.
Not many localities, we take it, can boast, within so comparatively limited a compass, such varied attractions for the lover of old-world [Pg 198] associations and time-worn architecture; attractions, withal, that to some minds are enhanced by a sense of remoteness and isolation from the ceaseless Sturm und Drang of modern city life. ”

“ The result is that Pembroke, even beyond most Colleges, is a medley of architectural additions. When Gray migrated to it, and for a century thereafter, the modest range of low white stone which still contains the main entrance, formed the whole frontage; the College buildings being a small quadrangle about half the size of the present First Court. It was, in fact (except for a new Chapel, built by Wren in 1663, and still in use) , no larger than it was at its first foundation, in 1346, by Mary, widow of Amory de Valence, Earl of Pembroke, and daughter of Guy, Count of Chatillon and St. Paul. ”