The Story Of Arden Of Faversham.

Almory Croft , behind the house , " where they laid him on his back in his night-gown , with his slippers on . " We are told b y the chronicler that the doubly-wicked Alice and her companions " danced and played on the virginals and were merrie . " It would appear to have been their intention to make the townspeople aware of au entertainment , with music ancl dancing , having been given by Arden to his friends on tho fatal evening , ancl to induce them

to believe , from the dead body being- arranged in night-clothes , that the unfortunate man had been murdered by someone in the night . On the following morning Mistress Alice seems to have alarmed the town with an announcement of her husband ' s absence from the house , ancl her fears of his safety . A search was instituted by the friendly inhabitants of the town , and the corpse was found in the croft .

In a manuscript " History of a nioste horrible Murder coniytted at Fevershame , in Kente , " preserved amongst the Harleian collection at the British Museum , we are informed how a circumstance , trifling in itself , at once destroyed the supposition that Arden had been murdered on the spot where his body was discovered , and also served to establish the guilt of the wretched persons who had committed the crime The affair isin quaint phraseology

, , described in detail , the narrative being substantially the same as that furnished by Holinshed . The assassins having strangled and stabbed Master Arden , then , we are told , "toke a clowt and wyped where it was blowdy , ancl strewyd agayne ye rushes that were shuffled wth strugglinge . " These rushes led to the detection and conviction of the murderers . The Mayor of Faversham ancl some of the townsmen discovered the bod y in the field where it had been

thrown ; ancl " then they lokynge about hym , found some rushes of ye parlour stickyuge in his slippars , " whence they concluded that he had been slain in a house , and not where the body was found . Here we have a glimpse of the old English custom of strewing the floors of dwelling houses with rushes . Rushes for a long time supplied the place of the modern carpet , in the living ancl sleeping apartments of rich and poor alike ; and were also much used for covering the floors of churches .

But to return to Holinshed ' s account . Suspicion being aroused , Arden ' s house was searched , ancl it was soon patent that the unfortunate man had been murdered in his own parlour . Very likely Alice ' s conduct as a wife had already attracted public attention , for she was at once charged with the murder . Her courage gave way , and she cried out : — " Oh , the bloud of God help ! for this blond have I shed . " One by one , as evidence was obtained

against them , the guilty confederates suffered the punishments due to their crimes . Mistress Alice was burned at Canterbury ; Mosbye was taken in bed , and was afterwards hung at Smithfield ; Green was executed at Faversham ; Black Will escaped for many years , but was at length captured , " and brent on the scaffolde at Flushing" ; Bradshaw was hanged in chains at Canterbury ; Cicely Pounder was hanged at Smithfield ; Saunderson was drawn and hanged

at Faversham ; and Elizabeth Stafford was burned at the same place . It was , in truth , a _ time when hanging ancl burning , drawing and quartering , were fearfully life as punishments for criminals . Long after the sacrifice of poor Arden to the wicked passions of his wife , it was held by the people of Faversham that the grass would not grow on the spot where the body of the murdered man was laid . Holinshed notices this

circumstance as follows : — " This one thing seemeth very strange and notable touching Master Arden , that in the place where he was laycl , being dead , all the proportion of his body might be seen two yeares after and more , so plaine as could be , for the grasse did not growe where his body had touched ; but betweene his legges , betweene his amies , ancl about the hollowness of his necke , ancl round about his bod y ; ancl where his legges , armes , head , or any part of his body had touched , no grasse growed at all of all that time . " Some , in accordance with the prevalent superstition of the time , attributed