heraldryofyorkmi01custuoft

lS8
THE HERALDRY OF YORK MINSTER.
lacked the lofty lantern which now crowns it, and no western towers
finished
the west end, but many of the windows must have been sparkling
with painted glass
: and all, in its partially developed splendour, not only
already beautiful, but kindling bright anticipations of its future glory.
Who does not wish to recall the scene therein on that winter day, when
amidst flashing steel, and gay silks and rich velvets, and costly furs,
glistening tapers, fragrant incense, and solemn voices, one of the fairest
brides of earth entered on a married life of forty years, in which she
attained to a high ideal of wife, mother, and Queen, and at the close of
which, extending her hand from her death-bed, she joined
it once again,
for the last time, to the right hand of King Edward, overwhelmed with
sorrow, saying in faltering accents, "We have, my husband, enjoyed our
" long union in happiness, peace, and. prosperity."
Yes, and there is one touching memorial of that tender but chequered
wedlock yet remaining in the Minster the recumbent figure of Prince
William of Hatfield, their second son, born at the royal hunting-lodge in
Hatfield Chase, near Doncaster, and, dying while still a child at York,
probably when Philippa was resident here during the King's absence in
France, 1346-7, was buried in the north choir aisle of the Minster. Who that
has eyes to see can fail to discern in that still beautiful figure, albeit defaced
during succeeding generations, not only the evidence of the sculptor's art
and taste, but the token of a fond mother's care and love, or fail to feel,
as he recalls the fate of his brothers, that the most appropriate epitaph
thereof are the words of " Scripture Taken away from the evil to come."
Surely the good bishop's prayer and blessing were abundantly
answered. But he had long before passed to his rest, having died, after
being stricken with paralysis and bedridden for two years, in 1336.
The high offices which Hotham filled enabled him to amass a
princely fortune, which he dispensed in a princely manner. His benefactions
to the Church and to his family in Yorkshire were many.
In 1327 he bought and settled on the bishops and church of Ely
divers lands and tenements, including a vineyard, in Holborn, adjacent to
his manor there. He probably built the noble chapel of St. Mary at Ely,
and in 1322, when the great central tower fell upon the choir, destroying
two bays, he rebuilt them at the cost of ^2,000, and they
still remain the
noblest portion of that magnificent cathedral.
His body was buried in the middle thereof, but the sumptuous tomb,
with its effigy of alabaster and splendid sculpture, is now gone only a
slab of marble, inlaid with a brass plate engraved with his arms, marks
the site of his last resting-place.
Godwin says of him that he was " Prudens sapiens sed admodum
" indoctus."
*
* Canon Raine MS.