A Health Unto His Majesty

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It was the month of May—the gayest and most glorious month, the people assured themselves, that England had ever known. This was the 29th, a day of great significance.

That morning, it seemed that the sun rose with more than its usual brilliance.

“A good omen!” people called to one another from the windows of houses, the overhanging gables of which almost met over the cobbled streets. “It’s going to be a fine day.”

In the country, as soon as the dawn showed in the sky, people were gathering on the village greens; there would be many to line the roads so that they should miss nothing when the time came.

“Listen!” one said to another. “Even the birds are mad with joy. Have you ever heard a blackbird or chaffinch sing like that before? They know the good times are back.”

Others declared that the cherry trees had never borne such great masses of blossom in previous years. The flowers seemed more fragrant that spring. Children gathered buttercups and bluebells, celandines and lady’s-smocks to strew along the road; they wore chains of daisies as necklaces and chaplets as they danced to the merry tunes of the fiddlers.

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