Page:The child's pictorial history of England; (IA childspictorialh00corn).pdf/116

 talking with the king, the mayor came behind him, and struck him on the head with his mace, and stunned him, and he was killed by Richard's party; and then the king, fearing the rioters would kill him in return, asked them what they wanted, saying, he was ready to do any thing that was right and just.

6. They said they desired that the poll tax should be taken off; slavery and villeinage abolished by law; so that all who were still in bondage should be made free; and that the old feudal custom of paying duties on goods, at all the markets and fairs, should be done away with.

7. All this Richard promised to do; but no sooner had the men dispersed and gone back to their homes, than he sent out a military force to seize all who had been concerned in the rebellion; and I grieve to say that, although he had given his word that they should all be pardoned, he ordered the judges to have every one of them executed.

8. After such conduct as this, you will not expect to hear much good of Richard the Second, whose selfish extravagance led him to do all kinds of unjust things, for the purpose of raising money to spend on his own pleasures; so that it might truly be said that he was con