270 



GODFREY 



GODOLPHLN 



of the objects of the institution being to provide 

 instructors in case of the death of parents ; but the 

 present rule of the Church of England, following 

 the rubric of the American Prayer-book, does so 

 allow. 



Godfrey, SIR EDMUNDBURY. See GATES 

 ( TITUS). 



Godfrey Of Bouillon, a typical represent- 

 ative of Christian chivalry, was born about 1061, 

 at Baisy, a village of Belgian Brabant, the eldest 

 son of Count Eustace II. of Boulogne, and Ida, 

 sister to Godfrey, Duke of Lower Lorraine and 

 Bouillon. He served with great gallantry under 

 the Emperor Henry IV. , both against Henry's rival, 

 Rudolph of Swabia, and in 1084 in the expedition 

 against Rome. Five years later the emperor 

 invested him with the duchy of Lower Lorraine. 

 Godfrey joined the first crusade, and was elected 

 one of the principal commanders. For an account 

 of his career in the East tip till the taking of 

 Jerusalem, see CRUSADES. Eight days after the 

 capture of the Holy City Godfrey was proclaimed 

 king by the crusading army ; but his piety and 

 humility forbade him to ' wear a crown or gold 

 where his Saviour had worn one of thorns.' He 

 siccordingly contented himself with the title of 

 Defender and Guardian of the Holy Sepulchre. 

 On 12th August 1099, on the plain of Ascalon, 

 Godfrey defeated the sultan of Egypt ; this victory 

 put him in possession of the whole of Palestine, a 

 few fortified towns only excepted. After a year 

 spent in organising his new state, Godfrey died, 

 18th July 1100. See De Hody, Godefroid de 

 Bouillon (2d ed. Tournai, 1859); and Froboese, 

 Gottfried von Bouillon (Berlin, 1879). 



Godfrey of Strasburg. See GOTTFRIED. 



Godiva, LADY, the famous patroness of Coven- 

 try, who built herself an everlasting name by an 

 unexampled deed of magnanimity and devotion. 

 About the year 1040 Leofric, Earl of Mercia and 

 Lord of Coventry, imposed certain exactions upon 

 the inhabitants, hard and grievous to be borne. 

 His wife, the Lady Godiva, besought her husband 

 to give them relief, and pleaded so earnestly that, 

 to escape from her importunities, tlie earl said 

 he would grant her the favour, but only on the 

 impossible condition that she would ride naked 

 through the town. Godiva ordered proclamation 

 to be made that on a certain day no one should be 

 in the streets, or even look from their houses, when, 

 'clothed on with chastity,' she rode through the 

 town ; and her husband, in admiration of her 

 intrepid devotion, performed his promise. This 

 circumstance was commemorated by a stained- 

 glass window, mentioned in 1690, in St Michael's 

 Church, Coventry ; and the legend that an un- 

 fortunate tailor, the only man who looked out of 

 a window, was struck blind, has also found com- 

 memoration in an ancient effigy of ' Peeping Tom 

 of Coventry,' still to be seen in a niche of one of 

 its buildings. The story occurs in most chroniclers 

 -,vho deal with the time of Edward the Confessor, 

 although it is true that there is no narrative of it 

 earlier than three centuries after. The earliest 

 "ersion is that in the English chronicle usually 

 ascribed to Brompton ( close of 12th century ), quoted 

 in Dugdale's History of Warwickshire, and followed 

 with some variations by Matthew of Westminster, 

 and Higden. Cox makes bold to connect Peeping 

 Tom with the universally spread story of the 

 Master-thief, and notes that the story of Godiva, 

 slightly altered, is told again in the tale of Allah- 

 ud-deen (Thousand and One Nights), who sees 

 through a crevice the king's daughter on her 

 way to the bath, when it is death for any one 

 to be seen abroad or to be found looking at 

 her. Part of the civic procession at the opening 



of the great fair of Coventry used formerly to 

 be a representation of the ride of Lady Godiva. 

 It continued at intervals of from three to seven 

 years, until 1826, and was revived with great 

 splendour in 1848. But the ceremony has now 

 fallen into disrepute, and such attempts as have 

 been made to revive it have not commended them- 

 selves to the best citizens of Coventry. There is a 

 poor ballad on the subject entitled ' Leoffricus ' in 

 the Percy Folio MS., and in the Collection of Old 

 Ballads (1726). The story has been gracefully 

 re-told by Leigh Hunt, and in noble verse by 

 Tennyson. See Felix Liebrecht's Zur Volkskundc 

 (1879), and a study by E. Sidney Hartland in the 

 Folklore Journal for 1890. 



Godollo, a market-town of Hungary, 15 miles 

 NE. of Pesth, with a royal castle and park pre- 

 sented by the Hungarians in 1867 to their king, 

 the emperor of Austria-Hungary. Here, on 7th 

 April 1849, the Austrian forces were defeated by 

 the Hungarians. Pop. 4940. 



Godolphin, SIDNEY GODOLPHIN, EARL OF, 

 who under four sovereigns occupied a seat at the 

 Treasury Board, and under Anne filled the office of 

 Lord High Treasurer solus, was descended of good 

 English family, and was born at Godolphin Hall, 

 near Helston, in the extreme south of Cornwall, in 

 the summer of 1645 he was baptised on 15th July. 

 Introduced at court as a royal page in 1664, he 

 four years later accompanied his kinsman Sir W. 

 Godolphin on a mission to Spain. But his first 

 important public work was performed as envoy- 

 extraordinary to the Netherlands in 1678, where 

 he became acquainted with the Prince of Orange 

 and with Sir William Temple. After his return 

 to England he secured a seat in the House of 

 Commons, and in 1679, on the recommendation 

 of Temple, was appointed a commissioner of the 

 Treasury. Although he voted for the Exclusion 

 Bill, he was nevertheless in 1684 made First Com- 

 missioner of the Treasury, and also elevated to the 

 peerage. On the accession of James II. Godolphin 

 was indeed removed from the Treasury, but re- 

 ceived compensation therefor in the appointment 

 of chamberlain to the queen. His services as an 

 administrator of the finances of the kingdom were, 

 however, valued so highly that in 1686 he was 

 recalled to the Treasury. On William of Orange's 

 landing in 1688 Godolphin stood firmly by James, 

 a.nd was left, along with four others, in charge of 

 the government when the king fled from London. 

 He was also chosen, along with Halifax and Not- 

 tingham, to treat with William ; and, when James's 

 flight from the country was known, Godolphin was 

 one of those who voted for a regency. Yet no 

 sooner was William proclaimed king than, on 14th 

 February 1689, he reinstated Godolphin in his old 

 quarters as First Commissioner or the Treasury. 

 Godolphin was a Tory ; and, when William began 

 to replace his Tory ministers by Whigs, the turn 

 came to Godolphin but came last, in 1696 to go 

 likewise. In 1700, however, he once more returned 

 to his old place ; yet he only held office on this 

 occasion for about six months. When Anne suc- 

 ceeded to the throne she made Godolphin (on 6th 

 May 1702) her sole Lord High Treasurer. This 

 position he filled down to 1710. The personal friend 

 of Marlborough, he steadily supported the great 

 general all through the war, enabling him by his 

 thrifty and able management of the finances to 

 conduct one brilliant campaign after another with- 

 out suffering embarrassment from lack of supplies. 

 And this feat Godolphin was able to achieve with- 

 out increasing the public debt by more than about 

 one million sterling annually a most eloquent 

 witness to his ability, sagacity, and sound adminis- 

 trative talents. He warmly advocated the union 



