208 THE DOVER ROAD 



and scrip, and tramp in guise of palmers through the 

 country to be hberally helped on their way. The 

 Palmer was, indeed, the ancestor of the modern tramp. 

 He had but to go unwashed, unshaven, and unshorn, 

 and he could live his life without toil or work of any 

 kind. If he were taxed Avith filthy habits, he could 

 reply that a vow to remain unwashed until he had 

 reached this shrine or another forbade him to remove 

 the grime that covered him as a garment ; and his 

 claim to be dirty would be allowed. Eventually the 

 number of these palmers at home and from over sea 

 became a nuisance and a danger to Church and State, 

 and no less objectionable were the hermits who squatted 

 down at every likely corner of the roads and solicited 

 alms. Human nature in the fourteenth century was 

 not appreciably different from that of the present era, 

 when many would rather beg a livelihood than earn it ; 

 and not only the laziness and the number of these 

 palmers and hermits, but also their shocking im- 

 morality, became a scandal, until many laws and 

 Archiepiscopal edicts were levelled against them. 

 Pilgrimage, Saint Thomas, and religion itself became 

 discredited by these creatures, and even as early as the 

 year 1370, the fame of Becket was resented by some, 

 and the efficacy of pilgrimages doubted. That year 

 was the fourth "jubilee of Saint Thomas, when pilgrims 

 Avere crowding in many hundreds of thousands to 

 Canterbury from all parts of the civilized world to 

 receive the free indulgences, the free quarters, and the 

 free food and drink, alike for themselves and their 

 horses, that were accorded to all who came to the 

 jubilee festival that was held, once in every fifty years, 

 for a fortnight. As these multitudes of pilgrims were 

 proceeding along the road to Canterbury during the 

 Festival fortnight of 1370, Simon of Sudbury, the then 

 Archbishop, overtook them. This Prelate had a hatred 

 for superstition somewhat in advance of his time. 

 He did not believe at all in pilgrimages and but little in 

 Thomas a Becket, and he told the crowds he passed 



