First came the band of musicians, mounted on gaily caparisoned horses, and clad in jacks of crimson-damasked satin, laced round with gold; the arms of the city richly emblazoned on the back and front, and the white velvet sleeves of their jerkins so closely laced and interlaced with gold, as almost to conceal the material on which it was wrought. Then two heralds in white-damasked velvet tabards, worked with gold in a variety of fanciful patterns, and with the city arms also emblazoned on the back. Then the sword-bearer of the chief magistrate, in a suit of polished scale armour, and on a steed accoutred in all the panoply of war. Then the Lord Mayor himself, in a flowing mantle of rich crimson velvet trimmed with ermine, and with a collar of fine gold adorned with gems, and mounted on a stately horse, whose velvet housing, fringed with gold, almost touched the ground. Two pages suitably attired walked on either side. Next appeared the two sheriffs in their scarlet mantles and gold chains. Then rode the four-and-twenty aldermen, two abreast, in loose gowns or robes of damasked-velvet or brocaded silk; and, finally, the members of the common-council closed the train.
"And is this the apparel and the bravery of merchants?" said the wandering monk within himself, as the splendid cavalcade passed by; "surely the pomp of royalty cannot surpass this." And John Ball did not draw a wrong conclusion--for when, in about half an hour, the citizens repassed, escorting their youthful sovereign, although there certainly was more cost and elegance, there was less of gorgeous display in the royal than in the civic train.
Richard, then a well-grown boy of eleven, with a countenance the early bloom of which was brightened by an eye of singular intelligence, sat with the ease of a practised rider on a beautiful white palfrey. A cap of purple velvet, trimmed with vair, shaded his fair, open forehead and thick bright curls, and a purple mantle, lined and edged with the same costly fur, and confined at the throat with a jewelled clasp, fell back from his shoulders over the housings of the animal. His tunic was of damasked satin, of a bright pink colour, and round the waist was a purple belt, on which a variety of fanciful devices were wrought with pearls. The housings of the palfrey were of velvet, as soft and rich as the royal mantle, and of a similar hue, but enlivened with a profusion of goldsmiths' work, and bordered round with a heavy gold fringe.