Orders were given by the
people that everybody should darken their windows and retire to the back
part of their houses until Lady Godiva had passed. All obeyed except one
man, "Tom the Tailor," afterwards nicknamed "Peeping Tom," who, as the
lady rode by on her palfrey, enveloped in her long tresses of hair,
which fell round her as a garment, looked down on her from his window,
and of him the historian related that "his eyes chopped out of his head
even as he looked." The ride ended, the taxes were repealed, and ever
afterwards the good Lady Godiva was enshrined in the hearts of the
people of Coventry. Many years later a beautiful stained-glass window
was placed in the Parish Church to commemorate this famous event, and
Leofric was portrayed thereon as presenting Godiva with a charter
bearing the words:
I Luriche for love of thee
Doe make Coventry toll free.
[Illustration: THOMAS PARR =_The Olde, Old, very Olde Man or Thomas Par,
the Sonne of John Parr of Winnington in the Parish of Alberbury. In the
County of Shropshire who was Borne in 1483 in The Raigne of King Edward
the 4th and is now living in The Strand, being aged 152 yeares and odd
Monethes 1635 He dyed November the 15th And is now buryed in Westminster
1635_=]
This story Tennyson has immortalised, and its memory is still
perpetuated in the pageants which are held from time to time in the
city.
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