Paintings 3

THE THIRD PICTURE
King John, confronted by his Barons assembled in force at Runnymede, gives unwilling consent to Magna Carta, the foundation of justice and individual freedom in England. 1215.

Painter—CHARLES SIMS, R.A. Donor—THE VISCOUNT BURNHAM

IN 1214 King John, having made himself intensely hated in Scotland, Ireland, and Wales, summoned his English barons to join him in an invasion of France. When he returned defeated, he attempted to exact money from those who had refused to accompany him. The Barons at once assembled at Brackley under Robert FitzWalter and William Marshall, and drew up forty-nine articles, which they compelled John to accept at Runnymede on June 1st, 1215. In this decisive move the Barons could not have succeeded if they had not been aided by the sympathy of the other classes whom John had oppressed and alienated. The Londoners opened their gates to the baronial army, and themselves joined it under their Lord Mayor. The freemen of all classes took the same side—it was impossible for John to enlist them under the old national militia system. “For the first time,” says Mr. George Trevelyan, “the People of England sided with the Barons against the Crown; and each of the classes that aided and abetted the movement had its share of benefits in the clauses of the Great Charter.” Though no claim was made on behalf of “ the people” or the nation as a whole, yet “several clauses

gave expression to the spirit of individual liberty, as it has ever since been understood in England.” The Charter redressed local and temporary evils, but it had also an abstract and general character, which profoundly affected the imagination of succeeding ages and made it a great influence in history—it became the symbol for the spirit of our whole Constitution. Finally, “the American colonists revolted in its name, and their 4escendants now seek spiritual fellowship with us in its memory)

In every way the Runnymede conference was one of the most passionate incidents in our history. Both sides were in angry mood:

The Charter was discussed, forced through and sealed in a single day; yet John was fiercely determined never to rest till he had destroyed it, and the Barons insisted on his acknowledging their right, if he should do so, “to distrain and distress us . . . by seizing our castles, lands and possessions, and in any other way they can.”

Mr. Sims’s picture is designed to symbolize the intense drama of the final moment. The King, a strikingly tragic figure, prematurely aged, and haggard with violently conflicting passions, is seen almost alone, upon a high dais, against a tempestuous sky. A sudden gust of summer storm has thrown down his royal standard and discomfited his ally, the Papal Legate, as he is indignantly leaving the scene of defeat.