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A Legend of Reading Abbey

by Charles MacFarlane · English · Gutenberg #41804 · 379,051 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: A Legend of Reading Abbey

Author: Charles MacFarlane


        
Release date: January 8, 2013 [eBook #41804]
                Most recently updated: October 23, 2024

Language: English

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Credits: E-text prepared by sp1nd, Mary Meehan, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made available by Internet Archive (http://archive.org)


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY ***

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A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY.

by

CHARLES MACFARLANE

The Author of 'The Camp of Refuge.'







London:
Charles Knight & Co., Ludgate Street.
1845.




A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY.




I.


It was in the year of Grace eleven hundred and thirty-seven (when the
grace of God appeared to be entirely departing from the sinful and
unhappy land of England), and Stephen of Blois, nephew of the deceased
King Henry Beauclerc, sat upon the throne, lawfully and honestly, as
some men said, but most unlawfully, according to others. And the woe I
have to relate arose from this divergency of opinion, but still more
from the change-ableness of men's minds, which led our bishops, lords,
and optimates to side now with one party and now with the other, and now
change sides again, to the great perplexing of the understanding of
honest and simple men, to the undoing of their fortunes, and well nigh
to the utter ruin of this realm, which that learned clerk and right
politic King Henricus Primus had left in so flourishing and peaceful a
condition.

Our great religious house of Reading (may the hand of sacrilege and the
flames of war never more reach it!), founded and endowed by the
Beauclerc, had then been newly raised on that smiling, favoured spot of
earth which lies on the bank of the Kennet, hard by the juncture of that
clear and swift stream with our glorious river Thamesis; and in sooth
our noble house was not wholly finished and furnished at this time; for
albeit the first church, together with most of its chapels and shrines,
was in a manner completed, and our great hall was roofed in, and floored
and lined with oak, the lord abbat's apartment, and the lodging of the
prior, and the dormitory for the brethren, and the granary and the
stables for my lord abbat's horses, were yet unfinished; and, except on
Sundays and the feast days of Mother Church, these parts of the abbey
were filled by artisans and well-skilled workmen who had been collected
from Windsor, Wallingford, Oxenford, Newbury, nay even from the right
royal city of Winchester, which abounded with well-skilled masons and
builders, and the capital city of London, where all the arts be most
cultivated. Moreover, sundry artists we had from beyond the seas, as
masons and hewers of stone, who had been sent unto us from Caen in
Normandie by the defunct king, and some right skilful carvers in wood
and in stone, who had been brought out of Italie by Father Michael
Angelo Torpietro, a member of our house, who had quitted the glorious
monastery of Mons Casinium, which had been raised and occupied by the
founder of our order, the blessed Benedict himself, when he was in the
flesh, in order to live among us and instruct us in humane letters and
in all the rules and ordinances of our order, wherein we Anglo and
Anglo-Norman monks, in verity, needed some instruction. And this Father
Torpietro of happy memory had also been enabled by the liberality of
our first lord abbat to bring from the city of Pisa in Italie a right
good limner, who painted such saints and Virgins upon gilded panels as
had not before been seen in England, and who was now painting the chapel
of our Ladie with rare and inappreciable art, as men who have eyes and
understanding may see at this day. All the learned and periti do affirm
that for limning and gilding our chapel of the Ladie doth excel whatever
is seen in the churches of Westminster and Winchester in the south, or
in the churches of York and Durham in the north, or in the churches of
Wells and Exeter in the west, or in Ely and Lincoln in the east. [I
speak not of the miracles performed by our relics: they are known to the
world, and be at least as great as those performed by our Ladie of
Walsingham.] Albeit our walls of stone and flint were not all finished
in the inner part, our house was girded and guarded by ramparts of royal
charters and papal bulls. Two charters had we from our founder, and one
from King Stephen, confirmatory of those two. And great were the
immunities and privileges contained in these charters. No scutage had we
to pay; no stallage, no tolls, no tribute; no customs in fair or market,
no tithing penny or two-penny, no amercements or fines or forfeitures of
any kind! Our mills were free, and our fisheries and our woods and
parks. No officer of the king was to exercise any right in the woods and
chases of the lord abbat, albeit they were within the limits of the
forests royal; but the lord abbat and the monks and their servitors were
to hold and for ever enjoy the same powers and liberties in their woods
and chases as the king had in his. Hence was the House of Reading ever
well stocked with the succulent meat of the buck. Too long were it to
tell all that our founder Henricus did for us. At the beginning of his
reign, he abolished the ancient power of abbats to make knights; yet, in
order to distinguish our house, he did, by a particular clause in our
charter of foundation, give unto the lord abbat of Reading and to his
successors for ever, authority to make knights, whether clerks or
laymen, provided only that the ceremony should be performed by the abbat
in his clerical habit and capacity, and not as a layman, and that he
should be careful to advance none but men of manly age and discreet
judgment. Of all the royal and mitred abbeys in the land ours was
chiefest after Glastonbury and St. Albans; and assuredly we have some
honours and privileges which those two more ancient houses have not. I,
who have taken up the pen in mine old age to record upon enduring
parchment some of the passages I witnessed in my youth and ripe manhood,
would not out of any unseemly vanity perpetuate my name and condition; I
would lie, unnamed, among the humblest of this brotherhood who have
lived or will live without praise, and have died or will die without
blame; but as the world in after-time may wish to know who it was that
told the story I have now in hand, and what were my opportunities of
knowing the truth, it may be incumbent on me to say so much as
this:--John Fitz-John of Sunning was my secular name and my designation
in the world of pomps and vanities; my mother was of the Saxon, my
father of the Norman race; my mother (I say a requiem for her daily)
descended from a great Saxon earl, or, as some do say, prince; and my
father's grandfather, who fought at the battle of Hastings, was
cup-bearer to William the Conqueror, in sort that if I could be puffed
up with mundane greatness I have the wherewithal: my name in religion is
Felix, of the order of St. Benedict and of the Abbey of Reading; and as
a servant of the servants of the Lord, I have filled without discredit,
in the course of many years, the several high offices of sub-sacrist and
sacrist, refectorarius, cellarer, chamberlain, and sub-prior; and mayhap
when I shall be gone hence some among this community will say that there
have been worse officials than Father Felix.

In the year eleven hundred and thirty-seven I was but a youthful novice,
still longing after the flesh-pots of Egypt, and mourning for the loss
of the worldly liberty I had enjoyed or abused in my mother's house at
Sunning, which was a goodly house near the bank of Thamesis, on a wooded
hill hard by the wooden old Saxon bridge of Sunning. But I was old
enough to comprehend most of the passing events; and being much favoured
and indulged by the lord abbat and several of the brotherhood, I heard
and saw more than the other novices, and was more frequently employed
upon embassages beyond the precincts of the abbey lands. It was a common
saying in the house that Felix the Sunningite, though but little given
to his books within doors, was the best of boys for out-door work. By
the favour of our Ladie, the love of in-door studies came upon me
afterwards at that time when I was first assailed by podagra, and since
that time have I not read all the forty and odd books that be in our
library, and have I not made books with mine own hand, faithfully
transcribing the Confessions of St. Augustin, and the whole of the Life
of St. Benedict, and missals not a few? But not to me the praise and
glory, _sed nomini tuo_!

As I was born in the house at Sunning (may the sun ever shine upon that
happy village, and upon the little church wherein rests the mortal part
of my mother) on the eve of St. John the Evangelist, in the year of our
Redemption eleven hundred and twenty, being the twentieth year of the
Beauclerc's reign, I was, on the feast of St. Edbert, Bishop and
Confessor, in the year eleven hundred and thirty-seven, close upon the
eighteenth year of mine age.

St. Edbert's festival, falling in the flowering month of May, is one
which my heart hath always much affected. The house had kept it right
merrily; and notwithstanding the unfinished state of portions of the
abbey, I do opine that our ceremonies in church and choir were that day
very magnificent, and fit to be a pattern to some other houses. All
labours were suspended; for he is a niggard of the worst sort that
begrudgeth even his serfs and bondmen rest at such a tide; and eager as
was our lord abbat Edward for the completion of our stately edifice, and
_speciliater_ for the finishing of our dormitory, he would not allow a
man to chip a stone, or put one flint upon another, or hew or shape wood
upon St. Edbert's day; and he was almost angered at the Italian limner
for finishing part of a glory which he had begun in our Ladie's chapel.
It was a memorable day, and, _inter alia_, for this: it was the first
night that the good lord abbat slept within the walls of the abbey; for
hitherto, on account of the cold and dampness of the new walls, he had
betaken himself for his nightly rest either to a house close by in the
town of Reading, or to the house of a God-fearing relation, who dwelt on
the other side of Thamesis at Caversham.

After the completorium and supper (we had both meat and wine of the best
at that coena), the weather being warm, and the evening altogether
beautiful, the abbat and reverend fathers, as well as the younger
members of the house, gathered together in my lord abbat's garden at the
back of the abbey, and sat there for a season on the green bank of the
Kennet, looking at the bright river as it glided by, and at the young
moon and twinkling stars that were reflected in the water, or
discoursing with one another upon sundry cheerful topics. Good cheer had
made me cheerful, and it remembers me that I made little coronals and
chains of the violets that grew by the river bank, and of the
bright-eyed daisies that covered all the sward, and threw them upon the
gliding and ever-changing surface of the Kennet, and said, as I had done
in my still happier childhood, "Get ye down to Sunning bridge, and stop
not at this bank or on that, but go ye right down to Sunning, and tell
my mother that I am happy with my shaven crown."

The lord abbat, looking back upon the tall tower of our church, and the
broad massive walls of our Aula Magna, said--

"In veritate, this is a goodly and substantial house, and one fitted to
beautify holiness."

"In truth is it," said that good and learned Italian father who had
brought the limner from Pisa.

"Torpietro," said the abbat, "this soil grows no marble; we have not
hereabout the nitent blocks of Carrara, or the soberer marble of Lucca;
we have neither granite nor freestone; but rounded chalk-hills have we,
and flints love the chalk-pit, and the pits of Caversham are
inexhaustible; and with our mortar, rubble, and flints, we have built
walls three fathoms thick, and have made an abbey which will stand
longer than your Italian temples, built of stone and marble; for time,
that corrodes and consumes other substances, makes our cement the harder
and stronger. Somewhat rough are they on the outside, like the character
of our nation; but they are compact and sound within, and not to be
moved or shaken--no, scarcely by an earthquake."

"'Tis a substantial pile," quoth Torpietro. "Balestra, nor catapult, nor
manginall, nor the mightiest battering-ram, will ever breach these
walls; and therefore is the house safe against any attack of war, and
therefore will it stand, entire as it now is, when a thousand years are
gone."

"Nay," said the abbat, "name not war: a sacred place like this is not to
be assaulted; and our good and brave King Stephen is now firmly and
rightfully seated, and we shall have no intestine trouble. We have no
fig-trees, or I would quote to thee, Brother Torpietro, that passage
which saith.... Felix, my son, leave off throwing flowers in the stream;
run unto the gate, and see what is toward, for there be some who smite
upon the gate with unwonted violence, and it is now past the curfew."

When the abbat first spoke to me, I heard a mighty rapping, which I had
not heard before, or had not heeded, being lost in a reverie as I
watched my coronals on their voyage towards Sunning bridge; but when his
lordship spake to me, I hurried across the narrow garden, and into the
house, and up to the outer gate, where I found Humphrey, the old
janitor, and none but he. Humphrey had opened the wicket, and had closed
it again, before I came to the gate. "Felix, thou good boy of Sunning,"
said he unto me, "thou art as nimble as the buck of the forest, and art
ever willing to make thy young limbs save the limbs of an old man, so
prithee take this corbel, and bear it to my lord abbat's presence
forthwith, and bear it gently and with speed, for those who left it said
there was delicate stuff within, which must not be shaken, but which
must be opened by the lord abbat right soon. So take it, good Felix, for
there is no lay-brother at hand, and the weight is nought."

I took up the corbel gently under my left arm, and began to stride with
it to the abbat, down at the Kennet banks. I was presently there, for
albeit the corbel was of some size, the weight thereof was indeed as
nothing.

"So, so," said my lord abbat, as he espied me and my burthen, "What have
we here?"

"Doubtless," said the then refectorarius, "some little donation from the
faithful. Venison is not as yet; but lamb is in high perfection at this
season."

"Nay," quoth the coquinarius, "from the shape of the wicker, I think it
is rather some sizeable pike, sent down by our friends and brothers at
Pangbourne."

"Bethinks me rather," said the lord abbat, waving his right hand over
the corbel (the jewels and bright gold of his finger-rings glittering in
the young moon as he did it), "bethinks me rather that it is a collation
of simnels from our chaste sisters the nuns of Wargrave, who ever and
anon do give a sign of life and love to us the Benedictines of Reading
Abbey. But open, Felix! cut the withies, and undo the basket-lid, and
let us see with our own eyes."

As my curiosity was now at the least as great as that of any of my
superiors in age and dignity, I cut the slight bindings, and undid the
corbel; and then there lay, uncovered and revealed to sight--the most
beautiful babe mine eyes ever beheld withal!

"Benedicamus!" said the lord abbat, gazing and crossing himself.

"Miserere! The Lord have mercy upon us! But what thing have we here?"
quoth the prior.

"'Tis a marvellous pretty infant," said the limner from Pisa, "and would
do to paint for one of the cherubim in the chapel of our Ladie."

"A marvellously pretty devil," said our then sub-prior, a sourish man,
and somewhat overmuch given to suspicious and evil thoughts of his
brothers and neighbours: "What have we celibatarians and Benedictines to
do with little babies? I smell mischief here--mischief and irregularity.
Felix, what knowest thou of this corbel? I hope thou knowest not all too
much! But know all or know nothing, why, oh boy, didst bring this
arcanum into this reverend company?"

"Father," said I, "'twas Humphrey bade me bring it, and for all the rest
I know nothing;" and this being perfectly true, yet did I hold down my
head, for that I felt the blood all glowing in my face, not knowing how
or why it should be so.

"Bid the janitor to our presence," said the lord abbat.

Humphrey, who had nothing doubted that the basket contained some
creature comforts, such as the faithful not unfrequently sent to our
house, soon appeared, and was not a little amazed to see the amazement
of the monks, and the high displeasure of the abbat; for as age had
somewhat dimmed his sight, and as the last gleams of twilight were now
dying away, the good janitor did not perceive the sleeping babe.

"Humphrey," said the abbat, "what is this thou hast sent us? Tell me, in
the name of the saints, who gave thee this basket?"

As the abbat spoke the infant awoke from its slumber, and began to cry
out, and lay its arms about, as if feeling for its nurse; and hereat our
old janitor's wonderment being manifoldly increased, he started back,
and crossed himself, and said, "Jesu Maria! Jesu Maria!"

"Say what thou hast to say," cried our sacrist; "my lord abbat would
know who left this corbel at the gate, and why thou didst take it in?"

"But," said the old janitor, making that reverence to his superiors
which he was bounden to do, "may I ask what it is that the corbel
holds?"

"A babe," said the prior.

"And of the feminine gender--to make the matter worse," said the teacher
of the Novices.

"'Tis witchcraft," said Humphrey--"'tis nought but witchcraft! What
Christian man, or woman either, could ever think of sending a babe to
the monks of Reading!"

"But who sent the basket?" said the abbat.

"That know I not," said old Humphrey, still crossing himself.

"Then who left it with thee?" asked the sacrist.

"Two serfs that I have seen at this house aforetime," said
Humphrey--"two honest-visaged churls, who were out of breath when they
came to the wicket, and who went away to the westward so soon as they
had put the basket in my hands, and told me to handle it gently, and
carry it to my lord abbat forthwith."

"And said they nothing more?" quoth the prior.

"Yea, they did say there was delicate stuff within."

"And what stuff didst thou think it was?" said the coquinarius.

"Verily something to eat or drink."

"Thou art stolid," said the sour sub-prior; "thou art stolid, oh
Humphrey, to take a corbel from strange men. Wouldst know the serfs
again?"

"I should know them again if I could but see them again. Seen them I
have aforetime. Whose men they be I know not; but I thought I had seen
them before bring gifts and offerings to our house; and it is not in my
office to open anything that is shut, except the convent-door; and ill
would it have beseemed me to have been prying into a basket left for my
lord abbat."

"But said the churls nothing else?" asked the abbat. "Bethink thee, oh
Humphrey! said the churls nought else?"

"Methinks that when I asked them whose men they were, and who had sent
this present, one of them did make reply that my lord abbat would know
right well."

Here all our eyes were bent upon the good abbat, who, to tell the truth,
did look somewhat conturbated. But when the head of our house had
recovered from this sudden emotion, he said to the janitor, "Were those
the very words the man did speak?"

"The matter of the words was that," said Humphrey; "yet I do think the
slaves subjoined that if your lordship knew not who sent the gift, your
lordship would soon know right well. But as the churl was walking away
while he was speaking, I cannot say that these were his _ipsissima
verba_."

"Janitor," quoth the abbat, "knowest thou what festival of mother church
it is we have celebrated this day?"

"The feast of the blessed Saint Edbert," responded Humphrey, with a
genuflexion and an _ora pro nobis_.

"Then from this day forward," quoth the lord abbat, "take not and admit
not within these gates any donation or thing whatsoever from men that
thou knowest not, and that run from our door instead of tarrying to
refresh themselves in the hospitium."

"That last unwonted and unnatural fact," quoth the cellarer, "ought to
have warned thee, oh Humphrey, that there was mischief in the corbel."

"But," replied the janitor, "it was past the time of even' prayer, nay,
after supper-time; and they did place the basket in my hands, and vanish
away all in a minute, and I could not throw the corbel after them, nor
could I leave it outside the gate. But mischief did I suspect none."

Humphrey being dismissed, the elders of our house debated what had best
be done with the child, which had not ceased crying all this while, and
which moved my heart to pity, for it was a beautiful babe to look upon,
and it seemed right hungry, and witchcraft could there be none about it;
for our sub-prior, who had adventured to take it up in his arms, had
espied a little golden cross round its neck, and an Agnus Dei sewed to
its clothes. The lord abbat, whose heart was always kind to man, woman,
and child, nay, even unto the beasts in the stable and field, and the
hounds of the chase, said that albeit it had been cast into a wrong
place, it was assuredly a sweet innocent and most Christian-looking
child, and that as the hour was waxing very late, it would be well to
keep it in the house until the morrow morn. But the sub-prior bade his
lordship bethink himself of the sex of the child, and of the rigid rule
of our order, which, in its strictest interpretation, would seem to
imply that nothing of the sex feminine should ever abide by night within
our cloisters. "In spite of its cross and agnus," subjoined the sour
suspicious man, "I must opine that this piping baby hath been sent
hither by some secret enemy, in order to bring down discredit and
aspersions upon our community."

"But what, in the name of the Virgin, wouldst have us do with the little
innocent?" said the abbat.

"Peradventure," quoth the sub-prior, "it were not badly done to set the
brat afloat in its basket down the Kennet into Thamesis. It may ground
among the rushes, and be found by the country people, or it may----"

"Brother," said the abbat, "thy heart is waxing as hard as the flint of
our walls! I would not do that thing, or see it done, to escape all the
calumnies which all the evil tongues of England could heap upon me."

"No, assuredly, nor would I," said the sub-prior; "for upon
after-thought it doth appear that the babe perchance might drown. Still,
my lord abbat, it is not well that it should stay where it is, or that
the townfolk of Reading should know that it hath been brought to our
door; for they have too many bad stories already, and some of them do
remember the wicked marrying priests of the days of the Red King."

"True, oh sub-prior," quoth the lord abbat; "true and well-bethought. We
must not, therefore, send the child into Reading town; but I will have
it conveyed unto my good nephew at Caversham, and his wife will have
care of it until we shall learn whose babe it is, and why so
mysteriously sent hither. There is gentle blood in those veins; this is
no churl's child. I never saw a more beautiful babe, and in my time I
have baptized many an earl's daughter, ay, and more than one little
princess. It must be a strange tale that which shall explain how the
mother could ever part with such an infant. But it grows dark; so,
Philip, take up the basket, and bear it straightway and with all care
and gentleness to Caversham; and Felix, do thou go with Philip, and
salute my kinsman in my name, and relate unto him the strange and
marvellous manner in which the basket hath been brought into our house,
and tell him I will see him in the morning after service."

Philip was an honest lay-brother of the house, and between him and me
there had always been much friendship; for on my first coming to the
abbey, to be trained to religion and learning, he had procured many
little indulgences for me, and had ofttimes taken me behind him on his
horse when he rode towards Sunning to look after a farm which my lord
abbat had near to that place. He was a mirthful man, and so fond of
talk, that when he had not me riding behind him he usually discoursed
all the way with his horse. Now he took up the corbel with as much
gentleness as a lady's nurse, and we began to go on our way, the dear
child still piping and bewailing. The sub-prior followed us to the gate
to give Humphrey the needful order to open, for at that hour the janitor
would not have allowed egress to any lay-brother or novice. "Beshrew
me," said old Humphrey as the sub-prior withdrew, "but this foundling
hath brought trouble upon me and sharp words; yet let me see its face,
good Philip, for I hear 'tis a Christian child, and a lovely ..."

Hereupon we took the basket into Humphrey's cell by the gate, where a
light was burning; and the janitor having peered in its face, vowed, as
others had done, that he had not seen so fair a babe. "'Tis nine months
old, at the very least," said he; "and ye may tell by its shrill piping
that 'tis a strong and healthy child. Mayhap it cries for hunger;" and
at this timeous thought the old janitor brought forth a little milk and
honey and gave it to the babe, who partook thereof, and then smiled and
dropped fast asleep.

We took the shortest path across the King's Mead to Caversham bridge. As
we walked along Philip ceased not from talking about the child and the
unprecedented way in which it had been left at the abbey. Being a man
much given to speculation and the putting of this thing and that
together, he made sundry surmises which I will not repeat, for they
touched the good lord abbat, and the next morning proved that though
very ingenious they had no foundation in truth. When we came to the long
wooden bridge, we found, as we had expected, that part of it was raised,
and that the old man that levied the toll for the baron was fast asleep.
But our shouting soon roused the toll-man, and he soon challenged us and
lowered the draw-bridge, though not without sundry expressions of
astonishment that two monks should be abroad at so late an hour. When we
told him whither we were going, he bade us make haste, for the lights
were disappearing in the mansion, and the family would soon be buried in
sleep. He then lowered the draw-bridge at the other end, and we went on
towards the hill side with hasty steps, the only light visible in the
mansion being one that shone brightly through the casement of the
southern turret.

"Ralpho, the toll-man," said I, "must have been more than half asleep,
or assuredly he would have asked what we were carrying in the basket at
this time o'night."

"May the babe have an extra blessing," quoth Philip, "for that it sleeps
on and did not wake on the bridge! A pretty tale would gossip Ralpho
have had to tell about us Benedictines if the babe had set up its piping
on the bridge!"

The castellum or baronial mansion stood on the top of Caversham hill at
the point where that hill is steepest; the village lay at its feet, and
the church then stood midway between the castle and the village. We
were soon at the edge of the dry moat; but the draw-bridge was up, and
we had to shout and blow the cow-horn for some time before we could make
ourselves heard by any one within; and when the warder awoke and looked
forth he was in no good humour. But as we made ourselves known, and told
him that we came from the lord abbat upon an occasion that brooked no
delay, he altered his tone; and after telling us that though bedward, he
believed his lord and ladie were not yet in bed, as he could see a light
in their bower above, he lowered the draw-bridge and unbarred the
wicket. That which Ralpho had omitted to do on the bridge, the warder
did under the gateway of the castle; for, pointing to the basket, he
said, "What have we here, brother Philip? Cates and sweetmeats for my
lord and ladie? Ay, Reading Abbey is famed for its confections!"

He had scarcely said the words when a noise came from the basket which
made him start back and cross himself; for the dear child began to pipe
and scream, and much more loudly methought that I had heard it do
before. We, however, stayed not to talk with the astonished warder; for
a waiting-woman had come down from the southern turret to inquire what
was toward, and we followed this good woman, who was still more
astonished than the warder, to the chamber where the lord and ladie
were. Sir Alain de Bohun was a bountiful lord, ever kind of heart and
gentle in speech; and the Ladie Alfgiva, his wife, descended from the
Saxon thanes who had once owned and held all the country from Caversham
to Maple-Durham, was the gentlest, truest ladie, and at this season one
of the fairest that lived anywhere in Berkshire or Oxfordshire. Before
hearing the short tale we had to tell, Sir Alain vowed that the little
stranger was welcome, and that so sweet a foundling should never want
home or nurture while he had a roof-tree to sit under; and the ladie
took the child in her arms, and kissed it, and pacified it; and before I
had gotten half through my narration, and the message from my lord
abbat, the babe went to sleep on the ladie's bosom. Our limner from Pisa
ought to have seen that sight; for the Madonna and Child he did
afterwards paint for the chapel of our Ladie was not so beautiful and
tender a picture as that presented to mine eye by the wife of Sir Alain
de Bohun and our little foundling. Much marvelled the gentle ladie at
the tale; but her other feelings were stronger than her curiosity and
astonishment; and she soon withdrew to place the child with her own dear
children--a little boy some four or five years old, and a little girl
not many months older than the stranger. Sir Alain gave to the
lay-brother Philip a piece of money, and to me a beaker of wine, and so
dismissed us with a right courteous message to our abbat and his good
and right reverend uncle.

The warder would have stayed us to explain how it was that monks went
about in the hours of night with a babe in a basket; but as he had a
sharp wit and a ribald tongue, we forbore to answer his questions, and
recommending him to the saints that keep watch by night, and telling him
it was too late for talk, we began to return rapidly by the way we had
come. As Ralpho let us across Caversham bridge he bemoaned the hardness
of his life, and complained that Sir Alain put him to much unnecessary
trouble in a time of peace and tranquillity, when the bridge might very
well be left open by night and by day without fear of the passage of
foes. Alack! before the next morning dawned Ralpho was made to know that
Sir Alain's caution was very needful. Scarcely had Philip and I gotten a
rood from the bridge-end when that honest lay-brother shouted "Fire!
Fire! a fire!" and looking to the west, the sky behind the town and
hills of Reading seemed all in a blaze. The young moon had set; but as
we came to the King's Mead our path was lighted by a glaring red light,
which seemed every instant to become stronger and redder. "Eheu!" said
Philip, who knew every township better than I then knew my Litany;
"Eheu! there is mischief afoot! The flames mount in the direction of
Tilehurst and Sulham and Charlton! More than one township is a-burning!"

I looked down the river, and joyed to see that there was no sign of
conflagration at Sunning, and returned thanks therefore to my patron
saint.

We were now running across the mead as fast as we could run; but before
we came to the abbey-gate the alarm-bell rung out from the tower, and a
loud shouting and crying came from the town of Reading, and the sounds
of another alarm-bell from Sir Alain's castellum at Caversham.

"What can this mean?" said Philip. "The two serfs that brought the babe
to our house came from the westward, or did go back in that direction,
or so said old Humphrey. After twenty years and more of a happy peace,
is this land to be wasted again by factions and civil war?"

Alas! Philip had said it! This night witnessed the beginning of those
troubles which carried woe into every part of England, and which ended
not until sixteen long years had passed over our heads, sending some of
our brotherhood with sorrow to the grave, and making others old men
before their time; for, to say nothing of our personal sufferings and
hazards, there was not one among us but had a brother or a sister and
friends near and dear to him tortured or butchered in these the worst
wars that were ever waged in England.

When we returned into the abbey we found that the lord abbat had called
up his men-at-arms, and the three good knights who did military service
for the abbey in return for the lands they held; that one of these
knights and divers of the men-at-arms were mounting and about to go
forth; and that the better conditioned of the town people of Reading
were already bringing their goods and chattels to our house for
protection; for the walls of the town had been allowed to fall into ruin
during the long and happy peace which Henricus Primus had kept in the
land, and our burghers had almost wholly lost the art military. Some of
these men, who had been to the hills, said that the whole country was on
fire from Inglesfield to Tilehurst, and from Tilehurst to Purley, which
news destroyed the hope our good abbat had been entertaining that the
fire might be accidental and confined to the thatch-covered houses of
one village or township. And, in very deed, by this time the whole west
seemed to be burning, and the welkin to be overcast by smoke and flame,
and a reflected lurid and horrible light. The swift stream of the Kennet
looked as though its waters had been transmuted into red wine, and the
broad Thamesis shined like a path of fire. No eye closed for sleep in
the abbey that night; and it was not until a full hour after the
scarcely perceptible dawn of day that certain intelligence was brought
us as to the causes and parties which had thus begun to turn our
pleasant and fruitful land into a wilderness.




II.


We had sung matins in the choir, and had nearly finished chanting lauds,
when three knights of good fame, to wit, Sir Hugh de Basildon, Sir Hugh
Fitzhugh, of Purley, and Sir Walter de Courcy, from Inglesfield, arrived
at the abbey, and demanded speech of our superiors. So soon as the
service permitted, the lord abbat, the prior, and the other
obedientiarii of our house retired into the abbat's garden with these
worthy knights, who were in great haste, insomuch that they would
neither stay to partake of my lord's collation, which was now nigh upon
being ready, nor allow the saddles to be taken from their wearied
horses. They stayed but a short while in the garden, and then remounting
their steeds, they spurred away for Caversham, bidding the burghers of
Reading and a number of serfs, who had collected outside our gates, to
look after their bows and arrows, and to get such other weapons as they
could, and to stand upon their defence, as traitors to King Stephen were
abroad and might be soon upon them. These good people made loud
lamentation, for they were ill prepared and provided, and they could not
divine who these enemies and night burners could be. We, the humbler
members of the house, were alike ignorant; but after he had refreshed
his inward man, the good abbat came forth and addressed us all, and the
people without the gate, in this wise:--

"My brothers and children, and ye good men of Reading, who be also my
children, lift up your voices and say with me, God save King Stephen,
the rightful king of this realm, and down with the traitors who would
shake his throne!"

Having all of us shouted as we were bidden to do, and with right good
will, for King Stephen at this time was much loved in the land, my lord
abbat continued his oration.

"The case," said he, "stands thus. That ungodly restless woman, the
undutiful daughter of our late pious King Henry, whose body rests within
these walls--that presumptuous Matilda, once Empress, but now nought but
Countess of Anjou, hath sent over her bastard half-brother Robert, Earl
of Gloucester, to claim the throne of England as her right; as if the
martial nobility and bold people of this land could ever be governed by
a woman, and as if Stephen, our good king and the well-beloved nephew of
our late King Henry, who appointed him to be his successor, had not been
elected with the consent of the baronage, clergy, and people of England,
and confirmed in his lawful seat by our lord the Pope! Now this
traitorous Earl of Gloucester, after taking the oaths of fealty and
homage to King Stephen, and obtaining by the act possession of his great
estates in this realm, hath suddenly lifted up the mask and thrown down
the gauntlet, and sundry false barons like himself have followed his
pernicious example, and are now raging through the country, seizing upon
the king's towns and castles, treacherously surprising the castles of
honest lords and good knights, and burning the homes and destroying the
lives of all such as will not join them, or of all such as hold the
manors and lands these traitors desire to be possessed of. In the east
Hugh Bigod, steward of the late king's household, and the very man who
made oath before the Archbishop of Canterbury and the other great lords
of the realm, as well lay as ecclesiastic, that King Henry on his
death-bed did adopt and choose his nephew Stephen to be his successor,
because this Matilda, Countess of Anjou, had been an undutiful child
unto him, and had given him many and grievous offences, and was by her
sex disqualified for the succession; this Hugh Bigod, I say, hath in the
east seized Norwich Castle and hoisted thereupon the banner of this
Angevin Countess. In the west the Earl of Gloucester hath armed all his
vassals, and is calling upon all such friends as hope to better their
worldly fortunes by deluging the country with blood and wasting it with
fire. Some of these evil men have raised the banner of war in our quiet
neighbourhood, and have fallen with merciless fury upon some of our
noblest and best neighbours, taking them by foul treachery and
surprisal, and waging war upon women and children, and unarmed serfs, in
the absence of their lords. Yesterday a great band of these traitors
marched from the vicinage of Windsore, and, last night, after a foul
plunder and butchery of the people, the townships of Basildon,
Whitechurch, Purley, Tidmersh, Tilehurst, Sulham, Theal, and Speen were
given to the flames. Sir Ingelric, of Huntercombe, who hath ever been
held as a loyal and fearless knight, and whose noble mate could trace
her Saxon ancestry beyond the days of King Alfred, was not at his home,
but his fair young wife being forewarned of their coming, made fast the
gates and defended the manor-house for divers hours: but, woe is me! the
evil men set fire to the house, and--_combusta est_, it is burned, with
the gentle dame and all that were in it! The brave Sir Ingelric of
Huntercombe was not there, or mayhap----"

"Ingelric of Huntercombe is here," cried that dark and sad-looking
knight, who had just arrived on a panting steed; "Ingelric of
Huntercombe is here, with a soul athirst for vengeance! But, my child!
My lord abbat, tell me of my babe!"

The fearful conflagration, which had made us all think of the day of
judgment, had caused my lord abbat, as well as the rest of us, to forget
the little stranger that had come in the basket, not without bringing
some trouble to him and to some of us; but his lordship soon collected
his thoughts, and seeing how the matter stood, he clasped in his arms
the knight, who had dismounted from his horse, and said to him in his
kind fatherly voice, "Sir Ingelric, may the saints vouchsafe thee
strength to bear the woe that hath befallen thee; but thy child is
safe."

"Let me see her," said the knight; "let me hold her in mine arms; her
mother shall I never see more! Her sweet body hath been consumed in the
fire that hath left me without a home! I can see my wife no more--no,
not even in death! But let me have sight of my child!"

The abbat then explained in a few words where the child was, and in what
good and tender keeping; and while he was doing this, Humphrey, our old
janitor, looking steadfastly at a churl who had dismounted to hold Sir
Ingelric's horse, and at another serf, who remained mounted, he said
aloud, "These be the two knaves that gave me the basket!" and then
entering into short converse with the men, Humphrey brought out these
facts:--At the near approach of the danger, of which she had been
forewarned, their mistress had given her child to them, with charge to
hasten with it to Reading Abbey, and then to make all possible speed
back to Tilehurst, whither, as she had fondly hoped, her lord would be
returned before his enemies could do her harm, for Sir Ingelric had gone
to no greater distance than to Wallingford, and a messenger had been
despatched after him on the only fleet horse he had left in the stable,
and well did she know that the love her husband bore her would bring him
rapidly to her rescue. This was all we learned now, but we afterwards
learned that the messenger on the fleet horse had been intercepted and
slain; that the manor-house had been stormed and set on fire before the
two serfs who had brought the child to Reading could get back; and that,
at this sad sight, the said two bondmen, full of devotion for their
lord, had thrown themselves into the woods, and had gone a wearisome
journey on foot in search of him, and had met their master between night
and morning near North Stoke Ford, for the conflagration had been seen
at Wallingford, and had filled the heart of Sir Ingelric with awful
presentiments, albeit he and no other man could at first conceive the
cause and nature of the mischief which had so suddenly broken out in a
time of the most perfect tranquillity. When Sir Ingelric had understood
that which had befallen, he had well nigh died of sudden horror; but,
rousing himself to vengeance, he had collected a few honest men and some
horses, and had ridden with all speed to our abbey, being but too surely
confirmed on his way, by a few of his serfs who had escaped, of the fate
his fair young wife had met in the manor-house. Never did I see a face
fuller of woe than was that of Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe when our good
abbat, taking him by the hand, led him within the house, to give him
ghostly consolation, and to commune with him upon the measures which
ought to be adopted for the defence of the country. But I should tell
how that, before our lord abbat quitted the outer gate, he gave
commandment that the draw-bridge, which had not been raised for many a
day, should be hauled up, and that the serfs of our abbey lands should
be set to work to deepen the ditch, and to dig a new trench right down
to the Kennet. Albeit no enemy was visible, the townfolk of Reading and
all the simple hinds that had assembled were seized with a mighty
consternation when we began to take measures for heaving up the bridge
and closing our strong iron-bound gate. By order of the prior many of
the better sort were admitted into our outer court, with their wives and
children, as well as their property. Those who remained without wrung
their hands, but departed not, for they felt that the very shadow of our
holy walls would be a better protection unto them than any other they
could find; and certes we would have brought them within those walls in
case of extremity; for was not our house the asylum of the unhappy as
well as the _refugium peccatorum_?

When Sir Ingelric had communed until the beginning of tierce with our
lord abbat, and had been somewhat restored by prayer and exhortation,
and by meat and wine, he came out and called for his horse. But the
abbat noted that the knight's horse needed rest, and so he ordered a
fresh steed to be brought from his own stable, together with his own
quiet grey palfrey, telling the brethren that he was minded to ride over
to Caversham with Sir Ingelric to deliberate with his well-beloved
nephew, who was too good a man of war to have omitted making some
preparations against the threatening storm. "You will put up a prayer or
twain for my safety," said the abbat to the prior, "and cause a
_Miserere, Domine_, to be sung in the church. And thou wilt hold thyself
ready, oh prior, to hurl an anathema at the head of the rebels, if they
should come near unto this godly house; and moreover thou wilt see to
such war-harness and weapons as we do possess, and station the
strongest-armed of our monks and lay-brothers, and the stoutest-hearted
of our serfs, with our men-at-arms, in the tower and turrets, with bows
and cross-bows; for it may chance that those who respect not the Lord's
anointed will have no respect for holy church that hath anointed him;
and when the children of Ishmael fall on, the children of Jacob may
defend themselves with the arms of the flesh."

Now our prior was a man of a very martial and fearless temperament, and
one that well remembered how, in the times that were passed, bishops and
abbats had put chain armour over their rockets and albs, and had ridden
forth with lay-lords and men of war, and had ofttimes done battle for
the cause which they held to be the just one, or the cause of the
church. It is not for a humble servant of mother church like me to
decide whether such actions be altogether conformable to the councils of
the church and the canons therein propounded; but this I do know, that
the sword and battle-axe have wrought their effects upon stubborn and
impenitent minds when our spiritual arms had failed, ay, when the wicked
had laughed to scorn our interdicts and our very excommunications. But
not to press further this _casus conscientiæ_, I will only record that
our prior responded with a firm voice and willing heart to the warlike
portions of our lord abbat's instructions, and that he, with marvellous
alacrity, did arm the house and prepare to do battle.

As the gate was unbarred and the draw-bridge again lowered to allow the
abbat and Sir Ingelric to go forth for Caversham, those of our knights
and men-at-arms who had ridden at an earlier hour to make
reconnaissance, came back with loose bridle to report that a great
battalia of the rebels was advancing upon the town of Reading by the
western road.

"Then," quoth our abbat, "is there no time to lose;" and putting his
foot in the bright silver stirrup, he got into his saddle without the
least assistance, albeit he was a corpulent man, and had had podagra.
Two of our knights and half of our men-at-arms rode after the lord abbat
and Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe, but the rest tarried with us.

"Remember," said the abbat, turning the head of his palfrey, and
addressing the townfolk and the serfs, "remember well that ye be all
true men unto King Stephen!"

The poor people made a very feeble essay to shout "Long live King
Stephen!" and then prayed that we would admit them in at the
postern-gate if the rebels came nearer; which thing we did now promise
them to do.

The lord abbat and his party, riding away at a hard gallop, were soon
seen crossing at Caversham bridge; and very soon after they had crossed,
a goodly band of armed men was seen to take post on the opposite bank of
the river, a little below the bridge. Except these armed men, not a man,
woman, or child could be discovered anywhere; for the shepherds and
cowherds had driven their flocks and herds to the other side of
Thamesis, and all the serfs and labouring people had fled either to our
abbey walls or unto Caversham Castle. Only yesterday morning our green
meadows and fruitful corn-fields had been full of life and joy and
thoughtless song, but now they were solitary, and as sad and still as
the grave. The wind, which blew freshly from the westward, still brought
with it hideous drifts of smoke, which dirtied the bright blue sky, and
a coarse pungent smell, which overcame the sweet odours that were
emitted by our flowering hedge-rows and by the myriads of flowers which
grew in the bright green meads and along the moist banks by the river
side. It was all a Tartarus now; but on that sunny, happy May morning of
yesterday it was like being in paradise to stand on our outer turret and
scent the breeze, and feast the eye on plain and hill, meadow, river,
and woodland, and to hear the lark singing in the clear sky over our
head, and the blackbird whistling in the brake at our feet. Not a bird
of all that choir was left now: the foul smoke and the pungent smell
had scared them all away, as Ætna and Vesuve are said to do when they
vomit their sulphureous fires.

I was roused from some meditations of this sort by the scream of a
trumpet, and by a chorus of rude voices that shouted, "The Empress for
England! Down with the usurper Stephen! Long life to the Queen, and
death to all who gainsay it!"

And presently after hearing these sounds I saw the head of a great
column wind round the castle-mound (whereon there was not now any castle
deserving of the name), and take the high road which runs from Reading
town to Caversham bridge. Saint John the Evangelist to my aid, but it
seemed a formidable host! And there were many men-at-arms in the midst,
and a company of well-mounted and fully appointed knights rode at the
head of it. But our prior, after waxing very red and wrathful at the
first sight, did say, upon better observance, that the mass of that host
were but rascaille people, serfs that had slipped their collars, knaves
that had no arms but staves and bludgeons, and that would not stand for
a moment against a charge of horse, nay, nor even against a good flight
of quarrels or long-bow arrows.

"They will not win across the bridge," said the prior, "for the chains
be up, and pass the river they cannot, for the skiffs be all on the
other side, and there is no ford hereabout. But see, they halt! And now
they wheel round for the King's Mead! Will the caitiffs hitherward? Let
them come--our walls be of flint. By the founder of our house, it is
this way they come!"

And in little more time than it takes to say the credo and
pater-noster, the rebels crossed a brook which runs into Thamesis, and
came midway into the King's Mead, with the head of their column pointing
straight for our main gate. But who be those that follow them on the
grey palfrey and dapple jennet? By Saint John and Saint James, the
patrons of our house, it is our good lord abbat, and it is that
right-hearted man the mass-priest of Caversham, and the latter hath a
white flag fastened to his saddle, and he upholds a golden banner
whereon is depicted the effigies of Him who died for our sins, and
taught that there was to be peace upon earth and good will among all
men! And see, the rebels halt, and our abbat and the mass-priest
fearlessly ride up to their leaders, and discourse with them. Word can
we hear not at this distance, but plainly do we discern, by the abbat's
gestures, and by the frequent up-lifting of the holy standard, that the
head of our house is earnestly recommending peace and repentance, the
truce of God for the present, and agreement and reconciliation
hereafter. Gentle are our lord abbat's actions, and no doubt his speech,
albeit the rebels have set their impious feet upon the lands of our
abbey; but rude and outrageous are the gestures of those mailed knights
that do confer with him.... And can their ungodly rage amount to
this?... Yea, verily, so it is! One of them rides his big war-horse
against the grey palfrey, and the lord abbat of Reading is jostled out
of his seat, and lies prostrate on the grass--may it be soft beneath
him!

Judge ye of the choler of our prior, and of the grief and anger of all
of us that saw this shameful and sacrilegious sight. We shouted from
our tower and turrets, "_O turpissime!_" and the prior, standing upon
the loftiest battlement, stretched out his hands towards the traitors in
the King's Mead, even as Pope Leo did from the walls of Rome, when
Attila and his pagans came on for the assault of the holy city. But the
prior's first anathema was not said before our good abbat, assisted by
the mass-priest of Caversham, was on his feet, and to all seeming not
much the worse for his fall. He now spoke so loudly to the knights that
we could hear the sound of his voice and distinguish some of his words,
_specialiter_ when he conjured them to depart quietly thence, and avoid
the shedding of blood. It was plain that the savage crew would not
listen to him; and we saw him remount his palfrey, and turn his head
back towards the bridge. We much feared that the rebels would lay
violent hands upon him, and keep him as their prisoner; but, _nemo
repente_, this was but the beginning of the great wickedness; and albeit
impious factions did afterwards load the servants of the church with
chains, and throw even bishops into noisome dungeons, and keep them
there for ransom among toads and snakes, Jews and thieves, and other
unclean men, this present band did offer no let or hindrance to our lord
abbat or to the mass-priest, who went back at a good pace to Caversham
bridge.

"And now," quoth our prior, with a brightening eye, "we shall surely see
some feat of war if Sir Alain be alive! The foul rebels have refused to
parley, and have atrociously wronged the would-be peace-maker. Ay, by
the bones of King Henry, 'tis as I thought! The trumpets sound! Sir
Alain's lances are on the bridge! May the saints give them the victory!"

I, Felix the novice, being at the topmost part of all the abbey with
Philip, the lay brother, who had been teaching me how to use the long
bow, did now see a battalia rushing across the bridge, a mixed force of
horse and foot, and did further perceive a good company of cross-bowmen
descend the left bank of Thamesis as if their intent was to march below
our abbey to Sunning. The battalia which crossed the bridge divided
itself into two parts, of the which one marched hastily along the road
that leads right to the Castle-hill and town of Reading, while the other
and major part struck across the meadows for the King's Mead, never
halting or pausing until it was right in front of the rebels. With the
party in the mead were seen the pennon and cognizances of Sir Alain de
Bohun: it seemed but a small force compared with that which was opposed
to it, but of horse Sir Alain seemed to have rather more than the
adverse party. There was a short parley, the words of which we could not
hear, but it was very short, and then we heard right well, from the one
side the shout of "God for King Stephen!" and from the other "God for
the Empress-queen!" and when they had thus shouted for a space, they
joined battle. At first their superiority in number seemed to give the
rebels the advantage; and our prior was so transported at this, that he
clapped a coat of mail over his black gown, took a lance in his hand,
and called for his horse, and would fain have gone forth with our
knights and men-at-arms to charge the enemy in the rear. But, lo! the
cross-bows, of whom we had lost sight, appeared on the river in skiffs,
and in less than an Ave they landed on the right bank; and then they
formed in good order, and came on with quick steps to the right wing of
the foe, and shooting close and all together, smote it sorely with their
quarrels. And hereupon the rascaille people fell off from their leaders,
and ran in much disorder across the meadows. Now that part of Sir
Alain's battalion which had marched towards the Castle-hill set up a
triumphant shout, and drove the fugards back again, and moved upon the
other flank of the disordered rebel host. The serfs of the abbey-lands
and the townfolk and others who had been cowering under our walls and
even in our ditches, became full of heart at sight of the great success
of Sir Alain's cross-bows and the easy victory the good knight of
Caversham was now completing; and this encouraged the prior to
distribute bows and bills among them, and to throw open the abbey-gate
and form a third line or battalia round the discomfited foe. Divers of
our brotherhood did go forth with the prior, and even take a post in
advance upon the Falbury-hill; but I, Felix, having no commandment to
the contrary, stayed where I was, in a very safe place, whence I could
see all that chanced below. After making sundry desperate attempts to
stop the flight of their pedones and bring them to a head again, the
Empress's knights, not without holes in their chain jerkins, began to
fly themselves and to knock down and ride pitilessly over their own
people. They could go no other gait than close by our abbey and across
the Falbury; and when they came near unto our force on the hillock, a
stiffish flight of arrows and quarrels made them swerve and draw rein.
At this juncture, Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe, whose lance was red with
blood, and whose casque had been knocked from his head by some terrible
blow, and whose face was covered with blood in a manner fearful to look
upon, came thundering among the rebel knights calling upon his mortal
foe, that caitiff knight Sir Jocelyn de Brienne, to tarry and receive
his inevitable doom as a felon traitor, coward, and foul murtherer. At
these hard words Sir Jocelyn, who was aforetime a man of a very evil
reputation, wheeled round his horse, and with his lance in rest charged
Sir Ingelric, who was charging him. Sir Jocelyn, the prime leader of
this first rebellion, and main actor in the horrible deeds of the
over-night, was wounded and unhorsed, and lay on the hard ground of the
Falbury (not on a soft mead like that on which he made fall our lord
abbat) crying "Rescue! rescue! Help me or I perish!"

Ay! there lay the proud strong man, struck down in his pride and
strength, looking towards our abbey-gate, and upon the hospital for
lepers, called the Hospital of St. Mary Magdalen, which Aucherius, the
second abbat of our house, did build near to the great gate, and I ween
that Sir Jocelyn would have changed his present estate even for that of
a leper! and still he cried "Rescue! rescue! Will no true man stop and
save me?" But the knights and men-at-arms that had ridden with him could
not stay to lift him up or give him any aid, for that Sir Alain de Bohun
and his horsemen were now again close upon them, and therefore did they
spur their steeds and gallop madly past some of the townfolk our prior
had armed. Rings still in my ear the horrible voice with which the
fallen and disabled Sir Jocelyn cried "Quarter! quarter!" and called
upon his foe to show mercy, and name what ransom he would; and still my
blood runs cold as I recall the manner in which Sir Ingelric of
Huntercombe, dismounting, lifted up his enemy's coat of mail and drove
under it into Sir Jocelyn's heart his long thick dagger, screaming,
"Where was thy mercy last night! Die unconfessed!" And Sir Jocelyn
perished, and another knight and ten men-at-arms perished unshrieved
upon our abbey lands, yea, and close unto our church and sacristy. Many
that escaped were sorely wounded, and well upon two score of the
commoner sort were made prisoners, either in the King's Mead or in the
Falbury. Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe, mad with revenge, would have
butchered all these captives on the Falbury-hill as a sacrifice to the
manes of his beloved wife, but Sir Alain de Bohun stood between the
wretched serfs and this great fury, and when our good and merciful lord
abbat rode up on his grey palfrey, Sir Ingelric was somewhat pacified at
his discourse. By the foundation charter which the Beauclerc had given
us, it appertained to the lord abbat, and to none but him, to judge of
offences committed upon the lands of the abbey; yea, our lord abbat had
the privileges of the hundred courts, and all manner of pleas, with soc
and sac, infangtheof, and hamsockna; that is to say, he could try all
causes, impose forfeitures, judge bondmen and villeins, with their
children, goods and chattels, and try and punish any thief or
housebreaker, or other evil-doer taken within our jurisdiction. All
these rights and privileges were granted to the abbat of Reading Abbey
in their fullest extent, with judicial power in all cases of assault,
murder, breach of the peace, and the like; in short, in as full extent
as belonged to the royal authority. Lord Edward might have hanged every
one of those prisoners by the neck to the trees on the Falbury, and none
could have said him nay; or he could have chopped off their hands and
feet. But being of a merciful nature, he only made cut off the ears and
slit the noses of a few of the churls, and then dismissed them all, as
to keep them in prison would be troublesome and costly. And when this
last thing was done, all the victorious party came into our church,
where we the monks and novices did chant the _Te Deum laudamus_, after
which our abbat delivered a learned discourse upon the rights of King
Stephen, and put up a prayer for his preservation on the throne.

Much bloodshedding and many horribly vindictive acts did the lord abbat
prevent on this unhappy day: nevertheless much blood was shed, and a new
score of vengeance was commenced. The kin and friends of Sir Jocelyn
could no more forgive and forget his death than Sir Ingelric of
Huntercombe could forgive the burning of his house and the murther of
his wife; every man that had fallen in the field left some behind him
who were sure to call for vengeance.




III.


Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe and the other knights whose houses had been
destroyed by the so sudden onset of their enemies, regained possession
of their lands; and, in other parts of the kingdom, Stephen, by force of
arms, or by treaty, recovered nearly all the castles which had been
taken from him. Merciful was the soul of King Stephen, even as that of
our lord abbat; for, although he lopped off the hands of some few of the
mean sort, he took not the life of one lord or knight, but, upon
submission made, did pardon them all their late rebellion. The empress's
illegitimate half-brother, Robert, Earl of Gloucester, fled beyond sea;
and when he was safe in Anjou, he sent his defiance to Stephen, wherein
he renounced his homage, and called the king usurper. But before he fled
out of England, Earl Robert had made a great league with many of our
barons, and had induced the Scottish king to engage to invade our land
with all the forces he could collect. King Stephen was again triumphant
over his many foes; he took castle after castle from the English barons,
and rarely began a siege which did not end prosperously. When the Scots,
and Gallowegians, and Highlanders, and men of the Isles, burst into
Northumberland and advanced into Yorkshire, Stephen was not there; but
the army that was collected for him by Thurstan, my lord archbishop of
York, and that was commanded for him in the field by Ranulph, my lord
bishop of Durham, and by William Peveril and Walter Espee of
Nottinghamshire, and Gilbert de Lacy and his brother Walter de Lacy of
Yorkshire, gained a glorious and most complete victory over the Scottish
barbarians at Northallerton in the great battle of the Standard, slaying
twelve thousand of them. The country, and the poor people of it,
suffered much during these sieges, and intestine wars, and foreign
invasions; but they came not near to Reading Abbey, and King Stephen was
everywhere successful, until, in an evil hour for him and for all of us,
he did violence to the church in order to satisfy the rapacity of his
ungodly men of war. For ye must know that King Stephen, in order to gain
the affections of the lay baronage, had given away so many lands and so
much money, that he had now nought left to give, and still those barons
cried "Give! give! or we will declare for the empress." "I see a flaw in
your title, therefore give me two more castles," said one great lord. "I
see two flaws, therefore give me four more castles that I may support
your right," said another great lord. "I fought for thee at
Northallerton, and therefore must have some domain for my guerdon," said
another. But castles, domains, all had been given away already; there
remained not of the crown lands enough to keep the king and his
household, and as for the treasury, it had long been empty. Seeing that
Stephen was like a spunge that had been squeezed, and that nothing was
to be gotten except by war and change of government, sundry of these
great lords withdrew to the strongest of their castles, and renewed
their correspondence with the Earl of Gloucester. In these great
straits, and while Stephen was holding his court in Oxenford, threatened
by foreign invasion, and not knowing how to distinguish his friends from
his foes, he was advised by the worst of his enemies to lay his hands
upon the property of churchmen. The most potent and wealthy churchman of
that day was old Roger, bishop of Sarum, who had been justiciary and
treasurer to Henry Beauclerc, and who had for a season filled the same
offices under Stephen; and next to the Bishop of Winchester, Stephen's
own brother, no man had done more than this Bishop Roger to bar the
claim of the empress, and secure the crown for the king. Moreover, this
great Bishop of Sarum had two episcopal nephews almost as great as
himself; the first of them being Alexander, bishop of Lincoln; the
second, Nigel, bishop of Ely. All three had been great builders of
castles, and men of a bold and martial humour. I find not in the canons
or in the fathers that bishops ought to make their houses places of
arms; but it is to be remembered King Stephen, to please the baronage,
had, at the commencement of his reign, given every baron permission to
fortify his old castle or castles, and to build new ones; nor is it to
be forgotten that in the midst of so many places of arms, the simple
unfortified manor-house of a bishop could never have been a safe abiding
place, or have afforded any protection to the serfs who cultivated the
soil, and the rest of my lord bishop's people. If Bishop Roger and his
nephews did build some castles for the defence of their manors and the
people upon them, and did expend much money in temporalities, they did
also raise splendid edifices to the glory of God. Witness the great
church at Sarum, which Bishop Roger rebuilt after it had been injured by
fire and by tempest--witness the beautiful works done at Lincoln by
Bishop Alexander, who nearly rebuilt the whole of that cathedral; and at
Ely, by Bishop Nigel. And these three great prelates did make noble use
of their wealth, in bringing over from foreign parts good builders and
artisans, and men of letters and doctrine, to improve and teach in their
several ways the people of this island; and if Bishop Nigel was somewhat
overmuch given to hunting and hawking, and spent much time, as well as
much money, upon his falcons and falconers, doubtlessly it was because
the climate of Ely is cold and damp, and requireth much exercise of the
body for the conservation of health, and because the circumjacent fen
country doth incredibly and most temptingly abound with wild-fowl proper
for the hawk to fly at. But to the propositus. King Stephen, being
minded to plunder these three great prelates, did summon them all three
to his court at Oxenford, where many ravenous lay lords and some foreign
lords had previously assembled. The two nephews, apprehending no
mischief, and being young men and active, went willingly enough; but it
was otherwise with the uncle, who was now a very old man. Bishop Roger
had lost his relish for courts, and seemingly had some presentiment;
for, as he started on his journey, he was heard to say, "By my Ladie St.
Mary, I know not wherefore, but my heart is heavy; but this I do know
for a surety, that I shall be of much the same service at court as a
fool in battle." At Oxenford the three bishops were received with a
great show of courtesy, as men who had done notable service to the king,
and as men whom the king delighted to honour; but they had not been long
in the town when a fierce quarrel arose about quarters and purveyance
between the retainers of Bishop Roger and the followers of that
outlandish man the Earl of Brittany. The aged prelate would have stilled
this tumult, but the Bretons, who had been purposely set on by those
about the king, would not desist, and swords being drawn on both sides,
the affray did not end until many men of the commoner sort were wounded,
and one knight was slain. And hereupon it was wickedly given out that
the bishops' people had begun the affray, and that the three bishops had
set them on to break the king's peace, and murther his guests within the
precincts of his royal court. Bishop Roger, the uncle, was seized in the
king's own hall, and Alexander, the bishop of Lincoln, at his lodgings
in the town; but Bishop Nigel, who had taken up his quarters in a house
outside the town, getting to horse, galloped across the country, and
threw himself into the castle of Devizes, the strongest of all his
uncle's strongholds. And it was thought that the Bishop of Ely would not
have been able to do this, and to distance his pursuers by leaping hedge
and ditch, if he had not providentially practised hunting and hawking in
his easy days. Bishop Roger, and his less fortunate nephew Alexander,
bishop of Lincoln, were confined in separate dungeons at Oxenford. They
were severally told that the king held them as traitors, and that the
price of their liberation would be surrender unto Stephen of all their
castles and manors, with whatsoever treasure they contained; and those
who delivered the message chuckled at it, seeing that they hoped to have
a share in the great spoil. At first Bishop Roger and Bishop Alexander
did manfully refuse to give up anything, but bishops in dungeons and in
chains are weak, and kings be sometimes very strong; and after they had
been menaced with torture and death, the two prelates put their names
and seals to an act of surrender and renunciation, and the castles which
Roger had built at Malmsbury and Sherborne, and that which he had
enlarged and strengthened at Sarum, and the magnificent castle which
Bishop Alexander had built at Newark, together with other places of
strength, were taken possession of by the king's people, in virtue of
the orders of the two bishops to their own people. But the alert,
hard-riding, and warlike Bishop of Ely would not give up the castle of
Devizes, into which he had thrown himself on his escape from Oxenford;
and, counting on the strength of his uncle's best fortress, and on the
affection the garrison and the people of the neighbouring country bore
to his family, Nigel did defy the power of King Stephen. Our unhappy
ill-advised king, whom I have so often seen, and with whom I have so
often spoken in this our house at Reading, had not the head to conceive,
nor the heart to execute, the foul trick which followed. No! it was all
the contriving and the doing of some of his ill-advisers, of the Earl of
Brittany, or Sir Alberic de Vere, or some other or others of those
children of perdition. Fasting is commendable at some seasons, but
starvation is horrible at all. If a man starve himself, he is guilty of
the worst and most unnatural species of suicide; and if a man starve
another, certes he is guilty of the cruellest of murthers. That which
impresses on my mind the belief that the aforesaid Sir Alberic de Vere
was deep in this guilt, are the facts of which I have had assurance; to
wit, that Sir Alberic never afterwards gave a feast in his own castle,
without seeing the apparitions of two ghastly, pale, starving bishops
take their stand opposite to him, and knit their brows, and wave their
right hands, as if they were pronouncing a curse each time his plate was
laid before him or his wine-cup filled; and that the said Sir Alberic
did die at the last of angina, which closed up his throat and allowed no
food to pass. Bethink ye whether the knight did not then think of Bishop
Roger and his episcopal nephew! But the procedure to force the Bishop of
Ely to give up the strong castle of Devizes was this:--Bishop Roger and
his nephew, the Bishop of Lincoln, were loaded in their dungeons with
more chains, and orders were given that they should be kept without food
until the castle was delivered up to King Stephen. When Bishop Nigel was
told of this intent he could not believe it, nor was it easy, even in
those wicked days, for any man to conceive the world wicked enough to
starve two prelates. "I will keep mine uncle's castle for him," said
Bishop Nigel, "for they dare not do the thing they speak of." But,
alack! his lordship was soon convinced to the contrary; for Bishop Roger
himself, already pale and emaciated, was carried to Devizes, and made to
state his own case in front of his own castle. And the old man implored
his nephew to surrender, and so save the life of his uncle and that of
his brother: and then Bishop Nigel gave up that great fortress, and
thereupon Bishop Roger and Bishop Alexander were allowed to have food,
after they had been three days and three nights in a fearful fast.
Before long all three of the bishops were set at liberty, but they had
been plundered of nearly all they possessed. The evil advisers of King
Stephen got most of the spoil. The robbery did not even a momentary good
to the king, and terrible was the penalty he was made to pay for it. The
whole body of the dignified clergy turned against him; and even his own
brother, Henry, bishop of Winchester, who was now the Pope's legatus for
all England, did join the other bishops in charging Stephen with
sacrilege. It was his own brother, the legatus, who summoned the king to
appear before a synod of bishops at Winchester; and what is brotherly
love when weighed in the balance with the duty of every churchman to the
church? King Stephen would not attend _personaliter_, but he sent unto
Winchester that Sir Alberic de Vere of whom I have spoken; and Sir
Alberic went into the hall of synod with a great company of armed
knights, and did there much misuse the prelates of the land, and did
refuse, in Stephen's name, to make restitution to Bishop Roger and his
two nephews of that of which they had been despoiled; and when he had
done these things, Sir Alberic made appeal to the pope and dissolved the
council, the wicked knights with him drawing their swords to enforce
obedience. The bishops separated for that present, but every one of them
saw that madness and much wickedness had prepared the downfall of King
Stephen. Bishop Roger died of old age, and grief and indignation, and of
the fatal effects of that dread fast; and while he was dying, the plate
and money which he had saved from the king's rapacity, which he had
devoted to the completion of his glorious church at Sarum, and which he
had layed for safety upon the high altar, were seized and carried off by
some who cared not for the guilt of sacrilege, and who were so blind
that they could not see in what such crimes must end. Forty thousand
marks, by our Ladie, was the value of that which was stolen from the
shadow of the Holy of Holies!

Now some of the baronage and clergy did send messengers into Anjou to
invite the Empress Matilda into England, and to give her assurance good
that they would place her upon the throne of her late father. And the
ex-empress, being a woman of a high spirit, did presently come over with
her half-brother the Earl of Gloucester, and one hundred and forty
knights; and the two nephews of the late Bishop Roger and many of the
optimates did renounce their allegiance to King Stephen and join her
standard. Bishop Nigel, who would have continued to hold the castle of
Devizes if it had not been for that fearful fast, went into the Isle of
Ely, his own diocese, and there amidst the bogs and fens, and on the
very spot where Hereward the Lord of Brunn had withstood William the
Conqueror, he raised a great rampart and collected a great force against
Stephen. In other parts our bishops were seen mounted on war-horses,
clad in armour, and directing in the battle or the siege: and many and
bloody were the battles which were fought during two years, and until
King Stephen was surprised and defeated in the great battle of Lincoln,
and taken prisoner by the Earl of Gloucester, the half-brother of the
empress. Stephen was now thrown into a dungeon in Bristowe Castle, and
his brother the Bishop of Winchester and legatus acknowledged the right
and title of the empress, and led her in triumph to his cathedral church
at Winchester, and there blessed all who should be obedient to her, and
cursed all who should refuse to submit to her authority. And this being
done, Stephen's brother, the bishop and legate aforesaid, did convene an
assembly of churchmen to ratify her accession. At this synod the said
legate bore testimony against his brother, and said that God had
pronounced judgment against him; and the great churchmen, to whom it
chiefly belongs to elect kings and ordain them, did elect Matilda to
fill the place which Stephen's demerits had vacated. Yet some of the
clergy there were who did not think that they could be so easily
discharged of the oaths they had taken unto Stephen, or move so far in
this matter without a direct command from our lord the pope, and many
lords there were, as well of the laity as of the clergy, who did not
like Matilda the better for knowing more of her. But not one felt more
unhappy at these changes than our good lord abbat, who came back from
the last meeting of the clergy at Winchester well nigh broken-hearted;
for, albeit he lamented his errors, he had much affection for King
Stephen and great reverence to the obligations of an oath, and very
earnestly desired peace and happiness to the country.

Also was he and all of us of the house at Reading and all devout and
considerate men in the land, much consternated by great signs in the
heavens: for on the twenty-first of the kalends of March in the year of
our redemption eleven hundred and forty, while we were sitting at
dinner, there was so great an eclipse of the sun that we could not see
to eat our meat, and were forced to light candles, and when lights were
brought in our appetites were gone because of our great fear; and when
we went out to gaze at the obscured sun and blackened heavens we did
plainly see divers stars twinkling near the sun. And these sad sights
were seen all over the land, making men believe, while they lasted, that
chaos was come again, and that this day was to be the day of judgment.
Abbat Edward did interpret these things as omens of our future woe.

"I do foresee," said he, "that infinite woe will arise out of these our
distractions, and I can plainly see with only half of an eye that too
many of our magnates be looking to nothing but their own worldly
advantage. With this classis of men 'twill be down with Stephen and up
with Matilda to-day, and down with Matilda and up with Stephen
to-morrow; just as they hope to gain by the change. They will all find
in the end that they have miscalculated, but that will not heal the
wounds that will have been inflicted on the country through their
selfish unsteadiness, and lack of principle, and oath-breaking. The
ex-empress hath brought a pestilent set of hungry foreigners over with
her; and every one of them is looking for some great estate or bishopric
or abbey; others will follow, and they will have no bowels of compassion
for the people of this land. 'Tis true King Stephen hath done much amiss
or hath allowed evil things to be done in his name, but Matilda will do
worse, and will have less power than he to prevent the rapacity and
bloodthirstiness of others! Steel-clad barons and knights will not yield
obedience to the distaff. Even the church will be divided. St. John and
St. James to our aid! but my heart trembles for this house, and for the
poor townfolk of Reading, and the freemen and the serfs who have so long
lived in peace upon our manors; I am an old man--this journey to
Winchester hath added the weight of ten more years--I shall not live to
see an end to these troubles which have already lasted four years. Death
will relieve me from witnessing the worst; but when I am gone hence, oh
my brethren and children, put your faith in heaven, and remember that
the honestest policy is aye the best, and meditate night and day, and
labour hard, in order to lessen the sufferings of our poor vassals and
dependants."

Grieves me to say that some of our house who made many solemn
protestations now, did not in after-time do that which they ought to
have done.

Affairs were in this state, and the flames of civil war were raging all
round us, and the health of our good lord abbat was daily breaking more
and more, when the Empress Matilda passed through Reading without
stopping at our abbey to say an orison at her father's grave, being on
her way to Westminster, there to be crowned and anointed by those who
had crowned King Stephen only six years ago. But the citizens of London,
who were very bold and powerful, loved Stephen more than Matilda, and
before the coronation dresses could be got ready they rose upon her and
drove her from the city, flying on horseback and at first almost alone,
as she did. This time the daughter of the Beauclerc found it opportune
to come to our abbey, for she wanted food, lodging, and raiment, and
knew not where else to procure them. A messenger on a foundered horse
announced that she was coming, and by the time the man had put his beast
into our lord abbat's stable, a great cloud of dust was seen rolling on
the road beyond the Kennet from the eastward. "_Medea fert tristes
succos_--she is coming, and will bring poisons with her! She cometh in a
whirlwind," said our good lord abbat, "and albeit she is her father's
daughter--the lawfully begotten daughter of the founder of this house,
(though some men do say the contrary,) it grieves me that she cometh at
all. Last year, and at this same season of the year, we did lodge and
entertain King Stephen, and prayed God to bless him; and now must I
feast this wandering woman and cry God save Queen Matilda? The
unlettered and rustical people be slow of comprehension, yet will they
not have their hearts turned from us by seeing these rapid shiftings and
changings? And so soon as the commoner sort lose their faith or belief
in the principles of their betters, crime and havoc will have it all
their own way. This people--this already mixed people of Saxons and
Normans--will go backwards into blood, and there will be war between
cottage and cottage as well as between castle and castle!"

The empress-queen arrived at our gates, and with a numerous attendance;
for some had followed by getting stealthily out of London, and some had
joined her on the road. Sooth to say she was an imperious, and
despotical, and loud-voiced, manlike woman, and of a very imposing
presence. Maugre her hasty flight she had a coronet of gold on her head,
and a jewel like a star on her breast, and her garments were of purple
and gold. A foreign lord, with a truculent countenance, bore a naked
sword before her, and another knight, with a visage no less stern,
carried a jewelled sceptre.

"'Tis mine own father's house," said she as she came within our gates,
"'tis the gift and doing of mine own father, of blessed memory, and
much, oh monks! did you wrong him and me by entertaining within these
walls the foul usurper Stephen. The usurper is rotting in the nethermost
dungeon of Bristowe Castle, and there let him die; but, oh abbat, lead
me to my dear father's tomb, that I may say a prayer for the good of his
soul; and see in the coining place what money thou hast in hand, for
much do I lack money and must for the nonce be a borrower! Bid thy
people make ready a banquet in the hall, for we be all fasting and right
hungry; and send into the township and call forth each man that hath a
horse and a sword, in order that he may follow us to Oxenford, and help
to be our guard upon the way. Do these few things, oh abbat, and I will
yet hold thee in good esteem. The land rings with thy great wealth and
power. By Notre Dame of Anjou! 'tis a goodly house, and the walls be
strong, and the ditch round about broad and deep,--by the holy visage of
St. Luke! I will not hence to-night though all the rebel citizens of
London, that do swarm like bees from their hives, should follow me so
far."

Our good lord abbat could do little more than bow and cross himself, and
our prior of the bellicose humour, who partook in our abbat's affection
for King Stephen, reddened in the face and turned aside his face and
grinded his teeth, and muttered down his own throat, "Beshrew the
distaff! The Beauclerc, her sire, was more courteous unto clerks!"

Our sub-prior, being of a more supple nature, and being, moreover, not
without his hopes of being nominated to the abbatial dignity so soon as
our lord abbat should be laid under the chancel of the abbey church,
kneeled before the empress-queen, and then formed some of the monks _in
processionale_, and began lead the way to the sepulchre of Henricus
Primus. But this roused the abbat and threw the thoughts of our prior
into another channel, and the lord abbat said in a grim and loud whisper
unto the sub-prior, "I am chief here, and none must move without my
bidding;" and the prior said without any essay at a whisper, "Oh, sub,
seek not to climb above _me_!"

The proud woman reddened and said, "If ye would honour me, oh monks, as
your queen, make haste to do it! An ye will not, I can get me in without
your ceremonies. No time have I to lose, and money and aid must be
forthcoming!"

Then up spake the lord abbat Edward, and said in a loud voice, "Oh dread
ladie, when that king of peace and lion of justice, _Rex pacis et leo
justitiæ_, did found this house, he did give us his royal charter,
wherein it is said, 'Let no person, great or small, whether by violence
or as a due custom, exact anything or take anything from the persons,
lands, or possessions whatsoever belonging unto the monastery of
Reading; nor levy any money, nor ask any tax for the building of bridges
or castles, for carriages or for horses for carrying; nor lay any custom
or subsidy, whether for ship-money or tribute-money or for presents;
nor....'"

"Oh abbat of the close fist," said Matilda, "I only want to borrow."

"But we may not lend without full consent of all our chapter monks in
chapter assembled," quoth the prior.

"And the foundation charter of Henricus Primus," said our abbat,
"recommends all the successors of the said royal founder to observe the
charter as they wish for the divine favour and preservation, and
pronounces a malediction upon any one that shall infringe or diminish
his donations. Dread ladie, thou art the Beauclerc's daughter: the curse
of a father is hard to bear!"

There was some whispering and sign-making among her followers; but the
imperious woman said not a word: she only stretched out her right hand
and pointed forward, into the interior of our abbey.

We now formed in more proper order and went through the church to the
Beauclerc's grave, on the broad slab of which there burned unceasing
lamps, and sweet incense renewed every hour, and at the edge of which
there was ever some brother of the house telling his beads and praying
for the defunct king, the founder of the house. Dim was the spot, for
death is darkness, and too much light suits ill with the decaying flesh
and bones of mortal man, be he king or plough-hind; yet, as the
empress-queen entered, our acolytes touched the tips of three hundred
and sixty-five tapers--sweet smelling tapers made of the wax brought
from Gascony and Spain and Italie--and in an instant that dim sepulchral
place was flooded with light, the converging rays meeting and shining
brightest upon the black slab and the graven epitaph which began with
the proud titles of the Beauclerc king, and which ended with that
passage from holy writ which saith that all is vanity here below.

Matilda knelt and put her lips to that black slab (which she safely
might do, for it was kept clear of all dirt and dust, it being the sole
occupation of one of the lay brothers of our house to rub it every day
and keep it clean), and she said an orison, of the shortest, and made
some show of shedding tears; but then she quickly rose, and would have
gone forth from the vault or cappella. But the lord abbat was not minded
that the first visit paid by his daughter to the tomb of her father
should pass off with so little ceremony and devotion; and, he himself
taking the lead with his deep solemn voice, the Officium de Functorum,
or Service for the Dead, was recited and chanted. The empress-queen was
somewhat awed and moved, and there seemed to be penitential tears in her
eyes as we chaunted "Beati Mortui qui in Domino moriuntur;" but at the
last requiem "Æternam" she flung away from the place and began to talk
with a loud shrill voice of worldly affairs and of battles and
sieges--for the royal-born woman had the heart of a man and warrior, and
her grandfather the great Conqueror was not more ambitious or avid of
dominion than she.

When we had well feasted Matilda and those who followed her in the
abbat's apartment, we hoped she would be gone, for it was a long and
fine day of June, well nigh upon the feast of St. John, and she well
might have ridden half way to Oxenford before nightfall; but she soon
gave the abbat to understand that she had no intention of going so soon.
Without blushing she did ask how and where we monks could lodge her and
her women for the night, telling us that she could not think of
sleeping in the town, seeing that it was but poorly defended by walls
and bulwarks. The abbat looked at the prior, and all the fathers looked
at one another with astonishment, but the ungodly waiting-women, who
came all from Anjou and other foreign parts, only smiled and simpered as
they gazed at one another and observed our exceeding great confusion.

"In truth, royal dame," said our lord abbat, "it is against the rule of
our order to lodge females within our walls."

"But I am your queen, oh abbat," said Matilda, "and this is a royal
abbey, and my sire founded it and endowed it! Have I not, as my father's
daughter and lawful sovereign of this realm, the right to an exemption
from the severity of your ordinances?"

"Ladie," quoth the abbat, "I wit not that you have such right, or that
the rule of St. Benedict is in any case to be set aside."

"But it hath been set aside," said Matilda, "and queens and their
honourable damsels have slept in royal abbeys before now."

"That," quoth the abbat, "was before the Norman conquest, when, through
the indolence, carelessness, and gluttony of the Saxon monks, the
statutes of our order were generally ill-observed."

"But I tell thee, oh stubborn monk, that I, the empress-queen, that I,
thy liege ladie Matilda, have slept and sojourned in half the abbeys and
priories of England!"

"'Tis because of these civil wars which have so long raged to the
destruction of all discipline and order, and to the utter undoing of
this poor people of England! I, by the grace of God, abbat of Reading,
would not shape my conduct after the pattern of some abbats and priors
that be in this land, or willingly allow that which they perchance may
have permitted without protest, and to the spiritual dishonour of their
houses."

Here the eyes of the empress-queen flashed fire, and wrathful and
scornful was the voice with which she said unto our good lord abbat, in
presence of most of the community, "Shaveling, I am here, and will here
tarry so long as it suits my occasions! I believe thy traitorous
affection for my false cousin Stephen hath more to do with thine
obstinacy than any reverence thou bearest to the rules of thine order.
But, monk, 'tis too late! thou shouldest have kept thy gates closed! I
and my maidens are within thy house, and these my faithful knights will
see thee and thy brethren slain between the horns of the altar rather
than see the Queen of England thrust out like a vagrant beggar from the
abbey her own father founded!"

As the empress-queen said these words the knights knit their brows and
made a rattling with their swords. This did much terrify the major part
of our community, and I, Felix, being then of a timorous nature, and a
great lover of peace, as became my profession, did creep towards the
door of the hall. But our prior spoke out with a right manful voice
against the insults put upon our good abbat, telling the empress-queen
to her face that respect and reverence were due to the church even from
the greatest of princes; that her father, of renowned and happy memory,
would not so have treated the humblest servant of the church; and that
if this unseemly business should be put to the issue of arms--if swords
should be drawn over her royal father's grave--it might peradventure
happen that the armed retainers of the abbey would prove as good men as
these outlandish knights, and that the fathers and brothers of the house
would fight for their lives, as other servants of the church had
ofttimes been constrained to do in these turbulent, lawless, ungodly
days.

At this discourse of our bellicose prior the empress-queen turned pale
and her lip quivered, though more through wrath than fear, as it seemed
to me; but her knights left off noising with their swords; and one of
them, a native knight, spoke words of gentleness and accommodation, and
put it as an entreaty rather than as a command, that the queen should be
allowed to infringe our rules for only one night.

"My conscience doth forbid it," said our lord abbat, "for it may be made
a precedent, to the great injury and decay of our discipline. Therefore
do I solemnly enter my protest against it. But as I would not see this
holy house defiled by strife and blood, nor attempt a forcible
expulsion, I will quit mine apartments." And so saying, the lord abbat
withdrew, and was followed by all of us. The queen slept in the abbat's
bed; her maidens on the rushes, which were carried into that chamber
from the abbat's hall; and the knights and men-at-arms slept in the Aula
Magna. And, as our good abbat had foreseen, this evil practice was taken
as a precedent, in such sort that empresses and queens, and other great
princesses, have in these later times been often lodged in Benedictine
and in other houses; yet, wherever the abbats and monks entertain a
proper sense of their duty, they lodge these visitors in the lord
abbat's house, apart from the religious community.

But before sleeping, the empress-queen did many things, for it still
wanted some hours of the Ave Maria, and many were the stormy thoughts
that were working in her brain. Two of her knights we allowed to go out
of the house by the postern-gate, but farther ingress we granted to
none; and not only did our armed retainers keep watch for us, but our
monks, under the vigilant eye of the prior, did also keep watch and ward
all through that evening and night, for we feared some extreme mischief;
and it would not have failed to happen if Matilda had been enabled to
get her partisans in greater force within the house. In truth, not many
of our community knew that night what sleep was. The materials for an
abundant supper were furnished to the empress-queen and her people; and
some of these last were singing ungodly songs in the abbat's great hall
when our church-bell told the midnight hour; yea, there was a noise of
singing, and a running to and fro, and a squealing of womanly voices
long after that, to the great sorrow and shame of the fathers of our
house. I, Felix, albeit only a novice, was of those who slept not. And I
saw a great sight. Watching in the eastern turret, I did see a fiery
meteor, hirsute like a comet, but not so big, shoot up from the marshes
on the other side of the Kennet, not far from the back of our abbey; and
this meteor, as it passed over our house, did divide itself into three
several parts, and these did rush away to the westward as quick as
lightning, and there drop and disappear. Before the night came again I
was made to understand what these things meant.




IV.


From all ungodly guests _libera nos_! Although they had feasted so late
at night, the people of the empress did make an early call for a
matutinal refection; and our good chamberlain and coquinarius and
cellarius were made to bestir themselves by times, and sundry of our lay
brothers and servitors, to the great endangering of their souls, were
made to run with viands and drink into our lord abbat's hall, and there
wait upon the daughter of the Beauclerc and her foreign black-eyed
damsels, who did shoot love-looks at them and discompose their monastic
sobriety and gravity by laying their hands upon their sleeves and
twitching their hoods for this thing and that (for the young Jezebels
spoke no English), and by singing snatches of love songs at them, even
as the false syrens of old did unto the wise Ulysses. Certes, the
founder of our order, the blessed Benedict, did know what he was a-doing
when he condemned and prohibited the resort of women to our houses and
their in-dwelling with monks. Monks are mortal, and mortal flesh is
weak: _et ne nos inducas in tentationem_.

It was still an early hour, not much more than half way between prima
and tertia, when more troubles came upon us. The two knights who had
been sent forth by the daughter of the Beauclerc to make an espial into
the condition of the country, and to summon her friends unto her,
returned to our gate with a large company of knights and men-at-arms,
and demanded to be readmitted. Our good abbat, calling together the
fathers of the house, held counsel with them; and it was agreed that to
admit so great a company of men of war would be perilous to our
community; and even our bellicose prior did opine that our people would
be too few to protect the abbey if these men without should be joined to
those the empress had within. It was our prior who addressed that great
company from the porter's window over the gateway, telling them that the
two knights who had come from London with the empress might be
readmitted, but that our doors would not be unbarred even unto them
unless the rest of that armed host went to a distance into the King's
Mead. Hereat there arose a loud clamour from those knights and
men-at-arms, with great reproaches and threats. Yea, one of those
knights, Sir Richard à Chambre, who was in after time known for a most
faithless man, and a variable, changing sides as often as the moon doth
change her face, did call our lord abbat apostate monk and traitor, and
did threaten our good house with storm and spoliation. The major part of
us had gathered in front of the house to see and hear what was passing;
but, alack! we were soon made to run towards the back of the abbey, for
while Sir Richard à Chambre was discoursing in this unseemly strain, and
shaking his mailed fist at the iron bars through which he could scantly
see the tip of our prior's nose, a knight on foot, who wore black mail
and a black plume in his casque, and who never raised his visor and
scarce spoke word after these few, came running round the eastern angle
of the abbey walls, shouting "'Tis open! 'tis ours! Win in, in the name
of Matilda!" The voice that said these few words seemed to not a few of
us to have been heard before, but we had no time to think of that. The
armed host set up a shout, and ran round for our postern gate, which
openeth upon the Kennet, and we all began to run for the same, our lord
abbat wringing his hands, and saying "The postern! the postern! some
traitor hath betrayed us!"

Now our postern was secured by two great locks of rare strength and
ingenuity of workmanship, and the keys thereof were not intrusted to the
portarius, but were always kept by the sub-prior, and without these keys
there was no undoing the door either from within or from without. As he
ran from the great gateway, I heard our prior say in an angry voice unto
the sub-prior, "Brother Hildebrand, how is this? Where be the keys?" And
I heard the sub-prior make response, "On my soul, I know not how it is,
but verily the keys I did leave under the pallet in my cell."

When we came into the paved quadrangle, we found some of our retainers
hastily putting on their armour; but when we came into the garden, we
found it thronged with men already armed, and we saw the postern wide
open and many more warriors rushing in through it: the evil men who had
stayed with the queen, and who had so much abused our hospitality, had
already joined the new comers, and the united and still increasing force
was so great that we could not hope to expel them and save our house
from robbery and profanation. Our very prior smote his breast in
despair. But our good abbat, though of a less bellicose humour, had no
fear of the profane intruders, for he stood up in the midst of them and
upbraided them roundly, and threatened to lay an interdict upon them all
for the thing that they were doing. But anon the empress herself came
forth with one that waved a flag over her head, and at sight hereof the
sinful men set up a shouting and fell to a kissing, some the flag, which
was but a small and soiled thing, and some--on their knees--the hand of
the Beauclerc's daughter; and while this was passing, those foreign
damsels came salting and skipping, and clapping their hands and talking
Anjou French, into the garden. There was one of them attired in a short
green kirtle that had the smallest and prettiest feet, and the largest
and blackest eyes, and the longest and blackest eyelashes, and the
laughingest face, that ever man did behold in these parts of the world;
and she danced near to me on those tiny pretty feet, and glanced at me
such glances from those black eyes, that my heart thumped against my
ribs; but the saints gave me strength and protection, and I pulled my
hood over my eyes and fell to telling my beads, and thus, when others
were backsliders, I, Felix the novice, was enabled to stand steadfast in
my faith.

The empress had taken no heed of our lord abbat, or of any of us; but
when she had done welcoming the knights that came to do her service,
and, imprimis, to escort her on her way to Oxenford, she turned unto the
abbat and said, "Monk, thou art too weak to cope with a queen, the
daughter of a king, the widow of an emperor, and one from whom many
kings will spring. But by thy perversity, which we think amounts to
treason, thou hast incurred the penalty of deprivation; and when we
have time for such matters, or at the very next meeting of a synod of
bishops and abbats, I will see that thou art both deprived and
imprisoned."

"That synod," said our abbat very mildly, "will not sit so soon, and
from any synod I can appeal to his holiness the Pope."

"Fool!" quoth Matilda, with the ugliest curl of the lip I ever beheld;
"obstinate fool! the Pope's legate is our well-beloved subject and
friend the Bishop of Winchester."

"See that you keep his allegiance! He hath put you upon a throne, and
can pull you down therefrom!" So spake our prior, who could not stomach
the irreverent treatment the Countess of Anjou put upon his superior,
and who knew that Matilda had in various ways broken her compact with
him, and done deeds highly displeasing to King Stephen's brother, the
tough-hearted Bishop of Winchester.

"Beshrew me!" quoth Matilda; "but these Reading monks be proud of
stomach and rebellious! Sir Walleren of Mantes, drive them into their
church, and see that they quit it not while we tarry here."

"I will," said the foreign knight; "and also will I see that they do
sing the _Salve, Regina_."

And this Sir Walleren and other unknightly knights drew their swords and
called up their retainers; and before this ungodly host the abbat and
prior and the monks were all compelled to retreat into the church,
leaving the whole range of the abbey to those who had so unrighteously
invaded it. But as soon as we were in the choir, instead of singing a
_Salve, Regina_, we did chant _In te, Domine, speravi_.

A strong guard was put at the church-door and in the cloisters; but it
was not needed, as we could oppose no resistance to those who were now
robbing our house; and as it had been determined therefore that all who
had come into the church should remain, with psalmody and prayer, until
these men of violence should take their departure from the abbey, or
complete their wickedness by driving us from it. As they ransacked our
house, as though it had been a castle taken by storm, and as they
shouted and made such loud noises as soldiers use when a castle or a
town hath been successfully stormed, we only chanted the louder in the
choir. For full two hours did these partisans of Matilda ransack the
abbey, with none to say them nay. At the end of that time, when they had
gotten all that they considered worth taking, that ill-visaged knight
Sir Walleren of Mantes came to the church-door, and called forth the
abbat and prior, saying that the queen would speak with them before she
went, and give them a lesson which they might remember. Though thrice
summoned in the name of the queen, the heads of our house did not move,
nor would they have gone forth at all if the fierce Sir Walleren
aforesaid had not sent in a score of pikes to drive them, or prick them
from their seats. Nay, even then, the prior would have run not unto the
door, but unto the altar; but the good abbat, fearing that God's house
might be desecrated by blood, took the prior by the sleeve, and
whispered a few soothing words to him, and so led him out into the
cloisters; and then all we who had been driven into the church followed
the abbat and the prior, and went to the quadrangle, where was the queen
on horseback, mounted on the lord abbat's own grey palfrey, which had
been stolen from the stable, together with every horse and mule that our
community possessed. It was a sad sight; and the lord abbat's master of
the horse and his palfrey-keeper were wringing their hands at it. Our
good cattle, save and except the lord abbat's palfrey and a fine
war-horse which had appertained to one of our knights, but which was now
mounted by that silent knight in the black mail, who never raised his
visor, were loaded with the spoils of our own house, to wit, the coined
money taken out of our mint, provisions, corn, wine, raiment, and goodly
furnishings. The masked knight had a plain shield, carried by his page,
and no cognizance whereby he might be known: he held in his hand one of
the queen's reins, and by his gestures, and his constant looking to the
great gate of our house, which was now thrown wide open, he seemed very
eager to be gone. As our lord abbat, with his hand still upon the
prior's sleeve, came through the crowd and nigh to the space where
Matilda sat upon his own palfrey, she first frowned upon him and then
laughed at him, and between laughing and frowning said--"Oh abbat that
shalt not be abbat long, thou hast comported thyself like a traitor and
a very churl in stinting thy queen of that which she needed, in
begrudging hospitality to these fair damsels, and in barring thy doors
against these my gallant knights and faithful people. For this have we,
for the present, relieved thy house of some of its superfluous stuff. It
is not well that disloyal monks be so well supplied and furnished, when
a queen, and noble ladies, and high-born knights be unprovided and bare,
and forced by treasons foul to flee from place to place as if they were
accursed Israelites. Light meals are followed by light digestion, and
abstinence is favourable to prayer and devotion. Yet have we taken
nothing from ye, O monks, but what is rightfully ours, or was given ye
by my father of thrice glorious memory."

"Oh Empress, or Countess of Anjou, or Queen of England, if so must be,
the deeds which have been done in this holy house, built and endowed by
thy father for the expiation of his sins, will make the bones of thy
father turn in his grave, and will bring down a curse upon the heads of
thee and thy party. Bethink thee, and repent while it is yet time! Thy
father, the father of his people and the peace of his country, _Pax
patriæ, gentisque suæ Pater_, did for the good of his own soul found
this abbey, and endow it with the town and manor of Reading, and with
all the lands which had aforetime belonged to the nunnery of Reading and
the monasteries of Cholsey and Leominster (which houses had been
destroyed in our old wars), and he did make it one of the royal mitred
abbeys, and did give the lord abbat privilege to coin his own money, by
having a mint and mintmaster. Other donations did he make, and other
privileges and honours did he confer upon our community. And hath not
our lord the pope by a special bull confirmed and sanctified this kingly
grant, and taken our house, with all its possessions and appurtenances,
to wit, lands cultivated and uncultivated, its manors, meadows, woods,
pastures, mills, fisheries, and all other, under the protection of the
holy Roman see? And hath not his holiness decreed that none are to
disturb our house, or to lay an impious hand on our possessions, or to
keep, or diminish the same, or in any other way give us trouble; but
that all that we have and hold is to be kept under the government of the
monks, and for the pious uses for which it was given? And in the same
bull hath not the pope blessed those who keep this commandment, and
cursed those who in any way break it? Unless thou makest restitution
thou wilt be denied the viaticum on thy death-bed--_et a sacratissimo
corpore et sanguine Dei et Domini nostri aliena fiat_."

At these words spoken, the countess did somewhat tremble on the palfrey,
and turn pale; but one of her wicked advisers from beyond sea said that
she did but borrow, and would make restitution at the fitting time, and
that we, being so rich, could well spare some of our substance.

Our treasurer, who would not deign to speak to this foreign marauder,
said to the countess, "Oh, ill-advised ladie, we be none so rich, and
much is expected from us. By thy father's endowment full two hundred
monks are to be kept for aye in this his royal abbey, and we be as yet
scantly more than one hundred and two score. Also do the good people
that we have drawn to this township of Reading look to us for present
employment and support; and herein have we much laboured, for the good
of the realm, and the happiness of the commoner sort. In the days of thy
grandfather, the dread Conqueror of this kingdom, when the Domesday-book
was made, Reading had only twenty-nine houses; but now look abroad, and
see how new houses have risen, and men have increased under the shadow
of our peaceful walls."

"There will be woe and want among that industrious people," said abbat
Edward, "if thou carriest away from us this great spoil, and all the
money that we have minted! The curse of the poor, which is the next
terriblest thing to the curse of God and holy church, will cling to
thee, oh countess, or queen! Look to it, oh Matilda! I see the crown
already dropping from thy head."

"This is treason!" said the silent knight with his visor down, in a
voice which made all of us start, for it sounded like that of one who
had lately been our fast friend.

Matilda, rising in her saddle, with glaring eyes and reddened cheek,
said, "And I, rebel monk, do see the mitre falling from thy head. Thou
wilt not be abbot of Reading this time next month."

"_Fiat voluntas_, let the will of God be done," replied our lord abbat.

"And now," quoth the violent daughter of the Beauclerc, "let us ride on
our way for Oxenford. Methinks we be now strong enough to defy all
traitors on the road." And she struck with her riding-wand the grey
palfrey, which it much grieved our abbat to lose, and followed by her
knights and her leering and laughing foreign damsels, she rode out at
our gate, and with a great host departed from Reading.

When the evil-doers were all gone we made fast our doors, and proceeded
to examine the condition of our house and its community. They had
completely emptied the buttery, the store-house, the granary, the
wine-cellar; they had so stripped the lord abbat's house and the lodging
of the prior that there was nothing left in them save the tables and
chairs, the mats and rushes; they had broken open both treasury and
sacristy, and had stolen thence all our most precious relics, and all
our gold and silver vessels, and all our portable pictures and
crucifixes; they had not left us so much as a patera, a chalice, or an
encensoire; they had even laid their impious thievish hands upon the
silver lamp which had been used to burn day and night at the head of the
Beauclerc's tomb, and they had carried off with them the Agnus Dei and
the jewelled cross which Henricus Primus had worn for many years of his
life, and which, at his order, had been laid upon his tomb. That silver
lamp had been sent to the abbey by Queen Adelise, the Beauclerc's second
and surviving wife, who, on the first anniversary of the Beauclerc's
death, gave us the manor of Aston in Hertfordshire, offering a pall upon
the altar in confirmation of the grant; and who likewise gave us the
land of Reginald, the Forester, at Stanton-Harcourt, nigh unto Oxenford,
and afterwards the patronage and revenues of the church of
Stanton-Harcourt, to supply the cost of the silver lamp, which she
herself did order should burn continually before the pix and the tomb of
her late husband. Yet Matilda and her plundering band had carried off
this precious cresset--and long did they prevent us getting any rent or
revenues from the lands which Queen Adelise had granted us. Not the most
recondite and secret part of our house had escaped their search. Much
did we marvel at this, until, calling over the roll, we found that three
members of our community did not answer to their names. The three
missing were, two novices, to wit, young Urswick, the whiteheaded, from
Pangbourne, and John Blount from Maple-Durham, and one full monk, to
wit, Father Anselm, of Norman birth, who had but lately taken the vows,
but who had been much employed by our treasurer in offices of trust. The
two novices (may their souls be assoiled!) had been wiled away by those
young Jezebels, and had put on warlike harness, and had gone with
Matilda to serve her as men-at-arms: Father Anselm, being a
well-favoured man, had found favour in the sight of the Countess of
Anjou, and had gone with her to be her mass-priest, and to aim at some
vacant bishopric or abbey. Well had it been for us if he had never come
back to Reading. Heavy suspicions had fallen upon our sub-prior
Hildebrand, touching the postern gate; but it was ascertained upon
inquiry, that Urswick, the whiteheaded, who had been wont to wait upon
the sub-prior, did, at the bidding of Matilda, or of one of her damsels,
steal the keys and undo the door.

Besides the three deserters from our own body, we found that divers of
our armed retainers had taken service with the errant countess, and had
gone away with her with their arms and horses; and that even one of our
knights, who did service for the lands of the abbey he held, had
forgotten his bounden duty and his honour in a sudden fantastic
affection for a pair of black eyes.

We were bemoaning our losses, and our exceeding great calamity and
disgrace, and wondering where we should get a dinner, when, some three
hours after the departure of Matilda, and the host that followed her
standard, another great body of horse and foot, bearing the banner of
King Stephen, marched towards our gates, demanding meat and drink, and
vowing, with many soldier-like profane oaths, that they would burn and
destroy all such as were not for Stephen. The new alarm thus created
was, however, but short, for some noble barons and knights, who had been
riding in the rear, came spurring up to the van, which was now halting
in the Falbury, and among these we saw, with his vizor down, that right
noble lord Sir Alain de Bohun, Lord of Caversham and the well-beloved
nephew of our lord abbat, whose sad heart was much rejoiced at his so
sudden appearance.

"Be it King Stephen or Queen Matilda," said the abbat, "let us throw
open our gates to our well-beloved nephew, for he will not see harm done
to us, and now, verily, we have nothing to lose but lives not worth the
taking." And the gates were thrown open, and Sir Alain was welcomed and
affectionately greeted by his uncle; and after many expressions of
astonishment and indignation at the wrongs which had been done us, Sir
Alain and divers of the lords and knights with him retired for a space
to the lord abbat's despoiled and naked apartment, with the lord abbat
and our prior, and some other fathers. I was not of that council, being
but a novice, nor can I say it that I ever learned in after times _all_
that was said in it; but I do know that when it was finished (and it
lasted not long) the prior came forth with a very confident countenance,
and told us all that the Bishop of Winchester, the pope's Legatus à
latere, had changed sides, that Stephen of Blois was still King Stephen,
and that we must sing a _Te Deum laudamus_ for that same. And we all
went forthwith into our church, and the barons and knights went in after
us, and we admitted as many as the church would hold of those
men-at-arms, and bill-men and bow-men, that had halted in the Falbury
with King Stephen's banner, and albeit we were hungry and faint, we sang
the _Te Deum_ for Stephen with sonorous voices.

Sir Alain de Bohun, one of the very few lords of England that never
changed sides during these nineteen years of revolutions and wars, had
fought bravely for King Stephen in the great battle at Lincoln, where
other barons and knights had deserted with all their forces to Matilda's
illegitimate brother and commander the Earl of Gloucester; and after
Stephen had been taken prisoner (not until both his sword and battle-axe
had been broken), Sir Alain had escaped from the field and had joined
one of the many leagues of nobles who vowed never to submit to the
distaff, or allow the Countess of Anjou to be Queen of England. In the
five months which had passed since the battle of Lincoln, Sir Alain had
fought in sundry other battles, and had given heart to many a knight,
who, after the synod of Winchester, had despaired of the cause of King
Stephen. He had appeared with a good body of horse, and the standard of
Stephen, on the southern side of Thamesis, opposite the city of London,
and his appearance had encouraged the citizens to rise and drive out
Matilda. And the day before, appearing in the suburb of London, Sir
Alain de Bohun had been at Guildford, and had there conferred with
Stephen's queen, the good Maud, and also with Stephen's brother, the
Bishop of Winchester, who did already repent him of that which he had
done in synod. But that the bishop had met either Queen Maud or Sir
Alain was for the present kept secret.

The Lord of Caversham and his friends had crossed the river, and entered
London city within an hour of Matilda's flight. Having toiled far that
same day, the horses of the king's party were weary, and could not give
pursuit; but after short rest they followed the flying queen along the
great road which leads to the westernmost parts of our island. Jesu
Maria! had they come unto Reading a few hours sooner, before the arrival
of that battalia which the two knights Matilda had sent forth from our
abbey had collected, the violent woman might have been made prisoner,
and our house have been saved from plunder. But now the horses of King
Stephen's friends were again aweary, and though Sir Alain and the noble
barons with him were stronger in foot soldiers, they were much weaker in
horse than the host which had left Reading with the countess, who, upon
these sundry considerations, and for that she had been gone more than
two hours, was let go on her road to Oxenford without pursuit.

The burghers of Reading who had endeavoured to save themselves from
plunder and violence by throwing up their caps and shouting for the
errant queen, but who had been plundered and beaten all the same (nay,
divers of them were wounded by sword and lance, and cruelly maimed), now
came to our abbey-gates, making their throats hoarse with shouting for
King Stephen and the good and gracious Lord of Caversham; and some of
the richer franklins of the township and neighbourhood, who had escaped
being plundered by Matilda's party, upon learning the sad case in which
we, the monks, had been left, hastened to bring us meat and drink.

Sir Alain de Bohun, who had not seen his wife or his home for many a sad
day, was about to ride across the fields homeward, when his ladie's page
was seen running across the King's Mead towards our abbey.

"Yonder comes one from Caversham," said Sir Alain; "and I read by his
looks and his hurry that he bringeth no good news!"

"Fear not," said the abbat, who saw that his nephew's cheek was growing
pale, "for the saints have ever defended thy roof-tree, and as I told
thee before, the Ladie Alfgiva and the children were as well as well
could be at the hour of noon of yesterday, when I did see them."

Nevertheless, the little page did bring bad news, or tidings which much
afflicted Sir Alain and our lord abbat. There had been treachery at
Caversham, and a fast friend had played loose. That sweet babe, the
daughter of Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe, who had caused our household so
much dismay four years agone, and had sent me and Philip the lay-brother
on the night-journey to Sir Alain de Bohun's castle, had dwelt in that
castle ever since, and had been nurtured with all delicacy and honour,
like a child of the house. For a long season Sir Ingelric, her father,
had no safe home unto which he could take her; for since the beginning
of these unhappy wars, no house in England could be called safe that was
not moated and battlemented, and strongly garrisoned; and if Sir
Ingelric had possessed a castellum, he had no gentle dame unto whom he
could confide his infant female child. But the Ladie Alfgiva was as
tender as a mother to this babe, and this tenderness became the greater
when death deprived her of her own little daughter. Sir Ingelric of
Huntercombe, who had taken vengeance on the destroyer of his wife and
home, Sir Jocelyn de Brienne, in the Falbury almost at our abbey gates,
seemed engaged for life in a blood-feud with Sir Jocelyn's family and
friends, and to be for ever wedded to the party of King Stephen by the
strong ties of necessity and revenge. Many were the combats he had
fought between that time his house and wife were burned, and the time
when King Stephen prepared for that campaign which had ended so
disastrously at Lincoln. During this long and busy interval he went not
often to Caversham, so that his child grew up with little knowledge of
him. The little Alice was wont to call Sir Alain de Bohun her father,
even as she called the Ladie Alfgiva mother. Once or twice within the
last twelve months Sir Ingelric had said, that since his house was well
nigh rebuilt, he should have a safe bower for his daughter, and that
Alice must soon home with him; and each time he had said the words the
child had run from him to the Ladie Alfgiva, and had clung round her
neck, weeping and saying that she would not leave her mother; and her
playmate and champion, that right gallant boy Arthur de Bohun, the only
son, and now the only child, of Sir Alain, who was some four years older
than Alice, said that she must not leave him. It was noticed upon these
occasions, that although Sir Ingelric began as in a jest, his
countenance soon grew dark and his voice harsh, and that he almost shook
his child when he took her on his knee and told her that she must love
her father, and must not always be a burthen unto other people. Nay,
the last time that he said these words he pressed the little Alice's arm
so violently that he left the blackening marks of his fingers upon it.
Other things were noted as well by Sir Alain de Bohun as by the Ladie
Alfgiva. It is not every man that is chastened by calamity. Sir
Ingelric's great misfortune had made him fierce, proud, and rebellious
to the will of Heaven; and, in losing his fair young wife, he had lost
his best guide and monitor. He became hard of heart, and grasping, and
covetous; and as for more than three years the party of King Stephen had
been almost everywhere victorious, he had abundant opportunities of
satisfying his appetite for havoc and booty. But the more he gained the
more he wished to get, and by degrees he gave up his whole soul to
avarice and ambition. Sir Alain de Bohun, who looked for no advantage
unto himself, who adhered to King Stephen out of loyalty and affection,
and who kept out of the horrible and unnatural warfare as much as he
thought his duty would allow him, entertained apprehensions that his
friend Sir Ingelric loved the war for what he gained by it, and would
not be very steady to any losing party. Sir Ingelric, however, had
fought bravely for King Stephen at Lincoln, and had there been taken
prisoner. But he had paid a ransom to his captor, and had been some time
at large, busied in putting the finishing hand to the strong castle
which he had raised on his lands at Speen. Though the distance was so
short to Caversham, he had not gone once thither until the evening of
the unhappy day on which the Countess of Anjou had come to our
abbey--that is, the evening of yesterday--but then he had told the
Ladie Alfgiva that as the weather was so fine and the country so
tranquil (alack! the good people at Caversham had not seen the arrival
of Matilda and her young Jezebels at our abbey), he would take the two
children forth for a walk in the meadows by the river side; and the
false knight had gone forth with the children, and neither he nor the
children had since been seen or heard of. As the little page came to
this point in his dismal story, not only our prior, but several of us
less entitled to speak in such a presence, cried out, "That knight in
the black mail who kept his vizor down, and that went away with the
countess, was none other than Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe;" and our
abbot said, "Verily, the voice was that of Sir Ingelric!"

"Woe for these changes!" said Sir Alain de Bohun, "woe and shame upon
them. If men have no faith even with old friends--if men do shift from
side to side like the inconstant wind, this war will never know an end,
and truth, and honour, and mercy will depart the land! Sir Ingelric of
Huntercombe! I aided thee in thy wretchedness, and King Stephen did
afterwards hand thee on the road to riches and greatness. I first gave
thee money and the labour of my serfs that thou mightest re-edify thy
house, but now thou hast built to thyself a strong castle, wherein thou
thinkest thou canst defy me, now thou believest the cause of Stephen to
be desperate, and therefore dost thou raise thy hand against me, and
steal away, like a thief, not only the child that was thine own, but
also mine only son, that the woman of Anjou may have my dearest hostage
in her power. May God of his mercy protect my dear boy! But, oh Sir
Ingelric, thy treachery is ill-laid and ill-timed, thy cunning is
foolishness. Great things have happened since thou hast been
castle-building, and thou wilt find that thou hast quitted the stronger
for the weaker party. Hereafter will I make thee pay, if not for thy
black ingratitude to me, for thy disloyalty to thy too bountiful king,
and for the tears my ladie wife will shed for her double loss!"

Here moisture very like a tear stood in the eyes of the Lord of
Caversham: but grief gave way to wrath as he said that the felon knight
might have taken his own child, which would long since have been in its
grave but for the Ladie Alfgiva, without robbing him of his son.

Our good abbat, who had his prophetic seasons, said, "Grieve not, my
well-beloved nephew. The two children will do well together, and thou
wilt soon have them restored to thy house: they were born to be together
and love one another, and so will not be separated. Alice will repay
thee hereafter for the ingratitude and treasons and other evil doings of
her father."

Here I, Felix the novice, and Philip the lay-brother, who had carried
little Alice from the abbey unto Caversham, and who had loved the child
ever since, did say "Amen! amen! So be it."

"The children," said an honest franklin who had stood by all the time of
these discourses, "be surely gone with the Countess of Anjou for
Oxenford; as on the road beyond the town I saw a blue-eyed boy riding
before a man-at-arms, and a little girl in the arms of a waiting-woman
who rode close to the countess on a piebald horse, and both the children
were crying piteously."

"Then will we recover them at Oxenford," said one of the knights.

Sir Alain de Bohun, with a part of the company who had come with him,
mounted for Caversham; and when Sir Alain began to ride, I could see
that he rode hotly and impatiently. The rest of the knightly company we
entertained in the abbey as best we could, and lodged them for that
night, the good franklins having brought us in some clean straw and
rushes for that purpose. The commoner sort slept in the open air on the
Falbury, with their weapons by their sides.

But before the troublous day was finished, other dismal tidings and
sights of woe were brought to our house. John Appold and Ralph Wain, two
franklins whilome of good substance, who farmed some of our outstanding
abbey lands beyond Pangbourne, came to tell us that their houses had
been burned, their granaries emptied, and the plough-hinds and shepherds
and all the serfs driven away by Matilda's people, who had chained them
together by their iron neck-collars, and had goaded them before them
like cattle with the points of their lances. And before these sad tales
were well ended, Will Shakeshaft, a faithful steward who dwelt in a
house our lord abbat had at Purley, arrived on a maimed horse, and with
a ghastly cut across his face, to let us know that violence had been
done to his wife, and that that fair house had been burned also. A
little later there came three of our poor serfs howling so that it was
dreadful to hear, and holding in the air their red and still bleeding
stumps. They had been amputated and then liberated, in order that they
might go forth and show all the people what they had to expect if they
opposed or so much as forbore to aid and join the empress-queen. As the
night became dark, we could trace the march of the countess by a line of
fire and smoke. Such were the things which drove the poor people of
England into impiety and blasphemy, making them say that Christ and the
saints had fallen asleep! And these things lasted in the land for
fifteen more years.




V.


When baptized Christian men did steal the children of other Christian
men, yea, and torture and slay them, no marvel was it that the
unconverted Israelites, who had been allowed to come into the land in
great numbers since the Norman conquest, should do deeds of the like
sort. So it was, that in King Stephen's reign the rich Jews of Norwich
did buy a Christian child from its poor parents a little before Easter,
and on the Long Friday, when the church was mourning for the crucifixion
of our Lord, they tortured him after the same manner as our Lord was
tortured, and did nail him on a rood in mockery of our Saviour; and
afterwards buried him. These sacrilegious and cruel Jews thought that
their horrible crime would be concealed, but it was revealed from above,
and the people of Norwich smote the Jews and tortured them as they
merited; and the Lord showed that the Christian child was a holy martyr:
and the monks took him and buried him with all honour and reverence in
Norwich Minster; and he is called Saint William, and through our Lord
wonderful miracles are wrought at his tomb even in our own day, and his
festival is kept with becoming solemnity on the twenty-fifth of the
kalends of March.

Sad and sinful was it for Christian parents to sell their children to
Jew, or even to Gentile. The evil practice had once been common in
England, and in the port of Bristowe children were once sold in great
numbers to be carried into Ireland and elsewhere; but the church had put
down the unnatural traffic, and when King Stephen came to the throne no
freeman would have sold his child. But want and hunger now severed the
natural tie, and starving parents sold their starving children rather
than see them die before their eyes and they unable to help them. Yea,
frantic mothers would give their infants from their dried-up breasts to
any strangers that would promise to nourish them. _Horresco repetens!_ I
do shudder in the telling of it, but so it was. Fair English children
were again sold to traffickers on the western coast, who carried them
into Ireland, and in such numbers that the slave-market of the Irishry
was all over-stocked with them. In the happy and plentiful days which
now be in the land such things are hard to believe; but I, as a novice,
did often see them with mine own eyes, and the causes that led
thereunto. Yea, have I seen the poor people of England roaming by the
wayside and eating garbage which scarcely the fox or the foul birds of
the air would touch, rambling in the woods and fields in search of roots
and berries, ay, grazing on the bank-side like cattle, or that great
sinner Nebuchadnezzar; for flocks and herds were swept away, and
slaughtered, and wasted by the armed bands that ever ranged the country,
or were kept penned up within the castles of the strong men--those
pestilent barons and knights that were now for Matilda and now for
Stephen, and always for plunder and all crime, living and fattening
upon great and bloody thievings--_magna et sanguineolentia latrocinia_:
and the fields could not be cultivated because of the continual passing
and repassing, and burning, and fighting, and slaying of these armed
hosts and bands of robbers, who did worse than the heathen had ever
done; for after a time they spared neither church nor churchyard,
neither a bishop's land nor an abbat's land, and not more the lands of a
priest than the fields of a franklin, but plundered both monks and
clerks! And so it came to pass that nearly every man that could, robbed
another, and carried away his wife or daughter, and did with her what he
list. If two men or three came riding to a town, all the township fled,
concluding them to be robbers. Some of our bishops and learned men
continually did excommunicate them and curse them; but the effect
thereof was nought, for they were one and all accursed, and forsworn,
and abandoned; and grieves me to say that too many bishops and churchmen
were men of violent and unsteady councils and castle-builders
themselves, waging war like the lay lords, and being as void as they of
steadiness and loyalty, and mercy for the people. Verily I myself have
seen prelates clad in armour and mounted on war-horses, even as at the
time of the Conquest, and in that guise directing the siege or the
attack, or drawing lots with the rest for the booty. The strong men
constantly laid gilds on the towns, and called it by a Norman name which
signifyeth _torture_; and when the poor townfolk had no more to give,
then they plundered and burned the towns; so that thou mightest go a
whole day's journey and never behold a man sitting in a town or see a
field that was tilled. To till the ground was as useless as to plough
the sea, for no man could hope to reap that which he sowed. Thus the
earth bare little or no corn; and bread became of a fearful dear price;
and flesh, and cheese, and butter were there none for the poor. Ay,
franklins who had been rich men, and who had kept good house and been
bountiful to the poor and to mother church, were seen begging alms on
the road. Many of the poorest died of hunger on a soil which God had
blessed with fertility, but which sinful men had turned into a
wilderness; and many, going distraught, threw themselves into the
rivers, or hanged themselves in the woods. This was greater woe than
England had witnessed during the long wars of the Norman conquest; and
it was in this abyss of misery that fathers and mothers sold their
children.

On the morning after his going to Caversham Sir Alain de Bohun returned
unto our house with the knights who had gone with him; and before it was
time to begin the service of tertia in the church, he and all the
company, as well foot as horse, marched away to the north-west. They
intended for Oxenford, but did not take the direct road; for they had
learned from scouts that Matilda's party had been strengthened by some
bands from the eastward, and Sir Alain and his friends hoped to get an
increase of strength in the westward before they turned round upon the
countess. But while the partisans of King Stephen were marching to the
westward and gaining great strength on the borders of Wiltshire, the
Countess of Anjou suddenly decamped from Oxenford and began a march for
Winchester, for she had at length conceived suspicion and alarm at the
conduct of the Bishop of Winchester, the king's brother, and our lord
the pope's legate. Intending to pass through Berkshire into Hampshire
and unto Winchester, she took her course by Cumnor, Abingdon, and
Wallingford. The news of her approach was a death-blow to our good
abbat. He had been for some time past declining. He could not away with
the thought of Matilda's evil doings unto our house. Being a man
formerly addicted to hospitality, good company, cheerful conversation,
music, and innocent mirth, he was observed to forsake all this with much
melancholy and pensiveness, and so to droop and pine away; but yet was
it the news of the countess's coming that gave the finishing stroke.
Eheu! and Miserrimus! A better monk or a nobler lord abbat was never
slain by princely violence and the wickedness of excommunicate men. He
was at Sir Alain de Bohun's castle, and I and Philip the lay-brother
were in attendance upon him when our scouts brought the intelligence
that Matilda was at Abingdon with the heads of her columns pointing
along the road towards Reading. The good, kind-hearted man had gone to
Caversham in order to console the Ladie Alfgiva, whom he found, like
Rachel, mourning for her children, yet not mourning like one that would
not be comforted. But comfortless and sad was the face of our lord abbat
when he gave his niece the parting blessing, and warned her to look well
to her castle, and bade the warder to keep close the gates, and not
admit so much as a strange dog within the walls. There had been a slow
fever in his veins ever since the bad visit of the Angevin countess, and
now his limbs shook and his eyes seemed to swim in his head, and he had
much ado to mount the rough upland horse which had been procured for
him in lieu of his gentle-paced palfrey. "Felix, my boy," said he unto
me as we descended the slopes of Caversham towards the river, "ride
close to my bridle-hand, for I am faint, and a heavy sickness is upon my
heart." As he rode across the meads, the breeze, which blew freshly and
coolly from the broad river, did somewhat revive him; but anon he
complained of the rough motion of his steed, and gently lamented the
loss of his ambling grey, which Matilda had stolen from him so foully.
When near to the great gate of the abbey he turned round and looked
towards the river and the Caversham hills that were shining in the
setting sun; and then, as he went under the archway, I saw tears drop
from his eyes, and I heard him mutter to himself, "'Tis a right
beauteous sight, but I shall see it no more." And that night, and before
the middle watches thereof, praying for the community of Reading and all
England besides, and imploring the saints to protect the house at
Caversham and the two sweet children, he turned his face to the wall and
died, to the unspeakable grief of every honest member of the house. He
left this troubled world in such good repute as a virtuous and holy man,
that assuredly he merited beatification, if not the higher glories of
canonization.--_In Domino moritur._

Before going to his bed, our good abbat held council with all the
obedientiarii and sworn monks of the abbey, and I was of the number of
those who thought that this exertion, and his long and anxious speaking,
hastened his demise. His opinions were, that the monks ought to keep
close their gates, and call in their retainers and some of the townfolk
of Reading to help them to defend the house; that Matilda could not
tarry long for a siege or any other object, as Sir Alain de Bohun and
his party would soon retrace their steps; and that the monks, having
made good their house by standing on the defensive, should remain
neutral in the horrible war, taking no step and raising no voice either
for King Stephen or Queen Matilda, until they saw what course was taken
by the pope's legate or a synod of the church. All present at this
council, whether cloister monks or monks holding office, agreed that
this advice was the best that could be given, and protested that they
would follow it; and Hildebrand, the sub-prior, was the loudest of any
in his prayers that St. James and St. John the Evangelist, patrons of
our house, would long preserve the life of our good old abbat, who had
governed the abbey for many years with great wisdom and gentleness; and,
sooth to say, in all that time he had ruled as a fond father rules his
own children, and never did he sadden the heart of an honest man and
faithful servant of the church, or cause a tear to flow until he died.

But, woe the while! the wickedness, the treachery, and malice of the
times, had spread themselves on every side and to every community; and
some members of our once quiet and loving brotherhood there were that
hid Judas hearts under fawning countenances; and before the passing bell
ceased to toll for our abbat's death, these unhappy men took secret
council with one another, and resolved to act in a manner altogether
different from that which had been advised, and that which they had
promised and vowed to follow. And, lo! on the second evening after the
death of our good abbat, when the Angevin woman and her host came again
unto our house, like a whirlwind, with lances in the air, and clouds of
dust rolling before their path, the sub-prior and his fautors, including
as well some of the franklins and retainers, as monks and novices, and
lay brothers of the abbey, did drive away the other party, and lower our
draw-bridge, and throw wide open our great gate, and sing hosannas, and
cry, "Long live the empress-queen! God bless the sweet face of Queen
Matilda, the lawful sovereign of this realm!" And again Matilda came
within the cloisters, and took possession of our house with her lawless
men of war and her gadabout damsels. This time they could not rob, for
we had not the wherewithal, unless they took our gowns, hoods, and
sandals, and our flesh and bones; but they did worse things than steal.
Matilda ordered that on the instant the fathers of the house should
proceed to elect and appoint a new abbat.

"Dread ladie," said Reginald, our prior, now the highest in office,
"This cannot be! It is against the rules of our order; it is against the
canons of holy church; it is against the feelings of humanity; it is
contrary to common decency! Our late lord abbat lies as yet unburied
within our walls. He must be first interred honorably, and as becometh
the dignity of the house; and before we, the fathers of the house, can
open a Chapter, many masses of requiem must be said, and the guidance of
the Spirit must be invoked to help us in our election, and notice must
be sent unto the head of our order, and alms must be given unto the
poor. Albeit, I see not what alms we can give, since our house hath been
so----"

"Rebel monk," cried Matilda, "reproach not thy queen! But I do perceive
that thou art a fautor of Stephen, like the old rebel that hath
departed. I told him that the mitre was falling from his head, and I now
tell thee that it shall never drop upon thine."

"Would that it had pleased the saints to keep it on the head which wore
it so long, and with so much honour," said our bold prior. "I never
aimed at it, or had a wish for it. I would not stoop my body, or stretch
out my hand, to pick it up, if it lay at my feet. I would never wear it
except forced so to do by canonical election, and the free and strong
will of my brothers. Matilda, thou that ransackest houses of religion,
and the very tomb of thy father, and tramplest on the monks that live to
pray for the soul of thy father, I would not accept the mitre and
crozier from thee if thou wert to fall on thy knees and implore me to do
it! I stand here as an humble but faithful servant of this community--as
a lowly member of the great family of St. Benedict; and if I raise my
voice, it is only for the sake of our religion and unchangeable rules.
Thy men-at-arms need not grind their teeth, and point their lances at
me. I fear them not; and in this cause would face torture and death."

"By the splendour!" cried Matilda, "we do but waste time in speech with
such as thou art. I tell thee, thou traitor and malignant, that the
election shall be made forthwith; and that before I quit this house I
will see an honest man put into the abbatial chair, and confirm him
therein by our royal deed. Thou wilt not question, oh monk, that the
election of a Chapter is nought without the assent and confirmation of
the lawful sovereign; and as I have weighty matters in hand, and will
soon be far away from Reading, there might be great delay in obtaining
my confirmation if it were not given now."

At this passage the sub-prior, bowing before Matilda more lowly than he
was ever seen to bow before the effigies of our Ladie in the Ladie's
chapel, said yea and verily, and that this last was a weighty
consideration before which the rule of St. Benedict might, in some
points, give way; and that in times of trouble and discord and anarchy
like these we were living in, the royal abbey of Reading could not with
safety be left for a single day without a head.

This discourse of the sub-prior much chafed our fearless and honest
prior, Reginald, who well knew the man and his ungodly designs; but
before the prior's wrath allowed him to speak, our sacrist brought forth
the book and opened the rules of our order, and read the same with an
audible yet gentle voice, and with the same gentleness did show that
much time must be allowed for mature deliberation; that a Chapter could
not be assembled while the house was full of strangers and armed men,
for that elections must be free and unbiassed by fear or by any other
worldly consideration; and then he did fall to quoting the charters of
the Beauclerc, which direct that on the death of a lord abbat possession
of the monastery, with all its rights and privileges, shall remain in
the prior, and at the disposal of the prior and the monks of the
Chapter, and that none shall in any ways meddle in the election of the
new abbat: and when the sacrist had thus spoken, the cellarer or bursar,
the second father of the convent, who had charge of everything relating
to the food of the monks, and who always knew best, by the eating, who
were present and who absent, did beg it might be observed that three
cloister monks were absent, one disobediently and contumaciously
(meaning hereby Father Anselm, who had absconded with the countess on
her previous visit); but two, to wit, the chamberlain and the almoner,
on the business of the abbey--and without the votes of these two named
fathers no election could be legal or canonical.

"But my good cellarius," said the sub-prior, in a very dulcet and
persuasive tone of voice, "it yet behoves us to think of the dangers of
the times, and to provide for the security of this royal abbey and
God-fearing community, even though we should depart from the rigid
letter of some of our minor rules. Remember, oh cellarius, that these be
days of trouble, and that we be living in the midst of discord and
anarchy, and treachery, and----"

"Treachery, quotha! I wis there was no treachery in this community until
thou didst bring it amongst us," cried our prior; "nor did we know
discord or anarchy in our abbey, or in any part of the manors and
hundreds appertaining unto this house until thou, oh Matilda, didst come
to our gates! Troubles there were around us, and for those troubles the
good men of our house grieved--not without labouring to alleviate them;
but we were a quiet community when thou didst come thundering at our
gates, bringing with thee thy subtle maidens and thy violent men of war!
and hadst thou never come we had still been at peace. If thou wouldst
listen to me now, I would say Get thee gone and cease from troubling us!
But _orgeuil mesprise bon conseil_, pride despiseth good counsel, and
pride and hardness of heart will lead to thy undoing."

Tradition reporteth that the wrath of William the Conqueror was a thing
fearful to behold; that the rage of the Red King was a consuming fire;
and that the slower and stiller but deeper hate of Henry the Beauclerc
was like unto the grim visage of death; yet do I doubt whether the wrath
of all these three preceding kings, if put all together, could be so
dreadful as that which the choleric daughter of the Beauclerc did now
display: and certes the extreme passion of rage in a woman, even when
she hath not a regal and tyrannical power, is fearful to behold. From
the redness of the fire she became pale as ashes; but then she reddened
again as she shouted "Ho! my men-at-arms, gag me that old traitor!"

"Tyrannous woman, that the sins of the land have brought into England,
the truth will endure and be the same though I speak it not. Thou hast
violated the sanctuary--thou hast dishonoured and plundered the very
grave of thy father! See that he rise not from the grave to rebuke
thee."

"Drag the traitor hence; put chains upon him; cast him into the
dungeon," cried the unfaithful wife of the Angevin count; and the
men-at-arms who had laid their rude hands upon the prior to gag him, did
drag the prior out of the Aula Magna. And when he was gone, Matilda
swore oaths too terrible to be repeated, that, seeing she must herself
away on the morrow, she would leave a garrison of her fiercest fighting
men in the abbey, and devastate all the abbey lands that lay on her
march, if our fathers did not forthwith elect and appoint a lord abbat
true to her party and obedient to her will. Most of the officials and
cloister monks held down their heads and were sore afeard. Not so the
sacrist and cellarer, who cried "Charter! Charter!" and repeated that
such election could not be, and who were thereupon dragged forth and put
in duresse with the bold prior. And now the sub-prior, who never doubted
that the choice was to fall upon him, did entreat those who had the
right of voting to submit to the will of God and the commandment of the
queen, and so save the house from ruin: and some he did terrify, and
some cajole, talking apart with them, and telling them that he would be
good lord and indulgent abbat unto them all. At last the timid gave way,
and the monks of delicate conscience would resist no longer; and the
sub-prior, with a smile upon his countenance, said to Matilda, in his
blandest voice, that the community was ready to elect whomsoever her
grace might be pleased to name.

"'Tis prudent and wise in the community," said Matilda; and then she
clapped her hands thrice, as great lords or ladies use to do when they
would summon a menial or call in their fool to make them sport; and as
she clapped her hands she said, "Come in, my Lord Abbat elect!"

And then, from an inner apartment, where he had been listening all the
while, there glided into the great hall, and stood before us, with an
unblushing and complacent countenance, that rule-breaker and
deserter--Father Anselm.

I did think that our sub-prior would have fallen to the ground in a
swoon, for his legs trembled beneath him, and his face became as ashy
with grief and disappointment as that of the countess had lately been
with rage: his eye, fixed immoveably on Father Anselm, became glazed and
dull, like the eye of a dead fish, and instead of a cry of wonderment, I
heard a rattling in his throat. But in a while the sub-prior recovered,
and ventured to say that the Chapter could by no means elect one who had
broken his vow of obedience, and who was thereby under censure and
interdict.

"In absenting myself from the house, I did but obey the command laid on
me by the queen's grace," said Father Anselm.

"Not the sovereign ladie, nay, nor the sovereign lord of the land, can
give such command without the foreknowledge and consent of the Lord
Abbat, or of the prior in the abbat's absence," said the sub-prior,
whose voice was growing bolder; "and dread ladie, I tell thee again,
that the chapter cannot elect this monk--I tell thee that I myself will
protest against such choice, and defeat such election."

"Ha!" cried Matilda, "sayest thou so? Then shalt thou join the other
rebel monks. Men-at-arms, away with him! He but wanted the mitre for his
own ugly head; but my dear mass-priest, thou shalt have it, and none but
thee, for I can rely on thy faith and love, and thou art the handsomest
monk that ever shaved a crown or wore a hood." And as she spake the last
words, she looked so lovingly at him that it was a shame to see.

Well! our false and double-dealing sub-prior was whirled away to the
dungeon, and the remaining officials and cloister monks were commanded
by Matilda to begin the election of Father Anselm and finish it off
hand, the countess vowing by the visage of St. Luke that she would not
take food again until the thing was done.

The terrible threats of the countess and the subtle arguments which
Father Hildebrand, the sub-prior, had made use of, in the belief that he
was to be our abbat, had such weight with the fathers that they kissed
the jewelled hand of Matilda, and went into the chapter-house; and
there, in less time than had been wont to be spent in deliberation on
the slightest business of the house (mailed knights and fierce
men-at-arms standing by the chapter-door the while), they did name and
elect the runagate Anselm to be our lord abbat, the monks of tender
conscience merely holding up their hands in assent, and saying no word,
but uttering in their secret souls that they acted under fear and
violence, and that all this was uncanonical work and foul, and against
the rule of St. Benedict. And then they all came forth from the
chapter-house, singing _Benedictus Dominus_; and the countess and her
painted damsels looked out from the windows of the abbat's house and
laughed, and the armed and ungodly multitude set up a shout, as though
they had gained a great victory. I will not tell how, in Father Anselm's
inauguration in the church, the rules of our order, the canons, the
decretals of councils, and the bulls of the pope, were all transgressed,
or turned into a jest and mockery: these things are not to be forgotten,
but I will not relate them. Instead of a godly bishop, it was the
countess herself that placed the mitre on the head, and the ring on the
finger of Father Anselm, and that gave him the first kiss and
accolade--_Osculum Pacis_, while _Te Deum laudamus_ was being sung in
the choir; but verily was it sung in so faint and plaintive a manner,
that it sounded more like a _Miserere Domine_. But when it was over, the
intrusive abbat was kissed by all the convent, according to rule; and
_Benedicite_ having been said, Father Anselm gave thanks to the monks
for that they had chosen him, the least of them all, to be their lord
and shepherd, not on account of his own merits, but solely by the will
of God. O! sinful and sacrilegious Anselm, better had it been for thee
that thou hadst never been born!

The will of the wicked woman was thus accomplished, but it brought her
neither future worldly success nor present peace. That same night as I,
Felix the Novice, lay in my cell unable to sleep, mourning for the loss
of our good lord abbat, and ruminating on all which had since befallen
us, I heard a cry, a piercing shriek, which rang through our cloisters
and corridors, and through every part of our great abbey. Yea, as I
afterwards learned, it was heard by the prior and by those that were
with him in the prison underground. Cardiff castle did not ring and echo
with so shrill a shriek of agony when the red-hot copper basin was held
over the face of the Beauclerc's unhappy brother Duke Robert to sear his
eyes and destroy his sight, as did now the abbey of Reading, which was
mainly built in expiation of that great crime of Henricus. It was
followed by a loud call for lights--lights in the queen's sleeping
chamber. And lights were carried thither, and Matilda slept no more that
night; and before the dawn of day preparations were made for her
departure. The shriek was from her, the vision was hers. _O beate
virgine!_ save us from ill deeds and an ill conscience, and the dreams
they do bring. The vision of the Beauclerc's daughter, as it afterwards
came to my knowledge, was this:--her father appeared before her, holding
in his right hand his heart, which had not been brought to our abbey
with his body, but which had been deposited in the church of St. Mary at
Rouen, which his mother had founded; and this heart did distil great
gouts of blood, as if in agony for the wrong which had been done our
abbey, and the insults which had been heaped upon his grave; and the
face of the spectrum was menacing and awful, and the visionary voice
full of dread--the words so terrible that the countess would never
repeat them save to her confessor.

In the same watches of the night there were moans and groans in the
prison underground. Nor was it only the upbraiding of an evil conscience
that caused Hildebrand, our sub-prior, so to lament and cry out. For our
bellicose and choleric prior Reginald did beat him, and tweak him by the
nose, reviling him as a Judas Iscariot; and, peradventure, he would have
slain him outright, or have done him some great bodily harm, if the
gentler and more circumspect sacrist and cellarer had not been there to
intercede and intervene. Our prior was the strongest man that then lived
in all these parts. A terrible man in his wrath was our prior! But his
wrath was never kindled except against evil-doers, and the swinkers and
oppressors of the poor. With all others he was as gentle as a lamb, and
he was ever indulgent to error and all minor offences, as I, who lived
long under his rule, can well testify--REQUIEM ÆTERNAM.

I, Felix, having in the bye-gone times had much familiarity and
friendship with our two backsliding novices, Urswick the Whiteheaded
from Pangbourne, and John-à-Blount from Maple-Durham, did much marvel
how it fared with them since their apostacy, and did diligently seek
them out in the great press which came with the countess, to the end
that I might talk gently with them upon their transgressions, and obtain
from them some knowledge of what had become of the little Alice and my
prime friend young Arthur de Bohun, hoping hereby to gain tidings
grateful and cheerful to the ear of the good and bountiful Ladie
Alfgiva. But neither in the evening nor in the morning could I see
Urswick or John among the people of the countess. Yet in the morning,
just before the departure, I gave a bowman my only piece of money, and
learned from him that a part of Matilda's host with sundry wains and
horse-litters had not come with her unto Reading, but had taken a
shorter road for Winchester; and so I did conclude that my two quondam
comrades had gone with that company, and I did comfort myself with
thinking that they had yet so much grace left in them as to have been
averse to come back and witness our exceeding great misery. Yet did the
archer spoil this my comfort by telling me that two black-eyed damsels
had gone with that division, riding like men upon big war-horses. Of
children the man knew nought; nor he nor any man of the meaner sort had
been allowed to look into the wains or to approach the litters. There
might be children, he said, among this moveable and vagrant host, but he
had seen none. Here again did I grieve, for I loved Alice and Arthur
right well, and would have laid down an untold treasure in gold to have
it in my power to speak comfortably unto the Ladie Alfgiva.

At the command of Father Anselm the monks of the house, and we the
novices likewise, did form in processional order, and accompany Matilda
from our gates even unto the Hallowed Brook, that branch of the swift
and clear Kennet which floweth by the township; and halting on the bank
of that holy and peaceful water, which ought not to have heard such
notes, Father Anselm made us chaunt _Hosanna_ and _Jubilate_, and
promised to the Angevin countess a bloody and complete victory over all
her enemies. And hence, upon _famam vulgi_, the trifling and ungrounded
talk of the common people, who, in parts remote from Reading, knew not
the violence which had been used, it was proclaimed to the world that
the abbat and monks of Reading, in this unhappy year eleven hundred and
forty-one, had received the empress-queen with the highest honours, and
had made themselves her servants and beadsmen. _Pater de Coelis, Deus,
miserere nobis!_




VI.


While she was yet at Oxenford, Matilda had rudely summoned the Bishop of
Winchester, legate to the pope and brother to King Stephen, to appear in
her presence and give an account of his actions and intentions. The
bishop had replied that he was getting ready for her; and this was true
enough, for he was manning and victualling the castles which he had
built within his diocese as at Waltham, Farnham, and divers other
places. Upon quitting our house at Reading, Matilda hoped, by a rapid
march, to surprise the bishop within Winchester, and to make him
captive, and to send him loaded with chains to join the king his brother
in Bristowe Castle, in despite of his legatine and episcopal character
and the authority of the holy see. But the lord bishop was ever wary and
well advised, and before the countess could reach Winchester he withdrew
from that most royal city, having first fortified his episcopal
residence therein, and set up his brother's standard on the roof.
Matilda was treacherously admitted into the royal castle at Winchester,
whither she summoned her half-brother the great Earl of Gloucester, and
her uncle David, king of Scots, who had been for some time in England
vainly endeavouring to make her follow mild and wise counsels. The Scots
king and Gloucester, and the Earls of Hereford and Chester, went
straight to Winchester and abided with the queen and her court in the
castle. But the bishop had made his palace as strong as the castle, and
when the party of Matilda laid siege to it, the bishop's garrison, being
resolved not to yield, did many valorous and some very sinful deeds.
They sallied more than once against the people of Matilda, and put them
to the rout; and they hurled combustibles from the palace, and set fire
to the houses of the town that stood nearest to the palace in order to
drive thence the enemy's archers; but by their thus doing, the abbey of
nuns within the town, and the monastery called the Hide without the town
walls were consumed, to their great sin and shame. Here was a crucifix
made of gold and silver and precious stones, the gift of King Canute,
the Dane; and it was seized by the ravenous flames, and was thrown from
the rood-loft to the ground, and was afterwards stripped of its
ornaments by order of the bishop-legate himself, and more than five
hundred marks of silver and thirty marks of gold were found in it, and
given as largesse to the soldiers; for, whether they stood for Stephen
or for Matilda, or whether they did battle with the sanction of the
church or warred against its authority, these fighting men did mainly
look to pay and plunder. And at a later season the abbey of nuns at
Warewell was also burned by William de Ypres, an abandoned man, who
feared neither God nor men, and who did change sides as often as any
one; but at this season he was for King Stephen, and he set fire to the
religious house for that some of Matilda's people had secured themselves
within it.

Having made a ruin all round the episcopal palace, the bishop's
garrison, being confident of succour, waited the event. The legate did
not make them wait long. Being reinforced by Queen Maud and the stout
citizens of London, who to the number of two thousand took the field for
King Stephen, clad in coats of mail, and wearing steel casques on their
heads, like noble men of war (more money, I wis, had they in their
pouches than most of our noble knights or pseudo proceres), he turned
rapidly back upon Winchester, and besieged the besiegers there. By the
first day of the Kalends of August, or nigh upon the festival of Saint
Afra, saint and martyr, the bishop did gird with a close siege the royal
castle of Winchester. Herein were Matilda, the King of Scots, the Earls
of Gloucester, Hereford, and Chester, and many others of note; and of
all these not one would have escaped if it had not been for the respect
paid by the bishop and the party of King Stephen for the festivals of
the church, which verily ought to be held by all parties as Truces of
God, neither party doing anything while such truce lasts. But when the
siege had endured the space of forty and two days, and when those within
the royal castle had eaten up all their victual, the 14th day of
September arrived, which blessed day was the festival of the Holy
Rood, and a sabbath-day besides; and lo! at a very early hour in the
morning of that day--_Festa duplex_, while my lord bishop's host were
hearing mass, or confessing their sins--which alas! were but too
numerous--Matilda mounted a swift horse, and, attended by a strong and
well-mounted escort, crept secretly and quietly out of the castle. Her
half-brother the Earl of Gloucester followed her at a short distance of
time, with a number of knights, English, Angevins and Brabançons, who
had all engaged to keep between the countess and her pursuers, and to
risk their own liberty for the sake of securing hers. They all got a
good way upon the Devizes road before the beleaguerers knew that they
were gone. But so soon as it was known that they had broken the Truce of
God, the bishop's people were to horse, and began a hot pursuit; and at
Stourbridge the Earl of Gloucester and his band of knights were
overtaken, and, after a fierce battle, were for the most part made
prisoners. But while the long fight lasted, the countess, still pressing
on her swift steed, reached Devizes, the work of, and the cause of so
much woe unto, the magnificent castle-building Roger, late bishop of
Sarum. But the strong castle of Devizes was not furnished with victual,
so that the countess could not tarry there; and being in a great fear as
to what might befal her on the road, she put herself upon a feretrum or
death-bier, as if she were dead, and caused herself to be drawn in a
hearse from Devizes unto Gloucester, whereat she arrived in that guise,
not without the wonderment of men and the anger of the saints. Of all
who had formed her strong rearward guard on her flight from Winchester
castle, the Earl of Hereford alone reached Gloucester castle, and he
arrived in a wretched state, being wounded and almost naked. The other
barons and knights who escaped from the fight of Stourbridge threw away
their arms and essayed to escape in the disguise of peasants; but some
of them, betrayed by their foreign speech, were seized by the English
serfs, who bound them with cords and drove them before them with whips
to deliver them up to their enemies. Yea some of the churls did cruelly
maltreat and maim these proud knights from beyond sea, thereby taking
vengeance for the great wrongs and cruelties which by them had been
committed. Nay men of prelatical dignity were not respected, for they
had had no bowels for the people, who now stripped them naked and
scourged them. The King of Scots, Matilda's uncle, got safe back to his
own kingdom; but her half-brother, the most important prisoner that
could be taken, was conveyed to Stephen's queen Maud, who laid him fast
in Rochester castle, but without loading him with chains as Matilda had
done unto Stephen, for Queen Maud was merciful and generous of heart.

Sir Alain de Bohun, who had joined the legate with a good force before
the siege of Winchester Castle was begun, made haste to enter into that
castle when it was abandoned by Matilda and given up by the few soldiers
that remained in it. It was no thirst for blood and no appetite for
plunder that made our good Caversham lord enter into the fortalice; but
it was his fatherly love for his only boy, and his tenderness for the
little Alice, who had grown up as his daughter. He thought that in so
hurried and rough a departure the children whom he had traced to
Winchester Castle must have been left therein; but although he searched
every part of the castle, as well below ground as above, he could not
find the children, or any trace of them, nor could he from the prisoners
taken learn more than that a fine young boy and a beautiful little girl,
together with sundry foreign damsels, had been sent from Winchester a
day or twain before the legate commenced the siege of the castle. Sir
Alain, albeit sorely disappointed, thanked Heaven that the children had
not been separated. A little later in this year's terrible war, when Sir
Alain de Bohun had discomfited a force commanded by Sir Ingelric of
Huntercombe, his once cherished friend, but now his deadliest foe, and
had well nigh taken Sir Ingelric prisoner, a writing was in secret
delivered unto the good lord of Caversham by one who wore pilgrim's
weeds, but who was a wolf in sheep's clothing, and, in verity, a fautor
and spy of the countess. Sir Alain being competently learned, and well
able to read without the assistance of his mass-priest, who was not
there to aid him, did peruse the secret missive, which did tell him in
the name of Matilda that she had his son in sure-keeping, and would
never deliver him up or permit the eye of father or mother to be blessed
with the sight of him until Sir Alain should have abandoned the traitor
Stephen and have joined the rightful queen of England; and that if he
long failed so to do, the boy would be sent beyond sea and immured in an
Angevin castle, where all traces of him would be for ever lost, and
where, doubtlessly, he would soon perish. "But if," said the letter,
"Sir Alain de Bohun will follow the loyal and wise example of his once
friend Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe and come join the queen, her grace
will receive him with honour, and Sir Ingelric will forget that which is
passed, and the boy shall be restored, and the little maiden likewise,
and they shall be contracted in marriage, and the queen will give a rich
dower to Alice out of her own royal domains, and Sir Ingelric and Sir
Alain may live neighbourly and happily together as aforetime."

Sir Alain, who could write as well as read, replied in few words that
his conscience forbade his breaking oaths to King Stephen; that he could
not change sides either through fear or through interest; that he could
not subject his lance to the distaff, or believe that the warlike
baronage of England would ever live quietly under the rule of a woman;
that he must trust to God and his saints for the protection of his only
child, as also for the well-being of his not less than daughter; and
that if it were the will of Heaven that the children, who had been
brought up so lovingly together, should be conjoined at some future day
in holy matrimony (of which in happier days there had been some talk
between him and the little maiden's father), it would not be in the
power of empress or queen to prevent it. "If," said Sir Alain de Bohun
in terminating his epistle, "if, oh Matilda! thou shouldest so far
forget the tender feelings of a woman and mother as to do harm to mine
only son, and thereby bring my wife with sorrow to the grave, God will
so strengthen mine arm in battle as to enable me to take a fearful
vengeance upon thy party and upon some that are nearest to thee. But
thou wilt not do that which thou sayest. So let me have no more secret,
tampering missives. When Thamesis flows backward from Caversham to
Oxenford instead of pursuing its course to the everlasting sea, then,
but not until then, will Sir Alain de Bohun prove false to his oath and
traitor to King Stephen."

_Circa id tempus_, or nigh upon the time that Sir Alain sent this
response unto Matilda, Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe, having composed his
feud with that family and kindred, espoused the rich widow of that Sir
Jocelyn who had burned his wife, the mother of the little Alice, in his
house, and who had been by him slain in the Falbury of Reading, almost
at our gates. The ladie of Sir Jocelyn had acquired an ill-fame during
her widowhood, for she was greedy of other people's goods and avaricious
of her own, faithless unto her friends, merciless to her foes, and to
her vassals and serfs haughty and cruel. It was as much from the
darkness of her deeds as from her foreign and dark complexion, that she
had gotten all through the country the name of The Dark Ladie. But she
was rich, passing rich, and aspiring, and allied with some of our
greatest men, and Sir Ingelric had given up his whole soul to ambition
and gold. This unseemly matrimony was mainly brought about by the
countess, and there were others of the like sort, which all terminated
in misery and woe, and in visible manifestations of God's wrath and
vengeance.

The Dark Ladie, who had done much mischief in the land in her widowed
condition, became still more terrible as the wife of Sir Ingelric, and
that lost knight became all the worse for his union with her. They
crammed their castle at Speen with a most ungodly garrison, and with
prisoners they kept and tortured for ransom.

King Stephen being a close prisoner in the castle of Bristowe, and the
Earl of Gloucester being well guarded in Rochester Castle, each of the
contending parties was, in a manner, without a head, for Stephen's
brother, the bishop-legate, was, after all, but a priest, and the woman
Matilda was nothing without her half-brother. A negociation was
therefore set on foot for a mutual release of prisoners. This was
several times interrupted, and at each interruption the party of King
Stephen threatened to send the Earl of Gloucester out of the land unto
Boulogne, there to be buried in a castle-prison deep under the ground,
and the party of Matilda threatened to send King Stephen over to Ireland
and consign him to the wild Irishry; but at last, on the first of the
kalends of November, it was agreed between them that the great Earl of
Gloucester should be exchanged for King Stephen; and the earl and the
king being both liberated, each betook himself to the head-quarters of
his friends and partisans. Both factions now stood much as they did
previously to the battle of Lincoln; but fearfully had the people of
England suffered in the interim. And yet, after all these sufferings,
neither faction did turn its thoughts _ad regnum tranquillandum_; but
both did prepare for more battles and sieges, sending forth their bands
of foreigners and leaving the cruel castle-holders to seize, torture,
plunder and kill. While the land was thus weeping tears of blood, the
king and his brother, the bishop, made repair unto London, where the
king had his best friends, and where the legate did summon a great
ecclesiastical council to meet at Westminster on the 7th of the kalends
of December, _ad pacem componendam_, for the composing of peace unto the
church and kingdom. When this council met on the appointed day, which
was in the octaves of Saint Andrew, King Stephen addressed the prelates:
he mildly and briefly complained of the wrongs and hardships he had
suffered from his vassals, unto whom he had never denied justice when
asked for it; he said that if it would please the nobles and bishops of
the realm to aid him with men and money, he trusted so to work as to
relieve them from the fear of a shameful submission to the yoke of a
woman, and so to succeed in his enterprises as to put an end to
intestine war and havoc, and establish his throne in peace. When the
king had done speaking, the legate his brother, who only nine months
before had in the synod held at Winchester declared for Matilda, rose
and proclaimed that the pope had ordered him to release and restore his
brother, that Matilda had observed nothing of what she had sworn to him;
that the great barons of England had performed their engagements towards
her, and that she, not knowing how to use her prosperity with
moderation, had violated all her engagements and oaths; that she had
even made attempts against his, the legate's, liberty and life; and that
this freed him from the obligations of the oaths he had taken to the
Countess of Anjou, for he would not longer call her queen. The legate
further said that the judgment of Heaven was visible in the prompt
punishment of her perfidy, and that God himself now restored his brother
the rightful King Stephen to the throne. Albeit there were some among
them who had but lately quitted the party of Matilda, the prelates and
great men at Westminster assembled did agree that all loyal men ought
forthwith to arm for King Stephen, and that the adherents of the
countess should be everywhere stripped of their usurped authority,
whether in church or civil government; that forced elections should be
all annulled, and that sentence of excommunication should go forth
against all the obstinate and irreclaimable partisans of the countess.
And the Bishop of Winchester, as legatus à latere, did stand up with a
new bull of the pope in his right hand, and pronounced the dread
sentence against all such as should disturb the peace in favour of the
Countess of Anjou, or should build new castles in the land, or invade
the rights and privileges of the church, or wrong the poor and
defenceless.

Judge ye if the news of these high proceedings at Westminster did not
bring with them joy and comfort unto the friends of the late Lord Abbot
Edward and all the honest monks of Reading abbey! Besides the sin and
shame of his forced election, we had suffered many things at the hands
of Anselm during the few months that he had held rule over us. In all
that time he had kept the stout-hearted prior Reginald in the prison
underground, and had maliciously devised penances and punishments for
all such members of the community as had pitied the prisoner. He had
alienated and sold some of the abbey lands to furnish out men-at-arms
for his countess. He had half-starved the brotherhood, and no
hospitality had he exercised unto strangers except to some Angevin
marauders; and when he went away to see the countess, which more than
once he did, he left in the abbey some of these outlandish men to keep
us in submission and dread. But now his evil reign was over, for so soon
as they had learned what had passed at Westminster, and had gotten a
rescript from the legate, the elders of our house took counsel together
and resolved to liberate Reginald the prior, and offer him the mitre,
and to throw Father Anselm into the prison instead of the prior. And the
thing was easy to do, for by this time Anselm had given offence to every
cloister monk, novice, and lay-brother, and the warier sort did all
opine that now that King Stephen was liberated, and his enemies
excommunicated by the legate, the cause of the countess must be
altogether desperate. And so with one voice and one will Anselm was
seized and thrown into the underground cell, and the prior was brought
forth, and conducted in triumph to the abbat's house, and there told
that he must be our lord abbat. Most true it was that he had never
wished for this post of eminence, and now prayed the brotherhood to
elect the chamberlain or the sacrist or any experienced cloister-monk
rather than him; but the universal will and voice of the community would
not be gainsayed, and in the course of a few days the prior was
unanimously elected, by those who had the right of voting in the
Chapter, to be our abbat; and then we all carried him into the church in
procession, sang _Te Deum laudamus_, with loud and jubilant voices, rang
the bells until they well nigh cracked, and set him on the abbat's
throne, and did him all the homage that is due unto the mitred abbat of
a royal abbey; and then brought up Father Anselm, and drove him out of
our gates with many kicks behind, for our new lord abbat would not have
him linger and pine in that cold dark cell underground, saying that he
knew to his cost how sad a thing it was, and that to hold any captive
therein would be to make the wholesome air of the house infaust and
insalubrious.

As he was crossing the Holy Brook the townfolk of Reading, who no more
loved Anselm than did we the monks, caught him by the girdle and threw
him into the stream, so that he was nearly drowned at the place where he
had forced us against our conscience to psalmodize for Matilda. He took
these things so much to heart that he got him back into Normandie. It
was said by some that he falsified his history and his very name, and
so gained admission into the abbey of Bec, but from the volatile nature
of the man, I did rather give my belief to another report--to wit, that
he turned himself into a jongleur or trouvere, and went about France
with women and menestrels and other lewd people.

Sundry times he promised, and did in his heart intend, to visit our
house, and force the restitution of the lands which the usurping Anselm
had alienated to ungodly men; yet King Stephen came not to Reading for
many a year, and when he came he could not tarry with us. But the king
sent Sir Alain de Bohun to build up and restore the ruinous castle of
Reading; and when this had been done, and when, by the vassals and serfs
of the abbey, the walls of the township had been strengthened, we
entered upon the enjoyment of such peace and tranquillity as we had not
known during five long years; for the Philistines could not come
suddenly upon us, or easily break through our defences. At Reading,
indeed, we did live as in a little Goshen, while war was raging all
round about; and albeit we could not always defend our outlying manors
and houses from fire and sword, but suffered many and grievous losses in
serfs, cattle, corn, hay, farm-houses, and granges; we yet suffered less
than other communities, and nothing at all in comparison with the abbat
and monks of Abingdon, our neighbours, but not always friends. Driven
from their once quiet seat at Oxenford, or too sorely troubled in their
residence there by the people of the countess, and the constant coming
and going of warlike and plundering bands, many of the professors and
pupils, _doctores et alumni_, did come unto Reading, and under the
shadow of our secure and peaceful walls, pursue those studies which
were destined to give to England a learned priesthood and a universal
increase of civility. Our brotherhood too did attend to that learning
and to the making of many good books which had done honour to the
Benedictines ever since their first foundation and in whatsoever country
their order was established. Our scribes and copyists once more worked
amain in their quiet cells, multiplying with a slow but correct pen the
precious works of antiquity, and the holy books, and the lives of
saints; and need there was for this labour, since other religious houses
had no peace or leisure, and great and fearful was the destruction of
books and codices in the conflagrations and stormings of this long
intestine war. But for the labours of the Benedictines and some few
learned monks of other orders in England, and but for the blessed
saints, who kept alive their love of letters and books, and gave them
heart and strength to work even in a season of horror and despair, the
land would have been plunged back into utter barbarism, and would have
been void of learning and of books as when the great Alfred came to the
throne. In the tranquil easy days in which I now write, for the solace
of my lonely hours and for the preservation of the fading memory of the
times of trouble, and for no fame or vain glory, the sense of these
things hath already become faint in men's minds, and mayhap, in after
ages, when the world shall have made great strides in learning and all
civility, these labours of the Benedictines will be altogether
forgotten, or be treated as nought. Yet was it they that did mainly save
the land from a great retrograde step; and I, Felix, _servus servorum_,
the humblest or least worthy member of the order (who have so often
seen shining in our western turret the midnight lamp which lighted our
copyists and makers of books at their solitary labours, and who have
seen those labours steadily pursued when the country was ringing with
the din of arms, and was blazing with midnight fires, and when no
earthly honour or reward whatsoever seemed to attend their toil), would
fain put upon record some faint notice of that which was done in the
evil times by our house and order: but not unto us the praise, but unto
thee, oh Lord! They, themselves, sought for no applause--_Celata
virtus_--their virtue is all hidden: not so much as the name is
preserved of these good and laborious monks who did so much for learning
and religion.

It was about the time in which Sir Alain de Bohun did re-edify Reading
Castle, that I, Felix, recovering from my early podagra, under the
instruction and guidance of old father Ambrosius (he hath now been many
years at rest in the chancel of our church, and I in gratitude do say a
daily prayer over his grave), did first addict myself to the use of the
pen, beginning with a missal, which our Pisan limner did richly
illuminate; and when this my first essay was finished, I did present it
unto the Ladie Alfgiva in her house at Caversham, and that bountiful and
right noble ladie did acknowledge the gift by sending unto the abbey
five milch cows and a goodly stock of Caen fowls, which our community at
that time much needed, for there had been a murrain among cattle, and
the spoilers had again swept bare our best farms.

Many were the tears shed by me, and many the masses and prayers said by
our house for the said Ladie Alfgiva and the two missing children. Grief
and anxiety for her son and foster daughter did at times almost bow that
noble dame to the earth, and her grief was the greater because of her
frequent loneliness and the hazards her lord was running in the many
sieges and battles of the times; but although her health declined and
her cheek became wan, hope and trust in heaven's goodness did not
forsake her. A pious dame was Ladie Alfgiva, and of a nature high and
noble in all things. Though thinking day and night of her only son and
her only living child, she never once implored Sir Alain to purchase the
boy's release and his restoration to her arms by proving false to his
oath and untrue to the king, and every time that her lord came to his
home she dried her tears and did all that she could to conceal her great
grief so long as he tarried with her. The virtuous woman is a crown unto
her husband, and verily there be wives as well as virgins that merit the
crown the church awards to saints and martyrs. Saint Catherine on the
wheel, or Saint Agatha at the fiery stake, suffered not pangs so acute
as those of this bereaved mother; and their torture was soon over, and
while they suffered they saw from the wheel and stake the heavens
opening to the eye, and they heard heavenly music in the air which made
them deaf to the shouts of the infidel rabble that were slaying them. So
much bliss and so great a foretaste of celestial joy was not vouchsafed
unto the secular Ladie Alfgiva, and could not be expected by her:
nevertheless had she her happy visions and sweet soothing sounds during
her long bereavement. More than once, in her great loneliness, when her
lord was away fighting for King Stephen, as she stood on the battlements
of her castle at eventide, she saw her boy and his playmate Alice
sitting on the flowery bank which slopes down to the river, as they used
often to sit before Sir Ingelric did steal them away; and she heard
their merry little voices on the breeze, and their frolicsome laugh.
Some would say that she but took two stray lambs for the lost children,
and that the sounds she heard were only made by the evening breeze among
the tall growing grass and the leafy coppices; but I, Felix, could never
so interpret it unto her. But constantly did I strive to give her
comfort, and to conceal from her the cruelties that were daily committed
in the land, and to stop the thoughtless indiscreet tongue of her people
who would have filled her ears with horrible tales of murdered children
and babes, for not the massacre of the Innocents in Judea was so fierce
as the slaughter that raged in England.




VII.


When our good lord abbat Edward had been dead well nigh a year, to wit,
in the summer season of eleven hundred and forty-two, King Stephen, from
great fatigue of body and uneasiness of mind, fell sore sick, and lay
for a long while like one that was dying. While this lasted the barons
of his party did many evil deeds, there being no authority strong enough
to check their lawlessness; and, at the same troublous season, the
partisans of Matilda and the foreign mercenaries in her pay did ravage
all the western parts; and more robbers came over from Anjou, Normandie,
and Picardie, asking no pay, but only free quarters, and the right of
plundering the poor English. It was a Benedictine from Rome that had
studied medicine in the school of Salerno, that brought a healing potion
to the king, and snatched him back to life from the jaws of the grave.

So soon as Stephen could mount his war-horse he marched with a great
force unto Oxenford, where the countess had fixed her court; and he
invested that unhappy city with a firm resolution never to move thence
until he had gotten his troublesome rival into his hands. After some
fighting, in which many lives were lost by both parties, Stephen burst
into the town, and having set fire to a large part thereof, he laid
siege unto the castle into which Matilda and her people had retired. Now
the castle of Oxenford, standing in the midst of waters, was very
strong. From St. Michael's mass well nigh unto Christ's mass, _à festo
Michæelis usque ad natali Domini_, did King Stephen persevere in the
siege, telling all men that complained of the hard service that he must
have the castle, and in it the countess, and that then there would be
peace in England.

In the mid siege, our new lord abbat, who had had much correspondence
with the lord abbat of Abingdon, with the prior and monks at Hurley, and
with other Benedictine houses, for the good purpose of saving the
remnant of the Christian people in those parts, and putting an end to
the cruelties and many deadly sins which were daily committed, received
from the Abingdon cell at Cumnor, nigh unto Oxenford, a missive from the
abbat of that community, who entreated him, now that the country was
clear of Matilda's people, to repair unto Cumnor that they might take
council together, and together confer with King Stephen, who seemed at
that moment to be in a heavenly disposition, and to have an exceeding
great desire to tranquillize the land, and to consult with the loyal
abbat of Reading. Now albeit Stephen had, by means of Sir Alain de
Bohun, expressed his great contentment at the expulsion of Father
Anselm, and at all that had been done by our community since the great
meeting of the synod at Westminster, the election of the prior to be our
lord abbat had not yet been formally confirmed by the king; and
therefore Dominus Reginaldus did make haste to accept the invitation of
the abbat of Abingdon, and to get him unto Cumnor. Not for any merit of
mine own, but through the kind favour he was ever pleased to show me, I
was chosen to be of the travelling party. Philip the lay-brother went
likewise; but Philip was a brave and ready man, quick-witted, and
well-trained aforetime in the use of arms, and in the riding of the
great horse. Although the nerve of the Angevin faction was shut up in
Oxenford Castle, my Lord Reginald was too wise a man to put himself on
the road with a weak escort; for he well knew that there were many
barons and knights, calling themselves King Stephen's friends and the
friends of mother church, that would not scruple to plunder an abbat, or
to keep him in their donjons for the sake of a great ransom; and well
nigh every castle between Reading and Oxenford, and between Oxenford and
Bristowe, was a den of thieves, and worse; and Lord Reginald had not
lost his bellicose humour by being promoted to the highest dignity. "By
the head of Saint John the Baptist," said he, as we were about to take
our departure, "not a robber of them all shall lay me in his crucet
house without having a hard fight for it! Before I bear the weight of
their sachenteges, I will make them taste the sharpness of my lance, and
the weight of my mace." And so was it that we went forth from Reading
forty and one strong, and every man of us armed cap-à-pie, and most of
us well mounted. The lord abbat wore a steel cap under his hood, and a
coat of mail and steel hose under his robes; and he had a two-edged
sword at his side and a heavy mace at the pommel of his saddle, and a
good lance resting on stirrup-iron; yea, and I, Felix the novice, wore
ringed armour and a steel casque, and had my sword and lance: Englehard
de Cicomaco, that famed and well-judging knight, who was one of the
retainers of our abbey, doing military service for the abbey lands he
held near Hurley Common, did say that I looked a very proper
man-at-arms, and did bestride my steed like a knight--but these are
vanities, and I by my vows did renounce all vanity. Yet can I but mark
that when we came to Cumnor a great baron asked who was that gallant
well-favored young soldier that rode in the van, near to the lord abbat
of Reading.

On our way we tarried for a night at Berecourt by Pangbourne, where we
had a goodly house among the hills which had wont to be a summer
residence of our abbats. But this goodly house had been robbed and
spoiled, and our vassals and serfs had not yet been enabled to restore
it. We were therefore roughly lodged and not over well fed; but that
which affected me more grievously than this was the sad condition of the
poor people of Pangbourne, who had been so prosperous and happy before
these accursed wars began. Sad were the tales they told, and not the
least sad of them all was this: my quondam friend and brother novice,
Urswick the Whiteheaded, had been in the spring season of this year at
Pangbourne with a great band of English and foreign robbers, ransacking
the place of his birth and maltreating the friends among whom he had
been born and bred; and his aged father had to his face pronounced a
curse upon him; and in a quarrel with some savage men from Anjou
touching the division of spoil, Urswick had been slain on the bank of
Thamesis, before he could recross the river or get out of sight of his
native village: and, since that black morning, or so our serfs did say,
his well-known voice had been heard at midnight, and he had been seen by
the light of the moon, now habited as a monk, and wringing his hands by
the river side where he fell, looking piteously towards the abbey of
Reading, from which he had fled, and now equipped as a man-at-arms, and
galloping on a great black horse, across the country and up the steep
hills and down the precipices--fire flashing from the eyes and nostrils
of the infernal steed, and from the burning heart of the lost novice.

On our march from Pangbourne we shunned the townships and castles as
much as we could, and took especial heed not to get near unto
Wallingford; for the strong castle there was held by Brian Fitzcount,
the most terrible of all Matilda's partisans, and the greatest robber of
them all; and the castle at this very time was known to be full of
unfortunate prisoners whom he kept and daily tortured in order to make
them disclose their supposed hidden treasures, or to pay a heavier
ransom than any they had the means of paying. Christian burghers and
franklins, noble knights who had warred against the heathen in
Palestine, nay churchmen, the highest in the hierarchy, were known to be
in his foul prison, pent up with Jewish traffickers and money-dealers;
the noblest and the purest with the vilest and foulest of the earth: and
the gaolers and torturers of Brian Fitzcount treated the Christians no
whit better than the Israelites that were chained at their sides,
contaminating them with their touch and poisoning the air they breathed.
Night after night, such of the poor townfolk as had contrived to live in
the midst of these horrors without deserting Wallingford, were startled
in their sleep by the cries and shrieks which came from the grim castle;
and when in the morning they adventured to ask what had been toward in
the night watches, the Count's people would tell them jestingly from the
battlements that it was nothing, or that Brian Fitzcount had only been
coining a little more money, or that a Jew had had his teeth drawn, or
that a traitor to the empress-queen had been questioned about his
treason and treasure.

The great prison in this castle of Wallingford was called Brian's Hell,
and it was deserving of the name. But the fiends were abroad, as well as
within those abominable walls--the spirit of the arch-fiend was
everywhere. The village churches and the chapels and hospitia in
solitary places had been destroyed or turned into fortalices; deep
trenches were cut in the churchyards among the consecrated abodes of the
dead; the sweet sounding church bells had been thrown down, and engines
of war had been set up on the church towers. Yea! the resting places
which the church and the piety of the faithful had built and stocked for
the poor and hungry wayfarers in the desert had been plundered and
destroyed--the last holy resting-places had been profaned! The temple of
peace and mercy had been turned into a place of arms!

As we came near to Hanney mead and the river Ock--that pleasant little
river that wells from the ground near Uffington and drops into Thamesis
by Abingdon, and that has the most savoury pike that be fished in these
parts--we came suddenly upon a castellum which we could by no means
avoid; for it had been lately built, and we knew not of it, and it lay
so lo

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