which threatened the Church, the Primate ought to, yield up his see, if it were ten times as much, and to submit himself to the King, who might possibly by such a compliance be induced to restore him. Hilary of Chichester in ornate language, Robert of Lincoln with a blunt simplicity, and Bartholomew of Exeter tendered similar counsel, while Henry of Winchester and others, more or less distinctly, advocated an opposite course. "If," said the Bishop of Winchester, "an archbishop, the Primate of all England, give bishops an example of yielding up their authority, and the care of the souls committed to them, at the nod and threat of a prince, what is to be expected but that the whole state of the Church should be confounded by arbitrary will, and that as is the people so should be the priest ?" It was argued that no question could now be raised as to the Archbishop's administration of funds while Chancellor, inasmuch as at his election to the primacy an express declaration of his discharge from all secular obligations had been required by the Bishop of Winchester on the part of the Church, and had been granted, in the King's name, by Prince Henry and the Grand Justiciary. length Becket desired leave to speak with the Earls of Cornwall and Leicester, and the doors were opened for their entrance. The Archbishop announced to them that he and his brethren had not yet been able to come

At

a Alan, i. 223; Gervas, 1390. | chester as having then advised a Roger (139), and Garnier (41), resignation. represent this sort of talk as having passed on the last day of the council, and the Bishop of Win

b Herb., vii. 138; Fitzst. 223. See Appendix XVII.

to a determination, and that they requested the King to grant them a further delay. The Bishops of London and Rochester accompanied the Earls to the Court, and it is said that Foliot falsified his message so as to mislead the King into supposing that an answer of submission might be expected. On this supposition Henry returned an answer by the Earls, and the Bishop of London was put to the blush by the exposure of his artifice which naturally followed.a

Throughout Sunday, the 11th of October, the Archbishop remained within his monastery, and employed the greater part of the day in anxious deliberations. In the course of the following night the agitation of his mind brought on an attack of an illness to which he was subject, and on the morning of Monday he was unable to appear at court. The King, suspecting that the illness was feigned, sent the Earls of Cornwall and Leicester to visit him, and to ask whether he would appear and would give bail to abide a trial as to the revenues; to which he answered that he would appear next day, even if he should be carried on his couch.b In the mean time he was told that Henry was swearing with even more than usual vehemence, that some of the courtiers had conspired to kill him, and that the King had declared an intention of either putting him to death, or depriving him of his eyes and tongue, and imprisoning him for the remainder of his days. Of these reports a part would seem to have been a mere

a Alan, i. 344-5; Gervas., 1391. b Roger, i. 135; Herb. vii. 138; Garnier, 34.

e Grim, i. 42; Roger, i. 135; Garnier, 35.

invention, and the rest to have been greatly exaggerated.a

b

The 13th of October-Tuesday-was the last and most memorable day of the council. Early in the morning the Archbishop was waited on by some bishops, who urged him to avert the dangers of the Church by throwing himself unreservedly on the King's mercy, and represented to him that, if he should persist in his refusal, he would incur at once the charges of treason and of perjury, for breach of his feudal duty and of his engagement to obey the Constitutions of Clarendon. To this he replied that he had been deeply wrong in swearing against God, and that it was better to retract his oath than to consent to laws which were contrary to the Divine law. He, therefore, charged the bishops to stand by him in rejecting the constitutions; he rebuked them for having thus far joined with laymen in judging him, their father, and charged them, on their obedience to the Roman Church, to do so no further; and he enjoined them, if any violence should be offered to him, to lay the sentence of excommunication on the authors of it. The only one of the bishops who answered was Foliot, who at once appealed to Rome against this exercise of authority; and the bishops withdrew, with the exception of those of

Qu'il volsist l'arceuesque faire occire u lier; Mais einsi li alerent le jur souent nuncier.

a "Je ne sais si li reis l'out fait appa- | said to have been the hundredth reillir, anniversary of the Norman invasion. It was really (as Mr. Morris mentions, p. 139) the anniversary of the Translation of Edward the Confessor, which Becket had performed with great solemnity a year before.

Puet cel estre, li reis le uoleit esmaier

Que il le plust mielz par manaces plaissier."

Garnier, 40.

b By Alan of Tewkesbury (S. T. C., i. 346), and others, it is strangely

Winchester and Salisbury, who remained to comfort the Primate. By way of preparing for the expected conflict, the Archbishop then, by the advice of a "religious man," proceeded to the altar of St. Stephen in the monastic church, where, solemnly arraying himself in the pall, which was usually reserved for high festivals," he celebrated the mass of that saint, beginning with the introit Etenim sederunt principes ("Princes also did sit and speak against me"). His performance of this service was interrupted by a profusion of tears and sobs, and in the course of it he solemnly commended the cause of his Church to St. Stephen, the Blessed Virgin, and the patron saints of Canterbury. As some of the King's servants had been present, this act was forthwith reported at court, with the commentary (surely very warrantable, although it has been treated as the suggestion of bitter malice) that Becket intended a parallel between himself and the protomartyr. On leaving the altar, the air of

a

1391.

Herb., vii. 140-1; Gervas., | him (Garn., Roger). Gervase says

66

that he used the mass of St. Stephen, not with reference to his own circumstances, but because the altar was St. Stephen's. But why was that altar chosen? According to Garnier, Foliot afterwards told the Pope that Becket celebrated this mass pur sorcerie.... et despit le rei." l. c. Becket was never backward to claim a parallel with a yet more sacred example than St. Stephen; and this is carried out in the most extravagant (and, to modern taste, most offensive) manner by the old biographers. Herbert's Liber Melorum' is

contrite humility which he had worn during the celebration was exchanged for a look of stern resolution—“the face of a man at once and the face of a lion," as Herbert describes it with an allusion to the vision of Ezekiel.a

b

It was his intention to proceed to the court barefooted, arrayed in his pontificals and bearing the cross in his hand, in the hope that by such an appearance he might awe those who had ventured to become his judges; but at the entreaty of some Templars, whom he highly regarded, he reluctantly gave up this and went on horseback, wearing his ordinary dress, but secretly carrying the consecrated Eucharist on his person. As he passed along the streets of Northampton, crowds of people, supposing that he was on his way to certain death, prostrated themselves, and with prayers and tears besought his blessing. The great gates of the castle were opened at his approach, and were hastily shut again as soon as he had entered. The Archbishop dismounted in the court, took his cross from the bearer, Alexander Llewellyn, and entered, attended by a single clerk, the doors immediately closing behind him. The prelates who were assembled in the hall, on seeing him with the cross in his hand, were alarmed, as it appeared to them a sign that he intended to brave the King and to claim for himself the character of a champion of Christ against the

expressly devoted to it; and the writer usually, there and elsewhere, speaks of himself, like St. John, as “the disciple which wrote these things."

a vii. 142. (Ezek. i. 10.)

b Roger, i. 136; Fitzst., i. 225;

Herb., vii. 142-3; Garnier, 37. Modern writers, however, have for the most part followed less accurate authorities, who represent him as having retained his pontificals. Roger, i. 136; Fitzst., i. 223.

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