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364

A MIDNIGHT DISINTERMENT

CHAP.

It was, according to Jocelyn, on the eve of the fourth day of the Festival of St. Edmund that Abbot Sampson called together the sacristan, medicus, and certain others of the brethren of the monastery, and confided to them that he wished to look for once upon the body of the martyred king. Accordingly at midnight, when the rest of the monks were asleep, these chosen few assembled in the abbey church and, in the presence of the abbot, proceeded to open the shrine. From its interior they took the loculus, which they placed on

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a table. Having removed the lid they found that St. Edmund's head was still united to his body and raised on a small pillow. A silk veil and a linen cloth "of wondrous whiteness" enshrouded the whole body, which was also closely wrapped in linen. These wrappings the Abbot refused to have removed, saying that he feared to look upon the body's naked flesh. He took the head, however, between his hands, and prayed that the glorious martyr would not "turn to his perdition" the fact that he, though mean and sinful, had dared to touch his holy body, adding that the saint knew how sincere was his

XIII

ST. EDMUND'S BODY

365 love and how devout his mind. He then touched the eyes of the wonderful corpse, the nose, which, according to the chronicler, was its most striking feature; the breast and arms; and placed his fingers between the sacred fingers. The feet he found pointing stiffly upwards, like those of a man but newly dead, and he was able to count their toes. Having satisfied himself that the body was miraculously preserved, he called the rest of the monks present forward, so that they might be able to testify to what they had seen. And they all saw the wonder, and one of them, a man of great courage known as Turstan the Little, dared to touch the saint's knees and feet; while John of Dice (who, I fancy, must have been a monk from Diss) who, Jocelyn says, was sitting on the roof of the church, peeped through a hole or window and “clearly saw all these things." But Jocelyn, as he himself admits, was not among the favoured few who accompanied the Abbot into the church that night, nor did he, like John of Dice, climb on to the roof and peep through a hole; yet it is Jocelyn who, with plenty of local colour and convincing details, relates the Abbot's proceedings. He adds that when, at matins next morning, the news of what had been done spread among the monks there was great lamentation, not that the saint's body had been disturbed, but that so few of them had been permitted to see it. But Abbot Sampson, when matins were over, called them together and explained that it would not have been fitting that they should all have seen the uncovering of the body; and hearing this the monks wept, but at the same time managed to sing the Te Deum.

He was an enterprising monk, this Abbot Sampson, and even if he had not re-awakened interest in St. Edmund's shrine, and so, no doubt, brought an increasing number of pilgrims to it and swelled the coffers of the monastery, he would have made a name for himself by the stir he caused when he reduced the monks' rations in order that he might save enough money to restore the abbey and build churches

366

A STURDY ABBOT

CHAP.

and barns. Although the monks refused to admit it, there was some excuse for the economy which kept an eye on the cellarer and a tight girdle around shrunken waists, for Abbot Sampson's predecessor, Abbot Hugo, had been so deeply in the Jews' debt that he had had to pledge the vessels and ornaments of the shrine. Yet when distinguished visitors came to St. Edmundsbury no one was readier than Abbot Sampson to provide good sport for them. In the parks which he had laid out and stocked with animals, and in the woods belonging to the abbey, he would organise great huntings, and himself, though he never hunted, come out to watch the sport. Yet, though he entertained royalty royally he was not a man to submit to royal dictation when he believed that right was on his side. Of this we have an instance in his defiance of Richard Coeur-de-Lion, who would have had him give to one of his (the king's) nobles a ward whose hand he had already granted to one whom he believed would prove a fitting spouse. Το the king's first letter he replied with humility; but when Richard began to bluster and threaten him with all sorts of pains and penalties if he refused to obey him his strength of character revealed itself. The king, he said, might carry away the ward by force; he might even, if he chose, destroy the abbey ; but rather than do a thing he believed to be wrong, and which would establish a dangerous precedent, possibly to the detriment of his successors in the office of abbot, he would endure all things. On hearing this the king was greatly enraged, and swore to be revenged upon the stubborn abbot ; but when his temper cooled, and he recognised that the "proud priest" was in the right, he not only forgave the stubbornness, but loved the monk. And a short time afterwards, when he wanted one or two dogs of a breed for which St. Edmundsbury was renowned, he wrote to Abbot Sampson concerning them, and the abbot sent him the best dogs he could find, and received in return a ring which had been given to the king by Pope Innocent the Third.

XIII

BURY AND MAGNA CHARTA

367

The worthy abbot was a great reformer, and had he lived a few years longer might have had a share in bringing about a far greater reform than any he was able to accomplish, namely, the extorting from King John of Magna Charta. For it was in connection with the granting of the great charter of liberties that a momentous incident occurred at St. Edmundsbury Abbey. It came about in this way. King John had returned from France, smarting under the defeat of his army near Lisle, and was venting his spleen on all and sundry in the way that had gained him his unenviable reputation. The Barons, tired of his tyranny, had already entered into a league with Cardinal Langton, and, knowing that the king would attend the Feast of St. Edmund, determined to present themselves at the abbey and there demand their rights. The feast day arrived, and with it the barons, who, according to some authorities, stood face to face with the king who had recently proclaimed his intention of ruling his realm in his own way, in defiance of all men. It was a memorable scene. Before an august assembly in the fine old church Abbot Baldwin had built, Cardinal Langton arose and read, amidst loud acclamations, the proposed charter of liberties. Then, standing before the high altar, he received the protestations of the barons, who one by one advanced, placed their hands upon the altar, and solemnly swore that unless the king granted them the charter they would unite. against him, arm their retainers, and fight until they gained their ends. Having taken this oath they appointed twenty-five of their number to lay the charter before the king. It was an event of which this old town may well be proud, and it is not surprising that to the ruins of Abbot Baldwin's church two tablets are affixed, one bearing the names of the twenty-five barons, the other this inscription:

"Where the rude buttress totters to its fall,
And ivy mantles o'er the crumbling wall;
Where e'en the skilful eye can scarcely trace
The once High Altar's lowly resting place—

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Let patriotic fancy muse a while
Amid the ruins of this ancient pile.

Six weary centuries have passed away;

Palace and Abbey moulder in decay;

Cold death enshrouds the learned and the brave;
Langton Fitz Walter-slumber in the grave;

But still we read in deathless records how

The high-souled Priest confirmed the Barons' vow;
And Freedom, unforgetful, still recites

This second birthplace of our Native Rights."

CHAP.

Thus St. Edmundsbury Abbey became a part of English history, and not only at the time of the barons' meeting, but on several other occasions, when Parliament was held within its walls. It was while attending Parliament here that Henry III. was seized with his fatal illness; it was here the clergy refused to contribute to the aid of his successor; and again, it was a Parliament held in Bury which ordered the arrest and imprisonment of Duke Humphrey of Gloucester, who a few days after the issue of the decree was found dead in his bed, local tradition says, in the Hospital of St. Saviour, of which there are some traces in Northgate Street. The abbey was famous, too, for numbering among its inmates not only that able and entertaining chronicler Jocelyn of Brakelond, but John Lydgate, the travelling monk, learned writer of a History of the Siege of Troy, and translator of Boccaccio's Fall of Princes. It was John Lydgate who, in 1433, presented Henry VI., then only twelve years old, with a MS. copy of his verses. What the young king thought of them we do not know: but the poet Gray had a high opinion of Lydgate's poetic powers, for he wrote, "I pretend not to set him on a level with Chaucer, but he certainly comes the nearest to him of any contemporary writer I am acquainted with. His choice of expression, and the smoothness of his verse, far surpass both Gower and Occleve. He wanted not art in raising the more tender emotions of the mind." Lydgate seems to have had a weakness for presenting copies of his works to notable visitors to St. Edmundsbury, for not only

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