clamations. But on the following morning came an order from Woodstock, forbidding him to enter any of the King's towns or castles, and ordering him to retire with all his retinue within the verge of his Church. He answered haughtily, "that believing himself bound in duty to visit the whole of his province, he would not have obeyed the order, had not Christmas been close at hand, on which festival he meant to officiate in his cathedral." To Canterbury therefore he returned. The Government had shown more firmness than he had expected. The higher clergy and the better citizens who had gone out to meet him, were summoned to give bail upon a charge of sedition, for having thus received the King's enemy. Persons of rank kept away from him; and men, who for their own sakes desired to render any accommodation impossible, endeavoured, even at Canterbury, to provoke him and his servants, by studied indignities. Becket wrote to the Pope, that the sword of death was hanging over him, and desired his prayers. He told his Clergy that the quarrel could not now end without blood, but that he was ready to die for the Church; and in his sermon on Christmas-day, said to his congregation, that his dissolution was near, and he should quickly depart from them: one of

their Archbishops had been a martyr, and it was possible they might have another. And then, in a strain of bold, fierce, fiery indignation, (for so his admiring friends and biographers have described it,) he thundered out his invectives against most of the King's counsellors and friends, and excommunicated three of his enemies by name, with all the appalling forms of that execrable act.

Meantime the Archbishop of York, and the two Bishops, had repaired to the father King in Normandy, imploring justice for themselves and the whole clergy of the kingdom. Henry was incensed at hearing what had passed, and observed with an oath, that if all who consented to his son's coronation were to be excommunicated, he himself should not escape. He asked their advice. "It was not for them," they replied," to say what ought to be done." Indeed they knew not what to advise, and no evil meaning can be imputed to them for saying, "that there would be no peace for him or his kingdom, while Becket was alive." This was the plain truth; and Henry, in his despair of ever being suffered to rest by this ungrateful and treacherous friend (for as such he regarded him), and in his indignation at this fresh instance of unprovoked hostility, .called himself

unfortunate in having maintained so many cowardly and thankless men, none of whom would revenge him of the injuries he had sustained from one turbulent Priest;....words which expressed, with culpable indiscretion, a wish for Becket's death, and were too hastily understood as conveying an order for it. It is certain that no such order was intended; but it is not surprising that men who were zealous in his service, and no way scrupulous how they served him, should have imagined that what the King wished, he would gladly have them perform. Reginald Fitzurse, William de Tracy, Richard Brito, and Hugh de Moreville, who were all gentlemen of his bedchamber, knights and barons of the realm, bound themselves by an oath, that they would either compel the Primate to withdraw the censures, or carry him out of the kingdom, or put him to death, if he refused to do the one, and they found it impossible to effect the other; with this determination they hastened to England, unknown to the King or any other person, and unsuspect

ed.

The result of Henry's counsel was the legal and proper measure of sending over three Barons to arrest Becket. These messengers were too late. The ministers of vengeance, who

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were before them, landed near Dover, and past the night in Ranulf de Broc's castle,...

the

persons whom Becket had excommunicated on Christmas-day, and to whom interested motives for his marked enmity to the Primate are imputable, because he was in possession of great part of the sequestered lands. He supplied soldiers enough to overpower the knights of Becket's household, and the people of Canterbury, if resistance should be attempted. They entered the city in small parties, concealing their arms, that no alarm might be excited. The Abbot of St. Augustine's who was of the King's party, received them into his monastery, and is said to have joined counsel with them. About ten in the morning, they proceeded with twelve knights to Becket's bedchamber; his family were still at table, but he himself had dined, and was conversing with some of his monks and clergy. Without replying to his salutation, they sat down opposite to him, on the ground, among the monks. After a pause, Fitzurse said they came with orders from the King, and asked whether he would hear them in public or in private? Becket said, as it might please him best,...and then at his desire, bade the company withdraw; but presently apprehending some violent proceeding,

from Fitzurse's manner, he called them in again from the antechamber, and told the Barons, that whatever they had to impart might be delivered in their presence. Fitzurse required him to absolve the suspended and excommunicated Prelates: He returned the old evasive answer, "that it was not he who had passed the sentence, nor was it in his power to take it off.” A warm altercation ensued, in which Becket insisted that the King had authorized his measures, in telling him he might, by ecclesiastical censures, compel those who had disturbed the peace of the Church to make satisfaction; this, he affirmed, had been said in Fitzurse's presence. Fitzurse denied that he had heard any thing to that purport ;-and indeed Becket himself must have known that if such permission had ever been given, it certainly was not in the latitude which he now chose to represent.

The four Barons then, in the King's name, required, that he, and all who belonged to him, should depart forthwith out of the kingdom, for he had broken the peace, and should no longer enjoy it. Becket replied, "he would never again put the sea between him and his Church." Their resolute manner only roused his spirit, and he declared, that if any man