 Section 1 of Tales of English Ministers at Canterbury Cathedral Kent and St. Paul's Cathedral London. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org, recording by David Wales. Tales of English Ministers at Canterbury Cathedral Kent and St. Paul's Cathedral London by Elizabeth Wilson Greerson. Section 1, Canterbury Cathedral Kent County, Part 1 Like a mighty army moves the Church of God, brothers, we are treading where the saints have trod. 1. When we come to visit Canterbury Cathedral, we find that there is so much to talk about that it seems as if the stories connected with it would fill a book of themselves. It is the most interesting of all our cathedrals, though I think that Winchester follows hard on its heels, and in one way it is unique. For as you know, it is the mother cathedral of the Great Church of England for the Archbishop of Canterbury ranks first among all Anglican bishops, whether at home or in our colonies, and when difficulties arise in the Church, not only in England, but in those far-off lands, which cannot be settled by the bishops and clergy living there, it is to the Archbishop of Canterbury that they look for advice and aid. Now, perhaps you wonder why I have said the mother cathedral and not the mother church, which is not such a clumsy expression and seems to mean the same thing. Ah, but I have a reason for doing this, for when we go down among the green Kentish op-fields and enter the quaint little city, lying among its pleasant meadows, it is not the cathedral standing in the middle of the town, which I want you to visit first, but a tiny little red-roofed church with a square ivy-covered tower, which stands in a churchyard, which in summer is fragrant with a perfume of roses on a hillside, just outside the town. This church is called St. Martins, and tiny as it is, it can claim the proud title of the Mother Church of England. For as far as we know, it is the very oldest church in the country, and we can touch the walls, part of them built, like the Tower of St. Albans Cathedral, of Roman bricks, which are standing today very much as they stood 1300 years ago, when a Christian queen worshipped here, when all her subjects and even her own husband were pagans. But how did a Christian queen come to be living in a heathen country, you ask? Well, I will tell you. As you all know, the Romans under Julius Caesar invaded and conquered Britain about 50 years before the birth of our Lord. They settled down and colonized our country, which they held for over 400 years, and curious to say, although they were heathens themselves and bitterly opposed to the spread of Christianity, it was through them that the way was opened up for the faith of Christ to be planted in our land. For they traded with France, or Gaul, as it was then called, where in the second century there were already Christian churches and the people of Gaul were not slow to send missionaries across the Channel to the island from which they were beginning to obtain large quantities of wheat. And in spite of persecution from the Roman emperors, the faith spread in England and a few churches were built here and there in the more important towns. Now, there was a colony of Romans settled at Canterbury, or as it was called in those days, Durovernem, just as there were colonies of Romans settled at York, Lincoln, Varelum, and other places we have read of. And there must have been some Christians living among them. Perhaps some of the Roman soldiers themselves believed the Christian faith and they built a little church here on the hillside and dedicated it to St. Martin. St. Martin was a French bishop, the Bishop of Tours, and I'm going to tell you his story partly because some people think that it was he who took an interest in the Christians at Canterbury and perhaps came over from Gaul to found this little church and partly because his story is such a beautiful one that I am sure you would like me to tell it to you even if the saint had nothing to do with Canterbury at all. Now although St. Martin was a French bishop, he was not a Frenchman. He was the son of a Roman magistrate and he was born in Hungary about A.D. 360. When he was a boy he heard the story of our Lord's life and death and he made up his mind that he would be one of his followers. His parents were pagans however and they did not want him to become a Christian so they made him a soldier hoping that the excitement of a soldier's life would drive his new idea out of his head and their plan was partly successful for although Martin as he moved about Gaul with his regiment still kept the old resolve before him and went to church sometimes and even put down his name as a Roman that is one who desired to be instructed in the Christian faith and to be baptized. He never came to the point as we say but just let time slip on meaning some day when he had more leisure to present himself for baptism and thus publicly declare himself a Christian. The years passed however and Martin grew to be a full grown man but although he was good and kind he had never been baptized. Now a chance that one winter his regiment was stationed at Amia and on a bitterly cold night he was walking near the city gate. Perhaps he was the officer on duty and was visiting the guard when he saw a miserable beggar with hardly any clothes on crouching by the wall almost perished with cold. In those days no one heeded beggars and it would have been the most natural thing for a soldier in Martin's position to walk on and leave the poor man to die but the young officer had learned what Christ had taught about showing mercy and he took his thick warm cloak from his shoulders and cut it in two with his sword and gave half of it to the beggar to protect him from the cold. The next night so the story runs as Martin the soldier lay sleeping in his chamber he had a wonderful vision. The gates of heaven were opened and he saw our Lord on a throne surrounded by a host of saints and angels and to his astonishment in the midst of all the glory and brightness he was wearing the half of a soldier's cloak. Martin recognized it as his and while he was gazing at the scene in breathless awe it seemed to him that Christ pointed to the cloak and said softly, Behold the mantle given to me by Martin yet but a catacumen. The vision faded but the words sank into the young man's heart. If his master could so confess him in heaven for doing such a little act of mercy he determined to be brave enough to confess him on earth and without delay he made a public profession of his faith and was baptized. And more than this he left the army and went into a monastery and became a monk. Afterwards he was made bishop of tour and we read that until he died he fought as bravely with his tongue and with his pen against errors and abuses in the church as he had fought with his sword when he was a soldier. But now we must leave him and come back to the little church on the kentish hillside which is called by his name. It must have fallen more or less into ruins or at least it must have stood empty and deserted for a century or two after the Romans were recalled to Rome and the heathen Anglo-Saxons overran England. Then what happened at one or two other places happened here. As the country grew more settled a new town arose with a new name. Durovernum became Canterbury, the burg of the men of Kent, the capital of their kingdom. Now as you know by looking at any old map the Angles settled on the east coast of England taking possession of the land from the Firth of Forth to the south of Lincolnshire. The Saxons took possession of most of the middle and the south of England and the Jews under their leaders, Hengist and Horsa took up their abode in Kent. And it chanced that in the sixth century a great king arose in Kent called Ethelburg who conquered a large part of the country of the Angles and Saxons and became their overlord. He was a pagan, fierce, strong and warlike who worshiped Thor and Wodan, the heathen gods of the north. But he went on a visit to Gaul and there he fell in love with a Frankish princess named Bertha, daughter of King Charibet of Paris. He loved her so much that he made up his mind at once that no other maiden should be his wife and he went and asked her father if he would allow him to marry her. Now as we know Ethelburg was a very powerful monarch and I expect he thought that King Charibet would be glad to let his daughter become his wife. But to his astonishment the French king hesitated. He and all his family were Christians and he knew that the Kentish king was a pagan and although he wanted to be on friendly terms with them it did not seem right to allow his young daughter to go alone into a heathen country. So he made one condition if King Ethelburg would allow a Christian priest to accompany the princess and would promise that she would be free to practice the rights of her own religion in her new home. He could marry her but not unless. The fierce heathen king agreed to this arrangement readily. He was so accustomed to people worshiping different gods that he did not mind much what God Princess Bertha believed in so long as she was willing to be his wife and when he was discussing the matter he suddenly remembered the little Christian church up on the hillside overlooking his capital and he promised that henceforth it should belong to the princess and her chaplain and that they might have service in it every day if they liked. King Gerebert was satisfied so the marriage took place and Queen Bertha went away with her husband to his own country taking with her a good bishop named Lleudard to be her friend and advisor. Her story is something like the story of St. Margaret of Scotland for as you will one day read St. Margaret was also a royal princess who went into a strange country and was married to a fierce or like husband King Malcolm Canmore who although he was not a heathen like King Athelbert was only a Christian in name until the brave example of his gentle wife made him think of religion as he had never thought of it before. It must have been very lonely for Queen Bertha at first. Her husband's palace stood in the centre of the Little Burg which was surrounded as were all towns in those days by a high wall so as to be guarded against any sudden attack from any enemy. These walls were pierced by gates which were always well guarded and we can imagine that it must have been a trial to the young queen to pass out as we read she did every morning through the groups of curious soldiers who perhaps dropped scoffing words about her religion as she went through their midst to her little church to join with her faithful friend Llewidad and any other Christians she could gather together in the worship of God. But she did it and she must have done it in such a wise and tactful way that her husband watching to see what sort of religion hers was came to respect it and to wish to hear more about it. So Queen Bertha little as she thought it was really acting as a missionary in those difficult years of her early married life and by and by as you will hear she had her reward. Now we will leave her at Canterbury for a time and turn our thoughts to a scene that took place in Rome some four years before she came to England. There was at that time a slave market in Rome and one day a young Roman deacon of noble birth was walking through it his name was Gregory. As he was looking with pitying eyes at the groups of slaves standing chain together in the hot sunshine his attention was arrested by some young boys with white skins and golden hair who had evidently been brought from some far distant country for no slaves with faces like this had ever been seen in Rome before. Gregory paused for a moment he felt that he would like to know where the strangers came from for their golden hair and sweet pale faces reminded him of what he had read about the saints in heaven. From what country do they come? he asked at last turning to the slave dealer who had charge of the group. They are English. Angles said the man wondering if the young deacon wanted to buy one of them. They should not be called Angles but Angels with faces so angel like, said Gregory sadly, his mind still full of thoughts of heaven. They come from a kingdom called Daira went on the merchant hoping he had found a purchaser. Daira answered the young man who was not thinking of buying slaves at all but of how it might be possible to teach these children with the angel faces about God. I plucked from God's ire and called to Christ mercy. And what is the name of their king he asked hoping perhaps to hear that the king of the Angles was a Christian. Ella was the reply. Now in those days if people were always on the lookout for good omens and as Ella sounded like the beginning of the Alleluia which Gregory was want to sing in church he instantly took this for a good omen. Some day Alleluia will be sung in Ella's land he said hopefully and passed on out of the market wondering more than ever how it would be possible to send missionaries to England. If the pope will give me leave I will go thither myself he said and he went to the pope and begged him to allow him to gather together a few other monks who will be willing to share the danger with him and go with him as missionaries to England the pope would have granted his request but the people of Rome would not hear of it for Gregory was so much respected that they wanted to keep him among them and the pope listened to them and greatly to the young deacons disappointment bad him stay at home but in a wonderfully short time Gregory became pope himself and had the power to send to men wherever he liked and although he had a great deal to think about in his new position he never forgot the fair haired boys he had seen in the marketplace and was always on the lookout for a suitable time to send men to preach the gospel to their nation. At last it came for news was brought to him that the Christian princess Bertha had married the heathen king of Kent and that he had allowed the Christian priest to her new home and to practice her own religion. If his wife is a Christian he cannot refuse admittance to my monks thought good to pope Gregory and straight way he sent for a very brave and holy man named Augustine and asked him if he would go at the head of a small company of monks and preach the gospel to the English nation. Augustine said he would and shortly afterwards he set out at the head of a little band of followers for England. They had not gone very far however when their hearts failed them and they sent their leader back to Rome to beg the pope to allow them to return. Perhaps some of you are inclined to say cowards when you read this but just think for a moment of what these men were asked to do. There were neither post offices nor telegrams nor trains in those days and they were asked to set out from Rome and go probably on foot across the continent of Europe to a strange land whose inhabitants they had heard spoken of as barbarous, fierce and unbelieving and of whose language they did not know a word. It was really very much as if we had asked one of our friends today to set out and walk right across the continent of Africa and visit some savage king on the other side who would probably murder him as soon as he set foot in his country. But pope Gregory did the stuff that martyrs are made of and he would not allow the monks to return. He sent Augustine back to them with a letter which we can read today if we will telling them that having begun a good work they must not think of giving it up and praying to God to grant that although he might not see them again on earth he might be permitted to see the fruits of their labors in heaven. For added the good pope thinking of the earnest desire which he himself had had to go to England though I cannot labor with you I shall partake in the joy of the reward because I am willing to labor. Do you remember the parable and the Bible about the kingdom of heaven being like a grain of mustard seed the least of all the seeds and yet how when it springs up it grows into a mighty tree. I think that if pope Gregory had been able when he planted his grain of mustard seed and sent away his handful of half frightened half reluctant monks to look forward eighteen hundred years and see into what an enormous and far spreading tree English Christianity would grow he would have been content. At last after weary travel the little band of missionaries arrived in England. They landed at Ebb's feet in the Isle of Dennett which as you know is the northeast corner of Kent. Augustine was a wise and prudent man and instead of beginning to preach to the people at once he sent a courteous message to the king at Canterbury that some strangers from Rome had arrived and would feign have an audience with him for he knew that he would have much more chance to succeed in his mission if the king took him and his companions under his protection. Now it seemed that King Athelbert must have watched Queen Bertha and become interested in the religion she professed for he said at once that he would meet the strangers and hear what they had to say but because he believed in witchcraft and it was very much afraid that they might have the power to be witch him he would not meet them in any house where he thought spirits had more power but went right on out into the country to a wide chalk down and there he gave audience to the little band of foreigners Saint Augustine could not speak to him in his own language but he could speak the language of the people of Gaul and he had taken the precaution to bring an interpreter over from Gaul with him so he stood there before the king who was seated in rude state on the green turf and explained the Christian faith to him and the Frankish interpreter at his side translated his words as he went on when he had finished the king spoke telling him that his words seemed fair but that he knew and strange and that he could not give up the gods of his fathers for them but that he was willing to shelter and protect him and his monks and to allow them to preach in his kingdom then he went back to Canterbury and in a very short time he sent an invitation to the strangers to come to his capital and so it was that Christianity came back to England to the middle and south of it at least or as you may know it was brought to America about the same time by Saint Columba and his followers who came from Ireland where the faith of Christ still held sway not having been destroyed by the jutes and angles and Saxons as it had been in Britain if we could have stood at the site of Saint Martin's church on the day when Saint Augustine and his monks entered the Berg of the Men of Kent we should have seen a strange sight indeed it has been described accurately to us by the venerable bead that we can almost picture it to ourselves we can imagine how the news must have spread in the little city that the strangers from Rome to talk to whom the king himself had gone to the Isle of Thanet were coming to live among them and explain to them, if they would listen their queen's religion and we could fancy how they would throng up this hilly road that passes the church and the strangers would come and perhaps they would stop and crowd together just by the church for I think Queen Bertha would be there with Bishop Lidard ready to welcome her fellow Christians and to pray for the success of their mission and by and by the faint sound of singing would be heard and a strange little procession would come over the crest of the hill first came two monks one carrying high in the air a silver cross together a board on which was rudely traced the crucified figure of our Lord then came the rest of the monks in their dark and travel stained gowns with their leader Saint Augustine in their midst they were chanting a litany as they walked one moment thinking of the heathen darkness that lay over the fair land into which they had come they were praying that God should turn away his wrath from the city and the next remembering with thankful hearts how they had been brought in safety to the end of their long and dangerous journey they were bursting into the word of praise which Gregory had taken for his word of good omen in the Roman marketplace alleluia alleluia it would take too long to tell all that happened to Saint Augustine and his monks we must hurry on to the history of the cathedral so I will only tell you that he preached constantly in the little church of Saint Martin and that the king must sometimes have gone with his wife to listen to him for in a year we find that he became a Christian and was baptized by Saint Augustine indeed some people tell us that the very font that was used at the ceremony is standing in Saint Martin's today now King Ethelburg did not do things by halves and when he was converted he must have thrown all his influence on the side of his missionaries for great numbers of his subjects were baptized also and in no very long time we hear of him helping his nephew the king of the east Saxons to build a cathedral in London and found a bishopric there he also handed over his palace in Canterbury to Saint Augustine and his friend telling them that they could turn it into a monastery while he and Queen Bertha retired to Reclver near the coast some miles distant where he built another royal residence this then was the beginning of the great cathedral which stands in the middle of the little city of Canterbury for Augustine founded not only a monastery but a church which was known as Christ Church and as has always happened in the building of our minsters this original church was burned rebuilt and improved added to and burned again then rebuilt until it has grown into the magnificent structure which we see before us today as was natural the Roman missionary always looked to his friend Pope Gregory for help and advice in all his difficulties and this is how the English church came to be under the yoke of Rome for so many long years this yoke grew to be so heavy that it could not be born and it was thrown off at the formation but just at first we can easily understand the comfort it would be to Augustine to send the letters to Gregory telling him all his troubles and asking him what he should do and what rules he should lay down for the guidance of the Christian congregations which were beginning to be formed all over the country and Gregory sent back very wise and comforting answers we can read some of his letters still telling Augustine to go to Gaul and there be ordained Archbishop of England by the Frankish bishops then with their help to ordain some of his most trusted monks to be bishops under him whom he could appoint to rule over different parts of England now the royal palace of Canterbury which the king had given to Augustine covered a great deal of space for besides the actual dwelling house there were gardens and pleasure grounds round about it and we know that in those pleasure grounds stood a ruined Roman temple and like a wise man St. Augustine made the most of the present he had received not content with founding Christ church on one side of the piece of ground he founded another church the church of St. Pancras on the other side just where the Roman temple stood and between them perhaps using the palace itself as part of the buildings he founded a monastery which he dedicated to St. Peter and St. Paul but this name did not continue long for before the monastery was completed the great missionary Archbishop had died and although at first he was buried in the grounds by the roadside we are told when the building was completed his body was taken up and laid to rest within its walls and from that time it was known as the monastery of St. Augustine now that we have learned the story of the beginning of Canterbury Cathedral let us approach it by the narrow streets of the little city and look at it as it stands today it is somewhat difficult to describe for it is so old and vast and has been improved and added to so often that although the principal part of the edifice is very regular being built as is usual in the form of a cross with a great square tower crowned by four little spires at the center and two other towers each with four little spires also at the west end there are numerous little offshoots and towers and turrets each bearing its own name and having its own history for long ago the Archbishops of Canterbury were not only ministers of religion but ministers of state as well and they not only ruled the church but they helped the king to rule the state and to make laws just as the prime minister does today so they were very important dignitaries indeed and held their courts as if they were kings and received all sorts of people and transacted all manner of business so that the Archbishop's Palace at Canterbury was almost as important a place as the king's palace at Westminster so when we walk about the cathedral and its precincts we are not only treading where the saints have trod but we are treading where proud kings and fierce soldiers and scheming statesmen have trod as well some of whom it seems to us did not deserve to be named with the saints at all but we dare not pass judgment on them for they lived in fierce and turbulent times and their actions cannot be measured by our standards and each of them did their part by fair deeds or by deeds that do not look so fair in the building up of this great country of ours when we enter the enormous church there is one peculiarity that we notice at once it rises up from the nave which is the lowest part of it by flights of steps to the highest part which is the high altar and the chapel behind it in which the shrine of St. Thomas of Eckit once stood as you see the nave is shut off from the choir by a stone screen which is pierced by three doors one of which leads into the choir the other two into the side aisles and transepts this screen can only be reached by going up a flight of stone steps and when we pass through it and enter what is known as Trinity Chapel we have once more to ascend the flight of steps which are called the pilgrim steps I will tell you the meaning of this curious name later on perhaps the very first thing that we want to see in this wonderful church is St. Augustine's chair which stands in the east end of the building in a curious little circular chapel known as the Carona or Beckett's crown when we look at this great chair fashioned out of three blocks of Purbeck marble our thoughts travel back along the centuries and we seem to see a long chain every link of which is a man stretching between St. Augustine on the one hand and the present Archbishop of Canterbury on the other for this is the chair in which all the Archbishops of Canterbury are enthroned some people are of opinion that it was King Ethelberg's throne and that he gave it to St. Augustine to be his bishop's stool others think that it was not placed here until some centuries later but whether St. Augustine sat in it or not we know that it is very very old and we look at it with awe as we think of the long line of men some of whose names are almost forgotten now who have come one after the other all down the ages to take their seats upon it thus signifying to all the world that they were entering into St. Augustine's office and assuming the great and solemn responsibilities which that office implies let us think of the stories of a few of these men on whom so much responsibility rested when we look at the long role of the Archbishops the first name of note after St. Augustine's is Theodore do you know where he came from he was sent from Rome but he was really a Greek and he had been born and brought up in the city of Tarsus the birthplace of St. Paul perhaps the school boys who read this book will not love this Theodore of Tarsus for he it was who introduced the teaching of Greek into England he founded a school at Canterbury he also divided the country into dioceses and placed a bishop over each teaching these bishops to look to the Archbishop of Canterbury as their head and little as we may think it this was a great work for England for before Theodore's time each bishop had settled down under the protection of the king and so had simply been the chief minister of that kingdom thus the Archbishop of Canterbury the Bishop of the Kingdom of Kent the Bishop of London the Bishop of the East Saxons the Bishop of Lichfield the Bishop of Mercia and so on but when Archbishop Theodore created a new dioceses which were not measured by the boundaries of the various small kingdoms and when the bishops of these dioceses learned to look to Canterbury for orders and advice rather than to their own petty kings then an object lesson was given and the first step was taken towards the breaking up of those smaller kingdoms and having one king to rule over all the land that was the piece of work which Theodore did for the good of the church and the building up of the English nation then there was an Archbishop named Cuthbert who caused the creed and the Lord's Prayer to be taught to the people in their own tongue and not in Latin which they could not understand this work for the church at large but there was another work which he wrought for his own cathedral church at Canterbury which is very amusing and shows that he must have had a keen sense of humor in those old days the church was apt to grow famous not so much for the piety of the people who worshipped there as for the number of holy men who chanced to be buried within its walls we can see examples of this in the way in which every church of note was in time containing the body of its particular saint now we know that Saint Augustine was buried in his monastery and not in his cathedral church and the Archbishops who succeeded him followed his example and gave orders that they were to be buried in the monastery also and so it came about that there were no great men buried in the church at all and strangers who came to Canterbury passed the cathedral by alongside Saint Augustine's grave this will never do said Archbishop Cuthbert to himself and he quietly wrote to the Pope and to the King of Kent asking that when his time came to die he might be laid to rest in the cathedral his request was granted but he said not a word to anyone he kept the letters and bided his time for he knew that if the monks of Saint Augustine's came to know of the slight he was about to cast on their monastery they would try to thwart his design at last the day came that he lay a-dying and his friends gathered round his bed with tearful faces but the Archbishop was not tearful he was not afraid to die and he was glad to think that after his death he would be able to render a service to the church of which he was so proud so he drew out the letters he had received from King and Pope he had astonished friends and told them where he desired to be buried then with a touch of humor which makes us feel that he must have been a very shrewd and human old man he added bury me first told the bell afterwards so his friends buried him hurriedly and in secret then after they had filled in his grave and built up the stones again they told the great bell mournfully and to very know that the Archbishop had passed away when the abbot and monks of the monastery came to claim, as was their want the body of the primate they were told to their wrathful astonishment that he was already buried and they were shown the letters and taken to see his grave which of course they could not disturb after this all the Archbishops were buried in the cathedral and as we shall see later on one of them who, if he were not a great saint at least was so famous that after his death his shrine became a place of pilgrimage not only for English people but for people from all over Europe then there were Archbishop Dunstan and Archbishop Alfege Dunstan and Saint Alfege as they came to be called who were buried on either side of the high altar they had magnificent shrines no trace of which remains today save a piece of carved stone which formed part of Saint Dunstan's shrine and yet these men, whose name seems so vague to us were great and noble figures in their time Saint Dunstan helped to mold the destinies of England Saint Alfege died for his faith and like Saint Albin at Beryllum helped to swell the English ranks of the noble army of martyrs Saint Dunstan was a little fair-haired, delicate, Somerset share boy who was born at Glastonbury where a famous Abbey stood his father, Hurston was a rich thing who owned lands and vassals and in the winter evenings when these vassals were gathered together in the great hall round the blazing fire they sang songs and told stories to one another and little Dunstan listened to them and grew so fond of the old songs and stories that he never saw all his life long he was passionately fond of music and persuaded an old harper to teach him to play on the harp and when he grew older and traveled about visiting first at one nobleman's house then at another as befitted a young man of his rank he always carried his harp with him and charmed the fair ladies whom he met with the beautiful music he could draw from its strings he was very fond of reading too and there were plenty of books in the Abbey of Glastonbury for him to pour over and in time he became known as one of the most learned and cultured youths of his day then he went to court and would doubtless have become a great courtier and perhaps might have idled away his time playing on his harp and talking about literature to the queen and her ladies if it had not been for the unkindness of some of the nobles whom he met there or jealous of him of his good looks and sunny nature and his skill in music and learning so one day when he was out writing in a marshy part of the country they said on him pulled him off his horse threw him into the marsh crampled him under foot and left him for dead he was not dead however but he was so badly hurt that he had a long illness afterwards and during the days and weeks when he was lying helpless he had time to think about many things about his life and what use he could make of it and by the time he had recovered he had made up his mind that instead of being a courtier he would be a monk I cannot tell you all that happened during his long life he first became abbot of Glastonbury then Bishop of Worcester and then Archbishop of Canterbury now as I have already told you in the days the Archbishops of Canterbury were practically prime ministers of England as well and Dunstan was both a good Archbishop and a wise prime minister in his time the Danes had conquered a large part of the country and had settled down to live there but instead of conducting themselves like peaceable citizens they behaved like thieves and robbers and naturally the English people feared and hated them and were constantly at war with them trying to drive them out of the country the wise Archbishop knew that they would never be able to do this so he tried to make the Danes take an interest in the land and learn to look on it as their home by giving them good laws and treating them firmly but justly and in his time at least the plan succeeded he also encouraged foreigners from France and Germany to come and trade with England but London first began to grow into a great city he made laws about the coinage of our money and saw that just weights and measures were used by traders so the poor people would not be oppressed and wrong after Archbishop Dunstan came Archbishop Alfege the martyr I told you that St. Dunstan had treated the Danes very kindly and wisely but after his death the king Ethelred who was a very foolish young man and had never taken the Archbishop's advice about anything determined to make one great effort to rid the country of them by putting them all to death so he gave orders that on a certain night the Saxons were to kill all the Danes who were living many of them quite peaceably in their midst this was done but as you may think dire vengeance followed the treacherous act as soon as the news of the massacre reached Swain king of Denmark he at once wore a great oath that he would never rest until he had conquered England and avenged his murdered people accordingly he gathered together an immense force of Norsemen and Danes and descended on the shores of England and for four long years they harried the country burning towns and homesteads wherever they went when it was known that they were approaching Canterbury the Archbishop he advised to fly for his life as long as there was time but to the brave old man such an act would have been a betrayal of the trust committed to him by God God forbid that I should tarnish my character by such an inglorious deed he exclaimed and be afraid to go to heaven because a violent death might lead me there so he remained at his post a true priest of God to the end and passed triumphantly to his reward through the violent death which he had looked forward to so calmly when the cathedral was attacked he and his monks locked themselves in the great church hoping that its walls would be strong enough to protect them and they might have been had the Danes not used their most deadly weapon fire as an old writer tells us they brought barrels and piled them together and set them alight on the roof and their heat melted the lead with which it was covered so that it ran down like rain on the poor men inside who were like to be roasted alive then the brave Archbishop gathering his monks around him flung open the door and begged mercy for his little flock of the wild heathen warriors offering willingly to become a prisoner himself if they were allowed to go free it was in vain all the monks except four who managed to escape were at once put to death and Alfege was led away a prisoner not that the Danes wanted to spare him but they hoped that the Saxon king might offer to pay a ransom for him but poor cowardly Ethelrid thought only of his own safety and fled over the sea to Normandy so no ransom came from him the country people who loved their good Archbishops were up most to gather enough money to gather to rescue him but he heard this and sent messengers to them telling them to desist for as he said there is enough misery in the country without people being made poorer for my sake so the Danes became tired of waiting for money and after seven weeks they led Alfege out to die in their husting or public meeting place at Greenwich and to make their cruelty more cruel the savage sea rovers determined that his death should give them a little amusement so they placed him in the center and stood around in a ring and pelted him with stones and with the sharp horns of oxen just as a thousand years before men had stoned St. Stephen outside the gates of Jerusalem it is terrible to read of such things being done in this peaceful England of ours is it not? and we feel thankful to the unknown Dane who more merciful than the rest of his countrymen struck the Archbishop on the head with his axe and so put an end to his sufferings after he was dead his mangled body was buried at Greenwich and the sad story seemed to be at an end End of Section 1 Section 2 of Tales of English Minsters of Cathedral Kent and St. Paul's Cathedral London by Elizabeth Wilson Grierson this LibriVox recording is in the public domain Section 2 Canterbury Cathedral Kent County Part 2 but now comes in one of those incidents which make these old cathedrals we are learning about so full of interest and such wonderful links with the past for King Swain of Denmark just when he had succeeded in conquering England and Canute, or Canute his son reigned in his stead this Canute was a wonderful man one of the most wonderful men in history from a heathen and a barbarian he turned into a Christian and a wise king in his time the English people had peace and by the justice and wisdom of his rule he taught them to forget that he was an alien and a foreigner his other good qualities he had a great care for God's house and God's ministers and when it was told him how sixteen years before his father's followers had murdered the Archbishop of Canterbury he immediately set to work to make what reparation lay in his power he had St. Alphages poor crushed bones taken from their humble grave at Greenwich and brought back in solemn state and with all the marks of honour he went to his cathedral church which in the years that had passed since his death had been rebuilt and restored and after the bones had been laid to rest beside the altar the great and powerful monarch whom everyone looked up to and feared lifted the golden crown from his head and handed it to the clergy asking them to hang it up at the head of the great cross which hung in the nave as a token that he was sorry for how the defene have undone the cruel deed of his countrymen soon after Alphages came two foreign Archbishops Land Frank and Anselm whose names will live in history although they were friends and fellow countrymen both of them being Italians and although they came to Canterbury from the same little Norman monastery they were very different in character the story of the little monastery itself would interest you had I time to tell you about it how it was called the monastery of Beck because it stood down in a wooded valley beside a little Beck or stream how the first abbot, Erlene was a soldier before he turned among how he was so poor that he had to build his first tiny house with his own hands and how he was making an oven when Land Frank found him out and asked if he might join him but we must pass over all that and go on to the time when Erlene was dead and Land Frank was abbot in his stead now Land Frank as well as being good and learned was what we call a practical man that is when there was anything to be done he not only saw the very best way to do it but he would do it himself if need be or direct other men to do it and the Norman Duke William when he conquered England needed such men to help him to arrange matters in his new kingdom so he sent for him and made him Archbishop of Canterbury there is a very pretty story told of how William and Land Frank first came to be such friends at the time when the Duke got into trouble with the Pope because he had married his cousin Matilda Land Frank was abbot of Beck and not being afraid of anyone not even of William himself he sided with the Pope and made no secret that he did so William was so angry when he heard this that he ordered Land Frank to leave Normandy at once the fearless abbot obeyed and set out from his monastery on the only horse he possessed which was very lame and went herpling along on three legs of course he did not get on very quickly and William who was foaming with rage and who had written to Beck himself to see if the abbot had obeyed his orders and took him in a narrow lane can you picture the scene to yourselves? the angry Duke on his great charger and the humble monk with all his worldly belongings strapped on his back jogging along on his poor lame genet thou shouldst obey my orders better and to make more haste to get out of the country said William haughtily give me a better horse and I will go the quicker said the abbot good-humoredly with a twinkle in his eye it was the soft answer that turns away wrath for William was so amused that he burst out laughing and ever afterwards the two men were the best of friends and William took Land Frank's advice in everything indeed Land Frank was almost as great a man in England as the conqueror himself and to his credit be it said he used his immense power wisely and well like St. Dunstan he was more of a statesman than a priest yet he found time in the midst of his lawmaking to attend to his cathedral which had been allowed to fall into such a state of dilapidation that it was almost a ruin he pulled down what remained of it and built it again and we can see some of his work in the crypt by and by the Norman king died flung from his horse if you remember at Montes in France and his friend the Norman Archbishop only lived long enough to place his crown on the head of his son William Rufus or William the Red then he died also and the Archbishop's throne at Canterbury was empty now Red William was a very different man from his father the conqueror had been stern and ruthless but he had ever cared for the church and for good men as someone has said of him he was stark to rebel and barren but he was mild to those who loved God Red William neither feared God himself nor honored those who did so instead of appointing a new Archbishop to fill land Frank's place he left the throne of Canterbury empty and put the money that belonged to it into his own coffers it was very wrong and very wicked but it did not trouble him at all until one day he was seized with illness and was like to die then he was frightened I am afraid we cannot say but he was frightened and his thoughts turned to the man who was abbot of back in land Frank's place the name of this man was Anselm and he was the most gentle, loving and saintly abbot you can imagine he was so kind and humble and altogether good that his fame had spread not only through Normandy but also through England it chanced that at this particular time he was on a visit to England and the sick meant for him and much against his will forced him to become Archbishop and Anselm did not in the least want to be Archbishop he was a great student and he would much have preferred to live on quietly at back but when the post was forced upon him he did not shrink from the responsibility but stood up bravely for what was right and because of this he had a very troubled life for after all the Red King recovered and when he recovered he broke all the promises which he had made on his sickbed and persecuted poor Archbishop Anselm because he would not do what he wished him to do driving him out of the country and he being all manner of insults and abuse on him until I think the sweet tempered old man must have been almost broken hearted but he never agreed to do what he thought was wrong and yet he never grew bitter and discourteous but was always meek and gentle and forgiving and at last after Rufus was dead and his son Henry had recalled him to England he died peacefully at Canterbury and was buried beside his friend Landfranc in the nave of the cathedral Landfranc's tomb has disappeared but if we go into this little chapel far up in the choir we can see where Anselm's remains now rest and beside his grave shall I tell you a few stories about him they are worth telling for they show us what kind of a man he was and I think when you have heard them you will agree with me that of all the great men who have sat on St. Augustine's chair and whose bodies have been laid to rest here there is no one who deserves the name of saint more than he did as I said before he was an Italian and he was born not so very far from the birthplace of St. Hugh of Lincoln it is a very beautiful country where rich valleys run up among the snow tipped Alps and where little Anselm was picking bright spring flowers in the meadows or playing in autumn in the harvest fields he could look up at these great snow mountains whose summits seem to touch the clouds there is one story told of him when he was a child that is told of St. Cuthbert when he was a shepherd lad among the hills by the tweed Anselm's father was a violent and passionate man but his mother was a gentle good woman who used to take her little boy on her knee and tell him about the great god who lived up in heaven and from his throne directed all the things on earth and little Anselm who was a thoughtful child used to ponder these things he saw the rays of the rising ascending sun light up the tops of the mountains turning them into rosy pink and burning gold he made up his mind that heaven was up there among the snow peaks and that God's palace was just where the light was strongest and he thought so much about this that one night he dreamt a dream he dreamt that a call came to him to go to the mountains to the palace of the great king and he rose from his bed and set out and it seemed to him that before he reached the mountains he had to pass through yellow harvest fields full of ripening grain there were a great many maidens there reaping but instead of working hard they were idling their time away talking and laughing to one another and all at once Anselm seemed to see that these were not ordinary peasant maidens but that they were servants of the great king who lived in the palace on the mountaintops and he made up his mind that when he got up there he would tell God how idle they all were thinking thus he went on his way up and up until at last he reached the heavenly palace and there to his astonishment he found only the great king and his chief butler for all the other servants had been sent into the valley to reap and as he stood and looked in through the door the Lord called to him and told him to sit down at his feet and asked him his name and where he came from and what he wanted and the lad answered all his questions as truthfully as he could only I think that he forgot to tell about the idle girls in the cornfields for he would began to see that he too was a little servant of the king and that he had not always worked as diligently as he might have done then the Lord ordered his butler to go and bring some food to the weary little lad and the man brought the whitest bread that Anselm had ever seen and he ate it and all his weariness vanished then he awoke and lo and behold he was in his little trundle bed at home it is a quaint and fanciful story is it not yet it influenced the whole of the great archbishop's life for he really believed that he had been in heaven and that God had fed him and ever afterwards he realized what is so hard for most of us to realize that heaven is quite close to earth not somewhere very far away and that if we will we can do our work here on earth as the girls in the harvest field might have done with their eyes fixed on the glories of the king's palace and this taught him not to draw a line as we all are apt so to do between what we might call his everyday work and his Sunday work to him one seemed just as sacred as the other because he was a monk and abbot of back he had to be a great deal in church and say a great many prayers and study the bible but he found time to do common things as well he was always ready to sympathize with anyone in trouble and to give them advice or to go into the classroom in the monastery and listen to the teaching there and he would take notice of the dull boys and try to show their masters how to make their lessons interesting so that they would learn them more easily and at night when all the rest of the monks were asleep he would go softly into the infirmary if there was any monk lying sick there and sit beside him and shake up his pillows and if he were very ill as one poor man once was he used to peel grapes and squeeze the juice between his hot lips to try and moisten his poor parched tongue he loved all animals once after he became Archbishop of Canterbury he was out riding near Winsu with his attendants as they rode through the forest they startled a hare and immediately the young men and their dogs gave chase there was no chance of escape for the poor frightened little creature and at last it came and crouched down stupefied with terror under Anselm's horse everyone crowded round laughing thoughtlessly at the easy way in which it had been captured but the tears came into the Archbishop's eyes at the side of its distress and he ordered all the dogs to be called off and allowed it to escape but although he was kind and gentle he was no coward as we read before William Rufus behaved very badly to him because he would not obey him in matters where he thought the king was wrong this made Rufus very angry but Anselm did not mind he spoke out boldly and let the monarch do his worst once William summoned a great council of bishops and parents to decide what should be done with this old man who cared more for God's smile than for royal favors I am afraid some of the other bishops were cowards who wanted to please the king so they did not defend Anselm as they ought to but turned against him because they saw he was likely to get into trouble and be driven out of England the council was a noisy one some of the members said one thing and some another and they all became very excited while the king grew more and more angry and what do you think Anselm did to whom it meant so much do you think he sat listening and trembling and begging his brother bishops to come to his help to see his defense in quiet dignified words then seeing that everyone was so angry that they could not decide what to do with him he rose quietly and walked out of the hall telling them that when they had made up their minds they could come and tell him then he went into the church and said his prayers and sat quietly down to wait and when at last the bishops came to look for him they found him leaning his head against the wall and sat down into calm sleep it was no wonder that such a man was not afraid of the anger of kings and that at last even his enemies came to admire his peaceful holy life too and now we come to the most famous Archbishop of all Thomas a Becket known as St. Thomas of Canterbury somehow we do not think of him as a saint in the same way as we think of St. Cuthbert of Durham St. Hugh of York or St. Anselm who were content to eat poor fare and live in rough lodgings and face hardships and go weary journeys for the sake of Christ and his gospel but all the same Thomas a Becket had a courage of his own although he was haughty and headstrong he lost his life rather than yield to the king in a matter where he thought he was right and we cannot help honoring anyone who is ready to die rather than be untrue to his convictions this is the story of Thomas's life after William the Norman conquered England large numbers of his countrymen flocked across the channel among them was a silk Mercer of Rouen called Gilbert a Becket he settled in London and set up a little shop in Cheepside and he seemed to have prospered greatly for in a course of time we find he became portray of the city which was something like being Lord Mayor he also built a chapel in St. Paul's church which shows that he was a wealthy man he had one little son named Thomas and a gentle pious wife who was very kind to the poor and who was in the habit when her little boy's birthday came around of weighing him in a pair of scales against a pile of money clothes and provisions which she afterwards carried with her own hands to restitute folk who needed them the boy was brought up in luxury as befitted his father's wealth and position and he had for his friends all the young Norman nobles and parents he went to Oxford then to the University of Paris and when his education was finished he was one of the gayest and most fashionable young men in London he was very daring and very witty and there was much that was noble about him for he was ever true to his friends true to his word true even to his favorite animals one day he was writing out with a party of his companions on a hawking expedition when his hawk tired with the chase fell into a mill-aid and too exhausted to rise from the water was in danger of being carried by the current under the mill-wheel to everyone's astonishment her master seeing her danger himself from his horse and plunged into the water and a grave peril to his own life rescued her it was a brave deed and we feel that we should have loved the young Galant who took so much trouble for the sake of a poor tired bird at last something happened which must have seemed very hard at the time to the handsome young man although he did not regret it in after years his father the rich merchant and his son had to look about for something to do instead of merely amusing himself as he had hitherto done he was clever and well educated and he determined to become a priest thinking no doubt that with his abilities he would soon obtain a comfortable appointment now it chanced that at this time the country had fallen into a great state of misery and confusion King Stephen had been chosen king in place of his cousin Matilda and although he had been forced to sign the great charter he had not held to the promises made in it but governed the country so badly that bloodshed and crime and lawlessness prevailed everywhere things were in such a state that it seemed almost hopeless to dream of better times and had it not been for the strength and prudence of one man these better times might not have come King was Theobald one of the archbishops of Canterbury he determined to invite Matilda's son Henry who was Count of Normandy and Anjou to come to England hoping that the English people would take him to rule over them when Stephen died and that he would prove a better king than Stephen had been he wanted someone to help him to carry out his plans however and the brilliant young scholar priest who was of Norman birth himself with friendly terms with all the English nobles seemed the very man to aid him so Thomas Abecket came to Canterbury to be the friend and confidant of the archbishop I expect that he was delighted as any young man would have been when he got the appointment thinking that his fortune was made I wonder what he would have thought as he rode down the leafy Kentish lanes to his new home if he could have read the future the reminder of his brilliant stormy life was to be connected with it how he was to be enthroned as archbishop and die a violent death there and there also be laid to his long rest at present however everything looked bright Becket was sent over the sea to invite the Count of Anjou to come to England Henry came and was accepted by the English people as heir to the crown soon afterwards Stephen died the throne and it was only natural that he should show great favor to the young priest who had taken such a part in placing him upon it so Becket was made Chancellor of England and as he was about the same age as the new king the two young men became great friends they rode and hunted together and sometimes played jokes with each other just like two school boys when the king had a war with France Becket fought for him at the head 700 nights in fact the youthful Chancellor was much more of a soldier and a courtier than a priest but once again a great change was coming in his life Archbishop Theobald died and to everyone's astonishment especially to the astonishment of Becket himself Henry insisted that he should succeed him the truth was that Henry had made up his mind to lessen the power of the church in other words he wanted to have to rule the affairs of the church as he ruled the affairs of the nation and he thought that if Becket being his bosom friend became Archbishop he would help him to do this but he did not know the man with whom he had to deal he had very little respect himself for the church or for religion and misled by his Chancellor's gay dress and reckless manners he thought that he had the same but although up till now Becket had been more of a soldier than a priest down at the bottom of his heart he had a strict sense of right and wrong and he knew that if he were to be a worthy Archbishop his life must be different to what it had been he was quite content with his office of Chancellor however so he tried to persuade Henry to appoint someone else to the primacy a fine figure you were choosing to lead your monks at Canterbury he exclaimed when the king spoke to him on the subject relating to the rich garments which he wore when Henry insisted he spoke more gravely you will soon hate me as much as you love me now he said for you assume an authority in the affairs of the church to which I shall never assent but Henry was determined to have his own way he did not dream that any man would dare to oppose him and Becket became Archbishop then came trouble trouble that lasted till the end Henry demanded more power in the management of ecclesiastical affairs Becket refused to grant it it is a sad story a story of a broken friendship and hasty words whose consequences could never be recalled we cannot help admiring Becket although perhaps he was too unbending to ready to stand on his rights as soon as he was made Archbishop he changed the whole manner of his life he had been gay and he listened luxurious before now he was grave and self-control and lived much more plainly he had told the king before his appointment that he did not intend to yield to his demands and he held to his decision although everyone, even the Pope urged him to give way a little at last the quarrel became so great that his life was in danger and he had to fly disguised from the country he was absent for six years but never once did he think of yielding although it became plain to everyone that by holding to his own opinions and the way he did he was really putting himself in the wrong at last Henry paid a visit to Normandy and met his old friend now his enemy at a place called Tredeval after some argument he agreed to let bygones be bygones and to allow Becket to return to England but the reconciliation cannot have been very complete for no sooner had the Archbishop departed than Henry exclaimed impatiently will no man rid me of this turbulent priest alas these were like other angry words spoken in haste without any thought of their consequences and the king repented of them all his life afterwards for there were four of his knights standing by and he uttered them Fitzhurst, Morphill, de Tracey and LeBrette who took them for permission to murder Becket and without further ado they determined to follow him to England meanwhile the Archbishop had reached Canterbury in safety and had been greeted by a joyous welcome from the people of Kent who had ever loved him dearly and had once more taken up his abode in the palace now let us go into the tiny which opens from the North Isle the Chapel of the martyrdom as it has come to be called for it was here that the terrible deed took place that filled not only England but Europe with horror we will not remain in it at present but go through this low door at the opposite side and then we shall find ourselves in the cloisters you all know what cloisters are the long vaulted stone corridors or arcades where the monks used to spend most of their time when they were not in their cells or in church, reading, writing or talking these cloisters almost always formed four sides of the square the center of which was open to the sky and carpeted with smooth green turf on one side the cloister walls were pierced by arched windows which however were not filled with glass so that they were really almost like stone verandas so the monks had plenty of fresh air indeed they sometimes had too much for we read of a monk at Canterbury writing to a friend in France and telling him that he would have to give up writing entirely until the spring as his fingers were so stiff and swollen with the cold that he could no longer hold the pen in many places these cloisters with their beautiful carving have been destroyed but here at Canterbury they are perfect and we can walk around them and look at the smooth green square of turf which they enclose which is now used as a burying place well if we stand at the corner of these cloisters just where the door leads into them from the chapel of the martyrdom and look across in a slanting direction to the opposite corner we will see where the bishops palace stood in the time of Becket it was connected with that corner of the cloisters just as the cathedral is joined to this corner about five o'clock on a dark December evening just four days after Christmas Becket was seated in his chamber at the palace talking to his friends while in the dimly lit church the monks were singing Vespers suddenly the Sénéchal appeared and announced that four nights had come from France from the king bearing a message to the Archbishop Becket must have known that their coming meant no good to him but he showed no sign of fear and ordered them to be brought into his presence the Sénéchal ushered them in and at once they began to insult and up braid the prelate and he on his side answered them sharply and proudly they demanded in the king's name that he should return to France he replied that nothing would induce him to do so so the storm of words went on and at last the four nights rushed impatiently out calling on their followers to arm and to close the doors of the palace so that none of the townspeople could enter they had determined to kill the Archbishop and they knew that if any of the citizens of Canterbury got the least idea of what they were about to do they would crowd in and rescue him meanwhile Becket's handful of faithful friends ordered him to seek safety in the cathedral for in those days people had such reverence for churches that it seemed to them impossible that anyone could be wicked enough to commit an act of violence there Becket did not want to go he believed that he was in the right and he did not want to appear as if he were afraid but his friends were so impressed with the danger he was in that they took hold of his cassock and half pushed and pulled him along the cloisters one of his clerks whose name was Henry of Oze going before him bearing a lock the staff with a cross on the end of it which was always carried before the primate can you picture the sad, disorderly little procession the cross-bearer in front the group of terrified clergy behind forcing along their unwilling master the only man who was not afraid as they reached this low door which leads to the cathedral the sound of hurrying footsteps is heard the four knights have armed themselves and are running around the other side of the cloisters trying to catch the Archbishop before he can enter the church but they are too late Becket's friends have got him safely inside the little transept and are turning around to bar the door behind them but the Archbishop would not have it so and we cannot help admiring his splendid bravery God's house was meant to be always open so that whoever will can enter and he would not have its doors shut for him he had begun to climb the steps into the choir but when he heard the iron bars being fastened he turned back and undid them with his own hands away ye cowards I command ye not to shut the door he thundered the church must not be made into a castle so the door was left open and the knights rushed in and here, just where this tiny stone at our feet marks the spot the Archbishop was struck down and killed it was a wild and wicked deed and no sooner was it done than it was repented of but no repentance could undo it and what weighed more heavily than anything else on the murderer's minds was the awful thought that they had killed a priest one of God's ministers and the very courts of God's house the place of all others where they should have been careful of their actions with hushed voices and trembling limbs they stole out of the building into the midst of a fearful thunderstorm which broke just then in all its fury over the little city and as they passed in haste along the narrow streets and mounting their horses rode away into the darkness I think they must have felt like Cain for they must have known that ever afterwards they would be marked men for no matter what the Archbishop's faults had been the whole of Christendom would regard the deed with shuddering horror because it had been committed within the walls of a church of God meanwhile in the cathedral the poor monks had fastened the doors and put out the lights and hidden themselves away in dark corners too dumbfounded and terrified even to venture near the dead man's body so here it lay unheeded on the stone floor till far on in the night when the monks gathered courage and came out of their hiding places and lifting it reverently laid it on a beer before the high altar next morning they buried it hurriedly and by stealth in the crypt where they had heard a rumor that they would not be allowed to bury it in the cathedral so many other Archbishops rested but it only remained in the crypt some 50 years for the story of that dark night's work soon spread through the length and breadth of the land and all over Europe and even to Rome itself and everybody was so horrified at the thought of an Archbishop being murdered in his own cathedral that they forgot Beckett's faults and only remembered that he died in defense of what he thought were the rites of the church and they spoke of him as a martyr and a saint and insisted that his body should be taken from its grave in the crypt and placed in a magnificent shrine which stood in this empty space which we see if we ascend these steps near the high altar and passing behind it enter Trinity Chapel look how worn and uneven these steps are almost as if they had been fretted away by running water why they are fretted away like that because thousands of men and women pilgrims from all parts of Europe from England and Ireland, Scotland and France Spain and Italy once climbed up them on their knees on their way to visit the shrine of St. Thomas of Genterbury for no shrine in the world was more famous and none was richer in ornaments and it was from these pilgrims that the steps take their name of pilgrims the steps. Have you ever heard of Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales? It is an old book written in curious verse and quaint Old World English and if you opened it perhaps you could not think it looked very interesting but it tells you of a company of pilgrims who set out from London one April morning to make a pilgrimage to Beckett Shrine in Canterbury there were 29 of them and some of them were rich and some were poor some were knights and barons and some were nuns one was a learned scholar from Oxford and one was a poor unlearned cook and they all told stories by the way and they all came into the great cathedral and prayed at the shrine and they slept at a little inn the checkers of the hope you can't see it still at the corner of the lane which leads from the cathedral precincts to the high street back to London again they were only people in Chaucer's imagination of course but to read about them gives us a very good idea of the companies of pilgrims with whom the streets of the little city would be crowded in the middle ages for 300 years this state of things went on and the shrine grew more and more famous and ever richer and more magnificent as kings and princes and nobles came to pray at it for offerings of gold or silver or jewels then came the beginning of the Reformation and Henry VIII's quarrel with the Pope in his name orders were given that all the great shrines were to be destroyed and the gold and jewels with which they were adorned put in the king's treasury so the gorgeous shrine at Canterbury was broken to pieces and the bones of Beckett were either destroyed or thrown into some unknown grave where no one knows today where they are lying before we leave the story of Beckett and turn to that of the black prince whose tomb we see close beside the spot where the famous shrine stood let us go down to the crypt and look at a stone slab in the floor which marks the spot where Beckett's body was buried for the first 50 years after his death it also marks the spot where one of the most extraordinary scenes in English history took place we have seen how Beckett helped to make Henry the second king of England and what friends the two young men were at first before Henry insisted on making Thomas Archbishop we have seen too how Henry's words spoken in haste in France were the cause of Beckett's death well no sooner was the Archbishop dead than the king was seized with terrible remorse it seemed to him that he was just as guilty of his crash deed as if he had struck down the primate with his own sword and to add to his distress serious troubles began to fall on his kingdom while he was engaged in war with France the people at home rose in rebellion the Scots invaded the northern counties and to make matters worse a stormy and inclement winter brought the country to the verge of starvation the common people in their ignorance and superstition said as the thunder crashed and the wind roared that it was the blood of Saint Thomas crying to God for vengeance and the king almost beside himself with remorse and perplexity came to the conclusion that the only thing he could do to obtain mercy from God for his distressed country and forgiveness for his own sin was to do penance after the custom of the time and humble himself before God and man in the very spot where the Archbishop was buried so he hurried home from France and one rainy July day the people of Canterbury trembling with awe and wonder saw their king walk barefoot through the muddy streets with nothing on but a long woolen shirt the dress of a penitent pilgrim and a cloak thrown over it to keep off the rain attended by a train of bishops and to the cathedral the strange procession went up the aisle and down into the crypt then throwing off his cloak and kneeling at the Archbishop's grave Henry solemnly confessed his sin owning that it was his hasty words that had led to the murder and expressing his deep sorrow for them after which he allowed each of the bishops present to give him five strokes with the rod and each of the monks there were three of them to give him three strokes then the ordeal being over he spent the night in the dark crypt alone leaning we are told against one of these stone pillars so ended this sad story of broken friendship and pride and angry words and violent death there were faults on both sides as we say and because Beckett was the one who suffered most he had the sympathy of the people and his name was held in honour but we must not forget that although the way in which the king acknowledged his sin and tried to make amends for it seems strange and unnatural to us yet to him and to the people of his day it was the sign of his deep repentance and he did not shrink from it as too many of us might have done now let us turn to the story of the black prince which is so much brighter and more hopeful than that of Beckett you know a great deal about this prince from your history books but somehow he seems more real to us when we stand beside his grave at canterbury and see the very armour he wore when he rode to battle he was the eldest son of king Edward the third and gentle Philippa of Hynalt who as you may have heard were married in York Minster he spent his school days at college Oxford and when he was still a boy he became a soldier when he was only 16 he went with his father to fight in France and after king Edward had ravaged the whole country to the very gates of Paris he was retreating with his forces in the direction of Flanders when the French king Philip with an immense army came up to him and offered instant battle the English had encamped near the forest of Cressy to leave its name to the fight I need not describe the battle to you you know about it as well or better than I do how the king did not fight at all but went up to the top of a windmill which stood on a hill nearby and remained there watching how things went on leaving the boy prince and his black armour to direct the soldiers and how when the lad was in danger and some of the English nobles indignant set what seemed to them his father's carelessness spurred their horses up to the windmill and called out to the king that his son was in peril he answered let the child win his spurs and let the day be his you know also how the child did win his spurs and gained the day helped by the fact that a terrific thunderstorm came on and the Italian bowman who had been fighting for the French allowed their bow strings to get so wet that they could not draw them while the English archers who were more accustomed to storms and carried their bows in cases kept their bow strings dry and afterwards used them with deadly effect no wonder that after that day the English nation worshiped their brave young prince but besides being brave he was gentle and courteous a true knight he passed away and once more he was leading an English army at Poitiers in France the odds were terribly against him he had 8,000 men King John of France had 60,000 but as the English army was surrounded he must either fight or surrender God is my help said the Dauntless Prince when he saw the number of his enemies I must fight them as best I can and fight them he did he conquered them and the French King fell a prisoner into his hands do you remember how he treated him he had a banquet prepared for him and his own tent and stood behind his chair and waited on him himself and when the French King would have remonstrated and said that it was not fitting that he the banquished should be waited on by his conqueror he pointed out that the French monarch was a king while he had not attained that dignity but was only a subject and therefore must show reverence to his superiors and you remember also that when they appeared together in the streets of London and the curious citizens thronged out to meet them ready to jeer at the unfortunate King who had lost his kingdom and to cheer their own Prince who had gained it they were rebuked and silenced and taught a lesson of generosity on the side of the banquished monarch writing in the place of honour on a fine white charger while by his side dressed in plain clothes on a little black palfrey rode the young man who had conquered him the King and the Prince had landed at Sandwich and on their way up to London they had stayed for a night at Canterbury and had visited the shrine of Thomas of Eckett we do not know if the Prince had ever been in the little Kentish town before but he knew for years that on this visit he was greatly delighted with the beauty of its cathedral and he made up his mind that when he died he would be buried there six years after this he fell in love with his cousin Joan who was so beautiful that she was called the fair maid of Kent but because she was his cousin there was some trouble about his marrying her and when at last he was allowed to do so he was so glad that he founded as a thank offering a beautiful little chapel or chantry down in the crypt of Canterbury Cathedral other sixteen years past and the Prince lay dying in the palace of Westminster we have seen what a brave and courteous gentleman he was and the way in which he met death shows us that he was a fearless Christian as well when he knew that he was dying he made his will we can still read it written in Old World French and directs that his body should be taken to Canterbury and buried in the chapel that he had founded in the crypt he also gave orders that his tomb was to be decorated by his crest three ostrich feathers and his arms and on them were to be inscribed his motos Humant and Isch-Dien further that round his tomb an inscription was to be written clearly so that all men might read it little the grandeur and pomp and success of this life matters when the time comes for a man to die he died the day after he had made this will on Trinity Sunday 1376 his commands were obeyed in part at least for in the midst of great morning his body was taken to Canterbury but people felt somehow that it was not fitting that this great and chivalrous and well-beloved Prince buried down in the dark crypt so they laid him here in Trinity Chapel close to the shrine of Becket look they have placed his effigy above his tomb so that all coming generations might know what manner of man he was there he lies in full armor his head resting on his helmet his feet with the likeness of the spurs he won at Cressy his hands joined in the last prayer he offered up in the deathbed the prayer in which he asked forgiveness for himself and his enemies over him hangs a wooden canopy on which is painted a curious representation of the Holy Trinity and above all fastened to the beam from which the canopy is hung are the things which I think will interest you most of all and which he himself desired should hang above his tomb there is his helmet filled and circled tarnished and faded now but once ablaze with the golden leopards of England and the fleur de lis of France and his sword scabbard which once contained his sword which it is said was carried away by Oliver Cromwell then before we turn away let us bring our eyes down to the tomb once more and notice the ostrich feathers carved around it which we know so well for they have been born as a crest by the heir to the throne of England ever since the days of the black prince let us also look at the motos woven around them Oumon or Hoekmuth High Spirits and Ichtin I serve do they not tell us the secret of the wonderful influence which this prince who died so long ago wielded but he served nobly, willingly with the high and generous spirit and the kindly tact of a good man I think the service which he rendered to all who were round about him whether they were his friends or whether they were his foes was the service which Saint Paul meant when he said whatsoever ye do do it heartily as to the Lord and not to men if we try to look at all the tombs in this grand cathedral and to recall the stories of all those who lie buried in them we might spend days here and unluckily we have not time to do that but before we leave it let us go down to the crypt once more for although it is so quiet and solemn I think the crypt is quite as interesting as the cathedral above you remember how I told you that the prince had had some trouble over his marriage and how when it was safely accomplished there was a chapel or chantry here as a thank offering we see this chapel on our left hand side as we enter but you say in astonishment it looks as if people worshipped in it today here is a pulpit and there are chairs and books yes people do worship in it today and that is one of the glories of Canterbury Cathedral it is the mother cathedral of England and in it for over a thousand years the stately ritual of the national church has been carried on but it was big enough and generous enough to spare a little corner of its crypt as a refuge to a congregation of strangers and foreigners who came to this country when they could not worship God in their own way with safety in their own native land you have read about the Huguenots the Protestants of France and Flanders who were so persecuted in the 16th century were brought for safety many of them went to Switzerland and Germany and many of them came to England they were mostly cloth or silk weavers and it was a very good thing for England that they did come for they brought the knowledge of their craft with them and taught it to English people a colony of them settled at Canterbury and as they could only speak French and had neither church nor workshops and as their manner of worship that of the English Queen Elizabeth said that they could have the crypt of the cathedral to work in on weekdays and to have service in on Sundays so they set up their looms here and worked at them until they had earned enough money to take work rooms elsewhere and they took possession of the Black Prince's Chantry and used it as their church and though they only wove in the crypt for a short time they had no choice and their descendants were shipped here after them and even now every Sunday a French service is held after the manner of the Huguenots in this little chapel End of Section 2