Page:The reign of William Rufus and the accession of Henry the First.djvu/194

Punishment of the rebellious monks.

Punishment of the citizens.

• chester and Gundulf of Rochester, accompanied by some

lay nobles, with the King's orders to punish the offenders. The monks were scourged; but, by the intercession of the Prior and monks of Christ Church, the discipline was inflicted privately with no lay eyes to behold.^[1] They were then scattered through different monasteries, and twenty-four monks of Christ Church, with their sub-prior Anthony as Prior, were sent to colonize the empty cloister of Saint Augustine's.^[2] The doom of the citizens was harder; those who were found guilty of a share in the attack on the Abbot lost their eyes.^[3] The justice of the Red King, stern as it was, thus drew the distinction for which Thomas of London strove in after days. The lives and limbs of monastic offenders were sacred.

§ 3. The Character of William Rufus.

Death of Lanfranc. May 24, 1089. The one great event recorded in the year after the rebellion was the death of Archbishop Lanfranc, an

1. Chron. Wint. App. "Coram populo subire disciplinam, quia palam peccaverant, ii qui advenerant, decreverunt; sed prior et monachi ecclesiæ Christi, pietate moti, restiterunt; ne, si palam punirentur, infames deinceps fierent, sicque eorum vita ac servitus contemneretur. Igitur concessum est ut in ecclesia fieret, ubi non populus, sed soli ad hoc electi admitterentur." Thierry, who of course colours the whole story after his fashion, becomes (ii. 140) not a little amusing at this point. The flogging was done by two monks of Christ Church, "Wido et Normannus." If one stopped to think of matters of nationality at such a moment, we might admire the impartiality of the Norman bishops in entrusting the painful duty to a monk of each nation, somewhat on the principle of a mixed jury. For no one can doubt that Normannus, Northman, was as good an Englishman as Northman the son of Earl Leofwine and other English bearers of that name. Thierry, on the other hand, tells us that the whipping was done by "deux religieux étrangers, appelés Guy et Le Normand." He seemingly mistook the Christian name "Normannus" for the modern surname "Lenormand," and he forgot that this last could be borne only by one whose forefathers had moved from Normandy to some other French-speaking land.
2. Chron. Wint. App.
3. Ib. See N. C. vol. iv. p. 410.