Two cardinals were present to represent the Pope, and on account of his simony, Stigand was deposed and imprisoned, while Eghelric and Eghelmar were also degraded. Yet Wulstan, clear of conscience, and certain of the validity of his own election, was not affrighted; so far from it, he boldly called on the King to restore some lands that Aldred of York had kept back from the see of Worcester.
Thomas, Aldred's successor, claimed them by a pretended jurisdiction over Worcester, and the decision was put off for a court of the great men of the realm, which did not take place till several fresh appointments had been made. Lanfranc, the Italian, Abbot of Bec, had become Archbishop of Canterbury, and was, of course, interested in guarding the jurisdiction of the Archiepiscopal see.
Wulstan, in this critical time, was exactly like himself. He fell asleep while Thomas was arguing, and when time was given him to think of his answer, he spent it in singing the service of the hour, though his priests were in terror lest they should be ridiculed for it. "Know you not," he answered, "that the Lord hath said, 'When ye stand before king and rulers, take no thought what ye shall speak, for it shall be given you in that hour what ye shall speak.' Our Lord can give me speech to-day to defend my right, and overthrow their might." Accordingly, his honest statement prevailed, and he gained his cause.
There is a beautiful legend that Lanfranc, thinking the simple old Saxon too rude and ignorant for his office, summoned him to a synod at Westminster, and there called on him to deliver up his pastoral staff and ring. Wulstan rose, and said he had known from the first that he was not worthy of his dignity, and had taken it only at the bidding of his master, King Edward. To him, therefore, who gave the staff, he would resign it. Advancing to the Confessor's tomb, he said, "Master, thou knowest how unwillingly I took this office, forced to it by thee. Behold a new king-a new law-a new primate; they decree new rights, and promulgate new statutes. Thee they accuse of error in having so commanded-me of presumption, in having obeyed. Then, indeed, thou wast liable to err, being mortal-now, being with God, thou canst not err. Not to these who require what they did not give, but to thee, who hast given, I render up my staff. Take this, my master, and deliver it to whom thou wilt."
He laid it on the tomb, took off his episcopal robes, and sat down among the monks. The legend goes on to say, that the staff remained embedded in the stone, and no hand could wrench it away, till Wulstan himself again took it up, when it yielded without effort. The King and Archbishop fell down at his feet, and entreated his pardon and blessing.
Such is the story told a century after; and surely we may believe that, without the miracle, the old man's touching appeal to his dead King, and his humility, convinced Lanfranc that it had been foul shame to think of deposing such a man because his learning was not extensive, nor his manners like those of the courtly Norman. Be that as it may, thenceforth Lanfranc and Wulstan worked hand in hand, and we find the Archbishop begging him to undertake the visitation of the diocese of Chester, which was unsafe for the Norman prelates. One great work accomplished by the help of Wulstan was, the putting an end to a horrible slave-trade with Ireland, whither Saxon serfs were sold, not by Normans, but by their own country people, who had long carried it on before the Conquest. Lanfranc persuaded William to abolish it, but the rude Saxon slave-merchants cared nothing for his edicts, until the Bishop of Worcester came to Bristol, and preached against the traffic, staying a month or two at a time, every year, till the minds of the people of Bristol were so altered, that they not only gave up the trade, but acquired such a horror of it that they tore out the eyes of the last person who persisted in it.
The favor and esteem with which Wulstan was regarded did not cease, but he was obliged to spend a life of constraint. The Archbishop made him keep a band of armed retainers to preserve the peace of the country, and they were new and strange companions for the old monk; but as he thought his presence kept them from evil, he did not remain aloof, dining with them each day in the public hall, and even while they sat long over the wine, remaining with them, pledging them good-humoredly in a little cup, which he pretended to taste, and ruminating on the Psalms in the midst of their noisy mirth.
These were the days of church-building-the days of the circular arch, round column, and zigzag moulding; of doorways whose round arch, adorned with border after border of rich or quaint device, almost bewilder us with the multiplicity of detail; of low square towers, and solid walls; of that kind of architecture called Norman, but more properly a branch of the Romanesque of Italy.
Each new Roman Bishop or Abbot thought it his business to renew his clumsy old Saxon minster, and we have few cathedrals whose present structure does not date from the days of the Conqueror or his sons. Walkelyn, Bishop of Winchester, obtained a grant from William of as much timber from Hempage Wood as could be cut in four days and nights; whereupon Walkelyn assembled a huge company of workmen, and made such good use of the time, that when the king passed that way, he cried out, "Am I bewitched, or have I taken leave of my senses? Had I not a most delectable wood in this spot?" where now only stumps were to be seen.
Wulstan had always been a church-builder, and he renewed his cathedral after the Norman fashion; but when it was finished, and the workmen began to pull down the old one, which had been built by St. Oswald, he stood watching them in silence, till at last he shed tears. "Poor creatures that we are," said he, "we destroy the work of the saints, and think in our pride that we improve upon it. Those blessed men knew not how to build fine churches, but they knew how to sacrifice themselves to God, whatever roof might be over them, and to draw their flocks after them. Now, all we think of is to rear up piles of stones, while we care not for souls."
Wulstan lived to a great age, survived William and Lanfrane, and assisted to consecrate Anselm. In the last year of his life he kept each festival with still greater solemnity than ever, and his feast for the poor overflowed more than ever before; his stores were exhausted, though he had collected an unusual quantity, and his clergy begged him to shut the gates against the crowds still gathering; but he refused, saying none should go empty away, and some gifts from his rich friends arrived opportunely to supply the need. The Bishop sat in the midst as feasting with them, now grown too feeble to wait on them, as he had always done hitherto.
At Whitsuntide, 1094, he was taken ill, and lingered under a slow fever till the new year, when he died in peace and joy on the 19th of January. His greatest friend, Robert, the Bishop of Hereford, a learned man, understanding all the science of the time, a judge, and a courtly Lorrainer, yet who loved to spend whole days with the unlettered Saxon, came to lay him in his grave. He received, as a gift from the convent, the lambskin cloak that Wulstan used to wear, in spite of the laughter of the gay prelates arrayed in costly furs, keeping his ground by saying, that "the furs of cunning animals did not befit a plain man." He went home to Hereford, and soon after died, having, it is said, been warned in a vision by St. Wulstan that he must soon prepare to follow him.
CAMEO X. THE CONQUEROR. (1066-1087.)
In speaking of William, the Norman Conqueror, we are speaking of a really great man; and great men are always hard to understand or deal with in history, for, as their minds are above common understandings, their contemporary historians generally enter into their views less than any one else, and it is only the result that proves their wisdom and far-sight. Moreover, their temptations and their sins are on a larger scale than those of other men, and some of the actions that they perform make a disproportionate impression by the cry that they occasion-the evil is remembered, not the good that their main policy effected.