Page:The reign of William Rufus and the accession of Henry the First.djvu/241

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were clouded by domestic troubles; and he is said to have formally perilled his own soul in his zeal for the temporal welfare of his sons. On his death-bed, so the story runs, Archbishop Ralph and other clergy bade him, for his soul's health, to restore whatever lands he had gained unjustly. What then, he asked, should he leave to his sons? "Your old inheritance," answered Ralph, "and whatever you have acquired justly. Give up the rest, or you devote your soul to hell." The fond father answered that he would leave all to them, and would trust to their filial piety to make atonement for his sins. But we are told that Waleran and Robert were too busy increasing by wrong what had been won by wrong to do anything for the soul of their father.
 * tinued the line of the Earls of Leicester. His last days

These are the two men who, of secondary importance in the tale of the Conquest and of the reign of the first