Page:The reign of William Rufus and the accession of Henry the First.djvu/540

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the stars, and Wulfstan Bishop of Worcester died!" The health of the good old man had been for some time ailing; we have seen that he had latterly been unable to show himself in assemblies and ceremonies. At the Easter of the year before his death, while the King was in Normandy, he told his steward that on the day of the feast he meant to dine in state with "good men." The steward, mistaking the meaning of a phrase which is ambiguous in several languages and which was specially so in the English of his day, got together many of the rich men of the neighbourhood—we are not told whether the Sheriff Urse was among them. The day came; the Bishop entered the hall with a large company of the poor, and ordered seats to be set for them among the other guests. The steward was displeased; but Wulfstan explained that those whom he brought with him were the men who had the true riches; he had rather sit down with such a company than sit down, as he had often done, with the King of the English. For Rufus, we are told, always receivedmigravit ad Dominum." Sigebert's Chronicle (Pertz, vi. 367) has some curious physical details.]*