'Then those of the nobles who 'were not yet so well reconciled to the new way of receiving the Sacrament' declined to communicate with the Bishops and others.

'All returned to the Bishop's Palace in order, where they were treated with a goodly dinner, and so departed at pleasure.'

THE

CHAPTER XIV.

EXHUMATION.

HE number of the dead,' says Sir Thomas Browne, 'long exceedeth all that shall live.' Even so long ago as the time of St. Dunstan that prelate was heard to say of the Cathedral of Canterbury that you could not set foot either in the Church or the Cemetery without treading on the remains of some Saints and I remember reading an ingenious essay which showed that we could hardly step in London without, in all probability, treading on human dust on the mouldered, scattered, changed dust of those who have suffered and sorrowed before us.' It were an inquiry useless and unsatisfactory to attempt to trace the fate of one thousandth part of the myriads of monuments erected in the futile hope of sheltering for ever the mortal remains of the occupants. Unhallowed curiosity has been a bitterer enemy than war, and greediness of gain, hope of plunder, has caused the desecration of more tombs than the so-called 'ruthless destroyer,' Time. Time hallows even whilst he desecrates. His 'robe of deep

sepulchral green,' his 'mantle of decay,' do gradually enclose and extend over, and cover defeature, until Oblivion hath swept all painful record away.

This is the natural, the providential course of things. For much that is otherwise man has to thank his own vanity,' pompous in the grave.' The Egyptian mummy-tombs have excited alike the researches of the scientific and the desecration of the curious. The treasure-tombs of antiquity have aroused the cupidity of the avaricious in all subsequent times.

It was the custom in the remotest times to bury treasure and rich ornaments with the dead; it had become usual also among Christian princes in the fifth century. The sepulchres of the Kings of Israel have been celebrated, whether justly or not, for the treasure enclosed in them; and according to Josephus, that of David was plundered by Hyrcanus and Herod. The tomb of Cyrus is supposed to have been full of gold and silver. It is possible that Darius had previously made free with this treasure, for when Alexander opened the sepulchre he found nothing worth abstracting. This same monarch, Darius, broke open the tomb of Nitocris, Queen of Babylon, which she had prepared for herself over one of the gates of the City. By some this action is ascribed to his desire that the people should no longer be deprived of the use of the gate, for at that æra no one would

willingly pass under a dead body; by others it is said that he sought a treasure supposed to be concealed there. If so he was disappointed. He found a label with this rebuke:

'Hadst thou not been insatiably covetous and greedy of the most sordid gain, thou wouldst not have violated the sepulchre of the dead.'

It was the hope of treasure that induced the Emperor Alexius Angelus to break open the tombs of his predecessors, and especially that of Constantine the Great; but the result was not successful. With regard to Alaric, King of the Goths, one is perplexed whether most to marvel at the folly of so burying wealth, or the barbarity attending the procedure. The bed of the river Busentia, near Cosenza, was laid bare, and there was Attila buried with an immense quantity of treasure. Then the river was turned back again. into its channel, and all the labourers concerned in the work were put to death.

Some similar means are said to have been resorted to by Odo, the brother of the Norman Conqueror, to secure, during his absence from the kingdom, the wealth which he had, not too justly, amassed.

Under Cæsar, when the Romans began to rebuild Corinth, the soldiers, accidentally opening a grave in which they found brazen and earthen vessels, broke open every grave in Corinth; for these things were

highly prized, and in a short time Rome was filled with them as articles of sale.

The folly of depositing things of value with the dead is seen in the temptation to spoliation it has offered to ruffians who have been found in every class of civilized life. 'Where profit hath prompted, no age hath wanted such miners. For which the most barbarous expilators found the most civil rhetorick.'

The tomb of Charles the Great was rifled by the Emperor Otho III. of the gold cross which was hung from the neck of the dead monarch. What punishment had been deemed adequate to the enormity of the crime had the culprit been of lower degree?

The leaden coffin of Narses was robbed of a vast quantity of treasure by the Emperor Tiberius. One might almost think, from the number of royal pilferers, that these deposits were made with a view to regal necessities.

Alexander the Great was buried by his successor, Ptolemy, in a coffin of gold, but was found by Augustus in one of glass. By whom the exchange was made, the robbery committed, does not appear. The Emperor Augustus caused the body to be brought out of the vault that he might survey it.1

1 In repairing a road in Northamptonshire, a beautiful glass coffin was found, containing the remains of a child. Antiquarians referred its construction to the reign of Henry VI.