the boy going before him with agile step, fled into the basilica to the protection of the saints.” A cynical reader might suggest that the disciplinary officers of the School of York resorted in those early times to unusual methods of making an impression on a careless boy. The Life proceeds to inform us that Alcuin was trained under the prelate Hechbert, whom we know as Ecgbert, Bishop and later Archbishop of York, 732 to 766. That learned man was a disciple of Bede. He had under his tuition a flock of the sons of nobles, some of whom studied grammar, others the liberal arts, others the divine scriptures.[12] They studied the doctrine set forth by “the holy apostle of the English, Gregory; by Augustine, his disciple; by holy Benedict[13]; also by Cuthbert and Theodore, who followed in all things [a word is omitted here, presumably the footsteps[14]] of their first father and apostle[15]; and by the man most loved of the Lord, Bede the presbyter, Hechbert’s own preceptor.” Then follows a very lifelike description of an ordinary day’s work, when no inevitable expedition came in the way, nor any high solemnity or great festival of the saints. “From dawn of day to the sixth hour, and very often to the ninth hour, Ecgbert lay on his couch and opened to his disciples such of the secrets of scripture as suited each. Then he rose, and betook himself to most secret prayer, offering first to the Lord fat burnt-offerings with the incense of rams, and afterward, following the example of the blessed Job, lest by chance his sons should slip into the pit of benediction,[16] offering the Body of Christ and the Blood for all. By this time the vesper hour was coming near, and, except in Lent, all through the year, winter and summer, he took with his disciples a meal, slight but fittingly prepared, not sparing the tongue of the reader, that both kinds of food might bring refreshment. Then you might see the youths piercing one another with shafts prepared, discussing in private what afterwards they are to shoot forth in proper order in public. Does it not seem to you that of this too it might be said,[17] “As an eagle provoketh her young ones to fly, fluttereth over them, spreadeth abroad her wings, taketh them, beareth them on her wings”? “Twice in the day did this father of the poor, this great lover and helper of Christ, pour out most secret prayer, watered from the most pure fountain of tears, both knees bent on the ground, hands long raised to heaven in the form of the Cross; once, namely, before taking food, and again before celebrating Compline with all his flock. Which ended, no one of his disciples ever dared commit his limbs to his bed without the master’s blessing laid upon his head.